Clark Morningstar
02/11/2012
Honors Tweens and Teens
Short Research Project
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/juvenile-crimes-taking-a-more-serious-turn/911037/
http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/dncrime/138973409.html
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-07-12-juveniles-inside_x.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/1995/09/08/us/grim-forecast-is-offered-on-rising-juvenile-crime.html
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unyin/documents/ch07.pdf
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1576076/Violent-youth-crime-up-a-third.html
http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/crm00102.htm
http://www.jstor.org/pss/651108
http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/tjvfox.pdf
All of the above links, and many more that can be found, are devoted to how crime rates are going up amongst juveniles. Considering this, and how juvenile delinquency rates have seemingly and continuously risen in the public spotlight, I asked myself if a differing parental style through the decades has led to the rise in crime rates. And if not the parents, then what other factors were there?
So, I set up an online survey, and branched out to people I knew via Facebook and email. In this survey, I asked questions about the years the respondent grew up in, and the morals or ethics they learned or tried to uphold. I asked about the parents, and the influences they had on the respondent in growing up. I asked about friends and fellow peers, about the society and the media. While six responses hardly constitute a scientifically proven analysis of a hypothesis, it is a beginning to further research and hopefully to conclusive results.
Parenting Through the Years
How to parent has been a question for a long time, and can even be traced back to Mesopotamian parents. Undesirable children could be sold into slavery, but that was considered an act of financial desperation. The children would be sung incantations by their mothers, who feared the crying would wake the gods. As they grew older, the children played with make-shift weapons or household goods to pretend they were adults. Parents were firm in disciplining, but withheld from being harsh. “A poor man does not strike his son a single blow; he treasures him forever (Proverbs from Ki-en-gir, 17)." However, if a teen got out of hand, there were laws in place that would send them packing, literally. "Be it enacted forever and for all future days: If a son says to his father, 'You are not my father,' he can cut off his locks, make him a slave and sell him for money. If a son says to his mother, 'You are not my mother,' she can cut off his locks, turn him out of town, or (at least) drive him away from home, deprive him of citizenship and of inheritance, but his liberty he loses not. If a father says to his son, 'You are not my son,' the latter has to leave house and field and he loses everything. If a mother says to her son, 'You are not my son,' he shall leave house and furniture (A Collection of Mesopotamian Laws, 1)."
Going forward to the Ancient Greeks, it was normal for mothers with unwanted babies to have abortions. Those that were wanted would receive toys during sacred ceremonies, which would then be offered to the gods when they entered adulthood. Girls stayed at home until they grew to marrying age. The education of boys was considered very important, and would start their education from an early age. Here is a Greek writer, speaking of a Spartan practice for social education. "The children would also come to the public messes, and were taken there as though to schools of modesty. They would listen to political discussions and would see amusements worthy of free men. They themselves would learn to play and joke without rudeness, and not get angry when being joked at. For it was thought to be a specifically [Spartan] virtue to put up with jokes, but if one found this intolerable, one could simply ask the jester to stop and he would comply (Lycurgus, 12)."
In Ancient Roman culture, fathers made the important decisions in terms of abortions or exposing the child if unwanted or if there were any abnormalities. By the later part of the empire, it was considered murder however for infanticide. Any children that were wanted would be given a bag of charms to protect them from evil. And while childhood lasted until thirteen for girls, and fourteen for boys, discipline was incredibly harsh. But some, like the writer Quintilian, objected to such treatment. "But that boys should suffer corporal punishment, though it be a received custom, and Chrysippus makes no objection to it, I by no means approve; first, because it is a disgrace and a punishment for slaves, and in reality (as will be evident if you imagine the age changed) an affront; secondly, because, if a boy’s disposition be so abject as not to be amended by reproof, he will be hardened, like the worst of slaves, even to stripes; and lastly, because, if one who regularly exacts his tasks be with him, there will not be the least need of any such chastisement (Institutes of Rhetoric, 1.3.14)."
In Imperial China, discipline could go either way, but a middle ground was advocated by Yan Zhitui saying, "But as soon as a baby can recognize facial expressions and understand approval and disapproval, training should be begun so that he will do what he is told to do and stop when so ordered. After a few years of this, punishment with the bamboo can be minimized, as parental strictness and dignity mingled with parental love will lead the boys and girls to a feeling of respect and caution and give rise to filial piety. I have noticed about me that wherever there is love without training this result is never achieved. Children eat, drink, speak, and act as they please. Instead of needed prohibitions, they receive praise; instead of urgent reprimands, they receive smiles. Even when children are old enough to learn, such treatment is still regarded at the proper method. Only after the child has formed proud and arrogant habits do they try to control him. But one may whip the child to death, and he will still not be respectful, while the growing anger of the parents only increases his resentment. After he grows up, such a child at last becomes nothing but a scoundrel (Household Instructions.)."
