Why parents should talk a lot to their young kids — and choose their words carefully

By Valerie Strauss September 30th, 2015

In 1995, the now famous Hart/Risley study was published on the impact of language on young children, revealing that  low-income children are exposed to 30 million fewer words than their higher-income peers before age 3. The study, and others that followed, found connections between poor early literacy skills and lifelong academic, social and income disparities, leading to a number of initiatives to help low-income parents understand the importance of language.

Children And Lying

Honesty and dishonesty are learned in the home. Parents are often concerned when their child or adolescent lies.

Lying that is probably not a serious problem:

Young children (ages 4-5) often make up stories and tell tall tales. This is normal activity because they enjoy hearing stories and making up stories for fun. These young children may blur the distinction between reality and fantasy.

Violent video games can alter children’s personality and in fact lead to violent/aggressive behavior

With the advancements in technology, various forms of entertainment were produced, one of the most popular one amongst all ages is video gaming. About 90 percent of U.S. kids ages 8 to 16 play video games, and they spend about 13 hours a week doing so (more if you’re a boy). 

Various studies suggest that young kids that play violent video games tend to display an increase in more aggressive behavior in real life.

What Causes Autism?

People have been searching for the cause of autism for decades. For most of this time, autism was looked at as an affliction—something that is acquired, as a disease would be. But autism isn’t something that you catch, like influenza. Rather, it is something that you are, like tall or left-handed or female. 

Autistic people were born that way. They will die that way, after living an autistic life. It is a characteristic of who they are. Having said that, there is no single expression of autism. More than a spectrum, autism is a varied landscape.