The Four Types of Emotionally Immature Parents

Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson's 2015 bestseller Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents is a self-help guide for those who experience residual trauma and stress from their childhood. The book is often recommended by therapists to help clarify emotional regulation issues in adults.

Gibson compiled decades of research to conclude that there are four types of emotionally immature parents: Emotional, Driven, Passive and Rejecting. All four types are similar in that they put the parent's desires over those of their children, but each type is distinct.

Emotional Parents: These parents can feel particularly unpredictable as they swing abruptly between being overly involved and entirely detached. They fluctuate based on how they feel at any given moment. They get upset easily and require everyone around to help soothe them.

Driven Parents: These parents thrive on busy-ness and achieving goals. They push their children to their definition of success regardless of how anyone feels about it. Their obsession with perfection can lead them to be overly-involved in their children's lives and manipulative.

Passive Parents: These parents avoid emotional upsets at all costs. They can often overlook serious issues like abuse or neglect, as well as minimize the feelings and experiences of everyone around them. They lack empathy and leave children feeling detached and alone.

Rejecting Parents: These parents actively avoid emotional intimacy and prefer just doing their own thing. When faced with the needs of others they can become explosively angry and/or isolate themselves from their family altogether. They are the least empathetic and most guarded.

Most emotionally immature parents will exhibit traits of all four of these types, but typically one type manifests most frequently. All types can result in adults who struggle voicing their needs as well as with establishing emotional intimacy with others.

This is because as kids, they learn that voicing their needs can cause them to be shamed or criticized. They will often put everyone else's desires above their own - even to their own detriment. They also tend to cling to any small amount of emotional intimacy they find.

It is possible to gain peace, self-confidence and become adults who can emotionally connect well with others. It doesn't require confronting emotionally immature parents or trying to change them, rather it takes looking at the past and/or present through a new lens.

When adults identify the parts of themselves that evolved due to unhealthy early childhood dynamics, it's easier to release tendencies that are no longer serving them. They can also learn to better cope with emotionally immature people and finally find true emotional intimacy.