Special Reports

Frank Vascellaro & Amelia Santaniello
(WCCO) Maybe it was your smart-alecky friend or the one who always smelled like cigarettes. Chances are you had at least one pal your parents weren't crazy about.

WCCO-TV's Frank Vascellaro and Amelia Santaniello wondered what parents should do when they don't like their child's friends. To find out, they turned to Dr. David Walsh, a nationally-known parenting expert and the author of "No: Why Kids of All Ages Need to Hear It and Ways Parents Can Say It."

Vascellaro asked him, "Is it ever okay to tell a kid, 'No, absolutely not. You're not hanging out with so-and-so?'"

"I would only do that if there really starts to be some serious signs of serious trouble," said Walsh.

He said forbidding friends can backfire.

"Once we start to put kids on the do-not-call list, for teenagers in particular, that can even make them more attractive," he explained.

What works better is criticizing the behavior, not the friend. It's okay to tell your children, "I don't like the way Sean drives or the kind of language Maddy uses."

Walsh remembers how he handled some foul language flying around his household.

"I can still remember that when my kids were teenagers, and they had friends over playing basketball in the backyard, and I'd hear the language that I didn't like, and so I would go out and say, 'Do I have to get out the bar of soap?' And they knew I wouldn't do that, but it was a joking way for me to say, 'I don't want to hear that kind of talk in my backyard,'" he recalled.

"What can parents do to push their kids to positive influences?" Santaniello asked Walsh.

His response: Get your children involved.

"Connected kids are less likely to get into trouble," said Walsh. "So teams, clubs, activities, Scouts."

Walsh said parents are right to worry about peer pressure. He said friends do have an influence, an influence that grows as children get older.

"We also know from research that the most protective factor for the teenagers, to get them through those teenage years with the minimum of serious bumps and bruises, is connection with caring adults," said Walsh. "So that means knowing what your kids are doing, to the extent that you can. When they're teenagers, you don't want to follow them around."

Santaniello knows what that's like. That was her mother's parenting style during Santaniello's teen years.

"I just have to laugh," said Santaniello. "Because my mom did drive around and follow me at certain times."

Walsh said your children are going to get away with some risky behavior.

"Every teenager has gotten away with things that their parents never know about. We did it. Our kids are going to do it. What we want to do is make sure that those things they get away with aren't the really big things," he said. "The things that really get scary are drinking, drugs, alcohol and sex."

Parents of younger children have an advantage when it comes to undesirable friends. Because they set up play dates and do the driving, they can steer their sons and daughters toward friends of whom they approve.

"As our kids get older, that gets trickier," said Walsh.

At any age, Walsh recommends knowing your child's friends and getting to know the friends' parents, too. He's also an advocate of setting ground rules, like 'no playing at a friend's house or at home if parents aren't there.'

"Is there a level of acceptance that we as parents have to have that we're not going to be able to pick our kids' friends?" Vascellaro asked Walsh.

"That's part of the anxiety of what being a parent is. We realize that we can't follow them around, we can't pick all of their friends," Walsh said.

So what's a parent to do?

"We put parameters, we put rules and guidelines into place, try to connect with their friends," said Walsh. "Stay positive, stay communicating and then hold our breath."

(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

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