Defining Parenting Styles | Ep. 5

Are you tapped into your kids’ feelings or wanting to always be in charge? Our experts dish on a few parenting types. 

Transcript

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Lori Hayungs 0:10

Welcome. Welcome to The Science of Parenting podcast. Here we are again. I just love that intro. Anyway, here we are where we connect you with research based information that fits your family. We will talk about the realities of being a parent and how research can help guide your parenting decisions. I'm Lori Hayungs and I am the parent of three in three different life stages. I have one launched, one in college and one in high school and I'm a parenting educator.

Mackenzie Johnson 0:43

And I'm Mackenzie Johnson. I'm a parent of two young children with their own quirks and I'm a parenting educator.

Lori Hayungs 0:50

And today we are going to talk about parenting styles. Yeah.

Mackenzie Johnson 0:56

Yeah. I'm excited.

Lori 1:00

What are parenting styles? They are the typical ways that parents think, feel and behave in terms of child rearing.

Mackenzie Johnson 1:11

Alright, so think, feel and behave. Okay. So I know we're going to get into the technical terms, you know, of parenting styles, but from that broad definition, how would you say you think, feel and behave generally? Like how would you define your parenting style if you had to, with just that definition.

Lori Hayungs 1:30

So we chatted about this a little ahead of time, of course. Right. And so I could not come up with three words because I could only hear one word in my head. And that word has always been respect.

Mackenzie Johnson 1:44

Really serious. Good job.

Lori Hayungs 1:47

I know you said you're silly , but yeah, we respect each other. We respect others. Respect.

Mackenzie Johnson 2:01

Respect. Look at you.

Lori Hayungs 2:01

I'm so stuffy. I'm so stuffy.

Mackenzie Johnson 2:06

But the best part is you mean it. I know, I know you well enough to know you mean it. Okay . Well now, okay, so I was like the way I typically think, feel and behave. So my thinking word is that I'm a forgetter. Like I'm a forgetter parent. It's like, oh, you need your backpack. Oh we got to bring winter boots. I'm a forgetter. And sometimes people are like, oh, you're so organized. I'm like, it's a front. Like I gotta be at least a little with it to get my kids and me where we need to go. So the way I usually think as a parent is like, oh, I forgot that. That's what I think it was .

Lori Hayungs 2:48

I love that. I'm totally a forgetter.

Mackenzie Johnson 2:54

And then my feeling word is that sometimes parenting makes me feel overstimulated or like overwhelmed. So I use the example, always in the car. My partner likes to have the radio on in the car. I do not like the radio in the car because right now our littlest one fusses a little bit in the car seat. So it's just kinda like, eh. And then my preschooler needs to know every time, are we in town or out of town? Are we on the edge of town? Are we going out of town? It's a conversation every time I get in the car. And then my husband tries to talk to me or I should say, my husband wants to have a conversation, which is reasonable, but then the radio is on, and so I'll just like, oh, that stimulates me. That's a lot. So that's the way it goes. That's honest. I get overstimulated. Okay. And then my behave word, which this one's a little more positive. It makes me feel a little more put together. I'm a breather. That's a behavior, that is a thing that I do and is a learned behavior that I've had to learn to do as a parent. Okay.

Lori Hayungs 4:07

Yeah, I'm totally a forgetter. That's great. So let's talk about the research then. All right. So a great deal of parenting research , when it comes to parenting styles , the credit really goes to Diana Baumrind and she came up with parenting styles back in the 1970s even. And so those styles are kind of defined by parents, whether they were high or low in two different traits. So are they high or low in demandingness and responsiveness? So when it comes to responsiveness and demandingness, you can be high in demanding or low in demanding and high in responding or low in responding. So demandingness is kind of that degree to which we have expectations and standards. So what are our demands of our children, right?

Mackenzie Johnson 5:07

Our expectations.

Lori Hayungs 5:07

Yep, expectations. And our responsiveness then is that warmth that we provide and the acceptance that we have of what our child needs and wants. Do we want to use the word you used? Expectations and response, right?

