“I’ve always known without any iota of doubt that my parents love my sister more than they love me,” she says.
I went further to ask her, “How do you mean?”
And she went ahead to give many instances of how her parents gave her sister preference over her on many occasions. She said she was always punished even if it is obvious that her sister was wrong. Her parents, Dad especially, had a way of defending her sister or covering up.
The truth still remains that parental favoritism is real: it is happening on a daily basis in many homes consciously or unconsciously. If parents do nothing, parental favoritism can continue or get worse: adult children still suffer from parental favoritism.
What is parental favoritism? Parental favoritism is simply when parents give consistent preferences to a particular child over another. Parental favoritism occurs in different ways; for some parents, it could be showing special love to a particular child by always going out of their way to help, buying gifts irrespective of birthday, showcasing the child’s talents and gifts, vocal affection, or even providing excess freedom to a child. It is being at that child’s beck and call above other children. Parents can do this without even realizing it.
Why Parental Favoritism?
These mistakes are oftentimes not intentional. Sometimes circumstances influence this behavior. A parent might say, “You see that my first child, I don’t joke with her. I stayed over eight years before we had her and we were so low financially, but immediately I became pregnant for her, financial opportunities started showing up–our lives became meaningful again. That’s why I give her whatever she wants.”
Hmmm! At the detriment of the other siblings, right?
Another reason parents indulge in this behavior is as a result of their perspective. For example valuing resemblance. They might say this child looks exactly like me, behaves like me, has the same beliefs, same temperament, the same likes and dislikes. A parent naturally will love that child above the rest of the children and will favor him/her unconsciously over others without even knowing or realizing.
Also, parents show favoritism to a certain child because the child has special needs that require special care and attention. Because of this, parents feel conditioned to love more, care more, and show attention more.
Where a child is exceptionally intelligent, very attractive, sociable and outspoken; parents tend to naturally favor that child above the less endowed child. Sometimes, it is not even the parent’s intention to do so but societal expectations subtly make them favor the child over the other. Let’s say for example, family, friends, school, neighbors, teachers and everyone around say to you that your child Janny is a star child, an A student, can’t you see her results? Please don’t joke with her. This they say every now and then, even in the presence of the less endowed child (without noticing her nor saying anything positive about her).
To be continued in my next post. Please look out for it.
