Family Dinner: A Stable Force in Times of Change

School's ending, summer's coming: this time of year is a season of change and is often full of transitions. Honestly, this year for me is so full of transitions that my head is spinning. My son turns 18 in a couple of weeks and will graduate from high school. He will attend college over 1,000 miles away, making his journey away from home very real. My middle daughter is graduating middle school, preparing to enter high school. The distance she will travel is also significant. Instead of a short walk to school on a relatively quiet Brooklyn street, her commute to high school will be via subway to that "big city" in Manhattan. And my mother, who is recently widowed, is planning a reverse-retiree move from Florida to Brooklyn this summer, so as to be closer to her only family, me.

All these journeys to and from home, all these big changes, are exciting, but nonetheless a bit scary and unsettling. Change can be hard, especially when the family structure you've been used to for... I don't know, for-EVER, is changing. Add these emotions to the usual end-of-the-year chaos of school picnics, special ceremonies and extra performances, and you've got A LOT GOING ON.

Family dinner is the one thing that gets us through these upside-down times. We still try to have dinner together 4 or more nights a week, no matter how busy we get. It really grounds us all and gives us a center. Weeknights are the best times for us to eat together as a family, though mealtimes get shortened because the older kids need to do homework and the youngest must fit in bath and bedtime by a decent hour. We rarely get our 17 year old to the table on Friday or Saturday night anymore because he has usually has plans with friends.

This holiday weekend, though, many of his friends were away and it was all five of us at the table with no time pressures or places to run off to. We laughed together, shared a huge bunch of fresh lychee nuts,* and had longer after-dinner conversations than we've enjoyed in a while. Though he would never admit it, I can sense my son is already a bit nostalgic for these family times together. I certainly am.

Really delicious fresh lychee nuts

Knowing how much family dinner has meant to me and my children as I approach my 18th year (!) as a parent, I fully support Aviva of The Six O'Clock Scramble in the Family Dinner Challenge. Many of my readers already have regular family dinners, so it's a great way to show the numbers of people who live this lifestyle. For anyone who is interested in making the commitment to family dinner, but need help getting started (or help keeping your efforts going), The Six O'Clock Scramble is offering great resources including a checklist and recipes.

Sign up here to join in! 

The Family Dinner Challenge

Have dinner together at least 3 times a week for 4 weeks by September 2013!

* The funny story behind the overwhelming amount of lychee nuts in our house: This holiday weekend we went to Chinatown to have dim sum as a family; it had been ages since our schedules aligned so we could go together. We got separated from my husband at one point because he left something at the restaurant and had to go back. As the kids and I maneuvered through the crowded streets, every vendor seemed to have fresh lychee nuts. The kids begged to get them, and I hesitated because they are quite expensive, but eventually I said, "Sure." Soon after we caught up with my husband; of course he had bought a big bunch of lychee nuts too! We all laughed about it as my middle daughter observed, "I feel like this would only happen in my family!" Anyone have any recipes?

The Teen Solution to Family Dinner

In preparing a presentation for high school educators recently, I had a "light bulb" moment. Teens are an untapped resource in the family dinner equation. When we think of family dinner, teenagers hardly even enter into the picture. This may be because they have busy schedules, just like their parents, or perhaps parents of teens have already given up on a family table! But the teenager years are a crucial time where family dinner can really help parents and older kids stay connected. Moreover, teens can help make dinner happen -- the Teen Solution to Family Dinner!

Real Benefits for Teens

Kids, teens and adults who have family dinner regularly report feeling more connected, happier and less stressed. This has a special resonance for teens. I was recently shocked and saddened to learn that 1 in 25 teens has attempted suicide and 1 in 8 has had some thoughts of suicide. Teen mood swings are typical, yet teen depression and other mental health problems are a very real threat that parents and educators need to be attuned to. Just the act of having a few meals together, at any time of day, can bring this crucial connection. Family dinner has been shown to be a positive behavioral therapy for teens with eating disorders, substance abuse problems, and other mental health issues.

Furthermore, teens actually like having dinner with their families, despite the stereotypes. They appreciate having a regular time with parents and they report eating more healthful foods with the family. As Tara Parker-Pope, reported in The New York Times Well Blog, a few years ago, even people working in the field can forget.

