Bringing Up Girls: Practical Advice and Encouragement for Those Shaping the Next Generation of Women [Hardcover]

James C. Dobson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 13, 2010

2011 Retailers Choice Award winner!
Bringing Up Boys by parenting expert and best-selling author Dr. James Dobson was, and continues to be, a runaway hit, selling more than 2 million copies to date. Now, Dr. Dobson presents his highly anticipated companion book: Bringing Up Girls. Based on extensive research, and handled with Dr. Dobson’s trademark down-to-earth approach, Bringing Up Girls will equip parents like you to face the challenges of raising your daughters to become healthy, happy, and successful women who overcome challenges specific to girls and women today and who ultimately excel in life.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

You’ve got daughters? Then you’ve got questions.
Parents, teachers, and others involved in shaping the character of girls have a lot on their minds:

• Are girls really fundamentally different from boys? If so, should they be treated differently?
• Whoever said that girls are “sugar and spice and everything nice” never met my teenager. What can I do?
• My adolescent daughter seems to be on an emotional roller coaster. One minute she’s giddy with excitement; the next she’s moody and withdrawn. Is this normal?
• As a mom, I so badly want to be “best friends” with my daughter. Why isn’t it working out the way I dreamed?
• How does a dad’s role in his daughter’s life influence her character and decisions—including her eventual choice of a husband?
• How can grandparents contribute to raising a healthy granddaughter?
• What’s the best way to educate girls?
• How are girls affected when their parents divorce?
• What should we be doing to shape the next generation of women?

In Bringing Up Girls, Dr. James Dobson, America’s foremost authority on parenting, tackles these and many other questions, offering wisdom and encouragement based on a firm foundation of biblical principles.
JAMES C. DOBSON, Ph.D., has devoted his career to helping children and families. A licensed psychologist and a marriage, family, and child counselor, he served on the faculty of the University of Southern California School of Medicine for 14 years and on the attending staff of Childrens Hospital Los Angeles for 17 years. He holds a Ph.D. in child development from the University of Southern California. Heavily involved in governmental activities related to the family, Dr. Dobson served on the task force that summarized the White House Conferences on Families and received a special commendation from President Jimmy Carter. He was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the National Advisory Commission to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. He has also served on the Attorney General’s Advisory Board on Missing and Exploited Children, the Department of Health and Human Services’ Panel on Teen Pregnancy Prevention, and the Commission on Child and Family Welfare.

From the Back Cover

The ultimate guide to raising our daughters right—from parenting expert and trusted family counselor Dr. James Dobson
Peer pressure. Eating disorders. Decisions about love, romance, and sex. Academic demands. Life goals and how to achieve them. These are just some of the challenges that girls today face—and the age at which they encounter them is getting younger and younger. As a parent, how are you guiding your daughter on her journey to womanhood? Are you equipping her to make wise choices? Whether she’s still playing with dolls or in the midst of the often-turbulent teen years, is she truly secure in her identity as your valued and loved daughter?
In Bringing Up Girls, widely acclaimed parenting expert Dr. James Dobson presents his highly anticipated companion book to the bestselling Bringing Up Boys. Based on the latest research, and handled with Dr. Dobson’s trademark down-to-earth approach, Bringing Up Girls will help you face the challenges of raising your daughters to become strong, healthy, and confident women who excel in life.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.; 1st edition (April 13, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1414301278
• ISBN-13: 978-1414301273
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (93 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,767 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

James C. Dobson, Ph.D., is founder and chairman emeritus of Focus on the Family, a nonprofit organization that produced his internationally syndicated radio programs, heard by more than 200 million people every day. A licensed psychologist and marriage, family, and child counselor, he earned a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California in the field of child development. The author of more than 30 books, including his most recent bestseller, Bringing Up Boys, he has been heavily involved in governmental activities related to the family. Dr. Dobson is married to Shirley and they reside in Colorado.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

65 of 72 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Bringing Up Girls Review, May 17, 2010

By 

L. Courtney "Book Mom" - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bringing Up Girls: Practical Advice and Encouragement for Those Shaping the Next Generation of Women (Hardcover)

Several years ago I read Dr. Dobson's book Bringing Up Boys. As the mother of a boy and the wife of a man who used to be a boy, I was thrilled to learn what made them tick. So, I was very excited to have the chance to review Bringing Up Girls through the Tyndale Blag Network!

