The Dad Difference: How To Encourage Autonomy

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Fathers today are far more involved in their children's lives than dads of previous generations. Nowadays dads attend parent-teacher conferences, help with homework, and drive carpool. At the local YMCA, the Mommy and Me class is now called Parent & Child Gym--and I see dads bringing toddlers in. How the world has changed!

Recent research shows that fathers' growing involvement in parenting is terrific for kids. The more dads are involved with their children, the more kids thrive.

Just make sure that your parenting style supports your child's autonomy. Because along with newfound joys, there's a noteworthy danger for dads: more than ever before, dads share in the skyrocketing anxiety about our children. One reason is that there's so much competition in our children's lives. Youth sports have become a competitive arms race, with teams of youngsters practicing two to four hours a week, the age for travel teams dropping, and kids as young as ten pressured to focus on one sport. From preschool onward, kids compete for admission to the best schools, the regional orchestra, honors courses and gifted programs. Don't even mention the pursuit of a brand-name college.

Dads' growing involvement means they share with mothers the panic and stress whenever their kids compete. This strong visceral response derives from evolution. It prompted our ancestors to save their children from becoming a predator's dinner. Kids whose parents got them to leap out of the tiger's way survived to reproduce, so they passed this competitive gene to their own children. As a result, kids' competition still trips their fathers' evolutionary hardwiring. Dads react as though their children's lives were at stake, when really it's only a question of getting an "A" on the science project they've spent hours on together.

Sometimes this angst morphs into a "hard" feeling like anger, cloaking the underlying "soft" emotion of fear, and dads erupt in rage at a coach, referee, or teacher who they think is shortchanging their child. A few years ago a father was sentenced to jail for putting drugs in the water bottles of his children's tennis rivals, one of whom died. A year before that, a Connecticut father allegedly beat a high school softball coach with a bat for benching his daughter. Fathers meddle academically too: that same year an assistant superintendent of schools in Long Island was charged with giving his son answers to a New York state Regents exam.

More commonly, dads simply feel anguished as they learn, say, that a neighbor's child has a private baseball coach. ("Will Jackson miss the boat if I don't get him one too?")

The natural response to such anxiety is to take action. While few fathers steal exam answers or murder their children's tennis opponents, many still want to jump in when their kids compete. They feel like telling their children exactly what to do. ("You will swim in this race." "Get upstairs and do that homework now.")

But despite the stereotype that successful kids have parents who push them, research shows that eliminating parental pressure is the best way to help children excel.

That's where autonomy comes in.

Successful kids have parents or coaches who nurture their autonomy rather than controlling them. The Olympic gold medal swimmer Summer Sanders, for example, says her parents never pushed her. "Whatever I wanted to do," she says, "they were behind me, matching their level of commitment to mine."

Dads who feel like pushing their kids to compete can know that this feeling is normal. In fact, it's the fathers who care most deeply about their children who feel the most angst. But they don't have to act on their urge to command and control. Nor is it good to go to the opposite extreme and "let go."

Instead, if you face competitive anxiety, focus on finding and supporting your child's inner passion. That's a good way to encourage your child's autonomy, which is key to staying involved without controlling him or her.

Here are some other ways to support your child's autonomy:

Take your child's point of view. Say your 10-year-old isn't doing his homework. You're thinking that studying will get him into a good college and help him land a good job. He's reasoning, "It's going to get dark soon. I want to have some fun now. I can do my homework later."

You could take his point of view by trying to imagine, "If I were his age, what would I rather do right now: play outside or do math problems?" Then you might say, "I understand that you want to keep playing. But tonight we're going to Grandma's for dinner, so unfortunately, this is the only time to do your math homework." What counts is acknowledging your child's feelings. You want to convey "I'm with you."

Support your child's independent problem-solving ability. That means exploring how he sees the problem, what he feels about it, and what ideas he has for solving it. You can say things like "Do you want to talk about what happened?" "Have you tried doing anything about it?" "Any ideas of what you could do?" "Sounds like a good idea!" Help your child generate possible solutions ("What else could you do?), and to think them through ("What do you think would happen if you did that?")

Give your child choices. Even a small amount of choice encourages your child's sense of autonomy. You might give your child the choice between riding his bike with you or with a friend, if you don't want him to ride alone. Or between practicing piano in the morning before school, or after school. As my own children have gotten older, I've found that phrases like "Have you considered....?" or "Do you think you might want to ...?" also work well.

Use the language of autonomy. Words like ‘have to,' ‘must,' ‘don't,' and ‘I want you to,' have a chilling effect on kids' feelings of autonomy. Instead, try giving information. For example, "Homework needs to be done before dinner," has a different feel from, "You better do your homework before dinner," or even, "You have to do your homework before dinner."

Whenever possible, explain your reasoning. Kids follow rules--and do chores--more easily when they understand the reasons for doing so. If your child is painting, you might say, "To keep the paint clean, the brush needs to be washed before switching colors. Or "If you go to every practice, you'll really improve your basketball skills."

By encouraging your child's feelings of autonomy, you'll help her excel while experiencing the great joys of taking part in her everyday life.