Rules
Parents must establish fair and reasonable rules and must enforce them consistently in order for teens to be able to negotiate the many challenges that they must face. Adolescents don’t have the tools—the prefrontal cortex development—to consistently and appropriately regulate themselves. In other words, they don’t have the judgment to consistently make appropriate decisions for themselves in the absence of parental rules. (Levine, 2006)
While teens may chafe at having firm rules that govern their behavior, in certain circumstances, the teen may be glad of a rule. If the teen is under pressure to engage in risky behavior, they can blame their parents (“My parents would kill me if I . . .”), and they can save face while staying within limits. (Levine, 2006)
Some categories of rules that are appropriate for teens are as follows:
• Curfew: Weekday and weekend;
• Supervision: Who is allowed at the house and at what times when no adult is at home;
• Dating: At what age are they allowed to date? How many years older/younger can their date be? At what age are they allowed to go on a “car date?”
• Smoking, drinking, taking drugs: Never acceptable; and,
• Cars: never get into the car with a driver who is has been drinking or using drugs.
Monitoring
In addition to establishing rules, parents need to monitor their teen’s behavior. They need to know where they are, whom they are with, and what they are doing. Parental monitoring reduces the incidences of risky behavior (early sexual encounters as well as tobacco, drug, and alcohol use) and promotes academic achievement and higher self-esteem. Optimal levels of monitoring depend on the potential danger in a situation and on your child’s capacity to use good judgment. (Levine, 2006)
It is necessary for parents to balance their need for monitoring with the teen’s need for independence. Without good monitoring, teens are vulnerable to making bad decisions. In situations in which it is difficult to show restraint, the teen will only be able to demonstrate that restraint if he has a strong attachment to a loving parent and he has clear guidelines for behavior and consequences for infractions. (Levine, 2006)
Mutual Respect
In addition to establishing rules and monitoring behavior, parents should seek to foster bonds of mutual affection and respect with their teen. A strong relationship between the teen and his parents makes it more likely that the teen will let his conscience be his guide when it comes to making decisions about his behavior in the absence of the parent.
Conscience
At this stage, the conscience seems to become less of an “all knowing” presence that threatens punishment at the mere thought of misbehaving and more of an “inner friend” to whom the teen may turn in times of stress to guide him and to help him avoid getting into trouble. Teens may rely on their conscience to make them feel guilty at the thought of the misdeed and, thus, keep them out of trouble, and it may be relied upon to help them find a way to seek forgiveness and/or to make amends if they go ahead and misbehave in spite of the pangs of conscience. Over time, the conscience seems to evolve allowing the teen to distinguish between serious transgressions and minor mistakes in judgment. (Furman, 1987)
Independence
Another way that parents can support their teen in making good decisions is to give freedom of choice within limits. In this way, parents foster independence in their teen. If parents have encouraged independence consistently over the years, the teen will be more likely to make good decisions in the parents’ absence.
In addition, telling your teen stories about your life when you were a teen can help him to make good decisions. I used stories from my own life and from the lives of my friends to highlight examples of both good and bad decisions that we made and the consequences of those decisions. Being honest with your teen about your past can bring you closer together and can help your teen avoid making the same mistakes that you made.
Supervision
It is inadvisable to leave your teen home alone until he has previously and consistently demonstrated that he can exercise good judgment. Even if it is deemed appropriate to leave your teen at home alone, it is generally not a good idea to allow him to have friends over when there is no supervision unless both your teen and his friends have demonstrated good judgment in the past.
Curfews
When children become adolescents and go out at night with friends, it is wise to impose a curfew. During the week, that curfew should reflect the teen’s need for sleep. Adolescents require about 9 hours of sleep at night or they will be sleep-deprived. This leads to an earlier bedtime than most of them would like. While you can’t force a teen to sleep, you can at least have them home and in their room by a certain time each night. Limiting screen time in their room will also lead to an earlier bedtime. On weekends, this curfew may be extended if you allow them to sleep late to compensate.
I put curfews in the category of negotiable rules. If there is a party that your teen wants to attend or a concert that he wants to go to, then, by all means, extend the curfew, but make sure that the party is to be supervised and that you or another parent picks them up from any event that keeps them out late. In doing this, you keep them out of cars driven by drunk or otherwise impaired drivers. In addition, if you are the one doing the driving, picking them up allows you to determine, before they have a chance to sleep it off, take a shower, or otherwise conceal the evidence, whether they have been drinking, smoking cigarettes or smoking marijuana.
Trust
If your teen has proven himself to be thoroughly trustworthy, you can give him more independence. My children earned my trust from an early age, and I did not worry that they were involved in risky or illegal activities. I did, however, make it a hard and fast rule that they were never to get in the car with a driver who had been drinking or taking drugs. They knew that if they ever found themselves in such a situation, they were to call me, and I would come and pick them up (no matter what the time), and I would bring them (and any of their friends) home with no questions asked. My thinking on this was that if they trusted that I would not lecture or scold them, they would take me up on this. And by making the offer, I was ensuring, at least to some degree, that they would think twice about getting involved in situations such as these.
It turns out that my trust was well placed and that I was certainly correct that some teens were not as prudent as mine were. When my children were in high school, they lost a classmate to drunk driving. This is often the case in high schools all over the country, and it is a terrible shame. I’m not saying that there was anything that the parents could have done to prevent this, but it goes without saying that it is the parents’ responsibility to do whatever they can to keep their children safe. Sometimes we can’t save them from themselves, however.
Consequences
It may be appropriate to make rules and consequences with your teen rather than imposing rules and consequences on him. Some consequences that may be appropriate for teens include the following:
• phone privileges suspended;
• car privileges suspended;
• early curfew; and,
• grounding;
Conclusion
The most important part of discipline during the teenage years is having a positive relationship with your teen. This requires that you keep lines of communication open (see blog post from 10 July 2015) and give him plenty of opportunities for independent action in his earlier years (see blog post from 8 June 2015). When he becomes an adolescent, including him in decisions about rules and consequences is a good way to show respect for him and his growing maturity.
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References
Furman, E. (1987). Helping Young Children Grow. Madison: International Universities Press.
Levine, M. (2006). The Price of Privilege: How Parental Pressures and Material Advantage Are Creating a Generation of Disconnected and Unhappy Kids. New York: Harper Collins.
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