Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting

By Dr. Lisa Damour/Good Trouble Productions

Kids & Family

What's Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting about?

Raising kids can be a bumpy, stressful, and uncertain process – which is why Dr. Lisa Damour is here to help. The New York Times Adolescence columnist and author of bestsellers Untangled and Under Pressure brings her sane, informed, and practical perspective to your timely and timeless parenting questions. Cohost Reena Ninan, a world-class journalist who has covered the White House while packing a breast pump, makes sure to get you the answers you need.

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43: What Should My Kids Do ...

06.08.2021

Should we be pushing children and teens to make up for lost learning this summer? Or should we let them call the shots on how they spend their time? What really matters most? Dr. Lisa has advice that might seem ...

Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting episodes:

06.08.2021 43: What Should My Kids Do This Summer? Should we be pushing children and teens to make up for lost learning this summer? Or should we let them call the shots on how they spend their time? What really matters most? Dr. Lisa has advice that might seem ...
06.01.2021 42: How Do I Talk to My Child About Racism? With Special Guest: Emmanuel Acho Lisa and Reena are joined by guest Emmanuel Acho, former NFL linebacker, current FoxSports analyst, host of the YouTube hit "Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man," and author of a book by the same name. Most recently, Emmanuel wrote the ...
05.25.2021 41: How Do I Help My Kid Find Friends Again? The pandemic has disrupted our kids' social lives. What can parents do to help a child make new friends if they've withdrawn from their peers? How do we help kids who are reluctant to reach out, or who rub their ...
05.18.2021 40: My Kid’s Room Is a Hot Mess. What Should I Do? Should you be concerned if your child has a messy, disorganized room? A mom emails asking for advice on how to handle a kid's room that feels out of control. Dr. Lisa introduces us to the term executive functioning, the ...
05.11.2021 39: How Do I Get My Kids to Stop Fighting? After more than a year of being stuck at home in a pandemic, it’s no surprise siblings are getting on each other's nerves. Should parents step in - or step back - when kids start fighting? Dr. Lisa tackles this ...
05.04.2021 38: How Do I Teach My Kids About Consent? Talking to kids about their love lives can be uncomfortable, but discussing consent is one of the most important conversations to have with our children. Dr. Lisa explains why she feels that when we focus on consent, we are articulating ...
04.27.2021 37: How Do I Know If My Child Has an Eating Disorder? Experts are finding that the pandemic has led to an alarming rise in eating disorders. Dr. Lisa explains how eating disorders can sneak up on families and why they can be incredibly harmful. Lisa and Reena discuss how social media ...
04.20.2021 36: Helping Kids Manage Grief and Loss "If the pandemic is about anything, it's about loss,” says Dr. Lisa Damour. Grief can come in different forms - from losing a loved one, to mourning the loss of senior year in high school, to not getting into your ...
04.13.2021 35: Sexy Social Media. Where Should Parents Draw the Line? How do you talk to kids about social media postings that might cross a line? What's the best way to start a conversation with your sons and daughters about what's too sexy for public consumption? A parent writes to Lisa ...
04.06.2021 34: How to Raise an Adult How do you prepare kids for life in the real world? Author Julie Lythcott-Haims joins Lisa and Reena for a conversation on the non-academic skills your children need to succeed as they move into young adulthood. Julie spent more than ...
03.30.2021 33: Encore Podcast: Toolbox for Terrible Times As we move into the next phase of this pandemic we take listeners back to an encore presentation of "Toolbox for Terrible Times: How to Manage Hopelessness and Helplessness." Lisa offers specific tools to help children with their feelings and ...
03.23.2021 32: Lying, Sneaking, Cheating. What Keeps Kids From Being Honest? There are many reasons why kids lie to parents. Dr. Lisa gives several explanations for why kids sometimes don’t tell the truth and shares stories from her practice of the difficult scenarios she's helped families navigate, including an example of ...
03.16.2021 31: My Kid Looked at Porn. What Should I Do? Talking to a child about pornography might not be a conversation most parents think of having. However, by the age of sixteen, 90% of kids have looked at porn. Dr. Lisa Damour explains that kids' interest in sex is normal ...
