海角大神

Even before the heartbreaking shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary, American parents were anxious about child rearing.聽

According to a report that came out earlier this month from the University of Virginia鈥檚 Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture, less than a quarter of US moms and dads believe this is a聽 great time to be bringing children into the world, and most say it is tougher to raise children today than it was 50 years ago.聽Fewer than 1 parent in 10 thinks the quality of American family life has improved since they were growing up.

RELATED: America's 4 family cultures 鈥� what's yours?

But in a twist, researchers found that most parents in the U.S. think their own kids and family are doing just fine, thanks. It鈥檚 the other families out there that are the problem.

鈥淕iven the chorus of cries from all quarters about family crisis, families in decline, the pernicious effects of technology, and the increasingly tenuous nature of contemporary family arrangements, there was really only one thing we did not expect to unearth in our investigation: That parents actually think their families are doing well,鈥� researchers wrote.聽聽

Better than well, actually.聽

Based upon parents鈥� responses in the project (a national sample that was surveyed with rigorous academic standards, according to the researchers), only 1 out of every 20 American school children consumes alcohol. Even limiting the analysis to teenagers, parent answers suggest only 1 in 10 kids ever drink.聽 (Compare this to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 72 percent of all high school students have tried alcohol.)聽

More than 7 in 10 parents report that none of their children are overweight. 聽And according to parents, 72 percent of American teenagers have 鈥渄efinitely not鈥� had sex, while more than a third of the country鈥檚 school children are A students, while another 49 percent are either A/B or B students. Ninety-three percent of children have never been suspended, and two-thirds have received an award or certificate for outstanding performance in school, sports, music or the arts.聽

Now, this last tidbit might be close to accurate.聽 We wouldn鈥檛 be the first ones to point out the 鈥渢rophies for everyone鈥� trend has pretty well taken over our child rearing culture.聽

But for most of these statistics, there is a clear disconnect between parent perception and what researchers say is an accurate picture of child achievement.聽聽

Carl Desportes Bowman, the director of survey research at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture and the lead author of the family culture report, said he suspected the parents鈥� rosy view of their own families has to do with another national trend: one toward not just close families, but families where parents hope to be 鈥渇riends鈥� with their children.聽

Nearly half of American parents put themselves on the 鈥渃losest鈥� end of a numerical scale that evaluated how close they were with their children; seven out of 10 American parents say 鈥淚 hope to be best friends with my children when they are grown.鈥澛�

鈥淭here is so much emphasis on being close to your kids that it plays tricks with personal identity,鈥� Bowman says.聽聽

Now, some parents here might ask: what鈥檚 the problem with that?聽 Why not look at your kid in glowing terms?聽The researchers don鈥檛 confront this exactly head-on.聽 And聽sure, some less-than-objective love for your kid is natural.

聽The issue, perhaps, is that when there is a wide-spread, culturally inflated view of one鈥檚 own family, everyone else's starts to look lousy in comparison. And this can鈥檛 be helpful for a society that, as this report showed, is quite divided about the moral questions of parenting, families and what values children should internalize.聽

So next time - think a little closer about whether Johnny is really a straight A student who would never drink or have sex or text and drive.聽 A realistic view won鈥檛 make you a worse parent; it will just give you the empathy to deal with these issues on a macro level.