Public Speaker and Author Gary King explains the two reasons kids lie and how parents can correct this.
A GOOGLE SEARCH for the phrase “honesty and integrity” brings up 1,350,000 results. The number might be typical of such searches, but scroll through the first several pages and it’s clear that these virtues are important to schools, churches, employers, government agencies at every level, and organizations that study trends in human behavior.
A study just released by the Josephson Institute, a California group that reviews and conducts surveys on ethics-related topics, says that 30 percent of the nation’s high-school students admit having stolen from a store in the past year, 42 percent say they have lied to save money, and 64 percent admit cheating on a test. Thirty-six percent said they plagiarized Internet information to complete an assignment. The numbers are rising compared with similar findings in past studies. The survey quizzed nearly 30,000 students at 100 high schools across the country.
While this is not intended to be one of those discussions about how the world is going to hell in a handbasket, considering the forces at work here and how to deal with them is certainly a worthwhile assignment. The researchers suggest that the increased pressure to get into a good college is leading some high-schoolers to cheat. Shoplifting may stem from teens wanting to keep material pace with their circle of friends. Are they spoiled? Do they not know right from wrong?
Educators contacted by The Associated Press were reluctant to blanket today’s young people with criticism, suggesting that such behavior merely mimics the actions of their parents and other adults who should set better examples.
Perhaps what seems like an innocuous situation sends a broader message: Father and son walk up to an admission gate. Kids 11 and under are free. Son is a youthful-looking 12-year-old. Father says, “One adult, one child, please.”
A child who sees that might experiment with an escalating series of “white lies,” which have something in common with his dad’s: They’re lies–dishonesty, pure and simple. The impression that action has left on the child may be much more costly than the price of an admission ticket. It’s not a message anyone should want to send.
Instead, it’s up to parents and teachers to emphasize integrity, and to preach from a child’s earliest days that nothing supercedes the importance of honesty.