The Effects of Peer Pressure on Teenagers
Peer pressure has become a well-known social issue crossing the world, especially for teenagers. As teens grow up, putting more and more attention on the comparison with their friends, they tend to be influenced by peer pressure that is generated by their social groups. In general, peer pressure has several negative effects on teenagers from their daily behavior to their ability of judging their identities. Specifically, peer pressure affects kids’ health, forcing them to follow the trends and negatively influenced them to try something bad. On the other hand, it also has some positive influences on teenagers: it increases teens’ attendance on activities and helps them practice their critical thinking
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Peer pressure is generated among teenagers because of their desires of being liked. A website organized by The Nemours Foundation in the aim of educating children about their physical and mental health problems, the KidsHealth, advertises that it mainly because they worry whether they will be laughed at if they do not go along with the social group (2017). Besides, teenagers can also cause peer pressure when they are curious about trying new things that everyone around them does. They are especially vulnerable to peer pressure, because they just leave their parents and may have not yet established their own values about human relationships or the consequences of their behavior (Hartney, 2017). Therefore, in order to be fit to the groups, teens maybe willing to engage in some activities to gain positive impressions. Influenced by these two factors, the peer pressure among students occurs …show more content…
Teens sometimes may feel pressured to do something they know is wrong, such as smoking, drinking, doing drugs, or stealing, or something they don’t want to do such as having sex. Statistically, according to The Canadian Lung Association, "my friends smoke" and "I thought it was cool" are two of the main reasons those between the ages of 12 and 17 start smoking (Zeiger, 2017). The Canadian Lung Association also pointed out that 70 percent of teens who smoke have friends who smoke because of peer pressure, and two-thirds of 10th graders and two-fifths of 8th graders have tried alcohol and smoking influenced by their friends (Zeiger, 2017). The data from the internet is astonishing; the majority of students who have been in the survey were somehow affected by peer pressure that led them into a bad degenerate way in doing bad things. Thus, from both the professional analysis and the statistics, peer pressure’s negative impacts on teen’s try of wrong things really have to be considered
Teens today are also influenced by their peers on their actions. In the article “Peer Pressure” it says, “The term “peer pressure” refers to any type of influence that your friends may have over you. Many times, teens are influenced by their peers to do things that result in negative consequences. This is negative peer pressure. Specifically, negative peer pressure refers to activities such as using drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes; vandalizing property; using violence against others; having sex before you are ready or having unsafe sex; stealing; or driving drunk” (Feder).
In “Salvation” by Langston Hughes, he recalls a time from his childhood when he was at church. All the children of the church were being “saved” until he was eventually the last one who wasn’t. Feeling tired and pressured, Langston stood, declaring he had been saved. He felt horrible for lying, but the pressure placed upon him by the entire church outweighed the feeling of guilt. Similarly, people of all types experience a feeling similar to Langston’s; something called peer pressure.
Peers make a set of unwritten laws that most people follow out of fear of being shunned. Peer pressure can also be explained as a tool to control individuals in society, for example, “In essence, society controls us by rewarding us when we conform, and penalizing us when we don’t. We learn at a very early age that we have to “go along to get along”. (Whittaker, Liam S. "Society Controls Us." CSGlobe.)
Peer pressure is a very disturbing thing in our culture today. In the book ScrewTape Letters, ScrewTape informs Wormwood about peer pressure. Of how this pressure can lead one astray for going into the wrong crowd. People change people. It is easier to pull someone off a chair than to pull someone up onto the chair.
One example of peer pressure that I found in the book was when Scooter says that he is going to jump the nail but then he actually has to go through with it because he doesn't want to be called a "Chicken". Elisa also got peer pressured. I know Elisa got peer pressured because she said she was going to jump with Scooter but she didn't want anyone to know because she didn't know if she was actually going to jump.
At a young age, parents tend to teach their child right from wrong. They teach you this to become responsible, so when your an adult you do not have to rely on them while making decisions. In George Orwell's Shooting an Elephant, we notice he wanted to do the right thing by not shooting the elephant but gave into peer pressure to fit in. The narrator felt the need he had to shoot the elephant because the people of Burma were frightened and he wanted to be their hero. Peer pressure can lead people to do bad things for what they think are good reasons but are actually not.
Adolescence: A Look at Adolescence in the Movie The Breakfast Club The 1985 movie written and directed by John Hughes, called The Breakfast Club looks at five very different students who are coming into adolescence and becoming their own people.
The students do this to because of the peer pressure that follows them. However, self-induced pressure also plays a role in convincing the students to try and defeat other students. Students put pressure on themselves to seek success in school. Seeing the success of others near them produces a panic to settle in, which leads to just he focus on their studies and nothing else.
An accepting and healthy environment is needed. Many people face peer pressure because they are deemed uncool and are pressured to do uncomfortable things and things that they believe are not right. If everyone accepts everyone around them for their real selves and will not judge them, people will not commit unhealthy acts and develop undesirable bad habits. People need to surround themselves around healthy and positive company that will accept each other and have healthy core values.
For reasons of which have no excuses for them. We were all teens once and know that teens like to conform and give in to the efforts of peer pressure which often implement doing some sort of “ extra-curricular activity” such as using drugs like alcohol and marijuana. Our youth partakes in theses activities for the likes of friends and what they see. They want to be hip and cool. Be like and apart of the “IN CROWD” and what better way to be like the cool kids then to do what the popular kids do.
Peer pressure is quite the controversial matter today. It is the feeling that someone your own age is pushing you toward making a certain choices, good or bad.(The Cool Spot). The level of peer influence generally increases as children grow and it has become an important influence on behavior during adolescence. Many researches and surveys have been done to find the answer to the question whether peer pressure is beneficial or harmful for teenagers. While Karcher &Finn (2005) claimed that peer pressure is the biggest factor result in bad behavious of adolescents; Bukowski (1998) and Salvy (2011) argued that pressure from peers can bring amazing benefits for them.
Academic and social pressures are pressure from family, friends and society which leads to university
provide a useful framework for the discussion of social influence, in general, and peer influence, in particular, on smoking, the paper is organized around the following key questions: what is social influence? however, it may be useful here to point out the centrality of social norms in the prominent theories typically used to design research and explain findings on peer group effects. : identity, adolescence, relationships with peersresumeobjectif:selon erik erikson, la principale tache des adolescents consiste a resoudre la crise d'identite versus la confusion des roles. the main tasks of this literature review were to: summarize results of adolescents' identity development and relationships with peers; and, discuss the theoretical factors that could predict the links of adolescent identity development and relationships with
Almost everyone has experienced peer pressure at least once in their lifetime,either on a small scale or a large one, in a positive or a negative way. Peer pressure is simply when someone gets you to do something. It is quite easy to get influenced by peer pressure (especially in the teenage years) because everyone wants to fit in and not be left out. Teens sometimes give into peer pressure by doing risky things. Correct friends -are more likely to- play more safe decisions in general.
Is Social Problems Among Teenagers An Increasingly Worrying Phenomenon? Nowadays, social problems are one of the major concerns in society and the condition got worsen year by year, mainly contributed by teenagers. Social problems emerged due to influences of the bad cultures from other countries. Teenagers cannot identify and differentiate between good and bad conducts.