Teen Lying

Teenagers usually begin disobeying their parents with simple acts of defiance and one of the first things they turn to is lying and this can be very frustrating for their parents who many not know what to believe or what to discount. It can also make parents very angry that their teens are being dishonest with them especially if the teen refuses to admit that they were lying after they’ve been caught. However if you find out that your teen has been lying to you it’s important to deal with the situation right away instead of ignoring it and hoping that it will resolve itself. If you do confront your teen though it’s critical that you be sure that you have your facts straight. If you accuse your teen of lying when they haven’t been they’ll lose all respect for you and they’ll probably be even more closed off to you then they were before.

When you confront your teen about having lied to you the best thing you can do is to try and figure out why they were lying to you in the first place. If it was a simple misunderstanding and they were trying to avoid upsetting you (perhaps they broke a favorite dish or figurine or something) then that’s one thing and you should encourage them to just be honest with you and explain the situation. Remind them that you’ll never be angry with them without justification and that if they just be open with you there won’t be a need for any dishonesty between the two of you. If it’s a situation where your teen is intentionally lying to you then that’s an entirely different matter and requires that you apply some pressure to the situation. It’s important that your teen understand that lying, for any reason, is unacceptable but lying intentionally to cover up an action or a rule-breaking is especially not accepted and will not be tolerated.

If your teen has lied to you in order to cover up an action or a behavior they knew they would be punished for then an extra set of punishment should be applied because not only did your teen disobey you they also lied about it to you - the actions are separate and thus the consequences for the behaviors should be separate as well. Usually the punishment for these types of rule-breaking involve a loss of privileges and it’s also important to convey the loss of trust that has happened as well. A good way to go about this is to simply require that your teen be more available to your supervision and has less freedom.

Once your teen has decided to stop lying to you and has been making progress towards earning your trust back you can slowly begin to restore some of their prior privileges and freedoms to them as they begin to display the correct behaviors and show that they are willing to be open and honest with you. The most important thing here is to establish the grounds for communication so that there is never a need for lying or dishonesty again.