Winnicott proposed that good enough — not perfect — is what children actually need and what development requires. The concept never became the parenting industry’s foundation because it closes the gap the industry depends on. Here is what good enough actually means and what the research supports.
More activities equals more development — until it doesn’t. Here is what the research shows about the non-linear relationship between extracurricular load and developmental benefit, what packed schedules displace, and why one sustained interest outperforms five strategic ones.
Helicopter parenting is driven by the desire to protect children from difficulty. Research finds it produces higher anxiety, lower self-efficacy, and reduced capacity for independent functioning — through the same mechanism in every domain it operates.
The tiger mom cultural debate largely bypassed the research. Here is what developmental psychology actually shows about high-demand parenting, the authoritarian versus authoritative distinction, and what high expectations with warmth produces compared to high expectations with pressure.
Gentle parenting’s research base is sound. Its popular ideological form — no child distress permitted, perfect parental regulation required, normal limits constitute trauma — is not. Here is the gap between what the developmental research supports and what the content ecosystem has built around it.
Screen time guidelines treat video calling with grandparents and hours of algorithmic content as one equivalent unit. Here is what the research actually shows about effect sizes, content types, causal claims, and what parents should actually worry about.
Intensive parenting promises that more investment produces better children. The research on parental time, unstructured play, enrichment schedules, and resilience development suggests the relationship is considerably less linear than the parenting industry implies.
