77 parenting questions where the evidence leans one way

Whether you back each other up in front of your child even when you disagree, and where the exceptions are.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whose way of doing things counts as "right" for everyday care, such as how to swaddle or what bedtime looks like, and whether the other parent is free to do it differently without being corrected.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether your child will see you disagree, and how: never, calmly with a visible resolution, or without a filter.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Having the same picture of what a baby, toddler or child can realistically do at each age, so one of you is not expecting a two-year-old to behave like a five-year-old.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether you will get ready for parenthood as a couple, from nothing formal to books, a class, or counseling, and what that preparation looks like.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Researchers describe parenting styles by two things: warmth and demands.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

How hard you will push your child to excel at school, sports or music, from letting them lead to holding very high expectations.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How the time off is divided between you: all by the birth parent, an overlap, a solo block for the other parent, or roughly equal.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

How you will make time for each other as a couple once a baby arrives, from date nights to small daily rituals, rather than waiting until there is time.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

How you will approach physical closeness and sex after the baby arrives, including recovery, timing, and talking about it.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

What you will do to avoid running yourselves into the ground: scheduled rest, lowering standards, or buying or asking for help.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · 0–6 months

Who will be in charge of your care in pregnancy and birth: an obstetrician (a surgeon who handles complications), a midwife (a specialist in normal birth, in a hospital, birth center or at home), a family doctor who delivers babies, or a team that shares the care.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Which hospital you plan to give birth in, and what to compare: how close it is, how advanced its newborn intensive-care unit is, its cesarean rate, and its policies on visitors, doulas and rooming-in.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

How much you want to spell out in advance about your birth: a detailed written plan, a short list of priorities, trusting the care team, or no plan.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Who will be with you during labor and birth: just the two of you, a doula, a family member, or more people.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether to have a quick procedure to release the tissue under the tongue if a baby is thought to have a tongue-tie that affects feeding.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · 0–6 months

What the parent who is not feeding the baby from the breast does at feeds and around them: diapers, burping, settling, bottles or night feeds.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether your baby uses a pacifier (dummy) and when to introduce it, for example from birth, after feeding is established, or only for sleep.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Around the birth

Whether you follow the baby's cues for feeding and sleep, build a flexible routine, or set a firm schedule.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · 0–6 months

Melatonin is a hormone the body makes to signal bedtime; it is also sold as a supplement.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Whether you keep a record of feeds, naps and diapers, and how: not at all, on paper, in an app, or with wearable devices.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Around the birth

How you respond when a toddler hits or bites, which is common at this age: stopping and removing them, a time-out or a time-in.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

How you respond when a child lies: punishing the lie, giving credit for honesty, making truth-telling safe, or treating it as normal development.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

What you do when your child is upset, angry or sad: validating every feeling and limiting only behavior, acknowledging briefly, distracting, minimizing or disapproving.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

How you respond when your child is afraid: avoiding what scares them, comforting them while gently facing it, or pushing them through.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

What you think builds a child's sense of worth: frequent affirmation, warmth with honest feedback, real responsibility, or achievement.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

Whether you fill your child's time or deliberately leave unstructured space, including letting them be bored.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

Whether you treat sons and daughters the same when they show feelings, or hold different expectations such as telling boys to toughen up.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

How you handle your own anger and stress, and whether you apologize and make things right with your child after losing your temper.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Ongoing

How you respond when a child refuses most foods: cooking a separate meal, serving one family meal with a safe food on the table, one meal take-it-or-leave-it, hiding vegetables, or repeated exposure without comment.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether food is ever used to reward good behavior, soothe upset or motivate, such as a treat for using the potty.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Ultra-processed foods are industrially made products with ingredients you would not use in a home kitchen, such as packaged snacks, sugary cereals and ready meals.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

How you talk about bodies, weight and diets at home, from avoiding weight talk entirely to treating weight as a health measure when a doctor raises it.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How readily you give medicine for everyday illness such as fevers, colds and aches: treating promptly, waiting and focusing on comfort, or keeping medicine to a minimum in favor of natural remedies.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · 6–12 months

When you start dental visits and brushing and how you handle thumb-sucking and pacifier use.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · 6–12 months

Whether a child must hug or kiss relatives, or is always allowed to choose, which shapes how they learn about their own boundaries.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

