4 Reasons Your Teen Is Lying?
How do you know a teen is lying? Their mouth is open. This is an old joke, but for some parents, the problem is, “When is their teen telling the truth?”
“I’m so sick of your lying!!” Do you have this type of relationship with your teen? There’s a lot of dishonesty and mistrust? To figure this one out you might have to go to the root of the problem and consider who might have lied to them first.
1. Their Environment
Teens really learn from those around them and they absolutely hate when adults are hypocritical about “proper behavior.” When you ask your teen to be honest while those around them are not, you create a world of hypocrisy (e.g. having to lie about abuse or a parent’s affair).
2. Reliability
Teens really need consistency. So if you say you’re going to do something, that thing needs to be done. Repeated disappointment teaches mistrust of what others say and gives your teen a very low standard to which they compare themselves.
3. No Rules
Teens also like to be held accountable and although they don’t seem to like the process of getting caught in a misdeed, they understand that getting caught means that you cared enough to change their behavior. Teens who are allowed to get away with bad behavior may wonder what they have to do to get caught. They will set off a series of lies that should get them caught to test your commitment to parenting them. If they are not held accountable, they may continue lying out of sheer habit of not telling the truth.
4. The Truth Is Hard To Hear
Some teens really want to tell the truth, but know they can’t because their parents won’t understand, may judge or may just get angry. Your teen knows you fairly well so even if they did nothing, they may know it is better to lie because you will always doubt the truth to their disadvantage (e.g. Yes I was at a party where there were drugs, but I didn’t know drugs would be there and I certainly didn’t do any).
Teens are not born lying. They are taught by the way their environment gives examples of the truth. So if you have a teen that seems to lie about everything, it‘s time to ask what’s going on in their lives rather than stay frustrated.
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I have a ‘compulsive’ liar. My other children are exceedingly honest (even when the truth hurts) but the one is unbelievable. I’m so accustomed to it now that on the rare occasions that she tells the truth, I no longer believe her. I know of nothing in our environment that makes her this way. I’m known to be honest (sometimes brutally so) and it’s a virtue I believe I’ve worked hard to instill. My ‘liar-liar-pants-on-fire’ borders on delusion. I think she really believes what she says except that even she can’t keep track of her lies. Is there some kind of psychological condition that can cause this? She has a diagnosis of bipolar and ADHD and is being successfully treated with meds, but the lies still range from innocuous to outrageous.