Establishing Rules About Alcohol for Your 11-Year-Old

Now Is the Right Time!

As a parent or those in a parenting role, you play an essential role in your child’s success. There are intentional ways to grow a healthy parent-child relationship, and creating rules about alcohol helps establish the supportive conditions necessary for your child to deal with risk.

Underage drinking remains a temptation for children/teens due to peer pressure and mixed messages in our society. If alcohol is consumed, it can have a significant impact on their brain development and overall health and safety.¹ Children/teens ages 11-14 will likely be introduced to more significant risk-taking opportunities, including drug and alcohol use and risky sexual behaviors.

A parent’s role is to provide information and skills for our children/teens to make good choices. The overall goal is to delay the use of any substances by our children/teens as long as possible so that the growing adolescent brain and body are not negatively impacted.

Most parents or those in a parenting role will face challenges in establishing rules about alcohol. “Why can’t I go to the (unsupervised) party?” you may hear from your child/teen. As children/teens are increasingly influenced by their peers, conflicts can occur when they are eager to do what their friends do, regardless of the risks involved. Your child/teen needs your involvement in establishing clear boundaries and providing monitoring and support to navigate peer pressure successfully.

The key to many parenting challenges, like establishing rules about alcohol, is finding ways to communicate so that both your needs and your child’s/teen’s needs are met. The steps below include specific, practical strategies and effective conversation starters to prepare you.

Why Rules About Alcohol?

Whether discovering the liquor cabinet has been opened by your curious eleven-year-old or arguing over your fourteen-year-old attending a friend’s unsupervised party, establishing rules about alcohol can help your family prepare for dealing with challenges cooperatively while growing essential skills in your child/teen.

Today, in the short term, rules about alcohol can

• provide an opportunity for you to teach your child/teen the science of how alcohol and other substances impact the growing adolescent brain
• help to manage your stress through your child’s/teen’s many changes;
• help your child/teen better manage the stress that comes with this age;
• cultivate a more trusting relationship, and
• help you feel confident that you’ve prepared your child/teen to stay safe.

Tomorrow, in the long term, your child/teen

• grows their capacity to assert boundaries and establish healthy relationships that will serve them for a lifetime;
• strengthens self-control and
• cultivates healthy habits that will contribute to their ongoing emotional and mental well-being.

Five Steps for Establishing Rules About Alcohol

This five-step process helps you and your child/teen establish rules about alcohol. It also grows important skills in your child/teen. The same process can also be used to address other parenting issues (learn more about the process).

You can get your child/teen thinking about establishing rules about alcohol by asking them open-ended questions. You’ll help prompt your child’s/teen’s thinking. You’ll also better understand their thoughts, feelings, and challenges related to friends and peer pressure so that you can address them. In gaining input, your child/teen

• has a greater stake in anything they’ve designed themselves (and with that sense of ownership also comes a greater responsibility for following the rules established);
• has more motivation to work together and cooperate because of their sense of ownership;
• will be working in collaboration with you on making informed decisions (understanding the reasons behind those decisions); and
• will grow problem-solving skills.

Actions

• Ask questions and listen carefully to your child’s/teen’s responses. Pick a time when you and your child/teen are enjoying time together. Riding in the car is ideal (when you don’t have time pressure) since your child/teen will feel less “on the spot” when you are not looking directly at them. You might ask:
  • “What are your hopes for your friendships?” Find out what your child/teen is longing for in their friendships. You may learn a lot about what motivates them. Then, when you discuss their friends, you know exactly what their aspirations are for their friendships, and you can help them work toward those healthy goals.
  • “What are you and your friends most interested in trying that’s new and different?” Listen for interests and ideas your child/teen might have for trying out healthy risks, whether entering an art contest or climbing a rock wall. If you observe your child/teen taking a new interest, create opportunities to experience those risks safely.
  • “Where do you like to hang out with your friends?” Listen to where your child/teen likes to see friends. Are there places to hang out socially that are desirable for your child/teen and their friends? Are they in supervised or public locations? Teens, especially, need spaces and places where they can be social; if they don’t have them, they’ll create them. Offer opportunities for healthy hangouts.
  • “Does alcohol show up at parties with friends, and how do you feel about it?” Because it’s a sensitive issue, just ask, but don’t pressure for an answer. Your child/teen may come back to you later to discuss. Also, avoid lecturing your child when they are honest with you. Lecturing may result in your child not sharing truthfully in the future for fear of your response.