Mackenzie Johnson 5:24

Yeah. Yeah . I'll say, and I've also heard, you know, like in terms of these parenting styles, depending on where you look, you might hear other terms for these two traits. I actually have a little list, so on my list is love and limits. So that's like the responsiveness is the love. The limits and the expectations or the demandingness is expectations. All right. That's not my word. I got it somewhere. Expectations and warmth or nurturing and control. And actually when I was getting ready for this article or this episode , I heard the terms acceptance and authority and I liked that, too. I like those. Which ones do you naturally say?

Lori Hayungs 6:06

I definitely think that the word expectations is definitely one that I, I mean, I think my three children would be like, yeah. If you'd said something else, we would call you out. Expectations and then, you know, I gotta go with the research word, responsiveness. You know, I know that's a big word, but warmth, I respond. I have these responses and so yeah, I have expectations and , and I respond. So I would say that, yeah, those are my two words. How about you?

Mackenzie Johnson 6:40

I feel like the words I know are demandingness and responsiveness, but the words I might say in conversation might be more like the expectations and warmth. But I kind of really like authority and acceptance. I feel like that actually really gets at where my brain lives on those two traits. We're accepting our child's needs and their wants and what they have going on, but authority, not in an unreasonable way. Right. But like I am the adult here. It's my job to keep us safe and get us where we need to be. You know? So I like that. I might try and use those words. If I can remember them.

Lori Hayungs 7:17

I've gotta write them down so I can remember. I mean, that word kind of drives us right into another thing that Baumrind did is that she outlined three different parenting styles. And actually many parents have probably heard these. So I'm just, you know, gonna replay them a little bit here. So the authoritative is a parenting style that she identified, and authoritarian is a second style that she identified, as well as permissive. So when we look at those three words, I know those first two sound really similar, and I mean, gosh, even all through my educational background of learning about parenting, I had to figure out ways to separate those two words. Authoritative, the ending -tive at the end there, right? Think of it like compromise, democratic process, give and take. And so authoritative is very much that give and take. I'm gonna listen, I'm gonna respond. You're involved in this as well as me. You're the child, but I'm also going to listen to you . Okay. So authoritarian that -tarian at the end is more of that, I'm the adult, it's my way and you are the child and you will listen to my way and you will do it my way. Okay, so authoritative, you've got that give and take, that flex and flow. And authoritarian, the adult is the primary figure that you see there. And then you have the permissive and permissive is a little easier to understand, right? So in permissive, I think that what you can picture in your head is the child has more control, so there are less limits. The child has more free r eign. The parent is saying, well, let's figure out what the child needs and wants based on what the child needs and wants. S o those w ere the three parenting styles. If I was to summarize it in my own words and how do you picture them?

Mackenzie Johnson 8:58

Yeah, well I love that Baumrind kind of lays them out and okay, authoritative is high authority, anti-acceptance, right? Like we're both here and that's where the authoritative is. And then the other two are on either side. This one's high and this one's low , right? So authoritarian is the high authority, maybe a little bit lower acceptance. And then the permissive was the high acceptance and the low authority. So I love that little visual of like full time and one of each. I like that. But the terms that I wrote down, because the authoritative, authoritarian, great words, great parenting styles, good research, but hard to differentiate. So I wrote for authoritative, considers both sides, right? Like you said, the democratic process. I'm considering my needs and wants and I'm also accepting my child's needs and wants, right. For authoritarian, I wrote down, my way or the highway, right? Like there's not much wiggle room there. What I need is what is going to happen. Right? And then in the permissive style, I kind of wrote like the best friend , right? You know, I care about my child's needs, which is good and important and their wants, but maybe I don't hold them to those standards or expectations that they maybe should. So those are my words. Authoritative, authoritative. Well, those aren't my words. Those are Baumrind's words. Authoritative, authoritarian, and permissive are those three styles .

