Group Identity vs. Alienation
In this time frame, romantic and sexual relationships have immensely impacted on the developmental growth process staging a crisis. Adolescents in their age 13-14 years experienced pressure from their peers and spent a lot of time away from home and trying to fit into peer groups. During a time of high mobility amongst peers, conflict arises if the peer adolescent’s values do not comply with those of parents back at home. Therefore, for adolescents to fit in, they agree to whatever beliefs and activities their friends require them to do.
Specific group pressure has had a significant influence on adolescent’s behavior. To deal with societies and cultures, adolescents require positive peer influence at this stage of developmental growth. Those who find themselves in the wrong groups tend to end up in improper romantic and sexual relationships, which they are not able to handle appropriately and end up being misled into early pregnancies, sexual diseases and infections, drugs, and others end up dropping out of school. Alienation tends to develop when adolescents don’t fit into their peer groups, which triggers them to try and fit into unhealthy peer groups despite the consequences (Mendes et al., 2019)
In this decade, there is a different intensity brought about by romantic and sexual relationships. Peer groups perceive childhood as the duration for relative calm compared to romantic and sexual exuberance of their youth. Zahavi (2019) believes that the majority of youth in their early adolescent stage of development have romantic feelings and begin a lifetime trajectory with overt sexual experiences. There is a specific feeling strongest during the adolescent’s phase of passionate attitude and sexual behaviors. It is said that romantic thoughts and interactions usually precede sexual involvement in a healthy adolescent growth process. Some children are too young at this stage and, through choice or coercion, get into body-centered sexual experiences without romantic meanings. Intimate relationship development is profoundly affected by coercive sexual experiences. The efforts to overcome group identity and alienation have been impacted by this factors, and it is, therefore, necessary for parents and adolescent caregivers to know that this crisis can be faced and solved by first accepting that children have a need of peer acceptance and their participation should be allowed but guided to avoid mass wastage of adolescents. In this time frame majority of youth are out of school and spend a lot of time with their peers; their influence cannot be ignored.
References
Costello, M., Hawdon, J., Bernatzky, C., & Mendes, K. (2019). Social group identity and perceptions of online hate. Sociological Inquiry, 89(3), 427-452.
Zahavi, D. (2019). Second-person engagement, self-alienation, and group-identification. Topoi, 38(1), 251-260.
Predictors and Consequences of Dropping out of College
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One of the worrying predictors of dropping out of school is peer influence into drug addiction, adolescent pregnancies associated with romantic and sexual relationships, and crime. A reflection through school drop-outs shows that this has a severe consequence on not only the student’s life but also their families. Dropping out of college impacts adolescents self-esteem and psychological well- being, this comes when reality hits them on their lack of skills and knowledge to fulfill life desire (Andrew et. al., 2017)
College dropouts risk a low wage and salary remuneration compared to their graduate counterparts. The lucky dropouts get little pay jobs while the unlucky ones don’t get any jobs at all, leading to increased use of drugs and crime rate for survival and to adjust from their frustrations. Dropping out of college increases reliability to public welfare and public health services. Incarceration during one’s lifetime tends to take place when one has fallen out of college.
Data on risk factors associated with school dropouts for students in their first year Zhao et. al., 2018) revealed that: after GPA (OR=0.395,p<0.001) included as a covariant, depression (OR= 1.04,p<0.05). This, among other examples mentioned above, are some of the impacts of college drop out on adolescents. College dropouts have been observed to suffer stress and trauma, depression, deviance, heavy drinking, and stressful life events. College dropouts tend to live in debt throughout their lifetime. Their self-discipline and attentiveness tend to decline with the pressures associated with it. Lack of skills brings about over-dependence even in adulthood life. College dropouts get into early marriage life, which does not tend to succeed due to a lack of enough knowledge and social interaction growth. We are aware that college dropouts contribute to the declining GDP of an economy.
References
Archambault, I., Janosz, M., Dupéré, V., Brault, M. C., & Andrew, M. M. (2017). Individual, social, and family factors associated with high school dropout among low‐SES youth: Differential effects as a function of immigrant status. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 87(3), 456-477.
Motl, T. C., Multon, K. D., & Zhao, F. (2018). Persistence at a tribal university: Factors associated with second-year enrollment. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 11(1), 51.