Peers and Adolescents
June 27th 2007 05:12
At adolescence, peer relations expand to occupy a particularly central role in young people's lives. New types (e.g., opposite sex, romantic ties) and levels (e.g., "crowds") of peer relationships emerge. Peers typically replace the family as the center of a young person's socializing and leisure activities. Teenagers have multiple peer relationships, and they confront multiple "peer" cultures that have remarkably different norms and value systems. The adult perception of peers as having one culture or a unified front of dangerous influence, is inaccurate. More often than not, peers reinforce family values, but they have the potential to encourage problem behaviors as well. Although the negative peer influence is overemphasized, more can be done to help teenagers experience the family and the peer group as mutually constructive environments. Here are some facts about parent, adolescent and peer relations:
1. During adolescence, parents and adolescents become more physically and psychologically distant from each other. This normal distancing is seen in decreases in emotional closeness and warmth, increases in parent-adolescent conflict and disagreement, and an increase in time adolescents spend with peers. Unfortunately, this sometimes is caused because parents are emotionally unavailable to their teenaged children.
2. Increases in family strains (economic pressures, divorce, etc.) have prompted teenagers to depend more on peers for emotional support. By the high school years, most teenagers report feeling closer to friends than parents. Stress caused by work, marital dissatisfaction, family break-up caused by divorce, entering a step-family relationship, lower family income or increasing expenses, all produce increased individual and family stress.
3. Parent-adolescent conflict increases between childhood and early adolescence, although in most families, its frequency and intensity remain low. Typically, conflicts are the result of relationship negotiation and continuing attempts by parents to socialize their adolescents, and do not signal the breakdown of parent-adolescent relations. Parents need to include adolescents in decision-making and rule-setting that affects their lives.
4. In 10 to 20 percent of families, parents and adolescents are in distressed relationships characterized by emotional coldness and frequent outbursts of anger and conflict. Unresolved conflicts produce discouragement and withdrawal from family life. Adolescents in these families are at high risk for various psychological and behavioral problems.
5. Youth gangs, commonly associated with inner-city neighborhoods, are becoming a recognizable peer group among youth in smaller cities, suburbs, and even rural areas. Gangs are particularly visible in communities with a significant portion of economically disadvantaged families and when the parent is conflictual, distant or unavailable.
6. Formal dating patterns of two generations ago have been replaced with informal socializing patterns in mixed-sex groups. This may encourage casual sexual relationships that heighten the risk of exposure to AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
7. As high schools become more culturally diverse environments, ethnicity is replacing individual abilities or interests as the basis for defining peer "crowds." Crowds can be an important source of ethnic identity, but also the center of racial and ethnic tension in schools.
8. There has been an increase in part-time employment among youth, but it has had little impact on peer relations.To find time for work, teenagers drop extracurricular activities, reduce time spent on homework, and withdraw from family interactions, but they "protect" time spent with friends
Sources: American Board of Pediatrics, American Psychological Association, and American Counseling Association
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Comment by Miswanderlust
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I can only joke about this now since my son is 21. I feel 'ya brother!
Mis
Comment by Miswanderlust
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I would never assume that !
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Comment by KylieW
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Great post.
Comment by Miswanderlust
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You have no idea. Love my son during this time but I am glad the teenaged years are over!
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Comment by Mrs M
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I found myself nodding as I was reading through your post.
I remember doing some of the things you talk about here. Protecting time spent with friends. Putting friends before family.
My daughter is only 6 and she's already started with "I hate being at home...it's boring. Can I go to a friends house?"
It's not unexpected.
I just need to remember how I felt as a teenager and hopefully that will help me at least when my kids become teenagers.
Love & stuff
Mrs M
Comment by Miswanderlust
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This is key to navigating teenage life
I just need to remember how I felt as a teenager and hopefully that will help me at least when my kids become teenagers.
You are spot on. So many parents get their feelings hurt during this time. I always try to help them remember. For some it is "all about them" and not their teenagers well being.
Thanks for stopping by...always a pleasure
Mis