Despite her research, Dr. Neumark-Sztainer was surprised when her own son was interviewed by a local television station about the family’s regular Friday night meal. A senior in high school at the time, he told the reporter, “I like that my parents expect me to be home, because it makes me feel important.’’

Real Help from Teens

The number one complaint from parents about family dinner is the time it takes to put dinner on the table. The light bulb moment came when I read that one of teens' biggest frustrations was that parents did not let them help more in the kitchen! Clearly, this is a potential win-win for parents and teens. Depending on where you live, teens can help shop, prep for, and/or cook dinner for their families, in addition to the more traditional role of cleaning up. Even if it is just once or twice a week, letting your teen take charge of dinner could mean the difference between having dinner together or not. Actually taking responsibility for making the family meal can be a great way to bolster self-confidence and self-esteem. Teens hate doing "busy-work" and may actually be more willing to cook for the family (an important job) rather than taking out the garbage (easier, but a more menial task).

The teenage years are an excellent time to learn cooking as a real-life survival skill. Unlike grade school children, where cooking is solely "fun," teenagers will actually be cooking for themselves in just a few years. I cooked dinner for my family while my mom worked nights, and I think that's where my confidence in the kitchen came from. I cooked meals throughout college to save money and was often surprised that other people didn't know how to cook. Though I'm able to make much more sophisticated meals now, I started with serving my mom's pre-made crock-pot dinners and re-heating frozen vegetables.

As the mom of two teens, I know having your teen cook dinner might be a hard sell; it definitely depends on the personalities involved. You may even have to scale back your own expectations about what constitutes dinner. (In an article from last year, My Sons, the Sous-Chefs, a NYT writer humblebrags about her sons cooking full meals and manage to critique their technique at the same time!)

What do you think? Is it possible to have teens or tweens actually make family dinner? Would this help your family eat together more often?

Family Dinner Beneficial to Low Income Urban Youth

Research: This study followed a large sample of urban, racially-diverse youth from low-income families from middle school age to the beginning of high school (3.5 years on average, n=4,750) and found that kid's perceptions of parent-child communication and frequency of family dinner was positively associated. That is, the more these kids ate family dinners together, the more likely they were to view their ability to communicate with parents in a positive light.

Although the frequency of family dinners declined as the kids got older, the study suggests that teens can benefit from family dinner and that eating family dinner at middle school age has enduring positive effects, at least 2 years later. Journal of Family Psychology June 2010

Reality: The positive effects of family dinner are NOT just a middle class phenomenon. It is never too late to start family dinner, but it seems important to set a routine by the time your kids are in middle school. Teens will not be as available for family dinner, due to their independence and other time commitments, as are younger children, but having family dinner as a regular option is beneficial to them as well.

Mothers and Meals: Attitude Makes a Difference

Research finding: Mom's attitude towards family dinner makes a difference. When mothers care about family meals, and take time to plan, shop and prepare for them, older kids and teens care about family meals too and are more likely to participate. Appetite, Sept 2010

Reality Check: Mom can set the priority, but she doesn't have to do all the work. Get Dad involved in the cooking or shopping and get the kids to help prep, cook, or clean up.

A common negative attitude was the time pressure associated with making family meals. More planning and organization can help ease this pressure and make family meals easier to accomplish. Easier said than done, of course (!), but try weekly menu planning so that nightly dinner is a less of a scramble.

Strength of Family Ties: Results from CASA Family Dinner Study 2010

Teens want to eat dinner with their families and family dinner strengthens ties among parents and teens, according to CASA's most recent study. All this makes sense: family dinner gives us the time and space as parents to connect to our kids and listen to them. It helps to have family time be something teens can "count on" rather than a random event. As much as teens want "their own lives," they both need and want to be connected. Family dinner is a way to do it, and it's never too late to start!

Here are some key findings from CASA's national adolescent survey.

