Peer Orientation: Why Children Are Stressed, Why Parents and Teachers Are Disempowered and How To Restore a Healthy Balance in Adult-Child Relationships (Online)

Based on the book Hold on To Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers

Parenting and teaching are much harder these days than they used to be, and than they should
be. In Hold On To Your Kids, Dr. Gabor Maté (with developmental psychologist Gordon
Neufeld) forward a provocative and important view of why this is, and what we can do to
counteract it.

The root of the problem is that children no longer look to adults for emotional support, the
teaching of values, or the modeling of behavior. Peer orientation refers to the tendency of
children and youth to look to their peers for direction: for their sense of right and wrong, codes
of conduct, and their very identity. Peer orientation undermines family cohesion, sabotages
healthy development and fosters an aggressive and prematurely sexualized youth culture. For
parents already challenged by the demands of our multitasking world and stretched by stark
economic realities, peer orientation further complicates the task of child rearing. Children were
never meant by nature to be in a position where they are so dominant in influencing one
another. This state of affairs may be the norm today, but it’s neither natural nor healthy.
Historically it is a very new development, due to economic and social influences prevalent since
World War II, resulting in a deep undermining of adult-child connections.

This talk aims at restoring parenting to its natural intuitive basis and the adult-child relationship
to its rightful preeminence. The concepts, principles and practical advice articulated will
empower parents, teachers and other adults who play a nurturing role to be for children what
nature intended: the true source of contact, security and warmth. Parents must regain their
natural authority, without coercion, punishment and artificial consequences. Children need to
be protected from becoming lost in the emotionally barren and culturally backward world of peer
orientation.