“Where the world is heading,” my mother proclaims pathetically. – In our time, it was customary to respect old age. To give way to an elderly person, to help carry the bag is the norm of behavior. And now? These youngsters are rude, rude, behave like a pig. “
Well, yes, not without it. Scientists say that the advancement of today’s grandparents is to blame: they don’t really want to babysit their grandchildren. After all, they raised the children, then let them somehow cope with their own. And it also happens that young parents do not get along too well with the older generation and do not want them to interfere in the upbringing of children. Both, taken to the extreme, are bad. And that’s why.
It turns out that if children have a good relationship with their grandparents, then the advantages of this are not only warm emotions, great gifts for the New Year and birthday, and an extra minute of freedom for mom and dad. It turns out that this close connection affects how children relate to older people in general. A new study, published in the scientific journal Child Development, found that children who enjoy spending time with their grandparents have much more respect and sympathy for the elderly.
In the experiment of scientists from the University of the Belgian city of Liege, 1151 children aged 7 to 16 years in the French-speaking part of Belgium took part. Children were asked what they thought of old people and aging in general. And at the same time they were interested in what kind of relationship the “test subjects” have with their grandparents, how they feel, how often they see their grandchildren.
It turned out that children who usefully and enjoyably spend time with their grandparents have the most favorable opinion of the elderly. One meeting a week was enough to notice the difference. But more important was not even the quantity, but the quality of the meetings – it is important that the children enjoy communicating with older relatives. And this is impossible if they do not show any interest in their grandchildren. And even gifts cannot fix the situation here.
“For most children, grandparents are their first and most frequent contact with the elderly, which can greatly influence the formation of the correct worldview,” the scientists summarize.