underparent

underparent verb: to provide one's child with insufficient attention and nurturing.

Verb

underparent (third-person singular simple present underparents, present participle underparenting, simple past and past participle underparented)

To provide one's child with insufficient attention and nurturing.
- Do I underparent my child because I am not around enough to give the child what he or she needs?2007, Michael Gurian, Nurture the Nature, page 111
- I am now convince it is more harmful to overparent than to underparent.2013, Steve Gilliland, Hide Your Goat: Strategies to Stay Positive When Negativity Surrounds You, page 70

underparent (plural underparents)

One who has a subordinate position to the main parent but who takes on some parental responsibilities.
- If Father is the typical male underparent, as he generally is, it is not that he is a failure, except by overparent standards.1978, William Reynolds, The American father, page 210

Verb
third-person singular present	underparents
present participle	underparenting
past participle	underparented
past	underparented
Noun
plural	underparents

From under- + parent.

What does underparent mean?: Underparent means to provide one's child with insufficient attention and nurturing.
What part of speech is underparent?: Underparent can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of underparent?: The past tense of underparent is underparented.

Adapted from Wiktionary: underparent (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-underparent.wav.

Cite this entry: “underparent.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/underparent. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.