“Your sister had an A+ in this class and look at you!” This common language used by parents nowadays seems to be efficient in the eyes of the parent but in reality is very detrimental to a child’s mindset. The amount of times I have heard my own parents tell me to follow in my brother’s footsteps is absurd. As a high schooler, academic pressures have surely increased. Having a sibling in college definitely has its benefits, but at the same time, it can be a lot to live up to. Parents expect students to exceed certain expectations (usually set by siblings) in order to succeed in their four years of high school. They often make comparisons between two siblings which is sure to diminish a child’s self-esteem and state of mind. Grades, talent, …show more content…
Some of this stress can be directly from parental pressure. Additionally, emerging research from Brigham Young University says that parental comparisons have a humongous role in how a child grows up. For example, many parents believe that their firstborn is smarter than the second born. When the two children grow up you will always believe the firstborn is smarter because they are performing more intellectual, academic tasks while the second born will obviously be behind. Most times, the child believed to be smarter usually turns out so, showing the impact of family opinions. Though the differences in grade point average between two teenage siblings may be 0.2, these small, subtle changes end up affecting a person for their lifetime.
This type of stress and comparison can also begin to distance a child from their own family. In Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, Amy Chua often compares her younger daughter, Lulu, to her older daughter, Sophia. She notes, “when I tell Sophia to do something, she responds instantly. That’s why she improves so fast.” Chua believes that this parenting shows her confidence in her younger daughter; yet, to a kid, this type of dialect is taken negatively. In response to her mother’s negative words, Lulu starts to perform acts of rebellion by locking herself in her room and ignoring her mother’s