Secondly, when talking about the increase of restrictions on teens and comparing to other countires, it seems like we determined American teens to be more rebillious, ultimately creating more turmoil. Why do you think teens crave to be so rebellious? If parents were to stop "babying" their teens, would the rebellion end?
Friday, February 11, 2011
Brains vs Enviornment
I was somewhat suprised to see that the class consensus was that teen turmoil is largely linked to environment, moreso than the chemicals and development of the brain. Coming from a family of scientists and being a science major myself, I rely much of my thoughts on research and biological processes. I'm interested to see what ratio you would determine for enviornment / brain input. 50/50? More or less?
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I think it's 50/50. I don;t know if it makes sense, but I'd say there is a difference between personality and characteristics. In that, personality (sense of humor, way of thinking, etc)is more of a genetic thing, whereas characteristics ("hard-worker" etc.) are stemmed from environmental factors.
ReplyDeleteFor example, I deal with problems similar to the way my mom does, and we even get mad about the same kind of things. That would be personality similarities.
On the other hand, my mom never went to college or anything and got in a lot of trouble when she was an adolescent. Being able to witness the struggles and things she has to deal with now because it, motivates me and makes me somewhat of a "hard-worker." This is what I would mean by environmental.
I might not be explaining it in a way that makes sense to others...but, yeah, just my two cents!
I think is hard to say exactly in percentage how much the environment or brain determine the person’s character. I would argue that majority is determined by brain because in my opinion the brain is the thing which make us choose certain environment in which we like to coexist or people with who we like to hang out. In my opinion brain also determine how much we can be influence by external factors, such as peers, environment or other people and how we will deal with such a situations. Some people can be easy manipulated and be very affected by external factors; on the other hand other can be very in themselves and follow only own rules.
ReplyDeletePersonally I think that American teens are more rebellious than in other countries because from early year they were getting whatever they want. Their parents didn’t have time to raise them in “right: way and in most cases the process of “raising” the child was either in baby sitter hands or kid had to do it by himself. American teens have much more opportunities and advantage than teenagers from other countries, but they don’t see it and always seek to get more and more.
Jasmine: i never really thought about separating out characteristics and personality.. i think it's a really interesting point you bring up! i'd say i agree with you completely!
ReplyDeleteI agree with everyone's points. I feel like it is difficult to pinpoint just how much of an affect certain factors have on teens, and I also believe things affect teens in different ways. One environment could have more of an impression on some kids whereas others may be not influenced by it in the least bit. Therefore, I don't think it's possible to set a standard ratio for how factors influence our brains. I think it is more important to learn of all the different factors teens are influenced by. I'm sure there are more influences out there besides brains and the environment. If we start to see exactly what sources affect our minds more heavily, we may get a better understanding of this whole idea in general.
ReplyDeleteI also believe teens are rebellious because they are "babied" a lot. Teens usually don't agree with most of what their parents have to say, so when parents make suggestions it is easy for teens to want to do the complete opposite (rebel). If parents did not treat their teens so much as young kids the rebellious attitude may be subdued; however I don't believe it would ever go away - I think this is one part that will forever be linked to teenage life.
I don't know how much the brain effects teen turmoil because we talked about how people in other cultures lack an adolescent title and do not experience teen turmoil. I really think that the environment we are in effects our development the most. I'm a teen and I am not rebellious but then again growing up I was not babied. I think that by not giving adolescents responsibilities or expectations to achieve they become rebellious and disgruntled in their environments.
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