Lori Hayungs 10:27

Excellent. So, you know, you think about, okay, we've identified these styles, but how do they really play into how our kids grow, learn and achieve? Right? So there's three different ways. Yeah. So we were talking about a little bit of research earlier and we found this study that was published in 2013 and it's from the Journal of Humanities and Social Science. And it's cool because i t really identified and it began to review the literature on parenting styles and how these styles actually affect children and their outcomes. So what are these styles doing for children as they learn and grow? And ultimately what they concluded is super cool. We chatted about this, and I think we both were just fascinated by this, is that they concluded that parents that have a strong relationship with their children and are using more of that authoritative style, their children are actually higher achieving. They have a higher well-being and a higher self esteem. They have better health. They have less risk taking behaviors. They show up at school more, more positive enrollments. And that generally says that the authoritative style, the one in the middle, has better outcomes for children. And so gosh, what we're basically saying is the style that we choose really does impact our children's outcomes.

Mackenzie Johnson 12:07

Oh yeah. And those are long-term things, right? Like their health, the risky choices that they might make as an adolescent or as an adult. Right? All of those things are important things that across different parents, you know, we might all have different goals for our kids long- term, but in general, we want healthy kids, we want safe kids, we want good self esteem. We want those things for our kids and it's kind of exciting to know that there's an answer or part of an answer of how we get there, right? Finding that authoritative balance of what my child needs, right, that acceptance and what I need and what needs to happen in terms of their expectations or authority. Finding that balance is going to help us get good outcomes. That's great news!

Lori Hayungs 12:52

Yeah, that balance, right? That can be especially hard, especially when you think about, there are times where, you know, we can say, oh, well, my goal is to be an authoritative parent. But there are times where you've got to say, these are the rules and these are not an option. I think about safety. You know, along the way as a parenting educator safety becomes one of those times where parents say, you know, what am I supposed to do when they won't keep their car seat buckled? You know, what am I supposed to do when they run out on the street? How can I be an authoritative parent? Well, you know what, at that point in time, the health and safety of your child is most important. And having a conversation with the child about this is why I'm not saying to have a conversation with your toddler. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying as you're buckling them in their seat, you know, you're using a voice that says we need to stay buckled. We need to stay buckled. This is not an option to unbuckle. We need to stay buckled.

Mackenzie Johnson 13:58

I think that's a great example. Yeah. Like riding in the car when that child finally figures out, I can unbuckle it. But even that conversation with your teenager when they start driving, right? It's a different conversation, but it is like this is the rule. This is why authority or demandingness or expectations is important. We need to keep our kids safe. This is an expectation we are going to follow. Right, right. Y eah.

Lori Hayungs 14:24

Another piece of that, I always tell parents who are frustrated with how do I balance this? And I got frustrated and I still get frustrated, is there's a way to show your child that you're still listening to them. I understand that you are upset about being buckled. I totally hear you. I understand that it is uncomfortable that it's tight. I hear you. I hear what you're saying, but we still have to buckle. And you know, this negotiation may not be happening out loud, but it might be more in your body language, your body posture, that you're nodding your head. Yep. I know you're upset about this. Your voice is being delivered in a way that says, I hear you. I feel that you don't like this either. I don't like being constrained either. And so there's that balance, that difference of, you know, that argumentative, loud voices as, you will keep your car seat on. It's that authoritarian as opposed to, you know what? I know. I get it. I am on team unhappy-about-this. Right.

Mackenzie Johnson 15:33

I'm on team this-is-a-bummer.

Lori Hayungs 15:35

Yeah, this is a bummer. And I think that a lot of times what we don't give ourselves permission to do is say, I hear ya. Yeah. It does stink. We feel like we have to jump into this, no, this is the way it is. We can actually say to them, yeah, I don't like it either. I don't like it either. But this is the way it is. Right?

Mackenzie Johnson 15:56

It could be fun if it was safe for me to lay in the back seat. Like hmm , not so safe.

Lori Hayungs 16:03

And you know, I'm just laughing at myself because I'm going back to my word at the beginning, which was respect. Stuffy word. I just want to respect that they have feelings about this and they have strong feelings about this. And guess what? I have strong feelings about it, too. And so I'm going to respect that you have strong feelings about this thing that is, you know, pressing against your chest to keep you safe and you will learn to respect that we have boundaries and we have rules. Yeah.

