How can Christian parents help their kids truly feel loved? In this episode of Upside-Down Parenting, Matt Jones and Janel Greig sit down with bestselling author Dr. Gary Chapman—the creator of The Five Love Languages—to talk about how parents can better understand their children, strengthen emotional connection, and reflect God’s love at home.
Drawing from his newest book, The Love Language That Matters Most, Dr. Chapman shares practical wisdom for parents navigating discipline, emotional connection, teens, boundaries, and everyday family life. Whether your child responds most to quality time, words of affirmation, physical touch, acts of service, or gifts, this conversation will help you love your kids in ways they can genuinely receive.
Dr. Gary Chapman is an author, speaker, pastor, and counselor best known for The Five Love Languages, which has helped millions of families and marriages worldwide. He has spent decades helping people build stronger relationships through intentional love and communication.
Episode 44: Summary & Transcript
Disclaimer: Please note that this is an automatically generated transcript. Although the transcription is largely accurate, it may be incomplete or inaccurate in some cases due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.
Episode Summary
This episode features Dr. Gary Chapman, who discusses how to apply the five love languages to parenting. He emphasizes that the most important love language is that of one’s partner or child. Chapman explains that knowing each child’s primary love language helps parents use their limited time more effectively, notes that a child’s primary love language can usually be observed by age four and tends to remain stable, and offers practical cues for kids to identify others’ love languages by watching behavior, requests, and complaints.
Chapman also connects the framework to a biblical view of love as a chosen attitude rooted in Jesus’ command to love others and stresses meeting children’s emotional needs. He concludes that parents should give heavy doses of a child’s primary love language while also modeling all five so children grow into adults fluent in multiple ways of expressing love.
Episode Transcript
Dr. Matt Jones (00:00):
Most parents genuinely want their kids to feel loved, but if we’re honest, there are moments when it just doesn’t seem to land. You show up, you care, you try, and somehow it still feels there’s a disconnect. What if part of the problem isn’t how much love we’re giving but how we’re giving it? Today we’re talking about one of the most influential ideas and relationships, the five love languages. But through the lens of parenting, how do we actually understand what makes our kids feel loved and how do we love them in a way that truly connects?
Janel and I are joined today by Dr. Gary Chapman, the author of Five Love Languages and his latest book, The Love Language That Matters Most: How to Personalize Love So They Really Feel It. To talk about how Christian Parents better understand their children, fill their love tanks, and build stronger, more meaningful relationships at home. Dr. Gary Chapman, Gary, I guess we get to call you. Thanks for joining us today. It’s an honor and a privilege for Janel and I to get to talk with you.
Dr. Gary Chapman (01:05):
Well, thank you. I’m delighted to be with you.
Dr. Matt Jones (01:08):
So where did you come up with this idea for the love language that matters most? I mean, why write that particular book?
Dr. Gary Chapman (01:19):
Well, this book really grew out of the two most frequently asked questions people have given to me over the last 30 years about the original book, The Five Love Languages. They’ve said, “Dr. Chapman, you mentioned in that book that these languages have dialects, different ways of speaking that particular language, but you don’t tell us what they are. And the other thing you mentioned is that personality interfaces with when and how you speak the love language, but you don’t go into that very much.” And so in this book we’re doing that. I teamed up with Les and Leslie Parrott. I’m sure you know them from Seattle.
Dr. Matt Jones (02:01):
Read a couple of their books. They’re great.
Dr. Gary Chapman (02:03):
And that title is to get attention because people read the title and they say, “Which one is it? Which one is it? Which one is it?” So in the first paragraph we make it clear. The most important love language is the love language of your partner or your child, the other person.
Dr. Matt Jones (02:23):
We appreciate you giving us the opening lines of your book away to us today. So I think that’s great. And I love that you listen to the folks in terms of, hey, there’s a dialect there and you guys have addressed that. It’s pretty impressive. So we really appreciate that. And how does this book in particular help parents better understand and actually practice the five love languages with their kids?
Dr. Gary Chapman (02:46):
Well, the book actually is addressed to adults, but I think if couples will read it and apply it themselves and learn the dialects with and learn the dialects that are most meaningful to them and learn their personalities and how that interfaces, it’ll give them clues on how to apply that same concept to their children.