03.09.2021 30: My Kids & I Have Hit a Wall. How Do We Keep Going? With the one year anniversary of the pandemic approaching there are reasons to be hopeful. The infection rates are dropping and more vaccines are being distributed. So why do so many people still feel down? Reena asks about what parents ...
03.02.2021 29: How Do I Get My Kid Into Mindfulness? Finding time to quiet your mind can have real benefits for you and your child. Author, instructor, mom, and entrepreneur Mallika Chopra is our special guest. She says that meditation isn’t just repeating mantras - there are many other ways ...
02.23.2021 28: Bored, Sad, & Smoking Weed: How Do We Talk to Kids About Drug Use? A parent writes in asking for help to address a teenager's marijuana use. Some teens are turning to drugs in this pandemic as they are looking for ways to cope with the sadness and boredom. Dr. Lisa explains what actually ...
02.16.2021 27: What Do I Do When Friends and Family Don't Share Our Covid Rules? Should you speak up when you disagree with the approach other families are taking with their Covid rules? Reena discusses the latest news on the spread of the British mutation and Dr. Lisa describes the mental maneuvers we make when ...
02.09.2021 26: My Child is Turning Into a Teenager. How Do I Handle It? When kids hit thirteen they often become highly emotional. What happens in the brain and the body during this time? Dr. Lisa explains and also talks about the process of "separation-individuation" where young people seek to define their own identities ...
02.02.2021 25: How Do I Get My Smelly Teen to Shower? How do you get kids to understand the importance of hygiene? A mom writes in that her son is making life unbearable at home because he refuses to take regular showers since he has spent much of the year learning ...
01.26.2021 24: My Daughter Is Questioning Her Gender. What Do I Do? A single mom writes in feeling worried because her daughter is questioning her gender. Dr. Lisa explains what we understand about gender identity and sexual orientation, and offers advice on what to do when you are at an impasse with ...
01.19.2021 23: I Can’t Make Sense of America. What Do I Tell My Kids? It’s not always easy to be the grownup in the room. What are the teachable moments for our children as we watch alarming events unfold in Washington DC? How do you move beyond intense polarization? Lisa talks about research conducted ...
01.12.2021 22: My Kid Hates Remote Learning. What Do I Do? Parents are finding it hard to get their children to feel motivated about school, especially when they are learning remotely. Dr. Lisa explains strategies that might help and how parents can help kids keep the academic train on its tracks. ...
01.05.2021 21: How Do I Hit the Reset Button for 2021? Lisa and Reena kick off the new year with a look at positive psychology. What is it and how exactly does it work? How do you stay positive when things aren’t rosy? Reena asks about the psychology of manifesting. Does ...
12.22.2020 20: Kids & Covid: Pediatrician & Covid-19 Expert Dr. Cara Natterson Answers Your Questions When can your kids get vaccinated? If my child has recovered from Covid-19, how long does immunity last? How do you know when it’s really safe to send your kids back to school? Lisa and Reena get answers to key ...
12.15.2020 19: How Will the Pandemic Affect my Child Long-term? We like to think that time can heal a lot, but when do we need to worry about the pandemic's lasting impact on our children? Lisa introduces us to the concept of “ordinary magic” - protective processes that happen at ...
12.08.2020 18: Can Online Socializing Go Too Far? What’s the limit for children socializing online? Many kids use social media to connect with their friends and as an escape from the monotony of this pandemic. Lisa walks us through the pros and cons of being online - from ...
12.01.2020 17: How Do I Get My Kid To Open Up? How do you approach your child when you know they may be struggling but won’t open up? Lisa shares what she learned when she asked teens why they sometimes clam up around their parents. Lisa and Reena consider how much ...
11.24.2020 16: How Do You Handle Holidays in a Pandemic? Navigating the holidays under Covid has its own pressures. A season that should be marked by joy is being met with sadness and loss by so many. Lisa explains how taking time to mourn the temporary loss of our regular ...
