A critique of gentle parenting

As a parenting trend, gentle parenting has been profoundly disempowering for parents.

There is nothing fundamentally unsound about the theories behind gentle parenting (though I will always take exception to children in loving homes being compared to research on neglected children in Romanian orphanages).

I wholeheartedly agree with the core principles that we should treat children respectfully, nurture their emotions, and guide rather than coerce.

And when you dig to find it, there is great literature on gentle parenting that emphasises many of the same principles that underlie other schools of parenting – that boundaries are important, that parents don’t have to be perfect and that staying calm and consistent as a parent is a learning process.

My problem is with the way gentle parenting has been translated into popular culture.

Social media rewards binaries and extreme views – and that is where so much parenting advice is found. It doesn’t take more than a quick scroll to find gentle parenting devotees who demonise all other parenting approaches.

Discussion quickly turns toxic. When I expressed reservations about gentle parenting on social media recently, for example, I was told:

• “Gentle parenting exists because other styles don’t work.”
• “Gentle parenting doesn’t demonise boundaries or disempower parents. Boundaries are used — they’re just not based on fear, shame, or isolation, which is cruel, ineffective, and can harm children, especially if they’re neurodivergent.”
• “Autistic, ADHD and PDA children aren’t defiant, they’re in nervous system overload. You can’t force a child into regulation through isolation or demands for compliance, that just causes distress and teaches children they have to mask to be accepted.”

As a parent with two neurodivergent young people in my household, I’m well aware that different children require different approaches. But the universalising of the needs of ND children (or children who have experienced trauma) strikes me as no more helpful than universalising parenting approaches that work well with neurotypical children.

In my work with parents, I use a wide range of psychological models every day – models like Attachment Theory, Polyvagal Theory, Behaviourism, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Social Learning Theory, and Family Systems. Each one of these serves to deepen our understanding of what is going on in a parent-child relationship.

Families are messy and complicated and children are all unique. Parenting support should be a field of thinking and practice informed by compassion not vitriol.

When gentle parenting devotees use vocabulary like ‘cruel’ and ‘harm’ and ‘shame’, it spreads fear among parents. These words prey on parents’ own worries about doing the best for their children and cultivate a pernicious anxiety that makes parents question themselves at every turn: “If I take that toy away, if I walk away and don’t co-regulate, I might damage my child in some fundamental irreparable way…”

Even experts and researchers get sucked into this fight for primacy, dismissing decades of affirmative research through randomised control trials showing that positive parenting programmes (which teach approaches like logical consequences and quiet time) support children’s development and decrease parental stress.

This is an example I read just this week by a US Professor of Behavioral Science:

• “It turns out that many old-school parenting and educational approaches based on outdated behavioral models are not effective, nor are they best-practice” (The Conversation)

Rather than trying to understand which children and parents in which circumstances these approaches might have value for, or how parenting education might need to be adapted or refined in light of new research, we throw it all out and sling mud.

Advocates of gentle parenting frequently appeal to emerging neuroscience as their evidence base, yet wide-scale research on how these findings have translated into real world practice within family life (and the longitudinal impacts on children of recommending different approaches) just isn’t yet there.

Gentle parenting started out as a helpful corrective. A shift in emphasis away from control and towards children’s emotional development was definitely overdue. We no longer live in the age of ‘children should be seen and not heard’.

But by centralising children’s feelings and nervous systems so completely, and generalising trauma as a governing principle applying to all, the cult of gentle parenting has left many parents struggling to set the boundaries that children need.

‘Old school’ strategies like praise, logical consequences, and quiet time can be implemented badly or thoughtfully. When we just dismiss these methods – and when sending a child to their room is presented as harsh and inappropriate punishment (and a failure of the parent) – what practical strategies are parents left with in their parenting toolbox? Co-regulation is a helpful concept but how are we supporting parents to see where this sits within boundary setting?

Context is everything. Parenting decisions need to take into account the child, the circumstances and the parent.

• If a parent is angry, a cooldown (solo regulation) period might be a good idea.
• If clear and child-appropriate rules have been put in place and a consequence is predictable and delivered calmly, then a removal strategy might be reasonable.
• If a child is struggling with overwhelming feelings, then sitting quietly with them might be the best response.

Nobody wants a return to authoritarian parenting. But children need their parents to have authority – to express warmth and love and take into account their emotions but also to draw boundaries in a way that helps them learn and feel secure and keeps family life functioning.

And that means building parents’ confidence and competence – and helping them understand the needs of their own unique child – not vilifying them.

READ NEXT:

• Should I use Time Out?
• When parents disagree about parenting
• How temperament impacts children’s behaviour

*This post contains affiliate links to Amazon. That means that if you click through from this post and make a purchase, the Positive Parenting Project will receive a small commission. There is no additional charge to you. This helps us to keep providing free content for our readers. For more info, see  Disclosure Notice.