ABSTRACT
The confidence that parents have in how they bring up their children comes from a combination of personality, their own upbringing and the reactions they get when trying an approach. Some parents find the child-rearing task to be one long, agonising worry, in which they lurch from anxiety over one issue to indecision over another. Other parents make snap decisions without any appearance of uncertainty and may seem to rule over their children with a rod of iron. The majority of people sit in between these two extremes, worrying over certain issues, such as how to reduce the amount of TV that children watch, but taking a more confident line over others. Today, in most western societies, cheap food is widely available, often ready prepared so that the minimum of cooking skills are required, and so rich and varied that eating has become a leisure pursuit in itself. Hunger has almost become redundant, and instead, a surrogate marker for boredom.
