FOCUS: PARENTS UNDER PRESSURE: Spare the risk and spoil the child

Today's stressed and guilt-driven parents often mollycoddle their children - but are they producing a generation unable to cope?

This is not an easy time to be a parent. Whatever they do they are criticised - too over-protective, not protective enough. Too strict, or too lax. Take this past week, for instance. There were warnings from child protection groups about stranger danger, the threat of imprisonment for administering even moderate discipline, censure for those who allow youngsters to watch television, and a promise from the Child Support Agency that it would administer an even tougher crackdown on absent parents who fail to pay maintenance.

No wonder that many parents feel under pressure to be perfect. That means doing the ironing, producing perfect food, proffering the kids quality time - and shining for the boss at work.

"Society expects us to be all- knowing and all-seeing," complains Michele Elliott, director of the children's action group Kidscape. "We have to make sure they don't consume too much salt as babies, to see that they're stimulated, but not too much or that would be hyperactivity. We are even responsible for organising their leisure activities. It's a 48-hour job these days."

Dr Elliott, the mother of two teenage boys, was among those who slated last week's NSPCC campaign warning families of the dangers of children being assaulted or killed by strangers while playing outdoors.

"It feeds our already inflated fears about their safety and drives kids indoors, when all you can do is give them the strategies and confidence to go out into the world, then hope and pray that any mistakes they make will not be fatal," she says.

A closer look at Home Office statistics tells a different story. Children are no more at risk now than they were 20 years ago, with around six youngsters murdered or abducted each year. The real threat to children lies within their own home. Nine out of 10 domestic-violence incidents take place in front of children and their home is the most likely site of any abuse. The Children's Society and the Children's Play Council, which are supporting a drive for the Government to provide more safe play areas, point out that the biggest danger facing youngsters is from traffic accidents.

But, despite the statistics, parents have irrational fears for their children's safety in the outside world. So where is this anxiety coming from? Reports of child abuse, killings and abductions are often to blame, family experts believe. Tragedies such as Dunblane may be rare, but they undermine people's feelings of security. Every look and glance is now treated suspiciously by watchful parents. The result: parents will not allow children to do normal things such as play outside unsupervised, or make their own way to and from school.

Dr Elliott recounted the tale of a Scottish woman who was so protective of her 19-year-old son that she insisted on ferrying him around, even driving him to his first job interview and waiting for him in the car. She explained that she "just wanted to make sure that he was safe".

Tiffany Jenkins, a founder- member of Families for Freedom, which campaigns against over-protective parents, argues that parents' confidence has been seriously eroded by the constant barrage of lessons from well-meaning institutions, which often conflate rare criminal events with everyday behaviour.

"Parents feel undermined and vulnerable. The message is that you can't trust anyone. That all adults represent a danger to the young. Is it any wonder that men have a hard time interacting with children when this relationship is so often open to negative interpretation?"

Ann Morris, an accountant and mother of four teenagers aged between 13 and 19, says that when she tried to play the role of a protective supermum she was left floundering.

"I juggled my hours to spend as much time with them after school as possible, but still felt so guilty that I often over-indulged their demands for expensive gifts as a way of easing my feeling of guilt.

"I insisted that they didn't watch TV, eat sweets or junk food and generally tried to do all the things society insisted a good parent should do."

But the demands keep shifting and have become more pressing, as Susan Collett, a health psychologist, discovered. "Being a parent is perhaps the hardest job around, especially for mothers. There are so many pressures on us to nurture perfect kids that it is often hard to strike a balance between work and home life. We feel guilty for wanting a career and constantly worry about not spending enough time with them."

Mrs Collett, whose children are aged 14 and 18, believes parents' difficulties are made worse because they can no longer rely on an extended family for advice. Instead they are relying on professionals who are thriving on trendy obsessions with child development. This seems to reflect developments in America which, over the last decade, have made childhood into a burgeoning industry.

The demographic shift towards having fewer children also means that parents are focusing more on each child. Yet, plagued by guilt because of their busy lives, they make up by satisfying their offspring's every desire for the latest toys, clothes or cars. Over-indulgence would therefore appear to be a bigger risk than any pervert.

"They are thoroughly spoilt little gods, of whom spectacular things are expected," says Dr Elliott. "Especially middle-class families, who invest all their aspirations into their kids."

The real danger for this current generation of mollycoddled youngsters, according to some educational psychologists, is our irrational emphasis on danger and the attempt to protect them from every possible risk.