A shared meal is more than just eating together. It is an anchor for families that are more often than not caught in a frenzy of after school, after work activities. With everyone keeping a different agenda or schedule, we need to make a heroic effort to insist on a piece of shared time. Some families can only indulge in the luxury of a Sunday night dinner, but even once a week is better than none at all.
Such insistence is well worth the effort. Time writer Nancy Gibbs says that the family meal "is where a family builds its identity and culture.Legends are passed down, jokes rendered, eventually the wider world examined through the lens of a family's values."
Studies support the idea that this kind of "cocooning" functions like a "kind of vaccine protecting kids from all manner of harm." For example, research indicates that frequent shared family dinners reduce the likelihood of kids taking up smoking, drinking, doing drugs, getting depressed, developing eating disorders or considering suicide.
What's more, frequent shared meals with family increase the likelihood that your kids will do well in school, delay having sex, eat their vegetables, increase their vocabulary and know the basics of dinner etiquette.
More at Why the Family Dinner is Important for Your Teen.
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