• 60% of teens have dinner with their family 5  or more times a week. This statistic has been steady from most of the past decade.
• 75% of teens talk to their parents at dinner about their lives.
• 80% of parents agree that dinner helps them learn more about their teen's life.
• Teens who frequently have dinner with their families (5 or more nights a week) are twice as likely to talk to their parents about their lives than are teens who infrequently have dinner with family (2 or less nights a week).
• Most teens (60%) want to have dinner with their families more often.
• 72% of teens think family dinner is important.
• Kids who frequently have dinner with their parents are less likely to use drugs, smoke, or drink alcohol. Of these kids, 70% reply that one reason is that they know their parents would be upset.

Family Dinner Contributes to the Strength of Family Ties. This year CASA added a new dimension to the survey to measure the strength of family ties and how that was related to illegal drug and alcohol use among teens. Stronger family ties resulted in less likelihood to use drugs, alcohol, or tobacco. Family dinner contributed to stronger family ties independently and by influencing two other component of the scale, as noted below.

• Teens who had frequent family dinners were 3x more likely to report an excellent relationship with both mom and dad. 
• Teens who had frequent family dinners were 2x more likely to report that their parents were good at listening to them.

Source: CASA, The Importance of Family Dinners, IV, September 2010. Full Report available by pdf.

Translating Family Dinner Research into Action

One of the things that I aspire to do with my work on this eatdinner blog/twitter/facebook page is to help translate research on family dinner into action. The statistics on the benefits of family dinner shouldn't just be empty slogans or exhortations of guilt directed toward busy families. The personal benefits of family dinner for you and your kids are important, but from a public health perspective, the societal benefits are even greater. Less kids doing drugs and drinking, more kids doing well in school, less childhood obesity: these positive outcomes affect the whole community and the whole country.

I know from experience that the academic research community puts a lot of effort into studying problems and identifying determinants of health, but often gives short shrift to actually developing and implementing solutions.  I just read a recent literature review in the Journal of American Dietetic Association that found that only a quarter of the studies on Weight Loss Management had any mention of real-world adoption or maintenance of the weight-loss strategies studied. The authors concluded that it was unknown what popular strategies could actually work becuase real-world adoption was not effectively considered. If you are not thinking about real-world adoption, especially in an area like weight-loss, why study these strategies at all?

Many research studies that mention family dinner end with a statement like "Family dinner is important and this message should be shared with the public." Gee, thanks. Can we get a little more detail please? I think the research community should go to the next level. The identification of key elements of family dinner success and the persistent barriers to family meal times would be a good start. There is also important work to be done assessing how public information and education on family dinner should be tailored regionally or by socioeconomic or cultural group.

Perhaps it's only fair to expect community-based organizations or policymakers to take up where the researchers have left off. CASA, a national research center, has done an amazing job with their annual Family Day campaign and getting key statistics out to the media. But one day is not enough; family dinners require a concerted commitment and attention throughout the year.

The best support for family dinner at this point has been from the social community of the Internet, with blog/twitter/facebook commentators weighing in on everything from menu planning to easy weeknight recipes to parenting support. To Malcolm Gladwell, I say, don't undestimate the power of weak ties and social networks. Spreading information and collaboration can do more than you think to change the world, though it may not be as dramatic as sit-ins during the civil rights movement.

Let's use the power of this social network to collaborate and learn from each other. What ideas do you have to help families make the commitment to family dinner?

Lessons from Research: Parenting Style and Family Dinner

Parents who are afraid to put their foot down usually have children who step on their toes. ~Chinese Proverb @AskDrVicki, RT@eatingarainbow

 A newly released study from The University of Minnesota's Project EAT (Eating Among Teens) hones in on an important aspect of successful family dinners: parenting style. Parents who were "authoritative" meaning understanding of their children, but able to set clear rules and expectations were more successful at creating and maintaining family dinner routines among their teens, both initially and 5 years later.

Parents (maternal and paternal) were classified as authoritative, authoritarian, permissive or neglectful based on the teens' answers to a battery of questions about their parents. (I'd like to see this list of questions! :) ) Authoritative parents were "empathic and respectful," but maintain clear expectations and rules in the household. Authoritarian parents were strict disciplinarians that showed little warmth. The permissive style was empathic but with few rules or expectations, and the neglectful style...well, as you can guess, cold, no rules, not showing care or attention. (Sigh, one hopes this was rare, but they are teenage perceptions.)

