Cotton-wool kids ... overprotective parents are setting their kids up for failure.

Even though there is no evidence that it is more dangerous for children to go to the park or walk to school without adults, parents are increasingly wrapping their offspring in cotton wool, a Perth study has found.

Children's mental development and health were also being threatened by their parents' fear of strangers, which was often cited as the reason parents did not let children leave the home without supervision.

The research, exploring the role parental fear for their child's security plays in limiting their physical activity and independence, was undertaken by University of Western Australia Assistant Professor Lisa Wood, in conjunction with the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research's Professor Stephen Zubrick.

It found that even though abduction, robbery, assault and homicide statistics had not risen substantially over the past 50 years, parents were more anxious not only about what could happen to their children but also about how other parents perceived them.

As a result children were leading less-active lives, were less likely to walk or cycle to school or play in parks, Assistant Professor Wood said.

Parents will greatly over-estimate the danger their children are in if they walk to school or to the park.

"It is very rare for a child to be abducted by a stranger. What has changed is that there is so much more media and community attention now if a child is abducted so it's in parents' faces constantly," Assistant Professor Wood said.

"Parents will greatly over-estimate the danger their children are in if they walk to school or to the park. It's really terrible when (something bad) happens but there's a huge gap between the likelihood of it happening and it actually happening."

She said children as young as 10 should have developed the skills necessary to allow them to go out on their own.

"We also should be fearful if our children are not active, if they become overweight, if they don't have the life skills like negotiating traffic, peripheral vision, and social skills," she said.


"By not allowing children to move around their neighbourhoods kids are missing out on some skills and physical activities and parents are so fearful that they get caught up in a spiral themselves."

Changes to family life in Australia, such as both parents working and the need for care outside the home, were also a factor in the changing attitudes, Professor Zubrick said.

"These factors, and changes to daily activity and routine, impart clear restrictions on where children can be left unsupervised, who can supervise them, the rules for transferring duty of care, and general tolerance for children having a 'freer range' of independent mobility," Professor Zubrick said.

The study recommended a number of strategies to combat the problem, including empowering parents to be less fearful and implementing transport systems that promote cycling and walking.

The issue of the freedom given to children has attracted recent controversy after the publicity given to American mother Lenore Skenazy, who has started a movement called Free Range Kids.

Ms Skenazy was branded "America's worst mom" after making a controversial decision in 2008 to drop her nine-year-old son in downtown Manhattan to take the subway home alone.

Skenazy, a columnist and author, responded to the attention by launching a crusade to urge parents to teach their children independence and social skills by loosening the reins.

Her parenting style includes taking her two sons to the park and leaving them there to meet other kids, play unaccompanied and find their way home when they are done.