Advice could be bad as well. John Locke wrote in his 1693 treatise Some Thoughts concerning Education states, "I will also advise his feet to be washed every day in cold water, and to have his shoes so thin, that they might leak and let in water. It is recommendable for its cleanliness; but that which I aim at in it, is health; and therefore I limit it not precisely to any time of the day.” Perhaps he should have stayed in economics, and I bet his son died of pneumonia.
Jumping ahead to 1928, John B. Watson wrote in Psychological Care of Infant and Child, "Never hug and kiss them, never let them sit in your lap. If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say good night. Shake hands with them in the morning. Give them a pat on the head if they have made an extraordinary good job of a difficult task.” It's a good thing Adolf was born before this, or we would have had an even worse basket-case. No pun intended.
Now, speaking of the surveys I collected, I had varying dates, but not various answers, or any real violence tendencies. To fix this, it would be better to be able to ask those in a juvenile facility, along with just more regular respondents. Coming back to the point, I will first begin with Janet, who was born in 1928. She grew up with both parents, and at sixteen went to work at a munitions factory during World War II and pretended to be eighteen to get the job. She considered her parents to be mixed in terms of their parental styles, as her mother would kind, and her Austrian father was a tad harsh. She was heavily influenced by the morals and ethics from her parents, and did little to contradict them, with the exception of listening to Jazz on the radio, which her parents did not like. Not one hand was raised in violence in her household, though harsh were known to be spoken.
Next was Ken, born in 1947 here in Philadelphia. He considered his parents to also have been incredibly influential on his moral development, and tried to emulate their caring and non violent ways. He described the society of the 50's to have a 'strong moral code,' that was expected to be followed.
This idea could be doubled by the next contestant, Dan. He was born only a year later, though on the opposite side of the country. He grew up in the woods, and laughed when I got to the question in the survey of "Did you ever think of bringing a weapon to school?" He explained his mirth by describing his living in the country, and most every boy had a pocket knife, but no one ever considered using it harmfully. He described to me that kids during that time never considered violence, and those that even "looked like a criminal," were ostracized by the rest of the student body. "Nobody liked the guys that would leave the closed-campus school at lunch and walk to the corner store to smoke." He also considered his parents to be heavily influential on his development of morals. His father was an ordained minister, and he and his siblings were expected to follow most of the parents' views, however, they let them ask questions, and think independently, and investigate other possibilities.
Next is Holly, born in 1952. She helped around the house when she wasn't in school. She said of her parents, "I would say strict, not harsh. But they were loving and fair, and always presented a united front." Her parents were Catholic, and she is today, "But because I want to be, not because they 'made' me." They were not violent, and she tries to emulate their example. She listened to music they frowned upon, as well as some other things. "I ditched school, sassed my folks sometimes, [and] disobeyed occasionally, but nothing really major."
Finally, there is Greg, born in 1974, that 70's Kid! He worked with his Dad in construction as a teen, but said there were no detrimental effects to it. "It was all good." His violent tendencies included shooting birds and frogs with his BB Gun, or wrestling with his brother, though not much else, and the limit to any crime was once stealing a pack of chewing gum. His parents were not violent, and would occasionally get into a verbal argument, but "solved their problems peacefully."
I had one incomplete survey done by an unnamed person born in 1993. He/she states that the parenting style was harsh, and that they were violent in a way. "They were vary violent but I never reacted violently... just sad." While little else was mentioned in the survey, this is the closest I got to responses I needed.
Conclusions
It's hard to draw much any conclusion from such limited amount of data, which more research and more responses will hopefully fill in. But so far, the data shows that the 'mixed' parenting styles allow for mostly non-violent individuals through the differing years of growing up.
Link to survey: http://app.fluidsurveys.com/
Words: 1,897
Work Cited
King, L.W. (2005). "The Code of Hammurabi: Translated by L. W. King". Yale University.
Retrieved February 11, 2012.
Locke, John. "Locke, John - Some Thoughts Concerning Education, 54 (1693) | WIST
Quotations." WIST. Web. 12 Feb. 2012.
Lycurgus. "12." Lycurgus: A Translation. Trans. Charles Melville Moss. S.l.: S.N., 1922. Print.
Quintilian. Quintilian's Institutes of Oratory; Or, Education of an Orator. In Twelve Books.
Trans. J. S. Watson. London: G. Bell and Sons, 1895. Print.
Watson, John B. "Psychological Care of Infant and Child (Open Library)." Welcome to Open
Library (Open Library). Web. 12 Feb. 2012. http://openlibrary.org/books/OL13968750M/Psychological_care_of_infant_and_child>.
Zhitui, Yan. "Yanshi Jiaxun - The Family Instructions of Master Yan." History - China Culture.
Web. 11 Feb. 2012.
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