By: Alice Langholt
Teenage peer pressure can be highly influential with the constant process of making choices and weighing what they have been told by parents, peers, the media, teachers and other sources of information. Any one of these influences can be attractive to a teen. Yet parents can be a stronger influence than peers, if they equip their teens with the courage and skills to assertively resist negative peer pressure.
Open Communication
It's important to be able to talk openly with your teen, and to make sure your teen is comfortable talking with you. It isn't easy, but it is important. Here are a few points to remember: don't judge, don't lecture and don't react emotionally. Instead, ask questions about how your teen feels about experiences, listen and problem solve and stay outwardly calm and rational. Let your teen know he can come to you to talk about peer pressure, and that you are here to help. Encourage your teen to offer her own suggestions on how to cope with friends or pressure, then steer her toward the choices that you think are best.
Discuss Behaviors and Expectations
Be clear, and be consistent. Make sure your teen knows the rules, boundaries and expectations in regards to curfew, smoking, drinking, going to class, being truthful and sexual behavior. These may be difficult discussion topics, but they are important enough that you need to work through your own feelings and appear as confident as you can.
Be honest if you want. Tell your teen if you made bad choices during your teenage years, and why you now realize they were wrong. Teens often don't grasp the long-term consequences of their actions, so providing examples involving people they know can help.
You don't have to share your past if you don't want to. Do think the whole conversation through before you begin. If you need to practice the discussion beforehand in the mirror or with your spouse, do so. You want to enter this conversation prepared and clear. Give reasons for the rules, and it will be easier for your teen to accept them. Help your teen feel armed with ways to confidently adhere to the boundaries, and the boundaries will be stronger.
Remember to watch your own behavior around your teen. "Do as I say, not as I do," is a rule that is seldom followed. Remember that if your teen sees you as someone who is in control and beyond the influence of others, he is likely to imitate that behavior.
Give Your Teen Tools
Instead of just laying out expectations and leaving your teen to figure out how to meet them, offer suggestions for how to deal with specific situations. You can ask your teen to give you a hypothetical situation, and you will give him the words to respond. Role plays give your teen the chance to practice assertive words in a safe situation. Doing role plays is also a bonding experience for parents and teens. The more types of peer pressure situations you can give your teen, the easier it will be for her to say no comfortably. Tell your teen she can use you as an excuse ("My mom would be so mad!"), or call you to pick her up at any time and you will.
Choose Your Battles
If your teen is hanging out with a group of friends who follow a fashion trend you don't like, you may decide to let it slide. Strangely colored hair, black nails, henna tattoos and baggy jeans are a passing thing. It may make sense to save drawing the line for when it's really important. Your teen needs some freedom for self-expression, and it may be wise to give him some reins when the choices are not dangerous or permanent.
Positive Peer Pressure
This is the kind you want your teen facing. It all depends on what your teen's friends are into doing. If your teen is hanging out with kids who get good grades and enjoy playing on the football team together, the pressure created by the expectation to do well is good for everyone. If, however, your teen doesn't enjoy football and only plays it to please his friends, doesn't play as well as they do and feels bad about himself because of it, this may not be positive peer pressure.
Talk to your teen about the reasons he participates in certain activities and whether or not he enjoys them. Offer ways he can stay true to himself and still keep his friends, or help him find other activities he will enjoy.
Pay Attention
Observe your teen. Know who his or her friends are. Meet the friends, meet their parents. Keep in touch with a cell phone or prearranged check-in times.
Building a trusting relationship depends on your teen keeping your trust. If you suspect your teen may be lying, ask some open-ended questions, such as, "What was that movie about last night?" rather than, "How was the movie?"
If your teen has sudden changes in behavior, stops being motivated in school, loses interest in hobbies or starts acting defiant, it may be time to intervene. Talk to teachers, coaches, staff, parents or friends to find out what is going on. If you suspect your teen may be just starting to hang out with the wrong friends, you can keep him busy by diverting his time to getting a job, meeting different people in a youth group or some other extra-curricular activity that can get the teen involved with a different crowd and take his time away from the wrong crowd.
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