Dr. Matt Jones (03:08):
That’s great.
Janel Greig (03:09):
For sure. And I think Gary, it’s awesome to have you on the show. I just absolutely am so appreciative of your work. It’s helped me a lot with my kids as well as my spouse, which lays the foundation for our family. So very, very grateful for that.
But along the lines of disciplining, I’ve heard some people say that parents shouldn’t discipline their kids using their love language. For example, if a child’s love language is quality time, a timeout alone could feel especially painful. Or if their love language is words of affirmation, certain words might really cut deep. So how should parents think about the love language of the child when it comes to discipline?
Dr. Gary Chapman (03:50):
Well, what I would say is their love language used in a negative way is the most stern discipline you could give them. I hope they’ve committed a big crime if you’re going to use that. I’m not saying you should never use it, but I think you’re best to not use their primary love language as a way to discipline them. What you mentioned, putting a child that quality of time is their language, put them in timeout. Man, that’s severe discipline.
Another child, you can put them in timeout. They don’t even know they’re being disciplined. They’re in there playing or doing something else. So I would just say be careful. And for most of the things I would seek to avoid that. Now, if they committed a huge, huge crime, then that would be the way to make them severely feel that they’re being punished for what they’ve done.
Dr. Matt Jones (04:47):
Yeah. That’s a really good point. That’s one of the things Cat and I have tried to do is say, “Hey, the discipline fits what they decided to do.” And I was just thinking, your story about the consequences there. I remember in grade school, I got in trouble for talking too much and what was great was my first and second grade teacher says, he talks too much. I’m going to sit him by the teacher so that he’ll talk less.
And I thought, “This is awesome. I have access to the teacher at any moment.” And so it backfired on him. So how does a parent go about, I mean, it’s crazy. How does a parent go about catching, wait a minute, I’m trying to interact, engage with this love language and it’s backfiring. Does that question make sense, Gary?
Dr. Gary Chapman (05:36):
Yeah. And I think we all learn by experience. So if we try something that doesn’t work, don’t keep doing the same thing. I mean, do something different. That didn’t work. But I do think, and what I have said to parents is one of the things I really encourage is when you make a rule, we should make rules and we should have rules, whether they’re children or teenagers, there’s guidelines or whatever you want to call them.
Tell them what the consequences will be when you make the rule. That way you know and they know what the consequences will be and you’re not likely to overreact and go in there and start yelling and screaming at them because you know what the consequences are and they know what the consequences are. So that’s going to make it much easier for both of you.
Janel Greig (06:23):
That’s really good. I think it’s great because, it’s the both sides of it, right? It’s being aware of what the love language is so that you can avoid weaponizing it against them and speak to that. But also I think the clarity there that you talked about, Gary, of this is intentional. These are the clear expectations we have for you and these are the consequences and that helps. Yeah. What about accountability? Filling the love tank is something you talk about, but how could you encourage parents to hold teens specifically accountable in a way that still fills their emotional love tank rather than depleting it?
Dr. Gary Chapman (06:57):
Well, I think what you have to do is to be careful to wrap your discipline in love. If words of affirmation is their language and Johnny has broken a rule and you’re going to administer discipline that you’ve already told him what it’s going to be and words of affirmation is his language. Then give him words before you do it.
“You know, John, I’m proud of you because most of the time you keep the rules and I really appreciate that. But now you know you broke the rule this time and you remember what the consequence is, right? Okay. Well then let’s do that, but please, please hear me. I’m proud of you because most of the time you keep the rules.”
So it’s trying to wrap the discipline in love. And if you’ve already told them what it is, then they’re open to it. They know we’ve already agreed on that. That’s going to be, but you still wrap it in love. And so whatever you can do so that they get the sense that you love them even though they’re going to have to suffer the consequences of what they did.
Janel Greig (08:08):
That’s good. Can I ask a question about, I have three kiddos and Matt also has three, but this isn’t personal, this isn’t my personal time, but one of the things navigating all three of my kids have very different love languages. Our oldest, she’s definitely a quality time kiddo. Our middle, he’s physical touch, always has been. That hasn’t changed. And our youngest is words of affirmation.
