Parents too scared to admit when their child has an accident

Would you be worried about being judged on social media if your little one fell over? You’re not the only one…

As we become more and more obsessed with Facebook and Instagram – and the pressure to raise a picture-perfect family builds – new research reveals that many parents are too scared of social media judgement to admit when their child has had an accident.

The survey by the Child Accident Prevention Trust (CAPT) reveals that nearly three quarters (71%) of us now feel under too much pressure to be a ‘perfect parent’, with 35% unwilling to admit an accident or near-miss for fear of being judged by others. The pressure of other parents’ posts on Facebook and Instagram only adds to the upset, with nearly half (48%) feeling that they’re not good enough.

“Parents are living under a social media microscope, too scared to admit to less than Pinterest-perfect parenting for fear of being judged,” says Katrina Phillips, chief executive of CAPT. “But this can have worrying consequences for child safety. If parents no longer feel able to share their experiences, or admit when they don’t know something, we lose the chance to learn from each other and stop accidents happening to our children.”

Interestingly, it is young parents who are feeling it the most, with 85% of them admitting feeling the pressure to be perfect.

“We know that more than 20% of total emergency department attendees in the UK are infants, children and young people,” says Dr Ian Maconochie of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. “While not all of these are preventable, many of them are. On route to reducing these is to educate and inform children and their parents and carers about the dangers,” he adds.