Bed Times

I figured that since many of you expressed an interest in having bad times for your teenagers if you become parents someday that it would be beneficial for you to know what you're going up against. You'd be surprised at how little parents know or want to know about their teenagers' sleeping behaviors. 12% of the teenagers I surveyed had bed times while 62% of the parents I surveyed said they enforced bed times. Somewhere along the way 50% was lost. When I asked parents what time their teenagers went to bed not a single answer was after 11 pm, and yet 42% of the answers teenagers gave were over 11 pm. Once again nearly half of these teenagers are lost.  The discrepancies show how difficult it is to actually enforce a bed time.
The studies I found showed that parental influence with bed times is positive in helping teenagers get more sleep and I came to the same conclusion with my own study, but it's difficult. In my study, teenagers with bed times had more difficult times falling asleep and waking, and they fell asleep on average an hour after their bed time.
My research certainly isn't the end all to sleep research, but I do believe that there is a general discrepancy between how much sleep teenagers get versus how much parents think they get which accounts for a general lack of parental influence on sleep.
By my percentages, there's a 50/50 chance your kids will not be on the same page as you with their sleeping habits. It seems to me, that being aware of how much sleep your teenagers are getting is most important in deciding whether they need a bed time or not.
I know my mom and sister both filled out the survey, and their numbers were certainly off, and I know they're even more off with my youngest sister. It might be easy to say you'll have bed times for you kids, but it won't be easy to enforce it.

Have a very nice summer everyone!

The Effect of Advertising on Pre-teens

For the preliminary research of my final paper, I looked into the effect of advertising on pre-teens in order to provide a basis for my study. I found that it is proven fact that younger children and teens are greatly affected my advertising, not only because of their quest for identity and the struggle to fit in, but their impulsivity and desire to buy things that are "cool". I found this video which illustrates this well and also embodies some of the final conclusions of age-related advertising influence that I was able to draw from my final study.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1KWofXSt6c

Have a great summer everyone! :)

Adolescence as a Social Construction

Hey guys,

After our last class I started thinking about the idea of adolescence being a social construct. I thought that idea was really interesting because I can see how it may be a social construct but there's also no denying the biological changes that define this life stage. So I got on the internet and started reading more about this debate and I came across this article that Professor Kenneth J. Saltman wrote that basically identifies adolescence as a socially constructed stage because it varies from culture to culture but also has a biological standpoint that has to be taken into account. It's a short article, only about six pages so you guys should definitely check it out. It's been a great semester! Have a great summer guys!

https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/cmayo/www/EPS%20427/Saltman.pdf

Nushi Baksh

Teens and Cosmetics

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/fashion/29tween.html?_r=1

This article discusses several things we've mentioned periodically throughout our course. The first being how tweens and teens are affected by marketing, especially that of cosmetics. The girl mentioned in this article is age 11 and has started wearing more "sophisticated" makeup, to which her mother has reacted by buying her makeup and taking her to get a makeover. The question asked by the author is about the parent's action; is it poor adult judgment or progressive parenting? There's also the idea of whether makeup sexualizes young girls by making them look more like adults. Given our discussions about how younger girls nowadays are already somewhat more mature when it comes to appearance and interests, how can we view their move towards more sophisticated makeup and the role of parents in this stage? Moreover, what do we make of shows such as "Toddlers and Tiaras" in which parents very actively encourage physical makeovers of their toddlers?