Psychiatrist's Parenting Guide: Let Children Make Their Own Decisions

Adolescence is a turbulent period. The transition from childhood to adulthood is never smooth, and the burden doubles in South Korea's intense college entrance examination culture. This period tests not only children but also their parents, who face immense pressure in a society that equates children's achievements with parental success.

Kim Hyo-won, a professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at Asan Medical Center in Seoul, identifies "self-determination" as the key to child education in her new book. Nurturing children's ability to make their own choices and take responsibility is what parents must not overlook, she argues.

Parents who themselves grew up in fierce competition often intervene in everything from academics to friendships, fearing their children might fall behind. However, such attitudes deprive children of growth opportunities rather than helping them, the author points out. Children pushed to study by parental pressure easily fall into lethargy or experience anxiety and depression because their inner strength remains undeveloped despite outward achievements.

To build self-determination, parents must allow children to decide, attempt, fail, and rise again on their own. The author, once a "Daechi mom"—a term for education-obsessed mothers in Seoul's premier tutoring district—stepped back after trial and error, letting her son create his own study plans and choose his own academies. She notes that "mother's information network" is merely secondhand information that can be inaccurate.

The author emphasizes that parents must also undergo "separation-individuation," gradually letting go as they recognize their children as independent individuals. Becoming a parent means accepting a diminishing role in one's child's life, she writes. Only when parents willingly accept this process can children establish their own center of life.

The book "Self-Determination" is co-authored by Kim Hyo-won and Kim Hyun-woong, published by Simsim, priced at 19,800 won.