Though your child/teen has likely been exposed to adults drinking throughout childhood, you may or may not have had a specific conversation about alcohol. Your child/teen may be well aware that underage drinking is illegal. Still, they may not know that the laws exist for minors because alcohol impacts the growing adolescent brain differently and is more harmful to teens than it is to adults. Knowing what the laws are can help provide a starting point for discussion. Families must discuss the facts and what they believe to be right for their family.

It is important to remember that teaching is different than just telling. Teaching grows basic skills, grows problem-solving abilities, and sets your child/teen up for success. Teaching also involves modeling and practicing the positive behaviors you want to see, promoting skills, and preventing problems. This is also an opportunity to establish meaningful, logical consequences for unmet expectations.

Actions

• Learn together. Alcohol impacts a child’s/teen’s growing body and brain differently than adults. Talk about the following information.
  • Less than half of a glass of alcohol in one hour is enough to change your personality and your judgment. That small amount will suppress the functions of the brain’s frontal lobe that control inhibitions, self-control, judgment, and concentration.
  • Research shows that childhood and the teenage years are a particularly vulnerable time for brain development and the adverse effects of alcohol. Because children/teens are undergoing a significant brain reconstruction, these changes paired with alcohol use can get in the way of normal brain development.
  • Youth who drink heavily have subtle but significant challenges with memory, language, academic achievement, abstract reasoning, empathy, future planning, and creative problem-solving.
• Discuss values for family health and healthy development. Consider discussing the following questions:
  • “How do we keep healthy (diet, exercise, preventative doctor visits)?”
  • “How do food and drinks fit into keeping your body healthy?”
  • “Do you take medication? For what and why?”
  • “What are some substances that alter your body and brain?”
  • “How do those altering substances fit into a healthy lifestyle?”
• Considering your child’s/teen’s hopes for their friendships and the impact of alcohol on healthy development, discuss with your teen setting up rules about alcohol. You could ask, “What might be some helpful rules we can stick to as a family?” Examples might include:
  • Family members will share an address or specific location where each person will be when they go out for the evening.
  • Go to all evening functions with a buddy for safety.
  • Always have an escape/excuse plan (with your buddy and with your parents or those in a parenting role) ready if alcohol or other substances are present.
  • If called or texted for a ride, parents or those in a parenting role will appreciate the chance to offer a safe ride. They will provide that ride without immediately asking questions or issuing consequences.

Your family and child’s/teen’s social life can offer regular opportunities for your child/teen to practice new skills and try out your family rules. With practice, your child/teen will improve over time as you give them the chance with support. Practice grows vital new brain connections that strengthen (and eventually form habits) each time your child/teen tries out the rules and plans you have created together.

Practice also provides important opportunities to grow self-efficacy — a child’s/teen’s sense that they can do a task successfully, which includes standing up to peer pressure. This grows confidence.

Actions

• Try out the new rules before your child/teen experiences peer pressure, and they are in a high-stakes setting. For example, if your guideline is that family members leave an address or specific location where they will be each time they go out for the evening, then create a system where you’ll always leave this information.
• Discuss the role of a safety buddy with your child/teen and help them identify which friends they could count on as their buddy. Over pizza, chat about what kind of plan they could establish if they want to leave a party or an uncomfortable situation.
• Create a plan together. Talk non-judgmentally (no blaming or naming) about some choices your child/teen might have for leaving an unhealthy situation. Review and roleplay using refusal skills to say “no” to alcohol and drugs while still maintaining friendships. You could ask:
  • “If you feel pressured and need to get out, what truthful excuses can we come up with to leave the situation?”
• Initiate the no-risk pick-up. Drive friends to hang out at the mall or movies. Assure your child/teen you’ll pick them up with no lectures if they are uncomfortable or there’s been drinking at a party.
  • “What code can we establish (use your cell phones) so I know to pick you up immediately, no questions asked?”

At this point, you’ve taught your child/teen about alcohol and established rules, and you are allowing them to practice how they might respond when invited to try alcohol so they can learn how these play out in social situations. Now, you can offer support when needed by reteaching, monitoring, coaching, and, when appropriate, following through with logical consequences. Parents or those in a parenting role naturally offer support as they see their child/teen fumble with a situation in which they need help. This is no different.