Using multivariate analysis, parenting style was matched up with how often the teens ate dinner with their families, in addition to other social behaviors. Both boys and girls in the study (over 1600 middle school and 3000 high school students) ate dinner with their families more often if they considered their parents to be authoritative. 

Many parents today strive to be "authoritative," even if they never thought of it that way. We want to listen to our kids and be understanding of their needs, but at the end of the day, rules and routines are important to make family life run more smoothly. When the balance tips more in favor to the child's individual desires and wants, and less toward family rules and standards, the parent heads towards the permissive zone. Parents today have been chided in the media, sometimes unfairly, for excessive permissiveness. The lean toward permissiveness may be a reaction to the authoritarian or neglectful parenting styles of the past, or it could be a result of less family support and structure and more frazzled parents who are working more and have less family time. Most would agreed, though, that there is hell to pay for "giving in" to our kids too often, both on a day-to-day basis and in the long run. As all parents in the trenches know, it can be hard to strike the right balance.

The big lesson of this study for me, and I think parents need to hear it loud and clear: it is OK to have rules and routines. In fact, it is better. You are not necessarily squashing your child's individuality or creativity or self-esteem by setting some household rules to live by. Dinner time, while it can be a struggle in terms of time and commitment, is the perfect way to establish not only an important routine, but a model of rules that your family lives by. These rules might include: we are respectful to each other, we listen and talk together and take turns, we are grateful for the food on the table and the effort it embodies (and we don't ask for something different or demand plain pasta every night). It sounds so simple, but it can be so hard in practice. Never fear mom and dads, if you can get and keep your kids at the table, especially as they age into teens, it is well worth it.

Journal of the American Dietetic Association, July 2010
Project EAT additional Resources
Update: Just found a great blog post by littlestomaks.com breaking down parenting style as it can affect family dinner dynamics

Let's Cook: Cooking as life skill

 Image from Let's Move website

Just heard about "Let's Cook" a new White House video series hosted by Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign, which is set to launch today Tuesday 7/13/10 at 10am via webcast. There is a preview here at the Obama Foodorama Blog. Such a great idea. From the start, I've been hoping that the Let's Move campaign would take a broad view of health and combine its message to be about both staying active and eating right. Teaching kids, and adults, how to cook healthy foods and empowering them to actually cook for themselves and their families is an important step.

I read something recently that listed all the things you would expect a 20-something independent adult to do, such as making simple meals, doing laundry, pretty standard stuff.  The punch line was that these are the things we are supposed to be teaching our older kids and teens to do now so that they will, in fact, become the independent 20-somethings that we hope they will be. I have to admit that I haven’t done too well in making my reluctant teenage son do these daily-living household chores. My nagging usually runs towards homework first and then to “please stop playing that video game and/or get off the computer.”

Nonetheless, cooking basic meals is an essential life skill.  I know my experience cooking for my family as a teen (my mom worked in a restaurant on the night shift) was instrumental in giving me life skills in the kitchen and beyond. My son does like to make breakfast and will often make himself or his crew of friends that slept over a big breakfast of eggs and whatever else he can scrounge up. It’s a start.

Cooking doesn't have to be set up as a chore (that goes for parents and kids), even though it's something to "get done." Find some joy in learning a new skill or just getting a dish to the table, be it something new or an old standard.  Bon appetit!

Five Tips to Bring Teens to Family Dinner

One of the most often quoted statistics about family dinner is that it helps keeps teenagers out of trouble. CASA cites that teens that eat dinner together with their families are less likely to do drugs, drink alcohol, and are more likely to do well in school and with social relationships. The thing is it can be hard to start a family dinner tradition when your kids are older. It's not just your work commitments anymore, it's their homework, sports practices, play rehearsals, and of course, social plans, that start to fill up the evening schedule. This is a good reason to start the family dinner habit when they are young. But even if family dinner is new to you, it's well worth it to your kids to start. Here are some things that have worked for us.

