Is it ever okay for children to lie?
A lie, as we know, is intentionally trying to deceive another person by saying something that isn't true.
And at around age three, children understand the concept of lies – and can tell porky pies themselves.
By middle childhood, their lies become more sophisticated and sound much more believable.
As children become older, they can distinguish between different types of lies, such as those that are about being polite or protecting someone else.
So children lie, and they lie in many different ways.
It's clear that children learn to lie, and the older they get, the more successfully they learn to cover up the truth.
They lie to:
- Avoid getting in trouble: "I didn't do that drawing on the wall."
- Get something they want: "Mum said I could have cake."
- Avoid having to do something: "But the dog spilled that milk, he should have to clean it up!"
- Blame others: "Jack hit me first."
- Protect themselves from embarrassment: "My (imaginary) friend had a toilet accident."
- Protect someone else from embarrassment: "But Georgia doesn't know how to put mud on the cat."
- Exaggerate when playing: "My friend Olivia said that I could stay at her house for the weekend."
- Be polite about something they do or don't like: "Dad said I can't eat green things."
So is telling lies okay? According to research conducted with almost 200 parents of children aged 3½ to 6, it all depends.
The researchers were interested in two questions: Do parents believe that there are some situations where lying is acceptable? If so, do parents teach this to their young children?
Promoting honesty within your family, encouraging cooperation and using humour can often be good ways to discourage bad habits.
In all, parents admitted that there are times when it is okay to lie. They nominated lies that are about protecting others as being the most acceptable.
But parents weren't actively teaching this to their young children – instead, they were teaching their children that lying is unacceptable and that they should always tell the truth.
So if a child was caught lying, the parent would discuss why it was unacceptable and why it's important to tell the truth. Basically, there was a difference between what parents believed and what they taught their children.
There were also times when parents were undermining their own message. They either told lies themselves in front of the children, or they asked their children to fib (such as "Don't tell Mum we had takeaway tonight").
If parents did teach their young children that it is sometimes okay to stretch the truth, then those children were more likely to tell lies than those who were taught that it's never acceptable.
In this study, the children lied on average 9.44 times over two weeks.
It's clear that children learn to lie, and the older they get, the more successfully they learn to cover up the truth.
Promoting honesty within your family, encouraging cooperation and using humour can often be good ways to discourage bad habits. Guiding your child's behaviour, rather than labelling them as a liar, is also a way to encourage truth telling at a young age.
As children get older, you can have more conversations about the difference between intentional untruths that are dishonest and little white lies that are socially acceptable.
Written by Jodie Benveniste. First appeared on Stuff.co.nz.
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