"positive parenting" programs
Infants subjected to Supernanny-style parenting end up behaving just as badly at two years old as other children, Australian researchers say.
And mothers who use methods such as the "naughty chair" and "quiet time", advocated by Supernanny's child-raising expert, Jo Frost, are just as stressed as other women, although less likely to use harsh or abusive parenting methods.
In TV's top-rating Supernanny, Frost helps families with uncontrollable or excessively naughty children to instil discipline and order.
A trial of 700 mothers at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne found there was little worth in introducing "positive parenting" programs - intensive two-hour sessions involving a nurse and childhood experts - on a wide scale. But researcher Harriet Hiscock said such sessions did work for high-risk families already struggling to cope with behavioural problems.
Dr Hiscock said the study was designed to examine if getting in early and targeting all socio-economic groups would prevent behavioural problems from developing in children.
The report, published in the British Medical Journal, found that toddlers whose mothers did the program were just as defiant and aggressive at two, and their mothers experienced the same levels of anxiety and depression, as those who did not take part.
The trial did not go beyond the age of two.
In the trial, the mothers of half the children were allowed to bring them up as they thought best. The other half attended group sessions at eight, 12 and 15 months and were taught how best to develop a "warm and sensitive relationship" with their toddler.
Advice included abandoning smacking and yelling in favour of ignoring or distracting a misbehaving child, and praising children when they did something right rather than punishing for wrongdoing.
While the program helped reduce unreasonable developmental expectations of children, and harsh parenting, children's behaviour and maternal mental health were no different from the control group.
Source: The Age
Discuss a range of parenting issues with hundreds of Mums online in the Essential Baby forums.
