5 Deeply-Rooted Ways Your Childhood Shapes How You Parent Today, According To Research
Research reveals the powerful ways your past shapes how you show up as a parent today.
kate_sept2004 | Canva What type of parent will you be? Did you ever think about when you started your parenting journey? Turns out, who you'll be as a parent doesn't start when you become a parent — it starts when you are born and your parents become parents.
Your parenting decisions are based on your beliefs, most of which are programmed in at a very early age, based on how you were parented, as well as other deeply-rooted experiences you had, mostly as a child.
Here are the deeply-rooted ways your childhood shapes how you parent today:
1. Children subconsciously learn things between ages 0-6
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Research from The Brain Sciences Journal showed that between ages 0-6, brain wave frequency is similar to an adult in a hypnotic trance. So whatever children hear, see, and feel gets programmed right into the subconscious mind, without any filtering or choice. Read that again. And one more time, to process the implications of that.
This one little-known fact has a big influence on how you are delivering your parenting, through your thoughts, words, and actions, and on how your children receive you as a parent.
2. Children learn how to trust from parents
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The meaning children give an experience is primarily determined by their cognitive and emotional development, as evidenced by research in The Journal of Health Technology Assessment in Midwifery.
So, infants interpret their world through the lens of whether an experience shows they can trust. Toddlers who are becoming self-aware and are ego-centric interpret experiences as though they are at the center of them, as in "whatever happened must be my fault" or something to that effect.
3. Children are influenced by their parents' own parenting
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A study in The Journal of Health Psychology suggested this subconscious programming becomes your operating system (OS). Just like Windows, Apple, or Linux are for computers, it runs on auto-pilot, in the back of your mind, like an 8-track tape that keeps looping.
4. When they grow up, children subconsciously reject styles different from how they were raised
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The function of your brain is to replicate your OS programming. There are parts of your brain, like the Reticular Activating System, that filter out and reject any belief or fact that doesn’t fit your OS.
5. When they grow up, a child's subconscious remembers experiences and may project them
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A study of implicit bias in The Journal of Laryngology and Otology suggested that most subconscious programming is negative. This programming also controls the average person’s thoughts, feelings, and habits, most of the time.
That means that despite your good intentions and efforts, you aren’t usually consciously choosing your responses. That’s why you might react to your children and say to yourself, "Oh, my gosh! I can’t believe I just said that! That was what my mom/dad used to say. I said I’d never say that to my children."
Then, a self-inflicted guilt trip often begins, which is also usually part of your childhood programming. The good news is that you can choose your parenting beliefs and use a parenting style based on the outcomes you want, not old habits.
This is the first step to intentionally re-programming your beliefs and learning new language and action skills, so your thoughts, words, and actions are all in alignment. The bad news is that unless you work with someone to help identify and rewrite these subconscious beliefs, you likely won’t recognize what isn’t true or even see what's hidden in your subconscious mind.
This doesn't involve someone telling you what to believe or talking you into something untrue. It involves learning more about how your mind works, and then using that information in an intentional way, along with tools and techniques you can use yourself to choose and rewrite your own beliefs.
Jody Johnston Pawel is a parenting expert, author, trainer, and coach. She has served tens of thousands of people through her interactive workshops and online webinars. Pawel has 40 years of experience in the child welfare world and has trained thousands of primary parents, foster parents, and protective service caseworkers.
