Kids lie.

”It wasn’t me; Molly broke the vase!”

“The dog ate my homework.”

“Yes, I brushed my teeth.”

Kids start learning to lie around age 3, according to researcher Kang Lee, the director and professor at the Institute of Child Study at the University of Toronto. He has studied lying for years and says the primary reason children lie is to avoid getting in trouble.

Most parents try very hard to teach their children the importance of telling the truth. They tell kids about the boy who cried wolf; some say lying is a sin or offer greater punishments for lying than for other infractions (breaking the vase gets you in less trouble than lying about breaking the vase). But Lee and fellow researcher Gail Heyman recently discovered that just because parents want their children to tell the truth, doesn’t mean adults don’t lie to their little ones.

More than three-quarters of parents of young children in Lee and Heyman’s recent study admitted to lying to their kids. Some told lies to get their children to behave. Others told lies to make their children feel better about something.

The study also examined how parents feel about their children telling the truth. Many said “‘Lying is terrible, it’s the worst thing you can ever do,’” said Heyman, a professor of psychology at the University of California, San Diego. Yet, in many cases, those parents were not always honest themselves.

The study

Lee and Heyman began the study about five years ago. They realized little research had been done about whether parents lie to their children and what they lie about. The study included two parts. They asked college students about whether their parents lied to them when they were growing up. The researchers also talked to parents of young children and asked them about their habits. Lee says they were quite surprised by the results. “Most parents do tell lies,” he said.

Lee says few people realize this because “nobody talks about it.”

The researchers selected nine scenarios for students and parents to consider. Six of those involved a lie designed to alter a child’s behavior. An example: A child is crying while out shopping with her mom, the mother tells the child the police will come if she doesn’t stop crying. The other scenarios involved lies designed to promote positive feelings. An example: A mother and son see a rainbow together. She tells her child that the rainbow appeared just for him. The students were asked if their parents ever told them a lie similar to one of the examples; the parents were asked if they ever told their children a similar lie.

Researchers found that the parents who were the most strict about their children telling lies were also more likely to lie to their kids.

Nearly 80 percent of the college students in the study were taught that lying is unacceptable and all lies are bad, while 17 percent were taught that lying could be OK in some cases, such as little white lies.

The researchers decided not to examine lies about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny or other cultural myths. Lee calls these “magical lies” that didn’t seem to fit into the other categories.

Why parents lie

Lee admitted he told occasional lies to his son. For example, his son frequently misbehaved in the car and Lee felt unable to do much to control him. So, he told the 6-year-old that the hazard light button in is car was in fact an ejector-seat button. If he pressed the button, the little boy would fly out of the car. The lie worked. “If I put my hand over the button, he calmed down immediately.”

Recently, Lee told his son the truth about the button. Lee says his son was excited to learn the truth, saying now he could misbehave whenever he wanted.

Some lies, such as the ejector-button lie, are intended to control children’s behavior. A common one told in many Asian families, according to Lee, was if children didn’t finish eating their rice, they would grow pimples. “I think parents, in general, think that kind of lying is bad,” Heyman said. But many find ways to excuse it. Heyman was surprised to discover so many parents told lies that were easily refuted, such as about monsters, witches or boogie men.

Bend dad Mike Kentley recalls his mother telling him she would sell him to the Gypsies if he misbehaved. He says he and his wife “try really hard not to use guilt, shame or making things up to get” their son to do what they want.

Heyman believes many of the lies just help parents get through the day. In a particular moment, they want a behavior to stop. So, why lie? “It works! Ultimately, that’s why a lot of parents do it,” he said.

In addition, many parents know their parents lied to them, so it is perpetuated.

Many of the parents justified their lies because they end up benefitting the child. But that is not always the case. “Some parents confessed (the lies) are not really for the benefit of the kids,” said Lee. For example, one woman in the study said every time she wanted to leave the house, her son would throw a fit. So she told him that her friend was being attacked by a witch and she had to go rescue her. “It was only for her own benefit so she could go on a dinner date,” said Lee. Another common lie they heard was parents telling the children the music from the ice cream truck meant that the driver had run out of ice cream.