So for parents out there that might be listening that have similar across the spectrum, maybe they even have five kids and all five have a different one. How do parents navigate having multiple kids with different love languages without it seeming overwhelming or feeling exhausting?
Dr. Gary Chapman (08:49):
Well, I think, let’s face it, parenting can be exhausting. Not just in this area, but in a lot of other areas. But the valuable thing is if you understand the concept and you know the primary love language of the three children or the five children, at least the time that you’re going to spend expressing love to them is going to be meaningful to them. If you just do what you think would make them feel love, then you may be spending time, but they still don’t feel loved.
So I think really understanding their primary love language is going to help you be more effective with the time that you have. All of us have the same amount of time. Now if you have five children, obviously that’s much more demanding than three children. We only had two. Before we got married, my wife said she wanted to have five boys, but we had a girl to start with and then we had the boy and then she thought, I think maybe one of each is enough.
Dr. Matt Jones (09:52):
That’s great. Do you think the primary love language of your child changes as the child grows and matures, or is it pretty much, “Hey, this is pretty consistent throughout.”
Dr. Gary Chapman (10:07):
I think it pretty much stays with us through those years. And I also think you can learn a child’s love language by the time they’re four years old.
Dr. Matt Jones (10:15):
Four. Okay.
Dr. Gary Chapman (10:15):
Observe their behavior. My son’s love language is physical touch. At that age, I’d come home, he’d run to the door and grab my legs. He’s touching me because he wants to be touched. Our daughter never did that. At that age, she would say, “Daddy, come into my room. I want to show you something.” She wanted quality time.
Dr. Matt Jones (10:34):
Quality time. There it is.
Dr. Gary Chapman (10:36):
And so when they got to be teenagers, it was still there. I mean, her favorite request was, her most frequent request was, “Dad, can we take a walk after dinner?” She’s asking me for quality time. My son during those teenage years, he would never walk with me. He said, “Walking is dumb. You’re not going anywhere. If you’re going somewhere, drive.”
Dr. Matt Jones (10:59):
All right.That’s great. Oh, go ahead, Janel.
Janel Greig (11:01):
Yeah, I was going to ask, Gary, as you’re talking about identifying our kids’ love languages and how early we can do that, we don’t have to just sit them down with a print off or sit them in front of the screen so that they can do the quiz and we can find out, we can identify that. But how about with regards to teaching them to identify others’ love languages as they navigate relationships growing up? What are your recommendations for helping equip kids in that area?
Dr. Gary Chapman (11:27):
Well, if they have close friendships, you have to have a close friendship to know someone’s language that is interfacing with them a lot. First of all, you observe their behavior. How do they typically relate to other people? If they’re always giving words of affirmation, we tend to speak our own language, so that’s a clue that that’s their language. If they are giving gifts, giving gifts to people, that’s a clue that that’s their language. They want to receive gifts.
Secondly, you ask yourself, what do they request most often? Because if they’re saying to you, “Can I sit with you at the lunch table?” They’re asking you for quality time. If they’re saying, “I noticed, could you give me something?” Or give you, asking for something. So what do they request and what do they complain about most often?
(12:18):
If they say to, a friend says to them, “I just feel like we don’t get to spend enough time together. I wish we could spend more time together.” Or, “You’ve been awfully critical lately.” They’re telling you, “Words of affirmation is my language and you’ve been giving me negative words.” You put those three together, you can pretty well figure out a child’s language. Of course, as you know, there’s a free quiz for teenagers at the fivelovelanguages.com website and there’s a series of questions there that parents can ask a child younger than that that will also help the parent discover the child’s primary love language.
Dr. Matt Jones (12:56):
Yeah. I remember when we were doing family devotions one night, we sat down and said, “Okay, let’s find out what our family’s love languages are.” And so we did the teen one and it was really helpful and it’s like, “Oh, this makes more sense.” In terms of the primary love language, besides the quiz, and I appreciate in the book there was a QR code for folks to go and access the quiz.
I am curious, what if someone comes away and says, “Man, I don’t agree with the results of that,” because there have been times where my wife has taken something and she goes, “Man, I don’t know if that’s accurate.” So how would you respond? How would you respond to that?
