Got A Nagging Mom? Chances Are You’ll Be More Successful
When you were growing up, did your mom drive you crazy with her nagging? Well, good news. A study by the University of Essex in England found that teenage daughters of pushy mothers will likely be more successful than girls raised by non-pushy ones. I know, I know, that doesn’t sound too fun (the nagging part), but knowing it’s for a good cause (one’s future success) may make it worth it.
The study was conducted with 15,500 girls, ages 13 and 14, in England from 2004-2010. According to the results, there any many benefits from having lived with a more assertive mother. The girls will:
- be more likely to go to college
- earn more money
- be less likely to be unemployed
- partner with successful mates
- be less likely to become pregnant outside of marriage (this is a big one, considering Britain has the highest rate of adolescent mothers in Europe!)
Female teens who were not as academic as others were seen as gaining the most from having such mothers. Ericka Rascon-Ramirez, who conducted the research, told the Daily Mail:
“In many cases we succeeded in doing what we believed was more convenient for us, even when this was against our parents’ will. But no matter how hard we tried to avoid our parents’ recommendations, it is likely that they ended up influencing, in a more subtle manner, choices that we had considered extremely personal. What our parents expected about our school choices was, very likely, a major determinant of our decisions about conceiving a child or not during our teenage years.”
What about fathers? Do they nag as much as mothers? Perhaps, but not in Rascon-Ramirez’s findings. “The measure of expectations in this study reflects a combination of aspirations and beliefs about the likelihood of attending higher education reported by the main parent, who, in the majority of cases, is the mother,” the study said.
Now, I have no research to prove this, but here are some mother-daughter duos where the daughters have gone on to have great success. (So kudos to their mothers!)
- Goldie Hawn & Kate Hudson
- Joan and Melissa Rivers
- Blythe Danner and Gwyneth Paltrow
- Hillary Clinton and Chelsea
- Sharon Osbourne & Kelly Osbourne
So before resenting our nagging mothers, perhaps we should thank them for our success instead.
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