I started this blog with no clue as to what I was doing, I'm still just taking shots in the dark occasionally. But, I think I have gotten the main point across, which is this.
From the moment a child starts making conscious decisions for him or herself, there will always be someone pressuring that child to do something; whether it be endorsing or against, for good or for bad. Over time, that child will hopefully learn how to handle this pressuring and not do the things that negative peer pressure tells him or her to do, and recognizes and accepts positive peer pressure. This will not always be the case, but it will hopefully become less of a problem if the child is surrounded by positive influences as he ages to adult-hood, and then continues to stay around people who won't pressure him or her to make the wrong choices.
It has been a good semester, and I hope that you have left this blog more aware of how peer pressure affects us all.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Friday, May 6, 2011
Bullying
So apparently I miscounted and have one less post than I thought I did, so I'm going to do this post now and figure out what I'm doing early next week later. So, as the title says, I'm going to touch on one of the biggest (in my opinion, at least) aspects of Peer Pressure there is. Could I give links to articles? Yes. However, I have two stories to tell about the effects of bullying on two people whom I have known at some point in my life. All of these facts have been gathered by me or by other people directly involved in these cases.
All names, times and locations and then some (Basically everything I can think of) have been changed and/or omitted without destroying accuracy to give the subjects of these stories their privacy.
Homosexuality: Why Public Enemy #1?
To begin, I'll start with the less-tragic story. Chris has grown up in a small town with a small school. He's nice enough and decently smart, but there's a problem. He is openly gay, but that isn't the problem. The problem is how a certain group of bullies at his school feel about his gender-orientation.
To show that being gay at their school "wasn't acceptable", Art and his friends would hunt Chris down, wait for him outside of doors, etc. to beat him up. This went on for some time, and Chris had to struggle through it alone. All the other kids in the school avoided him and pressured their friends to avoid Chris as well. Eventually, Art and his friends moved away, and Chris no longer had anyone hurting him anymore. The rest of his school, without the pressure from the bullies, started opening up to him. Without the main source of the pressure, the rest of the pressuring melted away.
Why So Nerdy?
This is a shorter story, as I know less about this, but it does not have the happy ending the other one had. Like with the other story, Jim had no friends at school. His appearance was mocked, as well as other features about him. To befriend Jim would have been "uncool", thus no attempts were made. Eventually, Jim got sick of it. During a break from school, he took his own life.
One life hurt, another lost, all because of negative peer pressure and nobody breaking through it. Negative peer pressure and bullying are two major problems, and I hope that I have helped you, as a reader, to see this. Stand up against Peer Pressure, when it is negative, and do not let it rule you. Until my next and final post~
All names, times and locations and then some (Basically everything I can think of) have been changed and/or omitted without destroying accuracy to give the subjects of these stories their privacy.
Homosexuality: Why Public Enemy #1?
To begin, I'll start with the less-tragic story. Chris has grown up in a small town with a small school. He's nice enough and decently smart, but there's a problem. He is openly gay, but that isn't the problem. The problem is how a certain group of bullies at his school feel about his gender-orientation.
To show that being gay at their school "wasn't acceptable", Art and his friends would hunt Chris down, wait for him outside of doors, etc. to beat him up. This went on for some time, and Chris had to struggle through it alone. All the other kids in the school avoided him and pressured their friends to avoid Chris as well. Eventually, Art and his friends moved away, and Chris no longer had anyone hurting him anymore. The rest of his school, without the pressure from the bullies, started opening up to him. Without the main source of the pressure, the rest of the pressuring melted away.
Why So Nerdy?
This is a shorter story, as I know less about this, but it does not have the happy ending the other one had. Like with the other story, Jim had no friends at school. His appearance was mocked, as well as other features about him. To befriend Jim would have been "uncool", thus no attempts were made. Eventually, Jim got sick of it. During a break from school, he took his own life.
