I’m not going to lie, I’ve got mixed feelings about being in The Times today. The article is exploring my work at Magdalen College School (with Helen Pike) and the workshop I recently ran for parents focused on developing the character strength of honesty.

I’m a little nervous that I’ll now become known as the expert that tells parents "yes, your child is a liar!" (based on the headline). When really our focus is much more about how we enable children and young people to build strengths of courage, kindness, honesty and leadership. To be able to focus on those strengths we sometimes have to explore the darker sides too.

Here’s a few things I say in the article:

“I’m not saying it’s great that your children lie, or to encourage more, but it’s important to recognise that there are some very complicated cognitive processes that come with the ability to be able to do that...”

“It’s really important that we don’t overreact to lying and we recognise that maybe we do sometimes have a gut reaction. What children say [initially] isn’t necessarily the story they might want to tell when they’ve had a bit more time to think about it…”

“Parents who overreact are sending a strong message to their children that it’s best to hide any lies or mistakes in the future.”

"The bigger picture is helping children and teenagers to feel resilient and OK when they are not perfect, despite being surrounded by YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, which can be their reality. Harrison says lying can be like an iceberg, sitting on top of other things."

I did like that Nicola (the journalist) picked up on my own character strengths - “Speaking on Zoom, the clinical psychologist is calm but engagingly positive, in a way that would probably reassure parents who are concerned that their child is becoming a prolific liar.”

The article is here - https://lnkd.in/ecCANsdq