ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the evidence pertaining to parenting in resilience science and its implications for practice and policy to promote and protect human development. It explores the resilience from a developmental systems perspective to provide a conceptual framework for sections that follow. The chapter summarizes the historical significance of parenting in the origins of resilience science, drawing on findings from classic studies. It also examines the evidence on how parenting functions to protect human development in the context of risk or adversity, organized by salient roles and processes, including nurturing behaviors, attachment relationships, socialization, stress management, and the transmission of protective cultural knowledge and practices. For children, the primary relationships that protect and promote development are parent–child relationships and the family system of caregiving. The chapter explains intervention research that targets parenting as a strategy for promoting resilience, offering compelling evidence to support causal models of parenting roles in resilience, as well as the importance of developmental timing and targeting.
