Fear-Based Parenting: Definition, Consequences, And Tips to Overcome

My parents always taught me, “Fear should be your trust adviser, but never your master!” 

Be it any relationship…romantic relationship, parent-child relationship, friendship, or platonic relationship… your partner or parent must not use fearful skills to control you or your actions! 

It’s been such a long time advocating for people with different types of positive parenting styles. However, I still see parents punishing their children for misbehavior. Do you know that such kind of inappropriate actions or punishments can have a negative impact on their overall well-being? 

Parents who still use fear-based parenting or fear-mongering to raise or manage kids need to know that fear-based parenting or mongering is an outdated parenting style in the 20s! Instead, you can try other positive parenting styles that offer trust, stronger bonds, high self-esteem, happiness, enhanced mutual respect, and whatnot! In this blog, let us explore the impacts of fear-based parenting or fearful parenting on children. So, let’s get started! 

What is Fear-Based Parenting or Parents Mongering? 

Fear-based parenting is a parenting style that uses control or power to get your kids aligned with the expectations and goals you’ve set for them. Fear-based parenting can also be referred to as fear-mongering. The major goal of fear-based parenting is to make your child fulfill your expectations and if they do not do so, they might have to face consequences that are not good for their mental health.

For example, when a child does not comply with a parent’s demands in fear-based parenting, they have to go through consequences like threats, insults, abuse, spanking, time-out, snatching a favorite toy, and more. 

There are different shades of fear-based parenting wherein an authoritarian parenting style can also be added as this parenting style comes out of fear. For example, parents don’t allow their children to go out and meet new people as they might have a fear of kidnapping or being exposed to trafficking.

Not only does authoritarian parenting come under the umbrella of fear-based parenting, but there is other 5 types of parenting that are counted under fear-based parenting. Psychologically, fear-based parenting is a result of hidden anxiety or fear and is not only derived out of curiosity. 

Taking a Look at the Other Side: Is Fear-Based Parenting Easy? 

No, fear-based parenting is not easy…it actually takes a lot of mental health toll on the parents too! It’s just parents use it to raise their children in a strict environment or may be due to the following reasons: 

• To ensure a protective and safe environment for their children 
• To raise children with great manners and habits so they build an intimidating and strict environment in the home
• To regulate control and discipline in the surroundings
• To protect their children from danger and harm. Overall, some parents do not want their children to be exposed to risky behaviors. 
• To ensure discipline techniques or to exert power and control. Meanwhile, some parents adopt this parenting style out of a lack of knowledge. 

Exploring the Umbrella of Fear-Based Parenting 

Defensive Parenting

Defensive parenting is a type of protective parenting wherein the child is scared of people’s and parents’ judgments. More than the parents, a child might be scared of hearing others’ judgments. It is defensive parenting wherein the parents are more focused on expressing their awareness towards inhibiting competitiveness in their children. Meanwhile, parents do so because they are afraid of dealing with others’ judgments or criticism passed on to their children. This fear violates parents taking good care of their children. 

Fuel-Injector Parenting

Fuel-injector parenting is a term invented by Writer and Professor Peter Gray from Psychology Today. Fuel-injector parents are the complete opposite of helicopter or snowplow parents as they do not remove barriers or obstacles from their children’s path but they actually inject certain motives or attitudes in their children which are necessary in today’s competitive world.

In this parenting style, the parents believe that life is a race and it’s important to know how to compete and win. You might be thinking that it’s kind of positive parenting… All parents think this way!! 

But, here’s the drill… fuel-injector parents focus so much on winning the competition that they invest large amounts of power, money, or fame to encourage their children to work hard to win. Now, you think…is that the right thing to do? To find out the answer, I did some research and found that parents do such things to get their children into an elite college or school.

The primary goal of such parents is to make their child understand how important it is to win a competition or acquire skills to win any competition. When their children win, parents reward their children with materialistic things or cash to reinforce the value. 

Psychologically, such parents never talk about intrinsic pleasure or motivation, they always seek extrinsic pleasure to achieve something. They have misunderstood the concept of discovering what you truly love to do! 

Helicopter Parenting

Helicopter parenting is one of the oldest and most commonly used negative parenting styles that have various impacts on the cognitive development of the child. Parents who follow helicopter parenting are mostly overprotective in nature and over-involved in the lives of their children. Helicopter parents usually favor trust in arguments against their child, which is a good or bad thing both! 

Blindly trusting your child can have multiple negative impacts on the child. Such children are generally convicted in danger and guarded by their parents. Mostly, this parenting style is adopted by parents who had poor coping skills in adulthood. As they develop helplessness in their offspring, it makes their life more difficult for adulthood. 

Snowplow Parenting 

Snowplow parenting is all about smashing down the challenges or obstacles in children’s lives instead of making them learn. When parents hover around their children to protect them from everything, it is known as snowplow parenting. Such parents use their status, sense of privilege, wealth, or power to clear the obstacles from the path. 

For example, you will see the parents using their power to get their children to enter into an elite school or college. Psychologically, this parenting is adopted by parents who are well-playing or successful in their careers. They will do everything to protect their child so that they can seek extra privileges for making their child successful and easy-going. 

But, have you ever wondered about the consequences or impacts of such parenting? Psychologically, the child will never be prepared mentally to fight off the challenges and they will always be dependent on their parents to seek something. Such children lack self-esteem, self-confidence, and resilience. 

Tiger Parenting

Tiger parenting is all about a hard-driving or fierce parent who believes life is a competition and the importance of winning. For example, parents who choose tiger parenting might also choose the career, path to be followed, goals to be achieved, and everything else for their children. They might use every tactic (violence as well) to reach their goals. Violence in the form of abuse, bribes, insults, threats, or screaming can be seen. Such parents make sure that their children are always occupied with activities that will help them reach their goals. Such children grow up in a strict environment where they are not even allowed to meet friends, go for sleepovers, play with friends, or date someone of their age. 