Dr. Dobson, in Bringing up Girls, first relates the physiological and psychological differences between boys and girls answering the question: What makes girls unique? Everything he writes is well backed up with current research. He goes on to talk about the importance of mothers and then fathers in a girl's life. He broaches some discussion of discipline. He looks at modesty and why this is such an issue with girls today. He sites research related to our current culture and technological trends that affect girls particularly. He attempts to give parents a better understanding of why their little girls (and big girls) are the way they are are and to equip parents to raise these girls to be the young women God wants them to be.

I was very impressed with Bringing Up Girls (as I was with Bringing up Boys). I find the physiological differences between boys and girls very interesting- especially as our culture has tried for so long to tell us boys and girls really aren't all that different. I think Dr. Dobson does an excellent job of bringing in a wide array of statistical research as well as writings form other learned people on the topic. He also provides real life interviews with girls and parents to give practical examples.

Dr. Dobson is very opinionated about such issues as stay-at-home moms, abstinence, and modesty. Some readers may not appreciate this "political incorrectness", but , as I happen to agree with most of what he says, I do appreciate his candidness. I also appreciate the fact that he is willing to be counter-cultural to address some of these important truths that parents need to know.

I will definitely recommend Bringing Up Girls and plan to pass my copy on to other moms who are raising these young woman of the future.

Tyndale House Publishers has provided me a free copy of this book for review purposes.

64 of 71 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not as good as I thought it would be, May 24, 2010

By 

American Expat (Cairo, Egypt) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Bringing Up Girls: Practical Advice and Encouragement for Those Shaping the Next Generation of Women (Hardcover)

I'm a big fan of Dr. Dobson's, so I had high hopes for this book. Unfortunately, I was left disappointed. It seemed that there was little practical advice. Instead, there were pages upon pages of warning about how depraved our culture has become and how toxic it is to girls. It was filled with discouraging statistics. There is a place for such warnings and such statistics, but I thought that this book focused on them without providing the counterbalance--the advice of how to help our daughters grow strong and healthy, avoiding becoming one of those statistics. Despite this, there were a few gems in the book. The one that stands out the most for me was the early emphasis on the role of the father--too many fathers do not realize how important they are in their daughters' lives, right from the beginning. The early part of this book did a good job in pointing that out. After those couple of chapters, however, it was all negatives and no advice for how to avoid them. I hoped for better from Dr. Dobson.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Eh, March 23, 2011

By 

Colleen Schwenger - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Bringing Up Girls: Practical Advice and Encouragement for Those Shaping the Next Generation of Women (Hardcover)

I was very disappointed by this book. I really enjoyed "Bringing Up Boys" and found lots of insights and practical advice in it. "Bringing Up Girls", however, offered very little, if any, practical advice. I was hoping for insights on things like good vs. bad friendships, gossip, effective methods of disciplining girls, attitudes, and all I got out of the book was "make sure she has a good relationship with dad". We've already heard that from a hundred different sources.He even took it to a Freudian level, making a weird comment about dads being attracted to their developing daughters' bodies. That one point seemed to be repeated over...and over...and over...until I was ready to scream "OK! I get it, but what else should I do?!" It seems to focus entirely on the teen years and offers little help for moms of younger girls other than "encourage them to play princesses". I almost got the feeling he never met a real little girl. He seems to assume they are all sweetness and light until puberty and then they are going to cut themselves and have sex. I have a seven year old and I wanted to know how to handle bossiness and know-it-all attitudes and bad influences. Maybe the book was helpful to mothers of teens, but not to me.
I should ad here that I really like Dr. Dobson and his other books. I just can't believe he didn't have more to put in this one.