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Dealing with a defiant teenager can be a very frustrating experience for parents. It can certainly set an antagonistic, negative atmosphere at home where everything leads to a debate. It steals away the peace in a household and causes a constant power struggle between parents and their children.

For defiant teens, their attitude is an assertion of control over their lives and their decisions. Defiance is a response to the feeling of powerlessness and frustration. Nobody wants to feel powerless, regardless of age. Young people just often handle this feeling in a less than desirable way. Oftentimes, they can interpret the friction at home caused by their defiant behavior as a positive result, or an indication that they are "winning" by ruffling feathers and inciting reactions.

When parents deal with defiant teenagers, the severity of problems range from teens backtalking to being verbally abusive. There's a big difference between the two, and both need to be handled in different ways. When teens backtalk, they are just being argumentative and aim to engage parents in a constant, tiring debate. When teens become verbally abusive, they resort to name calling, making threats, swearing, and saying hurtful or harmful things. When teens backtalk, they are trying to compensate for not getting their way with things. When teens become verbally abusive, it's a precursor to more serious behavioral problems.

Oftentimes when parents are dealing with defiant teens, they resort to trying to gain their children's approval or to win them over by rationalizing with them. They often think that this is the way to bring back the peace at home when all they are actually doing is empowering their children the wrong way.

The best way to help your child have a healthy respect for rules and authority figures is by setting up a home atmosphere that has clear rules and boundaries. If the rules are set properly and respected by all members of the family (including the parents), there should be no reason to respond to backtalk.

Say for example that you set a house rule that prohibits your children to stay out late on a weekday. If the rules are clear and are consistently upheld by both parents, there should be no reason to justify the rule everytime your teen wants to break it. When teens become defiant, it's an invitation to engage their parents in an argument. When parents get drawn into an argument about house rules that have already been set, they are effectively allowing their teens to question the rationality of the rule and (indirectly) the authority of parents in the house. The main idea is to establish the authority of parents rather than get into a never-ending argument with defiant teens that talk back.

If there's a valid reason to allow exceptions or revisions to the house rules, it's better to explain to teens that they can ask for it properly. They can politely explain their side and suggest changes to the house rules. All this while emphasizing that listening to their suggestions don't guarantee that you will take their suggestions.

One cannot stress enough why it is important for parents to set ground rules at home. When properly implemented, there's lesser chances of having to deal with defiant teens down the road.

As mentioned earlier, there's a difference between teens that just talk back and teens that are verbally abusive. What should parents do when teens cross that line towards abuse?

It's very important to be clear and unyielding about how abuse is viewed at home. It's a good idea for parents to wait until the situation has cooled down and talk to the defiant teen, reiterating that abuse is never acceptable and there's no excuse for it. Even if they are provoked to anger for whatever reason, choosing to be abusive should never be acceptable. Calling out and punishing abusive behavior is a good way to stop the problem before it gets worse.

If parents don't address the issue of abuse, other siblings will feel unsafe at home and the situation can get ugly pretty fast. Teens who are physically abusive often start out by testing the waters with verbal abuse first.