Originally Posted by MotherofToddler
Dude - I did not mean to say every parent's parenting style can be predicted by SES and that there is no variability within groups, but there are trends in interaction styles that are supported by research.


Do you think that this is a matter of cultural norming? I wonder.

Because I think that you are right... but I see fault lines there in ways that are not necessarily SES, but other cultural groupings. For example (and really, just an EXAMPLE, based upon my experiences within my own extended family);

the more adherent to the religious faith (common to that group) the individuals within that group are, the more likely they are to use corporal punishment liberally and to use a patriarchal authoritarian parenting style-- one which ignores problems that it cannot solve.

The children of those homes (ten of them) range from PG to below-average in IQ, and the homes themselves range from upper-middle class to the lowest 10th (as in the study). My observations lead to me to the conclusion that within this particular group (okay, just think of me as Jane Goodall here wink ) fall most closely along the religiosity line, rather than either IQ or SES alone. This is a faith that is somewhat anti-intellectual and openly promotes rigid gender roles and early marriage and child-rearing. I have a cousin born within weeks of me, who was lauded to me throughout my entire life as a "model" child... her oldest child is 14 years older than my own. Her parenting style and mine are similar, but one large difference is the premium that we place on "book smarts" and our expectation that our DD will have high achievement and expectations of herself in that domain. The other difference is that her household is HIGHLY adherent to the group religious faith, and mine is an outlier in that regard.

Among my cousins, there are two of us with HG+ children and we are also the only two whose households are not advocates of that group faith. Mine is fairly high SES, hers is not.


Anyway.


Complex. Yes. I think that there is a huge mass of cultural norms at work here-- and that teasing it apart variable by variable is nearly impossible. People are reluctant to admit to some parenting practices, they hide dysfunction, etc. Those are the factors that (IMO) probably produce outliers to the SES effect.

Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.