A chorus of “no” came from an auditorium packed with students of Classes VI, VII and VIII when a psychiatrist addressing the group of 540 students told them to have a conversation with their parents.

A lack of conversation or the absence of it leaves little room for children to confide in their parents, said the psychiatrist.

“Children will talk or confide when they know the ground is fertile and there is enough faith in the relationship,” said psychiatrist Jai Ranjan Ram.

Last month, Ram conducted an hour-long session with students of Sri Sri Academy in a bid to understand what causes stress and help them find solutions to their problems.

“What I tell in my session with parents is that we all make mistakes, and it is important to have conversations with children. I use the word conversation and not advice,” said Ram.

He insisted that not all communication has to be instructional.

“Parenting is more than giving instructions and so conversations have to be about everything, from successes, failures, rights, wrongs but that is not happening largely because of mobile phones, parental stress and hectic lifestyle,” he said.

The communication gap or not speaking with their parents begins as early as nine or 10 years of age, said Ram.

The students during the session shared their stress factors: finding it difficult to communicate their low grades to their parents, anxiousness about a game of chess in a competition or exam stress.

The breakdown of family structures has resulted in a gap between “human-to-human connect.”

“Parents have come to us and expressed their helplessness that they have no control over their children,” said Gargi Banerjee, principal, Sri Sri Academy.

“Circumstances have become such that children are left to themselves and they get little time to talk to their parents, and so naturally the gap widens. After a hard day’s work and sometimes carrying back work home or having to prepare for the next day, parents hardly spend time with their children,” said Banerjee.

A mother who returns home around 9pm from work said that often there is only enough time to ask about her son’s homework or school project.

“It is just a basic exchange not the inane conversation, which is more essential,” she said.