Dr. Gary Chapman (13:35):
Well, I think we ought to let the person be the expert on themselves. And so if they say, “No, I don’t think that’s my love language. This is my love language.” Say, “Okay, well, that’s insightful. That’s good. I’m glad you shared that.” And we go with that and if they continue to respond in a positive way with that, then they’re probably right. There was just something about what they were thinking at the moment when they answered that question that just made it turn out a different way.
Dr. Matt Jones (14:01):
Okay, that’s helpful. So how do you think understanding the five love languages connects with a biblical view of love and parenting?
Dr. Gary Chapman (14:11):
Well, I think love is the most important word in the English language because Jesus said, “A new commandment I give to you that you love one another. And here’s the new part, as I have loved you, he loved us while we were sinners.” And then he says, “By this, others will know that you’re my disciple by the way you love.” So I think loving our children and loving other people are both in that command. As Christians, we are to be loving people.
And I like to emphasize that love begins with an attitude because we choose our attitude. We don’t choose our feelings. You can have negative feelings toward a child because of certain behaviors. They can have negative feelings toward you, but love is an attitude. And once we understand that, then we think in terms of now, how can I meet the emotional need?
(15:12):
Because we’re emotional creatures, but our loving somebody else doesn’t start with our having a feeling. It starts with our having an attitude and understanding what Jesus commanded us to do. And so loving our children is one of the most important things you can do for them, especially on the emotional level because we’re meeting one of their deepest emotional needs and we’re building a connection with them and that’s extremely important between the parent and the child.
Dr. Matt Jones (15:39):
That’s so insightful. I love it. Gary, we have this speed round and this is really just for fun and we try to get the answers kind of short. If we go off on a rail a little bit, it’s okay, but we’re trying short, quick answers just so the audience can get to know you a little bit more. And so Janel and I will rotate questions. Does that sound all right to you? Okay. All right, here we go. Janel, you want to go first?
Janel Greig (16:02):
I love this one. This is my favorite one. All right, Gary. Coffee or tea?
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:07):
Neither.
Dr. Matt Jones (16:08):
Yeah, Gary. He’s with me, Janel.
Janel Greig (16:15):
Are you just water?
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:16):
Well, yeah, just water. I used to, when I was younger, I drank sweet tea. I live in the south.
Dr. Matt Jones (16:21):
Yeah.
Janel Greig (16:22):
Okay. That makes perfect sense.
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:22):
I’ve never been a coffee drinker. When I was young, my mother told me, “You’re not old enough to drink coffee.” When I got older, I didn’t like it.
Dr. Matt Jones (16:30):
I just want you to know, Gary, I made it through undergrad, master’s and PhD without a sip of coffee. I’m proud of me. Okay. Morning person or night owl?
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:43):
I’m a morning person.
Dr. Matt Jones (16:44):
Okay.
Janel Greig (16:44):
Yeah. All right. Favorite way to spend a free afternoon?
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:50):
Oh, I like working in the kudzu.
Janel Greig (16:53):
In the kudzu?
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:53):
You don’t know what kudzu is?
Janel Greig (16:55):
Oh, no. Tell us more. Tell me more.
Dr. Gary Chapman (16:57):
In the southeast, it’s a vine that grows about 18 inches and it’s a big, huge leaf and it climbs trees and it will eventually kill the tree because the tree can’t get the sun. And we have a lot of kudzu down behind our house. When I have a little free time, it’s just getting alone out there and spending time saving trees and enjoying God’s nature.
Dr. Matt Jones (17:21):
That’s awesome.
Janel Greig (17:22):
I love that.
Dr. Matt Jones (17:22):
I remember kudzu. I grew up in Tennessee, so there’s some. All right. Book you recommend most and we have to put the caveat beside your own.
Dr. Gary Chapman (17:36):
Oh my goodness. The Bible.
Dr. Matt Jones (17:38):
Okay. Man.
Janel Greig (17:42):
Correct.
Dr. Matt Jones (17:42):
All right. A book you recommend least. No, I’m just kidding. All right. Actually, that would be interesting. Is there a parenting book you would recommend the least that you’d be willing to share with us?
Dr. Gary Chapman (18:00):
No.
Dr. Matt Jones (18:01):
Okay. All right.
