Parents often want to crawl into a deep hole for a few years when their progeny reach the teen stage. There is hope for continuing to see daylight outside of the confines of that hole... simply "remember when" we were in the same shoes. Showing respect to children isn't difficult at all.
It has been an age-old quandary. Why do children seem to "change" when they hit that magical number of 13? At the same time, many parents go into "freeze mode" and just start counting the years until this apparent phase is over.
It may seem an extremely difficult concept, but teenagers need a parent's respect even more at this time than at any other time. Many people at this point will say something such as "oh, he knows I love him!" But love and respect aren't necessarily synonymous and we shouldn't assume the child knows that.
Granted, it's tough to show respect when someone has nothing to do but roll eyes and verbalize how little the parent knows, but it is a very vital aspect to the self esteem of any teenager.
Play a Mind Game with Yourself
When it seems as if there is no way to understand your teen, try to take a moment to play the "oh yes, I remember when" game. The game is simple... merely think back to when you were a teenager. Remember how it felt when our parents told us that we couldn't wear what classmates were wearing? Remember when our parents had nothing good to say about the friends we chose? While remembering these things, we also need to recall how those things felt. They hurt. Few parents will choose to purposely hurt their own children in those ways.
Remember how it felt when an adult criticized a choice we made when we were teenagers? It really isn't a complicated thing to tell our teen that we respect his or her opinion. We don't have to agree with it or pretend to agree with it because it's perfectly fine to add "but I don't agree with it."