IYD: For Parents - A Simple Place to Start

For Parents

A Simple Place to Start - The Dinner Table

By Anita M. Smith
Vice President, The Institute for Youth Development

Parents are told pointedly and often that they need to improve. In general, they are blamed for everything from kids' bad manners to their lack of academic achievement to their unusual mode of dress to their sometimes outrageous - even heinous - acts portrayed on the evening news.

Youth experts, the media, teachers, policy makers, civic leaders, religious leaders, and even kids themselves seem to agree that parents need to do a better job.

And most parents want to do just that. The big question for many, as they juggle professional and personal challenges, is how and where to start.

Hundreds of books on parenting offer advice on setting limits, teaching responsibility, discipline, teaching values, building character, protecting kids from risky and unhealthy behaviors-all vital issues and critical concerns to adults who take their parenting role seriously. But finding the time to read all these valuable books and implement their good ideas can be even more daunting to parents than dealing with their sometimes out-of-control adolescents and teens.

But not all good parenting tips are necessarily complex. Not all require dramatic changes in priorities or lifestyle.

One simple yet effective parenting tip comes from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (known as Add Health). According to Dr. Kathleen Mullin Harris, researcher from the University of North Carolina, adolescents who share five to seven dinner meals a week with their parents-regardless of family structure-are less likely to participate in substance abuse or early sexual activity.

"Obviously it's not the dinner meal that's reducing substance abuse," Dr. Harris commented when presenting her data at an IYD briefing. "There's something about sharing this time on a regular basis that promotes healthy development. I think a multi-faceted process is going on. All of us can think about what's going on in our dinners, especially with children if they're there. You think of things that involve communication, the sharing of feelings, the giving and sharing of advice, help, support, information, and so on. Whatever is going on during dinner meals, it appears to be very important."

Of course shared evening family dinners aren't an instant solution to all the issues parents face raising their children. But it's a simple place to start that we now know makes a tangible difference.

For parents who already share at least five family dinner meals a week-well done! Keep it up!

For parents who do not, take heart! It' not too late to start. The upcoming holidays may provide an excellent time to ease into a new pattern of shared family dinner meals that will have a lasting impact.

Tips for Family Dinner Time

Make the mealtime pleasant, something the children look forward to, by sharing funny events and talking about things of interest to the children. Try not to use dinnertime as an opportunity to criticize or put a child on the spot about an uncompleted chore or unfinished homework.
Be sensitive to your children's feelings and limits. Don't try to make the meal time last too long-especially at first if you haven't been eating together regularly as a family.
Turn off the television.
Make the same rule for both kids and parents: No telephone calls during dinner.
Parents should avoid talking together exclusively about work or other adult-only issues.
If your children are young, begin family meal times now to establish the pattern and parent/child connections.
If you haven't been in the habit of sharing multiple family dinners weekly, ease into the new routine. Teens and adolescents may resist if they see it as forced family time that infringes on their personal schedules. Including their friends around the dinner table from time to time might help.
Be persistent. Between work, school, sports, band, and other activities that both children and parents are involved in it can be a real challenge to carve out family dinnertime at least five times a week. Keep trying and working toward the goal. Two meals are better than one; three are better than two.
Be creative. If your and your children's schedules simply make it impossible to eat multiple dinner meals together weekly, choose another time that provides similar opportunities for regular, uninterrupted, face-to-face interaction.

Note: Dr. Kathleen Mullin Harris's presentation was made at an IYD sponsored briefing on Add Health. The full transcripts of her presentation and those of three other Add Health researchers will be available before the end of the year. Watch the web site for details on ordering.