Is Your Child Lying To You?

Wednesday, September 28, 2011, 17:29

If you find out that your child is lying to you then what do you do? Beat the child, discipline him/her or just laugh it off? All three of these approaches are wrong because you cannot be sure of what to do unless you know why children lie. Children of all ages lie. Even your little toddler is capable of lying and you will see him or her lie. This article is basically about toddler lies and how to deal with them.

If you are first time parents then these tips will help you deal with your lying child.

Why Do Children Lie?

Just because your toddler is really young that does not mean that they are lying out of silliness. You will be surprised to know that the are much smarter than you and know exactly what they are talking about.

Lying is a habit that has nothing to do with age. It is more about the nature or personality of your child. Your analysis will depend on the kind of lies your child is telling.

Sometimes children are too scared to tell the truth. If they know that they have done something wrong and they are going to get spanked for it then they will lie.

Suppose they have broken the bottle of your favourite nail polish while playing or spoiled some really important looking documents, then they may say they have not done it. You can make out from their guilty face that they are lying.

However, even if you know the reason for your child's lying, you cannot leave it at that. You have to dig deeper to do a little introspection. This could be an indication that you are being too strict with the child or your mode of punishment is too harsh.

If your child is lying for unimportant reasons then it means that there is no element of fear involved. Suppose you ask him what he did he do in play school and he says he saw a alien come down from the spaceship. It is a obvious lie but in such cases it could simply mean that your child is very imaginative and tries to spin fantastic tales as an outlet for his or her creativity.

However, if the child continues lying in this vein even after growing up then it might turn into a case of compulsive lying. That means that the first instinct of the person is always to lie instead of tell the truth even for unimportant matters.

To stop compulsive lying from childhood, you must explain to the child that telling stories is a good thing but when you are asked an question you have to give an accurate answer. You have to make sure they can differentiate between reality and illusion.

These parenting tips will tell you why children lie so that you can handle them in an easier way.