Your teenager and the friends you don't like

“Going to Miha’s again?”

The question was asked in passing, at the kitchen sink, but her fifteen-year-old son heard in it everything that was left unsaid. That Miha smokes outside the shop. That he has an older brother people talk about. That his marks dropped precisely in the year they started hanging out. “You’ve already judged him,” he said, and left. His mother was left with a thought many parents know: if I don’t stop him now, I’ll lose him — and if I try to stop him, I’ll lose him too.

Friends that parents don’t like are one of the oldest family themes. And one of the most sensitive, because two true things meet in it: peers really do have a strong influence on decisions in adolescence, and a parental ban very often makes them even more attractive. In this post I want to help you tell taste apart from danger, understand what a teenager is looking for in these friends, and protect what keeps them safest at this age: that they still tell you where they are and who they are with.

Why friends matter so much now

In childhood the family is the centre of the world, and friends are the people you play with. In adolescence the balance flips. Peers become the place where a young person tests who they are when they are not just “your son” or “your daughter”. There they get a different mirror, a different name, sometimes a different language. This is not a betrayal of the family. It is a developmental task without which adult independence cannot be built.

Research confirms that sensitivity to peers is especially high at this stage. Laurence Steinberg and Kathryn Monahan measured how resistant several thousand participants of different ages were to peer pressure. They found that resistance increases most markedly between the ages of 14 and 18 — before that it is relatively low, and after eighteen it does not change much. In other words, the secondary-school years are precisely the time when a teenager is still learning how to remain themselves within a group.

Another study from the same lab showed what this looks like in practice. Margo Gardner and Steinberg gave adolescents, young adults and adults a computer driving game in which they could take risks. When peers were sitting in the room, teenagers took considerably more risks than when alone, whereas for adults the presence of friends had no such effect. Later brain imaging showed that, in teenagers, the presence of peers boosts activity in the reward system. So friends don’t influence a teenager because they “talk them into” things. They influence them because everything they do in front of their friends is simply more rewarding.

Taste or danger: three levels of worry

The first step is to answer honestly what it is about the friend that actually bothers you. There are often several layers beneath the worry, and they don’t all belong in the same category. It helps to sort them into three levels.

I don’t like it is the level of taste. The friend dresses differently, swears, comes from a family unlike yours, lacks the ambitions you would wish for your child. All of this may be true, but none of it is dangerous. Here the best response is the one parents fear most: an open door.

I’m worried is the level of behaviour. It is not about who the friend is, but about what is happening with your teenager since they started spending time together: marks are dropping, they come home later than agreed, they lie about where they are, they withdraw from family life. Here a conversation is needed — but about your child’s behaviour, not about their friend’s character.

I act is the level of safety: friends who are much older and whom your child keeps hidden, drugs, violence, blackmail, criminal acts, encouragement to self-harm. Here you don’t wait for your teenager to realise it for themselves. More on this below.

Why a ban often doesn’t work

When something frightens you, a ban is the first reflex. “You’re not seeing that boy any more.” But with a friend who is only at the level of taste or worry, a ban very often achieves the opposite.

First, the friend becomes a symbol of autonomy. What was a classmate yesterday is today proof that the teenager is allowed to choose for themselves. If they give in, they lose not only a friend but also the battle to be their own person. And at fifteen almost nobody loses that battle voluntarily.

Second, the contact continues — only in secret. And here we meet a finding that is among the most important in parenting research. Margaret Kerr and Håkan Stattin showed that parents learn most about their teenagers’ lives not through monitoring but because their children tell them. A ban that closes this channel leaves you with less information precisely when you need it most.

Third, the teenager starts to defend the friend. Every criticism you make becomes an attack they must fend off, and in the process they bond with the friend even more. The psychologist Nina Mounts studied how parents try to shape their children’s friendships — by prohibiting, guiding or encouraging — and looked at how the effect of these attempts depends on the relationship at home. The same words sound different coming from a parent who is otherwise warm and approachable than from a parent with whom things are already tense.