Mackenzie Johnson 16:39

A time when it's hard for me is during transitions during our day, which is such a Mackenzie word, you know. But when we're getting ready for bed after playing or when it's time to come to supper or in the morning when we're getting out the door. Finding that balance of, okay, I need us to get going and you want, right? It's not an option whether or not we're going to leave the house in the morning. But how I approach it, like you said, I know you're really wishing we had time for this this morning, but reminding myself in the mix. Like I said, I get overstimulated and sometimes I get in a hurry, yeah, I get in a hurry. I forget. We know that balance. I mean, yeah, we're not going to get it perfect every time. You know, we've talked about that before. It takes practice and we get there. But taking the time to consider that over time we hope in the overall picture of our parenting, we have a balance.

Lori Hayungs 17:36

Yes, definitely, and there's also a little bit of research on how authoritative parents, those ones in the middle, and authoritarian parents, on the other side, how they look at highly intense situations or emotionally charged situations. So research actually kind of plays into that idea that if you are an authoritarian parent and you are the parent that has these higher demands and you're listening to the child less, you actually may perceive their behavior as them choosing to misbehave. So you see that they are choosing to do these things out of trying to push your buttons or make you upset intentionally. And authoritative parents, the parents in the middle, they actually perceive that as, okay, well there must be a reason why they're misbehaving and so I'm going to try to understand that reason behind the misbehavior. So the research actually showed that those two parenting styles actually even completely viewed why children misbehave differently, which I thought was really super cool because I can think about different times in my life in my parenting journey from when my children were little to now and I think about, I can visually see people in my brain and thinking this was my child's behavior. And we saw two completely different things. That person saw my child intentionally misbehaving and I immediately saw the noise that startled her, or heard the noise that startled them. I saw it from across the way and I knew that that was why they behaved the way that they did. So yeah, I can think of different examples of of how.

Mackenzie Johnson 19:28

And I agree, reading that understanding of that article of authoritative parents are more likely to, one, perceive the experience of the child and how that's affecting their behavior, but then that affecting how we discipline or guide our children in that situation. Right? I think one of the phrases that I've seen that I've kind of clung to is like, you're having a hard time, right? You know, it's not that you're giving me a hard time. It's you're having a hard time. Right? So the meltdown cry , you know. I tend to go with the preschooler, infant-toddler kind of age since that's where my kids are at. But even in older kids, that meltdown is a part of something like, yeah, I'm tired or I'm hungry or this is just too big . Right?

Lori Hayungs 20:18

I just took a test and I feel like I did terribly on it and now you're telling me that I can't have, you know, my favorite dinner because...

Mackenzie Johnson 20:29

in my house right now it's like I came home from childcare and I'm hungry and I'm expecting a snack, or my daughter might be thinking that, and I'm thinking, dinner is five minutes from being done! We're not going to have a snack, but to meet competing demands and understanding each other's needs. For sure. For sure .

Lori Hayungs 20:53

Definitely. Definitely. So what is a time that you feel like you were able to navigate a challenging moment really well when it comes to your style?

Mackenzie Johnson 21:06

Hmm , a challenging moment that I navigate well with my child. I think in that infant stage, like when that child is, you know, having a hard time going to sleep or is getting ready, you know, wants to eat. Uh , but we're not quite ready. You know, we don't have everything together yet. I'd say that's a time when I'm able to balance that a little bit better of like, okay, I'm really trying to finish changing your diaper very quickly. Um, but I'm a little more aware of that balance in that infant stage. And I think part of it, you know, we talked about that like perception of what's happening. We tend to assume infants don't have it, you know, they don't have those skills yet. And so maybe I'm a little more forgiving of like, Oh, you're right, you're so hungry. Uh , you know, what about you? When would you say you feel like you balance it well?

