This remind me of the saying that it takes a village to raise a child. The job is really a tough yet very rewarding one. I've noticed that many parents more or less repeat the generational cycle of what they experience as a child into their children, albeit tailored into a modern context. For example, giving them screens to entertain their selves while you're doing some seemingly important is reminiscent of one's parents not always being around as a child. The only issue here is modern parents can be around yet not still be around because their attention is sucked away somewhere else in the attention black hole.
RE: Pay them with attention.