1. Make food they like and make enough of it. The way to a teen’s heart is through his or her stomach. Make the foods that he or she likes and your teen will be motivated to be home. This is a bit of contradiction from the advice I usually give to families with toddlers and other picky eaters, but hopefully by the teenage years, they have settled into a normal range of preferences that the whole family can live with. Still cook only one meal for the family; that's what makes it "family dinner."
2. Invite over your teen’s friends and eat together as a group. Though this can’t happen every night, having your teen's friends over for a family meal can also be a great incentive to keep your kid at the table. Our experience has been that the kids really appreciate a home-cooked meal (though it could be take-out) and we make a real connection to the kids that our kid hangs out with. I find that even the most rambunctious teenage boys are pretty polite and agreeable when in the family dinner setting. Again, make enough food.
3. Have a set dinner time and expect your teen to show up, but be flexible. If dinner is at 7pm, then your kid knows when he or she is expected home for dinner. Make it a rule that they have to be there. Then it’s on both of you to make dinner and to be there to eat it. Be flexible though.  If you know ahead of time that sports practice or rehearsals will conflict, set alternate dinnertimes for those nights. If your kid complains that he or she is with friends, invite the friends over! It can be hard to keep to a strict schedule, especially during holidays and the summer, so I’ll let my teen skip out of family dinner occasionally. But I keep mental track to make sure not too many dinners slip by in any given week. Since it is such a solid tradition in our house, I usually just have to say something like, “Hey you’ve missed too many dinners at home.” The phrase, “We are having burgers,” works well too (see Tip #1).
4. Make your teen cook a meal. This can be a tall order, but valuable for both of you. One family I know with two teens, has each of them responsible for the family meal one night a week. It’s a big help to the parents obviously, and the teens get a big sense of accomplishment from it. If you couple this with the favorite foods idea (back to #1), then your kid can learn how to make his or her favorite dishes.

5. The dinner table is a no-nagging zone, and no gadgets either. You want your teen to come to the table and you hope there will be some positive conversation and chatting about his or her life or what’s going on with the family in general. It’s not the time to nag or run down a list of complaints or worries. Even if your kid brings up some hot topic (i.e., "My math teacher is such a jerk."), use the time to listen or talk calmly about the issue, not to nag or criticize. (You might reply, "Really? What's up?" and then just listen, stifling your urge to editorialize.)  You want your kid to see the dinner table as a positive part of the day, not a grilling session. If you want to go back to that hot topic, find another time to do it. Also, TV, cell-phone, computers, the newspaper, whether used by the teen or the adult are counter-productive to conversation and interaction. Family dinner time can be as short as 15-20 minutes, but it's very valuable. Everyone can lay off their gadgets and connect the old-fashioned way..

Family Dinner: Caught between a Teen, a Tween and a Toddler

Last week, the family calendar was bursting. My oldest is applying to public high school in New York City (a daunting process to the uninitiated), my youngest at 3 is starting to get birthday party invitations, and my middle one is balancing the usual 4th grade homework expectations, plus dance, acrobatics, sleepovers and social plans (HSM3!). It was a hectic and anxiety-provoking week, and our family dinners took a bit of a hit. There was food on the table every night, and at least one parent was in attendance, but it wasn't the whole crew sitting down at once the way it usually is. We all felt a little disconnected. I'm pretty sure the lack of a dinner routine just added to the stress.

Last night, I opted out of an evening meeting so that we would all be home, and it felt like the right decision. Everything was pretty calm, everyone went to bed on time. This week, there will be at least 3 normal weeknight dinners, which is probably the bare minimum we should schedule as our lives get increasingly busy. It's hard with the competing needs of a toddler, a tween, and a teen: more activities, more juggling, less time. But it's also increasingly necessary.

There is an old saying: Little kids, little problems; big kids, big problems. This adage used to annoy me, because when your baby's not sleeping through the night, it's a big problem. Yet, when you hear that a kid in your 13-year old's class had her stomach pumped because she took pills at a party, that seems like a pretty big problem. For my tween girl, you realize that as strong and smart girls can be, girls are sometimes the "risk-takers" at younger ages, can be more influenced by peer pressure, and tend to be better at deception. All of a sudden, staying connected with your kid is not a given, a luxury or a little problem.