It also helps to know that similarity between friends is not only the result of influence. As far back as the 1970s, the sociologist Denise Kandel showed that teenagers largely choose their friends according to what already appeals to them. If your child has started seeking out a crowd that takes risks, part of the question is also: what drew them to it?

That does not mean the influence is imaginary. Thomas Dishion and colleagues described how adolescents in a group reward each other for talk about breaking rules — with laughter, attention, recognition — and how programmes that grouped at-risk adolescents together sometimes even increased their behavioural problems. Selection and influence work at the same time. This is exactly why it matters that, alongside one group, a teenager keeps other places to belong: sport, a club, relatives, an older family friend.

What a teenager gets from these friends

This is the question parents most often skip when they are worried, and the one that opens up the most. A friendship that looks incomprehensible from the outside almost always makes sense from the inside.

Perhaps among these friends there is someone who doesn’t see them as “the one with bad marks”. Perhaps they can laugh with them, which hasn’t happened at home for a long time. Perhaps the friend you dislike is the only one who stayed by them when others shut them out. Perhaps this group gives them a sense of boldness they don’t yet have on their own. For girls and boys who feel invisible at home, a group that accepts them unconditionally can be a very strong magnet — even when that group has its dangerous sides.

In relational family therapy, in which I am training, we often read friendships as a message to the family as well. A teenager who becomes closely attached to a group the parents dislike is sometimes looking for what they don’t get in the family, or carrying a role the family has — unknowingly — given them. I wrote about how such roles form in Roles in the family: the hero, the scapegoat, the invisible child. Which was yours? In this case the friend is not the cause but a symptom. And when something shifts in the family, friendships often shift too.

Because a teenager builds much of their sense of self through their peers’ eyes at this stage, this theme is closely tied to self-image — more on that in Self-image in the teenage years: what parents can do.

How to talk about a friend you don’t like

If the worry is at the first or second level, the aim of the conversation is to keep the connection while clearly saying what worries you. A few guidelines that prove themselves:

Talk about behaviour, not the person. “Miha is a bad influence” is a judgement about someone your child cares about. “I’ve noticed that over the last few weeks you’ve been coming home later than we agreed” is an observation that can be talked about.

First ask what they like about the friend. And listen to the answer without immediately disputing it. The question “What do you like about Miha?”, asked with genuine curiosity, says more than ten warnings. And you may hear something you didn’t know.

Open the doors of your home. A friend who comes for Sunday lunch is harder to demonise. You get to know them as a person, they see what it is like at your house, and your child doesn’t have to hide anything. Parents often discover that the “bad influence” at the table is a polite, unsure boy who has a hard time at home.

Don’t speak badly about their family. Even if much of it is true. Your teenager will hear every such remark as an attack on their friend — and indirectly on themselves.

Say your worry once, clearly and without repetition. “I’m worried that you drink when you’re with that crowd. I’m not going to ignore that. I want you to know you can always call me, even at three in the morning, and I’ll come and get you without an interrogation.” Then don’t repeat it every day. A warning you hear every day turns into noise.

If you need more on how to set rules a teenager will actually hear, that is the subject of How to set boundaries with a teenager without losing your connection.

A scene: a conversation in the car

Let us go back to the mother from the opening. This is how a conversation might go a few days later, in the car on the way back from training — a place where teenagers often open up precisely because you are not looking each other in the eye (composite, not a real person):

“I was rude about Miha the other day. I don’t know him well enough to judge him.”
“Yeah. He’s not like you think.”
“What is he like, then?”
“Funny. And he never takes the mickey out of me about maths. And … things are bad at home, his dad’s left again.”
“I didn’t know that. Thank you for telling me.”
“You can’t tell anyone.”
“I won’t. There’s just one thing that worries me — that you smoke when you’re with him. I’m not going to just overlook that.”
“I don’t smoke every day …”
“We’ll talk about that. And Miha can come for lunch on Saturday, if he wants.”

Several important things happened in this conversation. The mother corrected her judgement without giving up her worry. Her son told her something he would not have told her before, because he didn’t feel attacked. The worry was still voiced — about her son’s behaviour, not his friend’s character. And the door opened, quite literally.

Exercise: a map of friends

This exercise is for you, not for your teenager. It takes fifteen minutes and a sheet of paper.

