Helping Teenagers Manage Peer Pressure

Peer pressure is a constant as we grow through childhood, adolescent, and even as adults. The use of the expression ‘peer pressure’ most times connotes negative influence. However, we must also know that there are peer pressures that have a positive influence on our children. However, we will limit ourselves to managing the negative influences. The following tips are provided as a guide.

·     As parents, make sure you know all your kid’s friends; this is important because you could easily discern the friends that might negatively influence your child

·     Explain to your child that peer pressure is real, and that there is nothing socially wrong with doing or deciding not to do what his mates are doing

·     Communicate with him as openly as possible so he can gain your trust to discuss things with you

·     Teach him morals in the house; the foundation of managing peer pressure is knowing and practicing morality

·     Let him understand that pressure could be verbalised or through actions; it could also be very subtle like when his friends decide not to include him in an innocent game of football maybe because he refused to smoke cigarettes or weed with them

·     Make him see himself in future; in this sense, reason with him of the evil effect of succumbing to peer pressures that while satisfying his immediate need to ‘belong’ could ruin him forever

·     He should act and think like a leader; he should be rational and logical, but not emotional

·     Where he takes a stand against a particular thing he is being pressured to do, he should maintain it and simply walk away from the situation

·     Being confident is a master key here as his mates will think twice before trying to influence him

·     Help him stay focused by engaging him in extracurricular activities in the genre of sports, music and gardening

·      Above all lead by example