Teaching Your Child to Resist Peer Pressure

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From an infant, we seek the approval of those around us. This feeling peaks at adolescence which can lead to declining mental health, self-esteem, and academic performance if social forces are negative. When positive, it can have the reverse effect as children are encouraged to perform better at school by positive influences around them. We have teamed up with a private school in Beaconsfield to share a few ways that you can teach your child to resist peer pressure.

How to Pick Friends

Friends will have a huge influence on your child and who they grow up to be. Teaching your child to pick their friends wisely will stop them falling into the wrong social circle and help them to avoid negative peer pressure. Explore what good and bad friends look like and how they can tell them apart.

Get to Know Their Friends

Equally, you can help them with this by getting to know their friends and their parents better. This will help you to gauge if they will be a positive influence on your child.

Role Play

Saying no isn’t the easiest thing to do, especially to a friend or peer. Practice can help your child to get comfortable with the idea while teaching them how to do so in a non-confrontational manner and avoid any potentially awkward situations. That might be how to convince them otherwise or offer alternatives to what their friends are suggesting.

You can also role play situations that they may encounter like being offered illegal substances and how they may present themselves. This will help them to stay alert and stay away from danger.

Reinforce Strong Values and Morals

Raising your child to have a strong moral compass will help them to refrain from participating in anything that’s dangerous or unsafe. Values such as honesty, humility, and compassion that you can exercise at home.

Peer pressure comes from a fear of rejection and low self-esteem. Reminding your child of their qualities and strengths will help you build their confidence and promote self-love so that they don’t need to seek validation from others. This will help them to be better equipped at saying no and dealing with peer pressure.

Talk About Consequences

All actions have consequences and raising your child with them will help them to be more aware of their actions. This can help them to be a better judge of their peers and the things that they encourage them to do.