Jean-Luc Aubert is a psychologist specialising in children and adolescents. He worked for many years as a school psychologist, counselling thousands of children and teenagers and their parents. During that time, he wrote many books, including Violence dans les écoles (Editions Odile Jacob, 2001), Cette enfant qui n’écoute jamais (A. Michel, 2006), Les Sept Piliers de l’éducation (A. Michel, 2009) and Une petite psychologie de l’élève (Dunod, 2007).
Parents often undergo a shock when their children reach adolescence. All of a sudden, parents find themselves incapable of understanding their offspring. Why have their children become so rude? What has made them so aggressive? Why are they so moody? Why do they never put their things away or tidy up their rooms? Why do parents have to keep repeating everything? Why have the children’s friends become all-important?
The author answers these and many other questions that the parents of teenagers often ask themselves. For most parents the main concern is: how to reopen the lines of communication with a child who has ceased listening? They also wonder: how is this going to evolve? What are the risks? What should be cause for concern? What should be less worrying? What are the danger signs to look out for? And, above all, what should parents do to prevent dangerous behaviour? How can parents best accompany their children through their teenage years?
Jean-Luc Aubert offers clear approaches to all these concerns and provides the keys to help parents understand their child. He explains how and why teenagers behave as they do and suggests how to deal with specific types of behaviour, in order to re-establish communication and recover a more tranquil day-to-day existence.

• A concrete, practical work for a better understanding of the psychology of teenagers, both boys and girls.
• Hands-on advice to help parents maintain communication with their child and to know how to distinguish between what really matters and what is less important.