Raising kids is difficult, especially in today’s fast-paced world. My wife and I are the proud parents of three grown children. Over the years, we noticed that time spent between parents and their children decreases with each leap in technology. Many families spend more time texting than they do talking to one another. Technology may have advanced but the goal of most parents remains timeless. They want their children to grow up to be happy, self-sufficient, adults.  

Psychological Narrative Analysis (PNA) is the study of word choices and the grammar structures people choose when they speak or write. PNA techniques identify specific words, speech patterns, and grammatical structures that reveal a person's truthfulness. Both truthful and deceptive people use the same grammar rules to construct sen­tences. The only differ­ence between truthful statements and deceptive statements is the obfuscation (verbal confusion) or omission of the truth.  PNA techniques identify and exploit those differ­ences.

People typically use two methods to deceive, obfuscation and omission. Liars who obfuscate create verbal confusion to hide the truth in a tangle of half-truths, assumptions, and suppositions. People who lie by omission tell the truth up to the point where they want to withhold information, bridge over the withheld information, and resume telling the truth. Lying by obfuscation and lying by omission will be addressed in this book. PNA techniques are subtle and nonthreatening. Parents simply listen to the words their children say and let their words do the talking. 

Knowing when your children are evasive, deceptive, or are afraid to talk about sensitive topics is critical because youthful indiscretions begin with deception and miscommunication. Equipped with the right tools, parents can make a real difference in the lives of their children.  Fibs to Facts: A Parental Guide to Effective Communication (Hyperlink to the sales section of this Web site)provides the tools necessary to strengthen the parent-child bond. The techniques presented in this book were derived from Psychological Narrative Analysis: A Professional Method to Detect Deception in Oral and Written Communications, a book I wrote based on my 25 year career as a police officer and as a Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Excerpts from Fibs to Facts can be found on the Psychology Today WEB site under the blog titled Let their Words to the Talking.