Dadtalk

Hi,

My name is Leanne and I am a PhD student at Loughborough University. I am currently gathering data for my thesis and am interested to find out what parenting and childhood is like in 2009. I think it is crucial that we understand if and how parenting and childhood is changing so I have been working with children to find out a bit more about childhood in modern society, i.e. how they cope with issues such as ‘stranger danger’, crime and online security and if these issues have any impact on their everyday life. I am now interested to hear from parents. This website is clearly very popular and I would love to hear from you about the issues you face (or don’t face) as parents.

Do you feel that childhood and parenting has changed?

Do you think that being a child and a parent is more difficult and dangerous today than it was when you were young?

Do you think you have more or different issues to deal with than your parents did?

Do you feel you worry about your children in a different way in today’s society?


As I said I would love to hear from you all so please post on this thread your thoughts, opinions and experiences. It would also be great if you could add how many children you have and their ages for a bit of context please. Thank you.

If you have any questions about the research please feel free to contact me at : L.V.Franklin@lboro.ac.uk

Kind regards,

Leanne

Please note: All information given will be confidential and will be anonymous so any identifying details will be changed. Please note that by taking part in the discussion you are providing consent for your replies to be used. The research will form part of my thesis and may be published at academic conferences, in journals or in books. If you would like to withdraw your contribution at any time please let me know and I will remove and destroy your data. Please note you must also be over the age of 18 to post.

Hi all,
It has been a few days since I have posted and I have had no responses as yet. I am really keen to get some responses from this site as it is the only one I have seen that is just for dads. I have had some replies from other websites which have mostly been from mums. I am really interested to hear from dads.
I would be so grateful if you could jsut take a few minutes out to post on this thread.
Thank you,
Leanne

Interesting Q's - personnaly, my immediate response is I don't know... The perceptions I had as a child to those questions is completely distorted, or I never thought about them when I was a child and so don't know how they have changed...

Will try and answer:
Q: Do you feel that childhood and parenting has changed?
A: Yes, access to computer games and the speed /ability to communicate with peers is very different - BUT my kids are not old enough for that to have a significant impact yet.

Q: Do you think that being a child and a parent is more difficult and dangerous today than it was when you were young?
A: The risk of children being "snatched" appears higher (I assume stats prove it), but I would say that we are more cautious as a society and so places like playgrounds are a lot safer.

Q:Do you think you have more or different issues to deal with than your parents did?
A: No - there is more information available at a younger age, BUT the issues still have to be dealt with. The younger age might make the resoultion of those issues more difficult.

Q: Do you feel you worry about your children in a different way in today’s society?
A: Don't know!

I hope that helps - my 3 kids are all under 7 (the risk of giving to much information publically is impacting this information..) !

Hi batman,
Thank you so much for responding, as I said I am really keen to hear from dads. Thank you for taking the time to consider the questions - it is appreciated!
I look forward to hearing what other dads have to say,
Leanne

Hi

Do you feel that childhood and parenting has changed?
-- I do not think that the dynamics between children and parents have changed particularly although the environment that we are in has changed, more electronic/more nuclear families
I would say that my children have a similar upbringing to myself, but have more tv and electronic games to contend with, whereas I a lot less electronic games and tv programs at a young age. My chilren are 4.5 boy / 1.5 girl

Do you think that being a child and a parent is more difficult and dangerous today than it was when you were young?
--I think the fear of being a parent is more prevalent, but that in the main comes because "bad" news is more reported than it used to be. Stranger danger is probably a lot less than it used to be because it is so much more in the conciousness of most people. I think that family danger is the greater danger for children, as it always was.

Do you think you have more or different issues to deal with than your parents did?
Definitely different issues to deal with, a lot of which come back to life as it is now. My parents aim was for me to have a better life than them (they were first generation carribean in the UK) and I would say that they have achieved their aim. Although our aim is the same for our children, it is starting from a very different base.
We have more (what would have been considered) luxuries than back in my childhood, colour TV, computer, games systems, disposable income. We can thus spend more time on our kids education, but also as they grow up we will have to deal with the differences in communcation these days which are so different to when I was growing up. The amount of information available may make my children grow up faster than I have to, but I will find out in a few years

Do you feel you worry about your children in a different way in today’s society?
I think the same worries exist, in terms of education, friends.

I would add that the same issues exist in a different way. The easiest way for me to sum it up is that when I was growing up "some youths'" would walk around with ghetto blasters, or radios playing full volume as they walked around, these days the same type of "youths'" are walking around with phones blasting out music, the same repeat of history just different products being used.

As I said I would love to hear from you all so please post on this thread your thoughts, opinions and experiences. It would also be great if you could add how many children you have and their ages for a bit of context please. Thank you.

Hi Zaden,
Thank you for taking the time to post - all help is appreciated!
Thanks again,
Leanne