Actions

• Ask key questions to check-in. “How are the rules we’ve established? Are they reasonable to you? Are the plans we set up, like your safety buddy, working out so far?”
• Monitor their activities. Before they go out, be sure you know where they are going, who they’ll be with, and how they are getting there. Verify when they’ll be home. Offer the ride home. And when they get home, be there to greet, hug, and discreetly check their breath.
• Recognize effort using “I notice…” statements like, “I notice how you called me when you were uncomfortable. That’s taking responsibility!”
• Stay engaged. Be ready to talk when your child/teen is eager. It can feel like their willingness to talk comes at the most inopportune moments. Remember that these are precious windows of opportunity for you to learn about what’s going on in their lives and offer support.
• Engage in further practice. If your child/teen shares challenges, explore how you can create additional plans to help them feel supported.
• Apply logical consequences when needed. Logical consequences should come soon after the negative behavior and need to be provided in a way that maintains a healthy relationship. Rather than punishment, a consequence is about supporting the learning process. First, recognize your feelings and practice a calm-down strategy when needed. It helps to know which calm-down strategies work best for you and have a plan. Not only is this good modeling, but you can provide logical consequences for the behavior. Second, invite your child/teen to discuss the expectations and rules established in Step 2. Third, if you feel your child/teen is not meeting these expectations (unless it is a matter of them not knowing how), apply a logical consequence as a teachable moment.

No matter how old your child/teen is, your positive reinforcement and encouragement have a big impact.

If your child/teen is working to grow their skills, even in small ways, recognize it. Your recognition can go a long way in promoting positive behaviors and expanding your child’s/teen’s confidence. Your recognition also encourages safe, secure, and nurturing relationships, a foundation for strong communication and a healthy relationship with you as they grow.

You can reinforce your child’s/teen’s efforts in many ways. It is important to distinguish between three types of reinforcement – recognition, rewards, and bribes. These three distinct parenting behaviors impact your child’s/teen’s behavior differently.

Recognition occurs after you observe the desired behavior in your child/teen. Noticing and naming the specific behavior you want to reinforce is key to promoting more of it. For example, “I noticed you designated a safety buddy and arrived on time. — love seeing that!” Recognition can also include nonverbal cues such as a smile, high five, or hug.

Rewards can be helpful in certain situations by providing a concrete, timely, and positive incentive for doing a good job. A reward is determined beforehand so the child/teen knows what to expect. For example, “If you follow our plan and come home on time, you will get to stay up 30 minutes later than usual.” (If you XX, then I’ll XX.) It stops any negotiations in the heat of the moment. A reward could be used to teach positive behavior or break a bad habit. The goal should be to help your child/teen progress to a time when the reward will no longer be needed. Rewards can decrease a child’s/teen’s internal motivation if used too often.

Unlike a reward, bribes aren’t planned ahead of time and generally happen when a parent or those in a parenting role are in a crisis, such as a child/teen arguing and refusing to leave a social gathering. To avoid disaster, a parent or those in a parenting role offers to stop for ice cream on the way home if the child/teen will stop arguing and leave the event. While bribes can be helpful in the short term to manage stressful situations, they will not grow lasting motivation or behavior change and should be avoided.

Actions

• Recognize and call out when it is going well. It may seem obvious, but it’s easy not to notice when everything moves smoothly. Noticing and naming the behavior provides the necessary reinforcement that you see and value the choice your child/teen has made. For example, when your child/teen is practicing being safe in social situations, a short, specific call out is all that’s needed: “I notice you reflected on whether or not to go with your friend to that party considering all the potential risks. That’s taking responsibility and thinking through consequences!”
• Recognize small steps along the way. Don’t wait for the significant accomplishments – like your child/teen arranging their safety buddy independently – to recognize effort. Remember that your recognition can work as a tool to promote more positive behaviors. Find small ways your child/teen is making an effort and let them know you see them.
• Build celebrations into your routine. For example, after your child/teen has a safe outing with friends and follows your family plan, invite their friends over for a game night at your house. Or, after your child/teen shares important information about how things have been going with friends, enjoy some hot chocolate together while you talk.

Closing

Engaging in these five steps is an investment that grows your skills as an effective parent or those in a parenting role to use on many other issues and grows essential skills that will last a lifetime for your child/teen. This tool allows children/teens to become more self-aware, deepen their social awareness, exercise their self-management skills, work on their relationship skills, and demonstrate and practice responsible decision-making.