Parents On Parenting: How Are Canada's Children Being Raised?

Toronto, Ontario - According to a new Ipsos-Reid/CTV/Globe and Mail survey of Canadian parents released today, four in ten parents in Canada (43%) believes they are doing a "better job" at raising children than their parents did and half (50%) say they are doing "about the same job."

A minority of parents (28%) agrees with the statement "I schedule my children into too many activities compared to my parents." However, most believe that parents in general are not good at scheduling their children's time: Seven in ten (71%) agree that "parents today over-schedule their children into events and don't allow them free time to just be kids."

Six in ten parents (62%) agree with the statement "I am more permissive with my children than my parents were with me." Six in ten (60%) also agree with the statement "I worry much more about how well my children perform in school than my own parents worried about me."

Most Canadian parents appear to be taking the `spare the rod' approach to parenting, with the majority of parents (57%) disagreeing with the statement "I have spanked or slapped my children for disciplinary reasons."

These are the findings of an Ipsos-Reid/CTV/Globe and Mail poll conducted between February 24 and March 4, 2004. The telephone survey is based on a randomly selected sample of 648 adult parents living in Canada. With a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate to within 1773.9 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had the entire adult Canadian parent population been polled. The margin of error will be larger within regions and for other sub-groupings of the survey population. These data were statistically weighted to ensure the sample's regional and age/sex composition reflects that of the actual Canadian population according to the 2001 Census data.

Four In Ten (43%) Think They Are Doing A Better Job Of Raising Their Children Then Their Parents Did

Four in ten (43%) parents living in Canada believe that they are doing a "better job" of raising kids compared to how their parents raised them as children. Exactly half (50%) of parents believe they are doing "about the same job" as their parents did of raising kids compared to their parents, and 6% say they are doing a "poorer job" of raising kids compared to their parents. The remaining 2% of parents "don't know."

• Parents living in Ontario (51%) are the most likely to believe that they are doing a better job of raising their children than their parents did of them, followed by parents in Alberta (43%), Saskatchewan/Manitoba (43%), British Columbia (40%), and Quebec (37%). Parents in Atlantic Canada (26%) are significantly less likely to think so.
• Parents in Atlantic Canada (69%) are the most likely to agree that they are doing "about the same job" of raising kids compared to their parents, followed by parents in Quebec (54%), Alberta (54%), British Columbia (49%), Saskatchewan/Manitoba (47%), and Ontario (42%).
• Younger parents are more likely than middle age or older parents to believe they are doing "about same job" as their parents did (60% of parents aged 18-34, 48% aged 35-54, 35% aged 55+). And, parents aged 35 and older are more likely than younger parents to believe they are doing a "better job of raising children then their parents" (54% aged 55+, 55% aged 35-54, and 36% aged 18-34).
• The percentage of those who say they are doing a "better job" than their parents increases by the age of children living in their household: Parents of children aged 0-5 (37%), parents of children aged 6-11 (43%), and parents of children aged 12-17 (44%).

Three In Ten (28%) Agree They Schedule Too Many Activities For Their Children

A minority of three in ten (28%) parents agree with the statement "I schedule my children into too many activities compared to my parents" (18% "agree somewhat", "10% agree completely"). A majority of seven in ten (70%) disagree that they schedule their children into too many activities (36% "somewhat disagree", 35% "disagree completely"). The remaining 2% say they "don't know."

• Parents living in British Columbia (80%) are the most likely to disagree that they schedule their children into too many activities compared to their parents, followed by parents in Ontario (74%), Alberta (73%), Atlantic Canada (67%), Saskatchewan/Manitoba (65%), and Quebec (61%).
• Older parents aged 55+ (43%) are more likely than middle age parents aged 35-54 (28%) and younger parents aged 18-34 (22%) to agree with the statement "I schedule my children into too many activities compared to my parents."
• Fewer parents of children aged 0-5 (22%) than parents of children aged 6-11 (31%) and parents of children aged 12-17 (30%) agree with this statement.