11.17.2020 15: How Has the Pandemic Changed College Admissions? High school seniors are feeling the disruption of the pandemic as they tackle the college admissions process. How do we help them manage these uncertain times while they plan the next chapter of their lives? Special guest and New York ...
11.10.2020 14: Dads & Daughters, Mothers & Sons: How Does Gender Shape Parenting? How do dads differ from moms when it comes to raising kids? Lisa unpacks the research on the different roles each parent plays while pointing out that there are no hard and fast gender lines in parenting and that you ...
11.03.2020 13: How Do I Motivate My Kid to Do Homework? Students are finding it hard to focus on school in the midst of a pandemic. But laying a good foundation for how homework gets done is a skill that can be carried into adulthood. Lisa explains the psychological research behind ...
10.27.2020 12: What Can Kids Learn from a Tense Election? How can parents help children cultivate the ability to have tough conversations? How do we teach tolerance? Lisa explains the building blocks of civil discourse and the emotional and developmental skills that help kids engage peers constructively on the charged ...
10.20.2020 11: Where's the Line Between Being Healthy and Having an Eating Disorder? Eating concerns are an issue in many families, especially during the Coronavirus pandemic. What should a parent look out for? When is it time to be concerned? And what happens in the mind of someone who struggles with an eating ...
10.13.2020 10: How Do I Parent When I Feel Like I’m Drowning? Parents are faced with new pressures under Covid-19, and many of us are barely holding it together. When does having personal struggles translate into bad parenting? While it's important to be honest with our kids, Lisa explains what’s not okay ...
10.06.2020 9: What to Do When Kids Don’t Listen: Advice for Threenagers to Teenagers What really works when kids just won’t listen? Dr. Lisa explains there are two different mental states that parents should toggle between — warm parent and robot parent. She explains how cultivating a joyful relationship with kids puts money in ...
09.29.2020 8: Apathetic, Cranky, Frustrated: Dealing with Kids' Distress About School What should parents do when their kids are fed up and unhappy about school? Psychologists are witnessing the rise of emotional distress in children as they try to manage their disrupted academic year. Stress is processed in different ways by ...
09.22.2020 7: When Is Anxiety a Disorder? When Does Sadness Become Depression? Anxiety often serves as a normal and useful warning system - an emotional alarm that rings when something isn't right. Lisa discusses the difference between healthy and unhealthy anxiety, and explains how anxiety changes the activity of the heart and ...
09.15.2020 6: Will the Pandemic Disrupt My Kid’s Social Development? When should parents hit the panic button over their child’s social development? A mom writes in about her shy, introverted teen, wondering if her daughter has enough contact with friends. What key milestones might kids be missing as a result ...
09.08.2020 5: Toolbox for Terrible Times: Managing Helplessness and Hopelessness How do we get through the pandemic without losing our minds? Lisa offers parents four distinct tools to help ourselves and our children through these challenging times. The specific tools are "feeling with" children, supporting healthy psychological defenses, having the ...
09.01.2020 4: Helping Kids Eat Well and Stay Active Under Covid-19 How do we encourage our kids to be active when they want to couch surf? Lisa tackles a listener’s question about a tween who has become sedentary during the pandemic. As much of the U.S. is getting back to school—often ...
08.28.2020 3: How to Deal with Conflict While Stuck at Home Conflict is unavoidable. Having a strategy can help. Divorce rates have increased in some countries under lockdown from Covid-19. When can a relationship not be repaired? How do we teach our kids to deal with conflict? Lisa covers the research ...
08.24.2020 2: Back to School During Coronavirus Uncertainty surrounds this school year amid all the Covid-19 news. Dr. Lisa talks about what families need most as they juggle working from home and school. How do you respond when everything seems out of your control? Reena discusses some ...
08.24.2020 1: Parenting During a Pandemic How can you tell when your child is not coping well during this Covid-19 pandemic? Dr. Lisa breaks down what to watch for in a child’s behavior. How much screen time is bad for a child’s brain? She also explains ...
07.29.2020 Trailer Welcome to ASK LISA: The parenting podcast co-hosted by psychologist Dr. Lisa Damour and journalist Reena Ninan.