Family : Be Firm but Fair With Teen-agers

Disciplining a teen-ager can be tricky. Dr. Kirsten Dahl, associate clinical professor at the Yale Child Study Center, offers this advice in Ladies’ Home Journal magazine:

Make your rules and limits completely clear. “Despite their grousing, what (teen-agers) most want to know is that their parents will hold firm to their values, rules and standards of behavior,” Dahl says. “A lot of their complaining is actually a way of reassuring themselves that that hasn’t changed.”

* Be willing to listen and negotiate. Explain the reasons for your rules, but let your teen-ager express his or her feelings. Negotiate and compromise until you reach a decision you can all live with.

* Keep in touch with other parents. You’ll be better prepared to respond when your teen-ager laments that you’re the only parent who insists she be home by 11 p.m. on weekends. On the other hand, you have a perfect right to say, “I know I’m the only parent, but I feel strongly that the others are wrong.”

* Make sure the punishment fits the crime. Be reasonable; sometimes it does take longer to get home from a basketball game. But if every Saturday night you get a phone call at five minutes to curfew, you need to find out what’s going on.