Whether parent coaching is getting delivered formally, through parent behavior training programs, or informally, through evidence-based parenting advice and recommendations shared in clinic with the family, parent coaching has become an essential part of clinical care today, both in general and in subspecialized pediatric clinics. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends anticipatory parenting guidance to be provided starting at the first visit. The AAP also recommends that pediatric health care providers discuss expected behavioral issues preemptively before problems arise to avoid problematic disciplining methods, and to reduce parental stress.
There are many different barriers both to delivering parent behavior training principles to families and to families themselves implementing these strategies. Many of these obstacles, such as clinic visit time, language barriers, and socioeconomic factors have been documented, studied, and addressed to different extents. While factors such as these are truly barriers, meaning they prevent the delivery of information, cultural factors should be approached differently.
Decolonizing parent coaching and cultural assumptions
It is tempting, and probably automatic, to think of cultural barriers to accepting parenting advice from a place of “what cultural pieces get in the way of them following my advice?” However, considering the diverse cultural backgrounds that families come from as a barrier to implementing parenting recommendations is both unjust and incomplete. It is part of the picture, but the bigger part is to think the advice we are giving, and what cultural perspective we are giving it in. Parenting advice does not exist as an abstract independent of culture and values, it exists within culture and values, and this includes the evidence synthesized to support it.
Parent behavior training and parent coaching in general, as currently conceptualized and delivered, is grounded in culturally specific assumptions that are often treated as universal. The process of decolonizing parent coaching requires clinicians to interrogate not only how advice is delivered, but whose values and social norms that advice reflects.
Understanding child-centered versus family-centered approaches
The first step is to examine the approach this family has to parenting and child-rearing. This is not necessarily explicit and more often than not families may not be aware of their own parenting perspective. In simple terms, this can be understood by asking what this family’s priorities are when thinking of rights, privileges, and duties that the child has. In most individualistic societies, like the U.S., parenting has a generally child-centered approach. This approach places the child’s individual needs, preferences, emotions, and developmental pace at the center of decision-making. Parenting practices are guided primarily by what is believed to best support the child’s autonomy, self-expression, and emotional well-being. Parents using this approach often adapt routines and expectations to support the child’s well-being and sense of agency.
On the other hand, family-centered child rearing is more common in collectivist societies, and it is merely a reflection of the community’s perspective. This approach views the child as part of an interconnected family system. Decisions consider not only the child’s needs but also family values, roles, responsibilities, and collective well-being. The child is socialized to adapt and contribute to the family unit. Children are encouraged to understand roles, responsibilities, and the importance of contributing to family life, even when this requires adapting individual preferences.
These approaches also differ in their socialization goals and views of authority. Child-centered parenting aims to foster independence, self-advocacy, and emotional awareness, often through flexible boundaries and negotiation. Family-centered child rearing emphasizes cooperation, respect for parental authority, and interdependence, with clear expectations shaped by family and cultural norms.
The limits of Western psychological research
If you find yourself automatically pathologizing one of these structures, particularly family-centered child rearing, it is worth reflecting on how deeply cultural assumptions shape our judgments about parenting. Family-centered approaches have been adopted across history and remain the normative framework in many communities around the world. Treating this model as deficient, rather than different risks overlooking its strengths, reinforces a narrow, culturally specific, definition of good or healthy parenting practices.
We must also acknowledge the gap in the literature even when looking at families and parenting through an “evidence-based” lens, knowing that the samples studied to synthesize much of the evidence that we have on parenting and child outcomes are not necessarily representative of the world, and therefore the conclusions are not always generalizable. Joseph Henrich argues in his article, and later in his book that carried the same title, “The WEIRDest People in the World,” that people from Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) societies are psychological outliers rather than the human norm. He argues that there are important limits of psychological research and its claims to universality. Henrich shows that a large proportion of psychological studies are conducted on WEIRD samples, often Western, educated college students, yet their findings are routinely generalized to all humans, which is a deeply flawed generalization. Therefore, many “established” conclusions in psychology may reflect culturally specific patterns rather than universal human tendencies.
Re-evaluating authoritarian parenting across cultures
One commonly cited example of the limits of universality in parenting research is the literature on authoritarian parenting. Both the AAP and the American Psychological Association (APA) advise against this parenting style based on its association with negative child outcomes in Western samples. However, cross-cultural research suggests that these associations are not consistent across cultural contexts. Studies conducted in collectivist and non-Western societies have found that authoritarian parenting does not uniformly predict poorer mental health or developmental outcomes, and in some cultural settings, it carries a different meaning and function altogether.
Evidence from diverse cultural contexts supports this view. For example, studies of adolescents in Singapore and across multiethnic samples have found that authoritarian parenting is not consistently associated with negative outcomes, and that its relationship to child anxiety, self-esteem, and adjustment varies by cultural group. Similar findings have been reported in Arab societies, where authoritarian parenting within authoritarian cultural norms does not appear to confer the same risks observed in Western contexts. These findings underscore that parenting behaviors cannot be meaningfully interpreted outside of the cultural frameworks in which they are embedded.
Decolonizing parent coaching begins with recognizing that the parenting norms embedded in clinical guidance are not universal truths but culturally situated perspectives. When recommendations derived largely from Western, individualistic contexts are treated as the global standard for healthy development, they risk pathologizing families whose values prioritize interdependence, hierarchy, or collective responsibility. Expanding our cultural lens requires more than adapting the delivery of parenting advice; it requires questioning the assumptions and evidence base that shape the advice itself. By approaching parenting practices with curiosity rather than correction, clinicians can move toward a more culturally responsive model of care that respects diverse family systems while still supporting children’s well-being.
Najat Fadlallah is a developmental-behavioral pediatrician.