Effects of Fear-Based Parenting on Children

Fear-based parenting can have various negative impacts on the children such as: 

• Produces anxiety: Fear-based parenting makes children anxious as they get scared of facing consequences or judgments passed on to them. This issue can put children to other risky mental health problems as well. Additionally, this makes children poor at problem-solving and decision-making. 

• Leads to behavioral problems: Fear-based parenting can make children rebellious, anxious, and fearful. This can also lead to engagement in risky behaviors such as alcohol or drug abuse. 

• Impairs trust and relationships: Fear-based parenting can make trusting and forming connections difficult for the child. It makes it hard to form healthy and positive connections with others. This behavior does not only impact childhood but also leads to various mental health issues in adulthood. 

• Reduces self-esteem: Fear-based parenting makes children feel unworthy of love, trust, and acceptance. This highly impacts their self-confidence and self-esteem. 

• Leads to physical health problems: Anxiety, stress, and other mental health problems can also result in physical health problems such as an impaired immune system, stomach aches, and more physical health-related problems. 

• Prevents learning: Fear-based parenting prevents children from learning through mistakes. For example, we all have encountered parents who are extremely curious about their children, they are afraid of mistakes. This surely prevents children’s opportunities from learning through mistakes, which is known to be essential for proper development. Psychologists believe that children raised through fearful parenting have not experienced uncomfortable or tough situations which leads to a lack of confidence in them. 

• Stops the growth of resilience: Children raised through fear-based parenting are not able to make their own decisions which not only makes them lack self-confidence but also lacks resilience. Low self-esteem, confidence, and resiliency levels make it difficult to navigate through their professional and personal lives. 

• Turns on the rebel inside: Fear-based parenting makes children more rebellious, when a child is not able to gain control over time, their internal needs turn on the rebel mode which is not good for their overall well-being. 

• Damages the parent-child relationship: Fear-based parenting leads to a lack of respect, empathy, and trust. This can result in a damaged parent-child relationship. 

Tips to Overcome Fear-Based Parenting

Calm yourself down and take small steps every day

To begin the process of positive parenting techniques or to avoid fear-based parenting, the first thing you must do is to calm yourself down, understand your negative points, and stop reflecting on them. Take small steps every day to raise your child in a calmer and more positive way. For example, you can start by allowing your child to go to the park and play with their friends. Meanwhile, you can cook healthy snacks for them. 

Focus on the long-term benefits, avoid finding comfort in the easier ways 

In order to achieve short-term comfort, we sometimes ignore long-term benefits. Well, you don’t have to do it anymore, focus on long-term benefits. Allowing your kid to meet their friends will not only make them independent but will also provide them a chance to view the world from their eyes and experiences. 

Be empathetic and acknowledge your child’s feelings and emotions

During the process, be empathetic to your child, learn about their interest, and acknowledge their emotions and feelings. Accepting their feelings is an essential step because it allows them to overcome traumatic experiences and allows them to live in a safe and secure environment. 

Communicate and understand each other’s needs

One of the best ways to connect with your child is to communicate each other’s needs. Communicating can help you bond with your child, understand their interests, strengthen the connection, and set clear expectations and boundaries with each other. 

Be a good listener with compassion and love

If your child needs to express something, don’t pass their feelings or emotions under the carpet, instead, be a good listener and be involved in the conversation with open-ended questions. This will help them develop more mindfulness, additionally, you will be able to introduce more compassion and love into the parent-child relationship. 

Reinforce positive habits regularly

Instead of fear-based techniques, try helping out your children by reinforcing positive habits in them. This will enhance good and effective behavior in your children and additionally, this will provide them motivation to accomplish goals or expectations you’ve set for them. Positive reinforcement includes rewarding, praising, supporting, and acknowledging their issues instead of judging them. 

Set clear expectations and boundaries

If your child does not have any aims or goals for them, you can help them set goals by guiding them. Avoid putting your expectations and goals in front of them. Instead, try to set clear rules or boundaries so that they can understand the expectations and achieve them more effectively. 

Provide a supportive, positive, trustworthy, and loving environment

Providing them with a supportive or loving environment can make your child feel safe, fearless, and valued. It can also develop resilience in children. Psychologically, when a child feels more protected, safe, and secure, they build strength and ability to cope with obstacles and challenges. This environment also makes them feel loved which helps in increasing self-esteem and self-confidence. 

Seek professional support

During the process, if you or your child feels unsupported, you can seek the help of a mental health counselor. A counselor can help you regain motivation, enhance self-confidence, and build resilience based on positive and mindful habits. The best part is that now you can also attend family or group counseling sessions through online platforms. 

To connect with a family counselor from Online Therapy, click below: 

Start Your Counseling Now

Takeaway: Positive Parenting Styles to Try!

Promoting more connection, mindfulness, communication, empathy, and respect can help us prevent fear-based parenting styles. Remember, control and fear can loosen the connection between parents and children. Gone were the days when parents used to control their children. Nowadays parents are more inclined to positive parenting techniques that help parents raise their children more mindfully, peacefully, and positively. In place of fear-based parenting styles, you can try the below-mentioned positive parenting techniques: 

• Peaceful Parenting 
• Gentle Parenting
•  Mindful Parenting 
• Team Parenting 

I hope this blog helps you understand the different shades of fear-based parenting, their impacts, and tips to overcome fear-based parenting. 

Did you read our quick takeaway? Comment down and do let us know which positive parenting styles you’re looking forward to! 

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Thanks for reading!