Blaming parents: oversimplification of social deviance
I recently listened to a sermon on parenting in which a religious scholar spoke passionately about the moral decline of society. Disrespect for elders, drug use and other forms of antisocial behaviour, he argued, were largely the result of poor parenting. While there was some truth in his concern, what struck me was the sweeping nature of the claim. It felt intuitively unsatisfying because such a claim overlooks the many other forces that shape who children become. It also seemed that beneath the moral urgency of the message lay a subtle push towards religious schooling as the corrective path. A closer look reveals why such explanations, though persuasive, are incomplete. No serious body of knowledge - whether in Sociology, Psychology or Behavioural Genetics - supports the idea that parenting alone determines behaviour. Human development is shaped by an intricate interplay of factors: biological predispositions, peer influences, schooling systems, media exposure, economic conditions an...