Lori Hayungs 21:58

So I share a funny story that I just vividly remember about my middle daughter and she must have been about two, two and a half. And she had her two favorite toys, right. Her two favorite toys that as parents we often have multiple.

Mackenzie Johnson 22:19

Oh yeah . The favorite , right .

Lori Hayungs 22:21

More than one. Yes . So this happened to be a small, a little about six inches tall lemur that had a long fuzzy tail and she would take the fuzzy tail and she would rub it on her nose to comfort herself and soothe herself. And so we had several of them. So you can imagine the state of the toys was different, right? So sometimes there was a clean Treelo and a dirty Treelo, right? Yeah. So , one morning she grabs both Treelos in her little fist. She's got them tight in her little fist and, two Treelos, mommy. Yes, that's right. You do have two Treelos. You do have two. That's right. You know, just remember just one Treelo gets to go into daycare. So, we get in the car and we buckle up, put the seatbelt on and that's fine. She's got those little fists tight around those tails of the two Treelos. These are coming in. And so in my brain I'm thinking, well, you know, I could pull the authoritarian, and I could have pulled one right away and said, you are not taking them both to daycare. You're only taking one. And what would the car ride have been? Loud tantrum all the way there . So I chose the authoritative middle ground and thought, okay, that's fine. Two Treelos are welcome to be in my car. I don't mind. Yeah . So it was a very peaceful car. Right . It was great. You know, every once in a while I'd hear from the back, two Treelos, mommy, two, right? Again, I could've chosen the authoritarian route and said, you won't talk to me like that. But she's two and a half. We're on our way to daycare and I'm choosing the authoritative middle ground thinking she's wanting to assert herself and tell me that both those Treelos are going in the building. I, in my mind, know that they aren't, right. So we get to daycare, her little fists are white knuckled by this time and she's got both Treelos entering in and she says, two Treelos, Mommy. I said, that's right. You do have two Treelos but only one Treelo gets to go inside. Fists tighten even more. Two Treelos, mommy. Again, I'm choosing the middle ground. I'm not choosing to address her attitude. I'm choosing to address the fact that the rule is one Treelo is going in that building with us. And I again, I tell her and you know I'm trying to replay this in my brain going, yes, that's right. I understand you want both of these together . That's right. You do have two Treelos. Only one can go in the building. You decide or I will decide for you which one goes in. Yeah. Do you think she's going to decide? Oh no , she's two and a half, right? She's going to hold tighter and you know, even kind of pull him away from me so I can't . So this was the second time I repeated myself. That's right. You do have two Treelos. Only one can go. You get to decide or I will decide. Two Treelos. Hold her ground. All right , I'm on time number three. And I said this time, that's right, you do have two Treelos. We're going to go inside. You can choose which Treelo to bring in or I will choose and if I choose I will choose, and I pointed to one, this one, I will choose this one. This is the one I am going to choose to bring inside. So I now took the authoritative piece and I pushed it a little farther and I said, now I get to control. I get to choose, right. And so she looked me firmly in the eye and gripped a little tighter and I started to reach for the one I was choosing and she took that one and she tossed it on the floor with all her two year old might . And she showed me the other one and kind of shoved it in my face and she said this Treelo, mommy. No, I'm not going to address her attitude. She's two and a half. There is now only one Treelo going inside. I only made one fatal error when I pointed to the Treelo that I would have chosen to bring inside. I pointed to the clean Treelo and so that day in particular, the one Treelo that went inside was the dirtiest Treelo that we had. The well loved Treelo. But I feel like that is a moment of literally in my brain, I walked through all those steps. I want a peaceful car ride. She can take the two Treelos. I don't want to argue with her. You know, she's in here, she's trying to engage me in an argument I'm going to stick with. That's right. You do have to. Yup , you have to. And then when it came right down to it, I needed to be the authoritative authority figure. I'm the adult. I'm in control. I'm going to say, here's what's going on. I'm going to choose that one. Like I want you to know what I'm going to choose. This is what's going to happen. And when you know what I'm going to choose, you're realizing your choice is about to be eliminated. So I gave her one more chance to choose. You know, I think we both won in that situation. Absolutely. And I don't feel bad that I never addressed, you know, her little nasty lack of respect. We're all looking for that independence. She's like, yeah, I got to take two Treelos in the car. Yeah , yeah, yeah.

