The Truth about Lies

When a child can already distinguish fantasy from reality, which is from age three to four, he will now be capable of lying. This can be a serious problem in the future if parents will just ignore it. According to Dr. Mirriam Stoppard, there are different purposes why a child will tell a lie:

1.0 Exploratory: This is to see how a parent will react. A good example would be telling that he does not want the food but he ate it all. This is serious and should be discouraged because there is a great tendency that he will do this repeatedly until he gets use to it.

2.0 Bragging: This is when a child tells exaggerated stories to impress his friends and to boost his self-confidence. Although it is not really harmless, this must be discouraged because when his friends will learn that he is lying, then he might loose them.

3.0 Make-believe: This is when the child mixes fantasy with reality. Monsters and fairies are among of those a child would tell his parents that he sees, when in reality it is just his imagination. This is not dangerous since it is normal for a child to be in a fantasy world.

4.0 Cover-up: This is very dangerous situation. It is being deliberately done to avoid punishment and it can be upgraded as the child grows. Parents should be careful in dealing this. Punishing or not punishing your child might still lead him to lie again.

Here are some of the actions parents should make:

1.0 Act calmly. A child may sometimes be confused fantasy from reality.
2.0 Understand his motives. Maybe he is just afraid to be punished.
3.0 Explain to him the consequences of his actions. You may site simple examples.
4.0 Make your punishments reasonable. If not, he will lie again.
5.0 Show anger but let him be aware that you still love him in spite of his wrongdoing.
6.0 For bragging, increase his self-esteem and help him bring back his confidence.
7.0 Never hurt or curse your child. If you are consistent with this, you are just encouraging him to tell a lie again.

If you want to live a life, honesty is still the best policy.

Article Source:Effective Parenting Tips