“I'm scared I'm passing my anxiety on to my kids”
A parent with anxiety may watch their child hang back at a party or ask the same worried question twice, and feel a stab of recognition. Anxiety does run in families, through genes and through what children learn from watching. Children of anxious parents are more likely to be anxious, and many are not. What matters most is what the child was like from early on, how the parent's fear shows in daily life, and how much room the child gets to face things and cope.
What to check first
It helps to check the child's age and how much the worry gets in the way of school, friends and sleep, since some fears are normal at every age. It also helps to notice whether the parent's own anxiety has grown lately. A child whose worries stop them from doing ordinary things for weeks is worth raising with a pediatrician.
What could be going on
Intergenerational transmission: Fits if your child's worries look like yours, in topic or style, and you can see where they may have learned them.
Emotional contagion: Check whether your child gets tense when you do, picking up your fear from your face and voice.
Overparenting (helicopter parenting): Could be that you shield your child from things that scare you, so they get little chance to find out they can cope.
Temperament: Check whether your child was cautious or sensitive from very early, before much could have been learned.
Generalized anxiety: Fits if your own worry runs most days across many areas, and the fear for your kids is part of it.
Parental guilt (‘mom guilt’): Fits if the fear of passing it on has become its own source of worry and guilt.
Telling them apart
Intergenerational transmission: Children may learn what to fear by watching a parent's reactions to dogs, germs, strangers or mistakes. The child's worries may echo the parent's in topic. A children-of-twins study led by Thalia Eley found anxiety passed from parents to teenagers through the home environment, with no clear sign of genetic transmission.
Emotional contagion: Children pick up fear from a parent's face, voice and body, often before words. In one experiment, toddlers showed more fear of a rubber snake or spider after their mother reacted to it with a fearful face. The tension may spread in both directions.
Overparenting (helicopter parenting): A parent may steer a child away from what scares the parent: the jungle gym, the sleepover, the phone call. The child may miss chances to find out they can cope. Research on family accommodation suggests that easing a child's fear in the moment may help keep it going.
Temperament: Some children are cautious and wary from the start, before much could be learned. Jerome Kagan called this behavioral inhibition, and it raises the chance of anxiety later. The child may have the parent's genes as well as the parent's example.
Generalized anxiety: The parent's own worry may run across many parts of life, most days. The fear of passing it on may be one more worry among many. The child may see the worry most on the parent's harder days.
Parental guilt (‘mom guilt’): The fear of passing anxiety on may become its own source of guilt and watchfulness, with the parent checking the child for signs. That watching may itself make the parent more tense. The guilt may sit beside real love and effort that the child also sees.
Questions to carry
- When did I last see my worry show up in my child, and what was happening?
- What do I want my child to see me do when I'm scared?
Also said as
- am i making my child anxious
- anxious parent anxious child
- is anxiety passed down from parents
- my daughter worries like i do
- i don't want my kids to have my anxiety
- how to not pass anxiety on to children