Mackenzie Johnson 27:26

Well, but when we look at that, you know, going back to some of those research bullets we looked at long term, right? It's a win for both of you. Your child was able to kind of rise to the expectation. The expectation didn't change. There's only one allowed in daycare. That expectation is still there, but you were heard, right? You got to hold Treelo and love those in the car and you got to bring one in , right? Yeah, absolutely. So I think this is, you know, I love that story. And one, I love Treelo, what a great name, but it kind of moves us into, so what's the takeaway? Alright, we learned about these three parenting styles and how they're defined long-term. It sounds like the authoritative, the research tells us authoritative with that balance of both is kind of leading to the best outcomes for kids. And we know in those heated and challenging moments is where that really shines through the most. So I think we might take away from all of that was, okay , I can soak all that in and what comes back out and what I do and I came to this idea of compliance and cooperation. You know, we talked about the safety thing, compliance being like you can't run in the road to chase that thing. You can't run on the roads and get the ball. That's not safe. You need to comply right now. So pick that battle. But there are a lot of times when we don't have to, right? Where we can do the one Treelo, two in the car, one when we get inside - so many more of those . So much cooperation. It's choosing the battle within ourselves.

Lori Hayungs 29:00

Yeah, definitely. Definitely. So can you think of a time where you maybe didn't choose cooperation that looking back now, you could have chosen cooperation.

Mackenzie Johnson 29:14

Actually an ongoing regular occurrence, getting the shoes on. You know, I told you that sometimes getting out the door is hard and getting the shoes on. I tend to choose, get your shoes on! We need your shoes on! But okay, one, I could prepare by giving us more time to get out the door. I could be a little more prepared there so that I'd give her that minute like, oh, you're wanting to do your coat first, or oh, you wanted to grab this before you go. So even the order of which we have to do things like shoes, coat, breakfast, get in the car, right? I could probably let that go a little. I maybe need to Stop. Breathe. Talk. every morning. Right? That doesn't have to be a super demand, but I could leave more room for where my child might want to be in that moment. What about you?

Lori Hayungs 30:14

Oh, so I'm going to play that permissive piece a bit because I do have three and you know, they are older and so sometimes with my youngest there are things where I'm probably a little bit more permissive. I'll catch myself, you know, telling the mothers of her friends, Oh yeah, you know, she's the third, she's the third. So, yeah, there are things where they're that way. Maybe I need to treat her like the first instead of the third in that particular instance. I maybe should have said, no, you actually will be home at such and such a time. So yeah, for me it's those moments tends to be that permissive piece, yeah.

Mackenzie Johnson 31:08

We're leaning in opposite directions where we could maybe use some work. But I think that's true for a lot of parents, right? Whether, you know, as a listener, you're on the end where you're like, okay, I maybe tend to gravitate towards some permissive stuff, or maybe I tend to gravitate towards some authoritarian, you know, and your own reality as we move forward. Think about, okay, what's the situation? Right? So if mine is, I need to practice with the shoes and the getting ready in the morning. What might be your situation this week where you might think about where you can strike a little bit more of a balance, right? Tiptoeing in the right direction is still progress.

Lori Hayungs 31:44

Tiptoeing. Oh, that word right there. It makes me think of Mackenzie and her Stop. Breathe. Talk. polls that we tiptoe around a little bit.

Mackenzie Johnson 31:56

Yeah. There she is. I feel like we always are like, dread. We like you, I swear!

Mackenzie DeJong 32:01

I'm so glad that when you think of me, you think tiptoeing and dread. That's really, really good news. Yeah, so it's time for Stop. Breathe. Talk. We can stop that conversation. Maybe take a breath and we're going to talk about something . Are you ready? Okay. So today's question is , we're gonna answer a question for parents listening. If someone is listening and they're maybe aligning themselves o r f inding themselves, maybe feeling like they fit in a certain style parenting style where they're at right now, do you think that our parenting style may change as we go along? Or can it change? And if so, what quickly might that look like?