1. Write down the names of the friends your teenager mentions or spends time with. Next to each, write what you actually know about them — not what you imagine.
2. Mark a level next to each name: I don’t like it, I’m worried, or I act. If you’re not sure, write down what you would need to know to decide.
3. For one friend at the first or second level, write what you think your child gets from them. Belonging, laughter, courage, an escape from home? If you don’t know, that’s the question for your next conversation.
4. Ask yourself what this friend stirs up in you. Do they remind you of someone from your own youth? Of a fear you once had? Sometimes part of the worry is ours, not our child’s.
5. Choose one small step for this week: an invitation to lunch, one curious question, one clearly stated worry. Just one.

If you notice that you hardly know any of the names, that in itself is important information — about how much your teenager confides in you, and about how that relationship has changed recently. There is more in the knowledge base on how trust is built and how it breaks down.

When you need to act straight away

Everything above applies to friends who are unfamiliar or unpleasant to you, but not dangerous. There is, however, a third level where curiosity is not enough and where a ban is justified, even if the relationship suffers for a while because of it. Pay attention when:

• your child is spending time with people who are much older, who buy them gifts, drive them around or demand secrecy — these can be signs of abuse or exploitation;
• there are drugs, regular drinking or dealing; there is more on telling experimentation apart from a problem in Alcohol and drugs in the teenage years: when it is time to worry;
• there is violence in the group — towards your child or from your child towards others — or blackmail, including over the phone;
• the group encourages self-harm, starving, or talks about suicide;
• your child shows sudden changes: fear, withdrawal, unexplained money or belongings, injuries.

In such cases seek help from the school counselling service, your family doctor or paediatrician and, where there is a crime or exploitation involved, the police (113 in Slovenia). In an emergency, call 112. A teenager can call the TOM helpline 116 111 in Slovenia themselves; adults can reach the Samaritan helpline 116 123 (24 hours) and the Crisis Line (Klic v duševni stiski) 01 520 99 00 (7 pm to 7 am) in Slovenia. Here too it helps to state the ban openly and with a reason — “I’m not allowing this, because it’s about your safety” — and to stay available while your child is angry.

When it isn’t about the friends

To keep the picture honest, a few thoughts against what I have written.

Sometimes the worry is more ours than our child’s. A parent who fell into bad company in their own youth will see danger faster — sometimes even where there is none. A parent who was left out may worry excessively that their child has the “right” friends. What helps here is not more rules but a look inwards. The capacity to see your own fear as separate from your child’s experience is called mentalising.

Sometimes the friend isn’t the problem at all. When a teenager suddenly loses interest in everything, sleeps badly, shuts down and is irritable, it is very tempting to blame the new crowd for everything. But sometimes the crowd is just where they have taken refuge from something else — from distress they can’t name, or from tension at home. If your child has completely closed off, a good starting point is When a teenager goes quiet: how family therapy opens the conversation.

Sometimes the problem is that there are no friends. A teenager who is always alone, has no one to go out with and never talks about classmates may need more of your attention than one whose friends you dislike. Loneliness at this age can be very painful, and it should not be mistaken for being “a quiet child”.

And sometimes your teenager is right. The friend you judged may turn out to be a loyal, honest person. If that happens, it is worth saying so: “I was wrong about Miha.” Few sentences tell a teenager as much about whether you take them seriously.

If conversations about friends in your home always end in an argument with everyone staying on their own side, it can help to talk together, with someone who is on nobody’s side. In family therapy it often turns out that friends are not the core of the conflict but a door through which you can talk about what really needs to shift in the family. I also work in English.

What to remember

• Peers really do have a strong influence in adolescence, and resistance to their pressure is built precisely between the ages of 14 and 18.
• Separate three levels: I don’t like it (taste), I’m worried (behaviour) and I act (safety) — each calls for a different response.
• Banning a friend who isn’t dangerous often achieves the opposite: secrecy and a stronger bond.
• Ask what your teenager gets from the friend — the answer says a lot about them and about the family.
• When safety is at stake, act firmly and seek help; even then, stay available.