When and how you talk about puberty and bodily changes: gradually from early childhood, in one planned talk, or leaving it to school.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How you handle sun: strict covering and avoidance, sunscreen with outdoor time, or a relaxed approach.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · 0–6 months

How you teach children to stay safe from harm by others: warnings about strangers, a trusted-adult plan, body-safety rules, or little explicit teaching.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

How many hours a day and week your child spends in care, from full days to part-time or occasional.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · 6–12 months

What kind of toys you buy and how many: few, open-ended, rotated, a mix with electronic toys, or plenty.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

What you weigh most when choosing a school: nearby and community, results and rankings, teaching approach, the mix of students, or your child's happiness.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

Whether you would move, use out-of-area options, or pay for private school to get a school you prefer.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

How you would respond if your child is far ahead of their classmates: enrichment, a gifted program, subject acceleration or skipping a grade.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Whether your child attends a school with both boys and girls or a single-sex school.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Whether you would ever send a child to live at school, and from what age.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Tween

How much you help with homework: hands-off, setting the routine and space, available on request, sitting alongside, or teaching and correcting.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How you treat homework for young children, from opting out to doing it lightly to treating it as a firm habit.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Whether you pay or reward for grades, reward effort, only praise, or give consequences for poor grades.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Whether your child gets extra academic help: none, only when struggling, enrichment to get ahead, or ongoing programs.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

Which languages your child hears and speaks at home and how you pass on a second language: one parent one language, a minority language at home, or classes and immersion.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether your child tries many sports through adolescence or settles on one early and plays it year-round.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How you handle competition: avoiding it when young, focusing on participation and fun, keeping score but praising effort, or treating winning as important.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

How you use your own phones around your child: phone-free time with them, set zones and times, or no particular rules.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Around the birth

Whether babies and toddlers under two see screens at all, such as video calls only, occasional shared viewing, or screens as part of the day.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · 0–6 months

Whether phones stay out of bedrooms overnight and how phones are handled during the school day.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · Tween

When you talk with your child about sex: one big talk near puberty, answering when asked, many small talks from early childhood, or leaving it to school.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

Whether and how your teen can get contraception: not provided, available if asked, arranged proactively, or managed confidentially by the teen.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Teen

What you allow around alcohol: none until the legal age, small sips on occasion, supervised drinking at home, or permissive with safety rules.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Teen

How you handle going out: unsupervised parties, curfews, check-in rules, and what happens if they need a ride home.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Teen

Whether your teen has their own car or shares the family car, and who pays for the car and insurance.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Teen

Whether your teen works during school years, from no job to summer only to part-time during the school year.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Teen

How much you spend on your child and what that teaches, from a minimalist approach and experiences over things to matching what their peers have.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether children do household jobs and why: childhood is for play and school, self-care only, unpaid contribution to the family, paid work, or working alongside adults from toddlerhood.

5 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

When you expect your child to do things for themselves, like dressing, feeding and washing, and whether you push early independence or follow readiness.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

How truthful you are with your child, including myths and small lies: never lying, only kind fictions, white lies, or lying to get compliance.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether you tell your child that Santa and the Tooth Fairy are real, play along, call it a game, or skip the myths.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether you follow traditional ideas about what boys and girls play with and wear, follow your child's preferences, mix deliberately, or raise children without gender expectations.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

Whether and how you talk with your child about race, money and unequal opportunity: not raising it, answering when asked, or proactive age-appropriate conversations.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Preschool

How you teach giving and community involvement: not structured, a give jar and donation choices, regular family volunteering, or expected service in the teens.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · School age

The regular practices that make your family yours, such as holidays, meals and bedtime customs, and whether you inherit them, blend both families' or invent new ones.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Around the birth

How involved grandparents are in your child's life, from occasional visits to regular presence to providing childcare to living with you.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy

How far apart you would like your children to be: close together, moderately spaced or wide apart.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · 6–12 months

How you respond when siblings fight: staying out, coaching and mediating, judging and imposing a solution, or separating them.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether you treat siblings strictly equally, give each what they need, or set privileges by age and stage.

3 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Whether you avoid comparing children and labels like "the smart one," use positive labels only, or give the eldest more responsibility.

4 options · Evidence leans one way · Toddler

Talking before it happens about how you would each want to grieve and whom you would tell if a pregnancy ended in miscarriage or stillbirth.

2 options · Evidence leans one way · During pregnancy