Mackenzie Johnson 33:00

Hmm. Dibs . One thing we didn't say in this whole episode is that research tells us, I don't have a citation, but this is a thing that I know in my brain, that we might be more likely to gravitate to the way we were raised, you know? And so for everybody that looks different, you know. Maybe you have a really strong relationship with your parents or you know , there's a wide variety of those things and how you feel about how you were raised and even if we love how we were raised, there's probably things we would do differently. So recognizing that your parenting style, you might gravitate and especially in those moments of stress, it might gravitate to the way you're raised. And so my suggestion, I guess, I mean it's a little on the nose with what we talk about, but that's stopping, right? That Stop. Breath. Talk. we talked about last week and the self regulation. That self control because, you know, I fess up that patience is not a natural virtue to me. It's a thing I have to work on. So that's Stop. I think. I think we can get there. I think it can change if, but it takes practice, a lot of practice.

Lori Hayungs 34:08

Yes, all the above, all of that. Just all of that. And I think that another thing to identify here is we really strive here at The Science of Parenting, to make sure that you understand that we're sifting through all the research for you, but we also want you to recognize that it's not going to look the same in every home. How the reality plays out is not going to be the same. And so , we really want to make sure that we keep telling you that, you know, this is what the research says. We've sifted through all these little pieces of research and these are the important pieces, but how it looks for you may be different than how it looks for Mackenzie and I. And again, I just want to bring up this piece of having a child with special needs. It's being able to say, yeah, I had these ideas and thoughts about how I was going to parent, but the more I learned at each stage and age that that my daughter had when it came to her special need, I had to change my parenting and I changed my parenting for her based on my other two kids. And so how I parent her is different than how I parent the other two. My expectations are different. And even if she didn't have a special need, I would still parent her differently because her temperament and personality are different than theirs. Which those are later episodes. Those are later.

Mackenzie Johnson 35:35

But adapting, right? Your style might be different.

Mackanzie DeJong 35:37

And that was my thought, as you were saying that, is my sister has four kids and let me tell ya, you have four very different personalities. That last one, Lori , like you were saying, your last one, you just let them do whatever they want because when you're at four.

Mackenzie Johnson 35:51

Exhausted.

Mackenzie DeJong 35:52

Climbing on the table and you're like, oh man. Okay.

Mackenzie Johnson 35:56

You have a little more experience picking your battles. Right?

Mackenzie DeJong 36:00

But they all have different personalities, so we might pair them in different ways as well. So. All right, well that was Stop. Breathe. Talk. for today and I will see myself out. Thanks, ladies.

Mackenzie Johnson 36:12

Well that was it, right? We covered it. Yeah. I mean there's so much more, but we covered it. Yeah.

Lori Hayungs 36:19

I'm excited about what we have laid the groundwork for. I know some of our upcoming topics and so hang with us. Yeah , I'm excited. And thanks for joining us today on our Science of Parenting podcast. And remember, subscribe to our weekly audio podcast . You can look for them on Apple or Spotify or your favorite podcast app. Watch the show on video, right? We have these recorded so you can watch them . And then once a month, at the end of the month, Thursdays at 12:15 on Facebook, join us live. We take your comments and your questions, but mostly we just want you to remember to come alongside us as we tackle the ups and downs and the ins and outs and the research and the reality of The Science of Parenting.

Anthony Santiago 37:13

The Science of Parenting is a research based education program hosted by Lori Hayungs and Mackenzie Johnson , produced by McKenzie DeJong with research and writing by Barbara Dunn Swanson. Send in questions and comments to parenting@iastate.edu. and connect with us on Facebook and Twitter. This program is brought to you by Iowa State University Extension and Outreach. This institution is an equal opportunity provider. For the full non-discrimination statement or accommodation inquiries, go to www.extension.iaastate.edu/diversity .