Chapter 16 Family Ties: Changing Relations with Relations

As adolescents stive for autonomy, parents have the tendency to be more protective in some cases. Adolescents who grow up without authoritaritive style of parenting usually do not cope as well during adolescence. Authoritaritive parents are warm, caring, and supportive, especially when they know their child is going through peer pressure and making changes in their life. Adolescents are also trying to gain the role of an adult and gain more independence from their parents. This can be hard for parents since adolescents will begin to test their parents, break the rules, and give in to peer pressure. Since their biggeset influences at this time are their peers, parents are going to have a harder time getting their teens to accept their advice. The parenting style ties into how well adolescence cope with stress, peer pressure, and maturation. Those adolescence who are incapable of dealing with all the changes usually go into a depression. According to the book, boys elicit depression in a more hostile way and girls elicit depression inwardly and feel helpless. Since depression is so common among adolescence, I think there should be more assistance for students in high school and more training for teachers when dealing with depression. I remember having many rude and degrading teachers once I got to high school. I felt so embarrased once when I was the last student taking the test and the teacher asked if anyone was still taking the test. I raised my hand and I guess she did not see me so I outloud I said I was still taking the test. Her reply in front of the class was, "If you weren't such a slow poke, you'd be done. Go outside and finish." At that point I wanted to just leave and never come back to the class. I had never been so embarrased by an adult in my life and I will never forget it. Teachers should be encouraging and supportive, especially in high school when adolescence are dealing with so many changes. In order to control depression among adolescence, schools should take part and train their instructors to have a more positive attitude and influence on their students, since they are the adults who have big impacts on students lives.

Gender and College

In chapter 15, they discuss gender and college and the ways it could hurt or benefit women. The book talks about the physical science classes contain more men than women. As I have observed in my major, I would say even if I went to a college that was always co-educational, Family Studies would be predominantly female. I started in community college taking Cisco Systems' classes and was the only female in the class. My instructor was female but she seemed so lenient and there was not a lot of rules or structure in the class. I agree that instructors treat men and women differently in their classes. I felt like all of the guys just spoke out loud and never had to raise their hand. Since I could not speak over them without sounding mean, I had to rise my hand. I feel like the argument of single sex education is a great idea due to the evidence provided. After the third semester of my computer courses, I stopped showing up since I felt I did not receive the attention I deserved. I agree with the research stated on page 429, that women's self-esteem increases when they are in a learning environment with same-sex peers. I know that my self-esteem has increased since I have been at Texas Women's University.