Perception of Helicopter Parenting and Mental Health Outcomes in College Students: A Correlational Study

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19483377

Ambika Dutta¹ and Geeta Bhagat² (Department of Psychology, The NorthCap University, Gurugram, Haryana¹ and Department of Psychology, MCM DAV College, Panjab University, Chandigarh²)

There are distinct styles of parenting, and Helicopter parenting is one of them, where parents involve themselves in a developmentally inappropriate way and try to control the life of their child, which is evident through their advice, assistance to the child and monitoring the life of the child. Therefore, there is a further need to examine the effects of perception of Helicopter Parenting on college-going students. The present study attempts to examine the impact of Parental hovering on Anxiety and Depression in College students. The sample consisted of 300 college-going students (150 males & 150 females) in the age range of 18-21 years from co-educational colleges of the University of Delhi. To assess the perception of Helicopter Parenting, Helicopter Parenting Scale (LeMoyne & Buchanan, 2011) was utilised, and to measure the Anxiety and Depression, Anxiety, Depression and Stress Scale (Bhatnagar et al., 2011) was utilised. The data was analysed using the correlation analysis. Descriptive statistics consisting of mean and standard deviation, were also used. The results posit a positive relationship between perception of Helicopter Parenting (Both Mother & Father) and Anxiety (p<.01) and Depression (p<.01). These results could be utilized heuristically to understand the impact of Helicopter Parenting on students Anxiety and Depression level.