One life hurt, another lost, all because of negative peer pressure and nobody breaking through it. Negative peer pressure and bullying are two major problems, and I hope that I have helped you, as a reader, to see this. Stand up against Peer Pressure, when it is negative, and do not let it rule you. Until my next and final post~
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Peer Pressure Statistics
So while searching for my next blog post topic, I found it in the form of a survey at Survelum.com. As it is only online and open to anyone, there is no guaranteeing the accuracy of the results, but they seem to be consistent with the points I have made and that others have made. While most of the really negative questions have "No" as the dominant answer (Illegal activities, etc), the questions like this one,
"Have you lied about liking something just because you thought your friends would make fun of you if they knew?"
have "Yes" as the highest answer. Other questions, like pressuring someone else into doing something, are almost equal in Yes and No answers. While only 436 people have taken the survey, it still should get the point across. Peer Pressure does affect decisions negatively, even for illegal acts. It's not exaggerated, and I hope that I have proved this to you throughout the course of this blog. Survey results found in the link below.
http://www.survelum.com/survey-results/PeerPressure/filter-2-0/Thursday, April 28, 2011
Peer Pressure During Adolescence (Article)
While searching the internet for something to post about this week, I came across an article that does a good job of illustrating several examples of Peer Pressure. It covers some things that I have covered, as well as a few that I have not.
http://www.mesacc.edu/dept/d46/psy/dev/Fall99/peer_pressure/index.html
http://www.mesacc.edu/dept/d46/psy/dev/Fall99/peer_pressure/index.html
Friday, April 22, 2011
Real Example of Adult Peer Pressure
I can't find much more on Peer Pressure, not that I can cover in this blog. I have saved one aspect, one very important aspect, of it for the last post. So until then, I will try to find significant topics of peer pressure that I haven't covered, other than the everyday "Dude, do this, everyone else is doing it", which is much too broad.
Anyways, not much else to say. Link going to the original blog post where this letter was copied from is Here, I take no credit for it whatsoever.
"Laurie,
My sister who is expecting her fifth child at the end of April is currently homeschooling her oldest two daughters, grades 1 and 3. She is knowledgeable in the classical approach, tries to use it herself, and also has helped to start a classical school that meets twice a week with paid teachers. The parents still homeschool the majority of the time and the children meet for the “extras” two afternoons a week.
Her dilemma is that she fears her oldest especially is not getting “enough” at home. The interruptions of the younger two are a major distraction. She is contemplating sending the oldest three to her church’s very popular day school next year (she has in fact received much heat over the last three years for homeschooling and she has little support for it in her church since the church has a school). The church is affluent by and large, and the conventional wisdom among young mothers there is to send the children to school as early as possible so that they, the mothers, can socialize, do volunteer work, etc. My sister is swimming upstream in that environment.
Yesterday she called me to ask my advice about school enrollment. I told her I understand her dilemma and her concerns about her children’s education and I strongly encouraged her to reconsider keeping her children home. Her oldest likes being homeschooled, but she is not “Speedy Gonzales” which is one of my sis’s concerns. My sis thinks maybe another teacher would be able to “get more out of her” than she can. I think she is really worried that they aren’t doing as much as are their cohorts at the day school. I think she wants a break. She really does so much of this alone. Her husband, who is very supportive of homeschooling and the classical approach, can’t help as much as he’d like. Is there anything more you would add to what I’ve told her? J.
———-
Dear J,
I think you have covered everything with your sister. In the end we have to just let go. When we surround ourselves with people who think differently than we do, and we experience very little support for our own position, then, in a moment of weakness (like when you are expecting a baby and feeling overwhelmed) we are tempted to give up and go the easy route (private school). It’s called socialization and peer influence, and I’m not talking about the children here. We as adults are just as influenced by the opinions of our peers as we know our children to be. We as adults want to “fit in.” That’s why it’s very important to properly “socialize” ourselves and avoid the influence of those who are intent on persuading us to go a route we ought not to. If you are one of those who is easily influenced by people and who likes to please people, then you ought to be careful who you surround yourself with. We all try to be careful who our children play with. We don’t want our children constantly surrounded with children who have different values, goals, and beliefs than we do. Of course, you know I’m not saying that we must never associate with those who believe differently than we do. That would be impossible and absurd. But if you attend a church where you get no support for homeschooling, if you live near relatives who only tear you down, if your friends and neighbors don’t homeschool, then it is no wonder that you will start to doubt the value of homeschooling. Surround yourself with people who will build you up, not tear you down.
