How ‘Helicopter Parenting’ Could Actually Be Contributing to Kids’ Screen Addiction?

If you stand over your child’s shoulder when they do their homework or direct your kids’ every move then you are one of the helicopter parents. Such parents actually spend a good chunk of your day obsessing about children’s success, like will they make the sports team or school play, or they will win it or not or will they get into the top-notch college or school. Parents always want the very best for their children but in that run, you are actually contributing to the kid’s screen addiction.

What Is Helicopter Parenting?

The deep love and care that parents provide children can even push parents to be a little bit more protective and end up to be a helicopter parent. In general, these parents are known to be overly protective and involved in their children’s lives. The term helicopter parenting can be defined as a picture of a parent who hovers over their children and always on alert most importantly they swoops in to rescue them at the first sign of trouble or disappointment. Here are three types of behaviors that parents exemplify according to helicopter parenting:

• The first information-seeking behaviors include knowing your children’s daily schedule and most importantly where they are and that enables you to make decisions and get information about grades and other accomplishments.
• Another behavior is the direct intervention which means jumping into conflicts with kids’ roommates, friends, romantic partners, and even somebody else.
• At last the autonomy limiting is when child think their parents are preventing from making mistakes, controlling the life of the child.

The Effects of Helicopter Parenting

According to various researches, it was found that children with helicopter parents tended to be less open to new ideas and actions, and were more vulnerable, anxious, dependent, and self-conscious. Parents love children as much as possible and protect them from the dangers in society. We are in such a competitive world and want to provide all the benefits to our child. But if parents start helicopter parenting then that leads to mental health issues like anxiety and depression as children get older and try to make it on their own.  Here are some of the negative effects of helicopter parenting:

• In most cases children with intrusive parents who had high expectations for academic performance, or if you overreact when your child made a mistake, they tend to be more self-critical, anxious, or depressed.
• There is a tendency in children of helicopter parents to be afraid of making mistakes and therefore they began to blame themselves for not being perfect. This happens when the parents indicate their kids that what they do is never good enough.
• Overall helicopter parenting is associated with stronger symptoms of anxiety and depression. It is also associated with poorer functioning in emotional functioning, decision making, and academic functioning.
• It may even trigger anxiety in kids who already struggle with some social issues. This shows that parents of socially anxious children may perceive challenges to be more threatening than the child thinks they are. And as a result, this may decrease a child’s ability to succeed on their own and potentially increase anxiety.

How to Deal with Kids’ Screen Addiction?

Usually, helicopter parents are communicating with their children in ways that they won’t be safe unless mom or dad is there looking out for them. When these children have to face the world on their own, they are not prepared to meet daily challenges. This becomes their inability to find creative solutions and make decisions on their own which can ultimately cause a great deal of worry since their protector is no longer around to help them. Parents have to understand that parenting is not easy. Having children and raising them presents brings in number challenges and surprises, but also immense joy. Now when over parenting leads to more problems for kids, here are some of the ways by which you can deal with helicopter parenting:

• You have to support your children’s growth and independence by listening to them, and not always putting on them your desires. You should never refrain from doing everything for your child. You should take steps to gradually teach your child how to accomplish tasks on their own.
• You should not try to help children escape consequences for their actions unless you believe those consequences are unfair or life-altering. Besides that, you should raise your child to expect to be treated differently than other children. There is a need to encourage your children to solve their own problems by asking them to come up with creative solutions.
• Most importantly, you must teach your children to speak up for themselves in a respectful manner. Besides that, you should understand and accept your children’s weaknesses and strengths, and help them to use their strengths to achieve their own goals.

iKeyMonitor Helps In Dealing with Screen Addiction

You can do the best for your kids so that the kids will have a great future. In order to deal with the screen addiction parents should deal with helicopter parenting. Instead of physically running behind the child to see what are their activities, you can easily install a parental monitoring app like iKeyMonitor and check on your device all their activities performed on the device. Here are the ways in which iKeyMonitor is helpful:

• It allows you to check all the text messages sent or received on the target devices. With that you will come to know about their friends.
• It enables you to limit screen time on iPad/ iPhone/ Android by setting the maximum usage time of all apps.
• It offers the feature of blocking certain apps and games so that you can control your children’s usage of some inappropriate apps or games.

Therefore, parents should let the children discover themselves and their weaknesses, strengths, their goals and dreams. You can install iKeyMonitor and avoid helicopter parenting and still remain protective.