Other lies are intended to protect children from certain information, such as death. Lee believes if parents could take time out to look up suggestions about what to say online or in a book, they might find a way to talk about these difficult subjects without lying. Instead they “come up with a solution on the fly.” “Lying is the easiest thing to do.”

Stories vs. lies

Bend mom Heather McBride sees a big difference between different kinds of lies. She thinks some untruths are storytelling and while some are true falsehoods.

“Honesty isn’t just about whether or not you lie,” said McBride. “Are you being deceitful or being sneaky?”

She thinks telling some stories can be a good thing. For instance several years ago, while McBride and her daughter were riding the MAX train in Portland, the train squealed as it turned the corner. The noise terrified her daughter. To calm her down, McBride told the little girl the train was environmentally sound and instead of running on gasoline, it ran on mouse power and the little mice all were saying “whee!” as the train went around a corner. This story was effective. Not long after the story, McBride received a note from her daughter’s kindergarten teacher saying that she had been telling classmates about the mice-powered MAX. McBride then made a point of telling her that the story about mice wasn’t reality, but “wouldn’t it be nice if it were true?”

The story came out of kindness and helped calm her daughter down at a time when she was frightened. “I didn’t expect her to believe it for any length of time,” said McBride.

While she doesn’t believe in lying to her children, she also thinks it’s OK to tell stories. “Not everything in this world is nonfiction.” She thinks stories, such as the tale of Santa Claus and the story she told, offer enrichment. “You have to be flexible and enjoy the story.”

Bend mom Laura Camacho agrees about the difference between fantasy, game playing and lying. She thinks telling a child that broccoli is “little trees” and he is a big dinosaur eating them is an acceptable form of stretching the truth. “The kid knows he’s not a dinosaur, but it sure is fun to pretend.” She thinks some tactics, such as the ejector-seat button story, are examples of lazy parenting. “Kids are incredibly attuned to when parents are hedging the truth or outright lying, and even if they don’t know what the actual truth might be, if they don’t sense that their parents are being honest, their trust begins to diminish.”

Local mom Lisa Jordan sees the situation differently. She sees the ejector-seat button story as “somewhat fun.” “I don’t think it’s necessarily a lie that could affect the people that they grow into.”

What to tell kids

Lee and Heyman’s study did not look at how lying impacted children’s perceptions of their parents, but it is something the researchers consider. They wonder if it would result in a loss of trust. “Parenting effectiveness may suffer,” said Lee.

Some of the college students in the study seemed very resentful of their parents’ lies, while other students thought the lies were funny or didn’t think much of them. Heyman says getting caught in a lie is tricky for parents. “Teens are also very, very sophisticated in catching parents in hypocrisy.”

Jordan believes it is essential to also tell children adults can lie to protect them from potential predators. “Children should be told that even adults have the ability to lie.”

Heyman believes parents should reconsider being super rigid about lying. She doesn’t think it’s valuable to tell children lying is always wrong or that they will go to hell for lying, when oftentimes they are later taught to tell white lies to be polite.

Also, parents should keep in mind that lies can sometimes backfire, even if they work at the time.

Stephen Hillis, of Madras, believes parents really shouldn’t lie to their children, but sometimes it seems it’s the best thing to do. He remembers telling his daughter a lie that ended up staying with her. They went to a local resort to swim and he told his children not to go to the bathroom in the pool. He said there was a special chemical placed in the water “and if a person were to go to the bathroom in the water it would turn bright green and all could see what one had done.”

He felt confident his children believed him and refrained, but he never told them the truth. When his oldest daughter turned 18, she was talking to her friends about swimming pools and mentioned the “special chemical” and then became embarrassed when she found out it wasn’t true.

“Her dad, who never lied, was in deep trouble,” Hillis said.

Nearly 80 percent of the college students in the study were taught that lying is unacceptable and all lies are bad, while 17 percent were taught that lying could be OK in some cases, such as little white lies.

— From a study conducted by Kang Lee and Gail Heyman of the Institute of Child Study at the University of Toronto

Researchers found that the parents who were the most strict about their children telling lies were also more likely to lie to their kids.