Laurie"
Anyways, not much else to say. Link going to the original blog post where this letter was copied from is Here, I take no credit for it whatsoever.
"Laurie,
My sister who is expecting her fifth child at the end of April is currently homeschooling her oldest two daughters, grades 1 and 3. She is knowledgeable in the classical approach, tries to use it herself, and also has helped to start a classical school that meets twice a week with paid teachers. The parents still homeschool the majority of the time and the children meet for the “extras” two afternoons a week.
Her dilemma is that she fears her oldest especially is not getting “enough” at home. The interruptions of the younger two are a major distraction. She is contemplating sending the oldest three to her church’s very popular day school next year (she has in fact received much heat over the last three years for homeschooling and she has little support for it in her church since the church has a school). The church is affluent by and large, and the conventional wisdom among young mothers there is to send the children to school as early as possible so that they, the mothers, can socialize, do volunteer work, etc. My sister is swimming upstream in that environment.
Yesterday she called me to ask my advice about school enrollment. I told her I understand her dilemma and her concerns about her children’s education and I strongly encouraged her to reconsider keeping her children home. Her oldest likes being homeschooled, but she is not “Speedy Gonzales” which is one of my sis’s concerns. My sis thinks maybe another teacher would be able to “get more out of her” than she can. I think she is really worried that they aren’t doing as much as are their cohorts at the day school. I think she wants a break. She really does so much of this alone. Her husband, who is very supportive of homeschooling and the classical approach, can’t help as much as he’d like. Is there anything more you would add to what I’ve told her? J.
———-
Dear J,
I think you have covered everything with your sister. In the end we have to just let go. When we surround ourselves with people who think differently than we do, and we experience very little support for our own position, then, in a moment of weakness (like when you are expecting a baby and feeling overwhelmed) we are tempted to give up and go the easy route (private school). It’s called socialization and peer influence, and I’m not talking about the children here. We as adults are just as influenced by the opinions of our peers as we know our children to be. We as adults want to “fit in.” That’s why it’s very important to properly “socialize” ourselves and avoid the influence of those who are intent on persuading us to go a route we ought not to. If you are one of those who is easily influenced by people and who likes to please people, then you ought to be careful who you surround yourself with. We all try to be careful who our children play with. We don’t want our children constantly surrounded with children who have different values, goals, and beliefs than we do. Of course, you know I’m not saying that we must never associate with those who believe differently than we do. That would be impossible and absurd. But if you attend a church where you get no support for homeschooling, if you live near relatives who only tear you down, if your friends and neighbors don’t homeschool, then it is no wonder that you will start to doubt the value of homeschooling. Surround yourself with people who will build you up, not tear you down.
Laurie"
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Examples of Peer Pressure
So, I am pretty busy this week, but I'm not going to forget about this. However, instead of posting about an aspect of Peer Pressure, I'm going to link any and all of you readers to a few videos I found that illustrate some examples of it. The first one is in a more humorous light, but it still is a good example. All credit for the videos goes to their respective makers/uploaders.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4s7LJy__iQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orZ9gG8Vnfs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OZT4dM7-fs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4s7LJy__iQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orZ9gG8Vnfs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OZT4dM7-fs
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
The Perfect Body Part 2
Guy time, now. One word: steroids. You have to be big, buff, do well in sports, right? Even at the cost of your own health. Sadly, this is true, especially in high-school students. Link to an article is below, there's not really much to say on this.
http://articles.sfgate.com/2003-11-02/news/17516529_1_school-athletes-creatine-supplement
http://articles.sfgate.com/2003-11-02/news/17516529_1_school-athletes-creatine-supplement
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