parents don't realise that unwittingly they can push their own anxieties onto their children

Yeah, I think I got a lot of my outlook on finances and spending from seeing my parents struggle a lot of the time not because they were broke, but because they were borrowing. Life was better before I was a teenager and we were just poor really. So, I guess in a way it's a positive, but not necessarily everyone will take it that way. I'm just a people watching observer that sponges it all up. It's not even something I do consciously, but if I'm around friends and family, I learn a lot that they think I'd never notice.