Ap Pysch

I agree with the hypothesis the article “A Nation of Wimps” proposes. The article points out that many of today’s parents are totally involved in every activity their kid participates in. The parents of these kids are so involved with the kid’s life; that the parent make all the decisions and don’t let the kids make any decisions independently. The parent’s total oversight is to protect the kid from failing at anything. The parents are not letting there kids take any risk. Everything a kid does is being carefully watched, supervised, and then checked to make sure that it is safe. If the parent thinks anything could be a potential problem for their kid then it is immediately highlighted and squished. “We all know that it is a parents job to try to make there children’s life’s better”, according to Hara Estroff Marano. Parents are making it hard for their children to learn anything on there own”. It also does not teach a kid how to cope with anything they do that ends up being less then perfect.
The article calls these parents “Hothouse Parents” because their raising these kids in a controlled environment likes a plant hothouse. The article made me think of these parents like a hen sitting on a nest of eggs. When the eggs hatch then the hen never will let the chicks leave the nest.
Chapter 14 of our Psychology book is about personality. The chapter is broken into four perspectives on the study of understanding and explaining personality. Each of the four perspectives has a different approach and the article uses a little of each perspective to explain the effect the Hothouse Parents have on kids they are raising.
Parents are always so concerned about children having self-esteem. (Moarano, 68) Over parenting can program the nervous system to create lifelong vulnerability to anxiety and depression. (Moarano, 68) The parent that does everything for a child makes the child think they can’t do anything on their own and something must be wrong with them. The humanistic perspective says low self-esteem comes in different forms. Those vulnerable to depression often feel they are falling short of their hope. (Myers, 514) Those vulnerable to anxiety often feel they are falling short of what they ought to be. (Myers, 514) The benefits of high self esteem pays dividends. Accept yourself and you will find it easier to accept others. (Myers, 515)
Parents that that overprotect their kids make the child psychologically fragile and have no shot at real happiness. (Moarano, 61) The child will not have learned any coping skills and needed to deal with life. The child is more or less helpless. The social-cognitive perspective speaks about learned helplessness versus personal control. (Myers, 523) People who feel helpless and oppressed often perceive control is external. (Myers, 523) When the perception of helplessness gets strong then the person accepts helplessness as a way of life and believes nothing can be done to change their situation. A person that feels they have control of their situation is more optimistic. Optimism is a coping skill that will help overcome the helplessness. The protected kids never had control of their life.
The hothouse parents see their kids as perfect and anything less then perfect can be changed to be perfect. The parents will do whatever it takes to get the perfect result for their kid. Parents could use anything from doctors to money to get things changed. Parents getting things changed show the kids how to work the system for their own benefit. (Moarano, 64) One kid that had his parents change things for him said I wish my parents had some hobby other then me. (Moarano, 64) The trait perspective says behavior depends on the interaction of person with the situation. . (Moarano, 64) So if a kid has learned from his parents that the system can work to change a situation for their own benefit then they will always use the system.
Kids that were not allowed to take risks never grow up or take a lot longer to grow up. (Moarano, 68) The reason it will take longer is because the kids will stay in endless adolescence and not reach full adulthood until they learn how to play. Kids that had everything planned for them will rebel and start doing something the article called exploring. The humanistic perspective calls this self-actualization. (Myers, 512) Self-actualization is when a person has learned from play about relationships, negotiate conflict, love, and have self-esteem. (Myers, 512) (Moarano, 70)
Hot house parents should not focus so much on their own children. They should care about all children (Moarano, 103) There are kids that really need help and are not getting it. The kids that have everything handed to them make it much harder for the kids that have real problem like poverty or disabilities. The kids with problems have to try so much harder then the wimps. That’s why I’m saying that parents need to start looking at the way they are treating there kids. If they are 4 years old, then yeah you need to watch out for them and help them out. But you can’t continue to treat them like that when they get older. That’s where the problems start to develop.