Helicopter Parents

Abstract

The term “helicopter parents” refers to a parenting style in which well‐meaning but misguided parents provide excessive support for young and grown children that is characterized by overinvolvement in, and micromanagement of, their children's daily affairs. Most popular accounts and empirical studies of helicopter parenting focus on the parenting of college‐aged youth, with media commentators positing that helicopter parenting harms young people by rendering them overdependent and anxiety‐ridden. The term is typically used pejoratively in media outlets, though social scientists have demonstrated that helicopter parenting produces both positive and negative consequences for parents and the young people over whom they supposedly hover.