Janel Greig (18:02):
That’s a good answer, Gary. Safe. Sounds good. Let’s shift topics. One place you’ve always wanted to visit.
Dr. Gary Chapman (18:11):
It’s very interesting. I have been everywhere I want to go.
Dr. Matt Jones (18:17):
What a blessing.
Janel Greig (18:18):
I love it.
Dr. Gary Chapman (18:19):
Yeah. People have asked me because five years ago I retired officially from the church that I’d served on the staff for 50 years.
Dr. Matt Jones (18:26):
Wow. Wow. Thank you for your service. That’s amazing.
Dr. Gary Chapman (18:29):
But they let me keep my office, where I am now, and keep my assistant and do what I want to do. So if I’m in town, I’m here every day still seeing people because I love what I do.
Dr. Matt Jones (18:39):
That’s awesome. That’s awesome.
Dr. Gary Chapman (18:40):
But being retired, my wife and I talked about, had the thought, honey, is there anywhere else you want to go? Anything else you want to do? But we’ve done so much through the years, all of it connected with ministry really, that we’re just happy to live life together. That’s great. It’s beautiful. And enjoy our friends that we’ve had through the years.
Dr. Matt Jones (19:00):
That’s cool. And since you brought up getting to do what you want to do, what’s your go-to comfort food?
Dr. Gary Chapman (19:07):
Oh, I like everything. My wife says to me, “You know, honey, you’re not hard to please.” Because everything she fixes, I love.
Dr. Matt Jones (19:17):
Wow.
Dr. Gary Chapman (19:18):
And interestingly, my wife still fixes dinner every night except on Thursday. We have a date night every Thursday night.
Dr. Matt Jones (19:25):
That’s awesome. Our date night’s Wednesday night, so that’s good. Something people would be surprised to learn about you.
Dr. Gary Chapman (19:34):
That I’m 88 years old.
Janel Greig (19:36):
Wow, that’s awesome. Doing great. Doing great.
Dr. Matt Jones (19:42):
We should have guessed his age earlier, Janel, just to see how close we could have got it. That’s pretty great. You look great.
Janel Greig (19:48):
I wouldn’t have been close. Yeah. I wouldn’t have been close.
Dr. Gary Chapman (19:50):
I feel like I’m 65.
Dr. Matt Jones (19:52):
That’s awesome. All right.
Janel Greig (19:53):
Yeah. What’s one word your family would use to describe you, Gary?
Dr. Gary Chapman (20:00):
Oh, I would hope, loving.
Janel Greig (20:03):
There it is. Yep.
Dr. Matt Jones (20:04):
That’s awesome. We’re going to take a break. We’re going to have the first half of our podcast and then we want to follow up with some more questions. But I am curious, what is one question that you come on podcasts or as you’re doing these interviews that you don’t get asked that you wish you would? Is there something that, man, when you come on these podcasts, you say, “Man, I really wish people would ask me this.” And you would want to say, “Hey, this is what families or parents need to think about” that you don’t get asked.
Dr. Gary Chapman (20:38):
I think the question, “Do you only speak their primary love language?” And my answer will be clear. No. You give heavy doses of the primary love language, but you speak the other four. We would like our children to grow up knowing that there’s different ways to express love. And so we talk about the five ways to express love. And then we would like for them to learn how to express love in all five languages.
So we’re going to give them heavy doses with their primary, but we’re going to also illustrate to them how to speak the other four languages. That’s the healthiest adult, the one that comes to adulthood having learned how to speak all five of these languages. Most of us did not learn all five growing up. So yeah, that’s a question I wish they would ask.
Dr. Matt Jones (21:23):
That’s it. I really like that one, Janel.
Janel Greig (21:26):
Yeah, that’s great. Well, let’s wrap up this first episode with Dr. Gary Chapman and then we’ll look to part two for all you listeners to continue. So Dr. Chapman, thanks for being with us in this first part of two episodes and thank you listeners for listening to this episode.
At the end of the day, remember loving our kids well means more than just feeling love as Dr. Gary shared with us. It means learning to express it in ways they can actually receive. Thanks for listening to Upside Down Parenting. If this episode encouraged you, share it with another parent. Be sure to subscribe and listen to our part two coming soon. We’ll see you next time.