[bpyne]

I think we need to have a better idea what's meant by "family ties". I'm from the US. My teammate on a project is a woman from India. (We're both working in the US.) She doesn't have children, but I have a 9yo daughter. We talk about differences in how my wife and I raise our daughter versus how she was raised. My wife and I follow the trend in the US of being very involved in our daughter's life. We walk her to school, volunteer for her softball and basketball leagues, and play key roles in the PTA. I stepped back my software engineering career so that I can pick her up a few days a week from school and either hang out, setup a play date, or bring her to an activity. (As an aside, because I'm part-time employed now, I assumed more of the household tasks. There seems to be a trend in this direction in the US for men.)

In my teammate's experience, parents in India tend to be more hands off and let their kids develop independence earlier. Parents focus more on career. Grandparents are more involved with caring for the children while parents work. Despite the more hands off approach, my teammate misses her parents greatly and was very sad and worried when her father was ill recently.

The parenting approaches are different, but the ephemeral "family tie" seems to be present in both situations.

[Manishearth]

Actually, my experience (Indian-American, brought up in the States but currently studying in India), is sort of the opposite.

Americans inculcate a _lot_ more independence than Indians do.

For example, in the US:

- Kids often get jobs and earn their own pocket money at 13+. It's the norm in most places after 16.

- Kids fund their own education

- After 18, there's an expectation in many families that the child will leave and become independent (or at least start paying rent)

- Kids generally make their own life decisions

- This reverses in old age; "old people's homes" are common in the US. After retirement, parents stay separate, and if they're unable to take care of themselves will often move into one of these. Nuclear families are common

In India:

- Middle class kids will not earn until 18, mostly not until after college. When they do earn it's something you can brag about. Definitely not the norm.

- Education is funded by parents. I earned a lot of money last year (I'm a college student). When my friends asked me what I intended to do with it, I got quizzical looks when I said that I was repaying my education. (Higher ed isn't particularly expensive here, but it's not cheap either, and I sort of wanted to start being more independent)

- It is perfectly fine to stay home till ... forever.

- Life decisions are made by the family, sometimes. Marriage is an example of this (though arguably there's a lot of legacy cultural reasons behind that). But career choices are too. A ton of the folks in my college are there because their family wanted them to study engineering.

- Kids take care of their parents as they get older. Extended families are common.

YMMV, of course, but this is commonly how things go from talking with my peers in both countries. Perhaps what you're noticing is a difference in generations, not in countries. Parents are universally more involved in the minutae of their children's lives than they used to be in the past.

[harryh]

Articles like this make me think the Indian way is better:

http://aeon.co/magazine/culture/children-today-are-suffering...

I'm about to have a kid (wife is 8 months pregnant) so I've been thinking about this some. Unfortunately though, a lot of this is culture and individual parents can't necessarily do a lot. It doesn't matter if I'd rather my kid play in a pick-up game instead of an organized league if all the other kids in the neighborhood are only in leagues.

[bpyne]

Just some advice, don't worry about organized league vs. street play so much. I played organized hockey year-round (up to 3 teams at a time) and still had plenty of time for unorganized play with neighborhood kids. I grew up in an urban, relatively population-dense neighborhood. Within 2 blocks, there were at least 30 kids within 3 years of my age. Your child's chance to do unorganized activity depends mostly on the number of kids close to his/her age within shouting distance.

The biggest drain on your child's free time is going to be school. Our culture is scared right now about falling behind the rest of the developed world in cognitive skills necessary for the future job market. The knee-jerk reaction is to work harder. The result is that more homework gets assigned, more testing takes place, and some groups are calling for longer school days and less vacation time.

You're a parent now. Educate yourself on child development and Education reform. Then get yourself involved politically so you can be your child's advocate.

[amalag]

That is an interesting article but I don't think they do it any better in India. In India there is even more emphasis on memorizing things. In India academics are probably over emphasized.

[harryh]

shrug

I really have no idea. Was just responding to the parent comment which said: "In my teammate's experience, parents in India tend to be more hands off and let their kids develop independence earlier."

[amalag]

I have Indian from the US but have spent time in India. I think its the opposite, but as you said shrug