I firmly believe that family dinners help keep parents and kids connected. Family dinners (or the connectedness it brings) can help protect kids from using drugs and alcohol. The most recent surveys indicate that most kids do not use drugs and alcohol, though they can get them if they want to, and at surprisingly young ages. Parent attitudes, expectations, and behaviors make a huge difference. CASA surveys indicate that five or more dinners a week are the most effective. To me, that number is to set a goal, not to set an impossible standard for families. Every dinner helps, and the routine and the expectation that you sit down together on a regular basis may be the most important of all.

Are parents passive pushers? CNN.com (10.24.08) reports on recent CASA survey (August 2008).
Increase Risk for Alcohol Problems in Adulthood when Consumption Starts Before Age 15. Medical News Today, 09.30.08

Drug Use Prevention Sites for Parents and Teens
www.theantidrug.com/
www.drugfree.org/Parent/Home/
http://decoder.drugfree.org

For teens:
www.freevibe.com
www.abovetheinfluence.com

More Tips for Table Talk

Having conversations with your kids and your partner are one of the main highlights of family dinner. We don't have great conversations every night. Some nights it's more like a traffic jam of talk with shouts of "We need a serving spoon!", "Who wants juice?", "My dear toddler, please sit down!", "Quick! Get the paper towels!" But the dinner table is a time when we usually get to each say a sentence or two about "our day." This often leads into broader conversations or questions about the world and their place in it. My kids know that they can always catch us at dinner with questions about stuff.

Meg Cox, author of The Book of New Family Traditions, suggests that you create a family dinner basket to help with conversations. Basically, it's just a box of simple ideas or questions that can be used as conversation starters. You can make your own or buy one. The Family Dinner Box of Questions gives a portion of the proceeds benefits CASA, one of the champion organizations for family dinner. More tips for getting conversations started are below.

• Keep it easy. Talk about light subjects, not grades or chores or the day's "bad behavior." Use it as a time to compliment your child on something he or she did that day.
• Let the kids direct the conversation. Prompt them with specific questions about a school subject or after school activity.
• If you know your child has a story from his day (i.e., a field trip), encourage him to re-tell it for the rest of the family. Don't re-tell it for him. Encourage him to recount it, or add more details to the story.
  
• Let the kids interrupt you. But try to let each of your kids have a turn talking. Sometimes that "competition" for the floor is what really gets them talking!
  

We recently instituted a "no TV or computer after dinner" rule, so that the kids don't run off immediately to a screen. This has definitely improved their willingness and ability to linger and have conversations at the table. Plus, they are on hand to help clear the plates and help with dishes.

(If you need the time to decompress and chat with your spouse, feel free to use the TV as a babysitter after dinner. I'm not anti-TV; I just know that TV kills conversation. So, if you want talk, nix the TV. Our TV is in a separate room, so we don't hear it or see it if we're at the table.)

Since there's no TV time after dinner, sometimes we have time for a family game. We've been playing Apples to Apples, Jr. which is so much fun. We end up talking and laughing through the whole thing. Less competitive games end up working better for us, and encourage more talking.

Round-up: Family Dinner Tips From Other Sites

Here's a quick round-up of family dinner tips I found from other web sites. The writers include medical doctors, social scientists, and a pediatric nurse (who is also a feng-shui specialist).

• Make it a family priority.
• Sit at the table, not the kitchen counter, not in front of the TV.
• Parents signal the start and end of the meal.
• Keep conservation easy: no lectures or nagging.

From: Linda Varone, RN, MA Psychology

• Family meals are for connection and communication.
• Healthy habits are easier to introduce at a family table.

From: MedicineNet.com

Tips for Teens:

• Remember, teens are in a growth stage and need better nutrition (as well as all that sleep!)
• Don't let them "opt out" of dinner, even if they say they have homework.
• Set rules so the focus in on the table and talking, such as "no texting or taking cell phone calls" at dinner.

From articles about Adolescence and Family Dinner, Drs. Nuemark-Sztainer and Doherty, Univ. of Minnesota and Texting Generation Gap, NYT, 03.09.08