But, The Majority (71%) Believes Other Parents Today Over-Schedule Children

While three in ten (28%) parents feel that they themselves over-schedule their own children, the majority (71%) agree when it comes to parents in general: "parents today over-schedule their children into events and don't allow them free time just to be kids" (44% "agree somewhat", 26% "agree completely"). A minority of three in ten (28%) disagree with this notion (20% "disagree somewhat", 9% "disagree completely"). The remaining 1% "don't know."

• Parents in Alberta (84%) are the most likely to agree that parents today over-schedule their children into events, followed by parents in Saskatchewan/Manitoba (78%), Atlantic Canada (78%), Ontario (73%), British Columbia (72%), and Quebec (56%).
• More parents of children aged 0-11 (76%) than parents of children aged 12-17 (69%) agree that parents today over-schedule their children.

Majority (62%) Of Parents Think They Are More Permissive With Their Children Than Their Parents Were With Them

Six in ten parents (62%) agree with the statement "I am more permissive with my children than my parents were with me" (39% "agree somewhat," 23% "agree completely"). Four in ten (37%) disagree with this statement (25% "disagreeing somewhat", 12% "disagree completely"). The remaining 1% say they "don't know."

• Seven in ten parents living in Alberta (69%) and Atlantic Canada (69%) agree that they are more permissive with their children than their parents were with them, compared to two-thirds in Ontario (66%) and Saskatchewan/Manitoba (65%), and half in Quebec (55%) and British Columbia (52%).
• Parents of children age 0-5 (54%) are less likely to agree than parents of children age 6-11 (64%) and parents of children age 12-17 (66%).

Six in Ten (60%) Feel They Worry Much More About Their Children's Academic Performance Than Their Parents Did

A majority of (60%) parents agree with the statement "I worry much more about how well my children perform in school than my own parents worried about me" (28% "agree somewhat", 33% "agree completely"). Conversely, four in ten (38%) disagree with the suggestion that they worry more about their children's academic performance than their parents did about theirs (20% "disagree somewhat", 17% "disagree completely"). The remaining 2% of the respondents say they "don't know."

• Parents in Ontario (67%) are most likely to agree with the statement "I worry much more about how well my children perform in school than my own parents worried about me" followed by parents in British Columbia (62%), Saskatchewan/Manitoba (58%), Quebec (58%), Atlantic Canada (54%), and Alberta (49%).
• Parents aged 55+ (68%) and 35-54 (64%) are more likely than younger parents aged 18-34 (50%) to agree that they worry more about their children's performance in school than their parents worried about them.
• As the age of their children rises, the level of agreement with the statement "I worry much more about how my children perform in school than my own parents worried about me" rises: 52% of parents of children age 0-5, 61% of parents of children age 6-11, and 65% parents of children age 12-17.

Majority (57%) Have Not Spanked Or Slapped Their Children For Discipline

Six in ten parents (57%) disagree that that they have spanked or slapped their children for disciplinary reasons (14% "disagree somewhat", 43% "disagree completely"). However, 42% agree that they have spanked or slapped their children to discipline them (27% "agree somewhat", 14% "agree completely"). The remaining 2% of respondents "don't know."

• Parents living in Quebec (77%) are the most likely to disagree with the statement "I have spanked or slapped my children for disciplinary reasons," followed by parents in Atlantic Canada (56%), Ontario (53%), Saskatchewan/Manitoba (53%), British Columbia (46%), and Alberta (38%).
• The level of agreement with the statement "I have spanked or slapped my children for disciplinary reasons" is consistent among parents of children of all ages: Parents of children aged 0-5 (46%), parents of children aged 6-11 (45%), parents of children aged 12-17 (43%).

Please open the attached PDF to view the factum and detailed tables.

For more information on this news release, please contact:

John Wright
Senior Vice-President
Ipsos-Reid Public Affairs
(416) 324-2900