Even 'White Lies' From Parents Encourage Lying by Kids

Kids are more likely to lie to their parents if their parents have been lying to them -- even with positive “white” lies, a new study shows. But researchers found a difference between encouraging white lies and “instrumental” lies that involve false threats or promises. Any sort of instrumental lie -- “Behave or I’ll call the police” or “Finish your homework and we’ll go to Disneyland” -- increased the likelihood that a kid would lie to their parents. But white lies only affected kids if they knew that their parents weren’t telling the truth, researchers found. “Our study shows that while both instrumental and white lies told by parents could result in children lying to their parents, the effect of white lies was seen only in children who know they have been lied to,” said lead researcher Pei Pei Setoh, an associate professor at NTU in Singapore. “This suggests that the way children develop lying behaviours could depend on the way they understand and process different types of lies told to them,” she added.

Read here for the actual article.