Classroom Friendships May Offset Effects of Punitive Parents

New York: Warm relationship with classroom teachers, friendship with peers may provide a unique opportunity for harshly-parented kindergarteners to retool their negative behavior, a new study suggests. Angry, threatening and highly-critical parenting can result in children with defiant, non-compliant and revengeful behavior that spills over to adulthood and impacts relationships with all authority figures, the research team said.

“Acceptance within one’s peer group creates opportunities for socialization and a sense of belonging that acts as a buffer against the impact of harsh parenting,” said first author Danielle Roubinov, Assistant Professor at the University of California - San Francisco. (IANS)