Grandparents can play important roles in the lives of their grandchildren, mentally, physically and emotionally. The lives of children who are lucky enough to have relationships with their grandparents on an ongoing basis can be enriched in many ways.
Here are just a few of the benefits grandparents can bring to their grandchldren:
1) Improved Mental Health
Grandparents who take part in their grandchildren's lives can increase the children's sense of well-being. Research from England and Wales studied 1,596 children who were between 11 and 16 years of age. The children who had relationships with their grandparents were seen to have better mental health in their teen years.
2) Greater Sense of Security
Grandparents who are available to help care for their grandchildren when parents must be away, e.g., for work, instil the children with a greater sense of security. A sense of extended family, of people who are there for them, provides a safety net that many children don't have these days.
3) Better Nutrition
Lots of kids can fix basic meals for themselves. But having breakfast, lunch or dinner laid out by a loving grandma or grampa who have been fixing food for many years and know their way around the kitchen wins hands down.
So maybe a child would be content making do with some chicken nuggets. But who wouldn't be happier, and healthier with a some veggies and dip, some fruit and juice on the side, with a hug and a kiss before chowing down.
4) Greater Physical Safety
There are advantages to being with older people who are more settled in their ways and whose days of tearing around and taking chances are (hopefully) behind them. The journal Pediatrics reported that grandchildren are 50 percent less likely to be hurt in a car accident when one of their grandparents is driving rather than a parent.
5) Greater Self-Esteem
Grandparents can give their grandchildren a sense of safety, of tradition and of heritage. Personal attention can increase a grandchild's learning and developmental skills, and encourage greater independence. When a child is treated as valuable and important just by virtue of their existence by their grandparents, it rubs off. A child can learn to expect to be treated this way and to see themselves in the same light.
6) Unconditional Love and Acceptance
Research from the University of Haifa in Israel indicated that grandparents are equally loving with adopted grandchildren as they are with biological grandchildren. In other research, this was also seen to be the case with children who have special needs, such as autism. A grandparent's love and acceptance are often unconditional.
A Canadian study found that grandparents provide stability and give children someone to talk with when they are uncomfortable approaching parents about a sensitive issue.
Michelle Borba, EdD, a Campbell, California psychologist and author of "Building Moral Intelligence" said, “This is the greatest of all gifts since it lays the foundation for children's physical and mental health.”
7) Better Relationships with Parents
Research from the University of Wisconsin found that children with troubled families benefitted from spending time with their grandparents, and parents were less likely to split up in such scenarios. Parents may be adults, but sometimes they need their parents, too. And grandparents' perspectives of caring but not being immersed in the problems can bring a sense of peace and reassurance to more than one generation of the family.
Grandparents can also pass on family traditions and stories that help to hold everyone together.
8) Benefits of Grandparent/Grandchild Connection Flow in Both Directions
Benefits go both ways, of course. Research that ran from 1985 to 2004 studied the mental health of 340 grandchildren and 376 grandparents. A mutual, reciprocal relationship where the grandchildren also help their grandparents is most beneficial for both sides. This can include children, teens and adult grandchildren helping around the grandparent's house, running errands, and listening to the old stories.
The grandparents, and the now-adult grandchildren, who had been close to each other over the years, were less likely to have symptoms of depression.
Sources:
7 Health Boosts Grandparents Give Their Grandchildren. Everydayhealth.com. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2015.
http://www.everydayhealth.com/kids-health-pictures/health-boosts-grandpa...
Bonding Benefits. Kidshealth.org. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2015.
http://kidshealth.org/parent/positive/family/grandparents.html
Grandparents and Grandchildren Can Protect Each Other's Mental Health. Livescience.com. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2015.
http://www.livescience.com/38807-grandparents-grandchildren-protect-ment...
Celebrating Seniors in Our Lives: Where Would We Be Without Them? EmpowHER.com. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2015.
https://www.empowher.com/relationships-amp-family/content/celebrating-se...
The Ties that Bind: Grandparents and their Grandchildren. Psychologicalscience.org. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2015.
http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/news/releases/the-ties-tha...
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Reviewed September 11, 2015
by Michele Blacksberg RN