Questions on Adolescence

Question 1: Do you think that the increasing incidence of the Internet relationships aids or hinders the development of intimacy? Why?

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I think that the increasing incidences of internet relationships exhibited through online interaction are hindering the development of strong intimacy between people. Even though many people have switched to interacting and having relationships online instead of face t face interaction, the fact is that such relationships are going a long way in making it difficult for those engaging in them to develop strong trust and intimacy for the people they love. The reason for this is simple and clear because of the fact that as one goes out of site, somehow he or she also goes out of mind. Intimacy means two people being able to be there for one another in a relationship when they are ready to accept each other and let go their pride and therefore experience closeness emotionally and be ready to express their true feeling s to each other (Whitty & Gavin, 2001). This is not possible when the interaction is only limited to the online relationships and interactions.

It is extremely difficult to achieve intimacy in a relationship where two individuals have never come face to face with one another and only interact through online internet platforms especially on social media. Social media websites such as facebook lack intimacy because of the lack of privacy. This means that someone will definitely not feel free to let loose his or her feelings for the person that they are interacting with on the internet. Even though whatsapp and twitter social media platforms have tried to improve on the privacy issue, it still remains difficult and almost impossible to trust someone whom you have never met face to face in matters of love and affection. As a result, the development of intimacy in online relationships is almost impossible especially in situations where people have not come to a face to face interaction and also the exaggeration of the images used on such sites (Whitty & Gavin, 2001).

Question 2: Do you think TV and movie portrayals of popular and unpopular characters in high school settings are helpful or harmful to adolescents wrestling with popularity issues? Why?

I think that such movie portrayals are very helpful to adolescents who are struggling with popularity issues in their youth. This is because of the fact that these movie and TV portrayals help the adolescents to understand that that is a stage in life and they are not the only ones straggling with such conditions. As such, they get to learn that it is a normal thing to straggle for popularity and therefore, this realization goes a long way in making them to change their mentality and start maturing up in their behaviours and actions.

Secondly, the movie and TV portrayals of popular and unpopular characters in high schools settings also helps to elevate the straggling adolescents from the depression resulting from lack of understanding of one self and therefore helps them to understand themselves better and be able to make decisions in their lives for the better. The adolescents who are in serious popularity issues will get to learn that in life, one can be popular or unpopular and they will understand the factors that determine this and therefore work on them to achieve the statuses that they admire in their lives (Berger & Dijkstra, 2013).

Question 3: Does the popularity of online networking indicate a greater or lesser tendency to engage in social activities than face to face networking? Why?

Yes. Indeed the popularity of online networking is an indication of how much or how less one engages on online social activities than face to face networking. This is because for one to be popular on a certain online networking platform, that person has to engage more in online interaction than face to face. Otherwise, the person is bound to be less popular and therefore have fewer followers on the online social platforms. The increased interaction of the internet definitely limits the amount of time one is able to social interact with other people face to face. This explains why the popular characters on the online social media are those people who heavily engage in internet networking than face to face interactions.

Question 4: Do you think social skills training should be a standard part of the curriculum for every student at the middle school level? Do you think such a requirement could be successful? Why?

Yes. I think social skills training should be incorporated in the curriculum for each and every student to undertake undergo it in the middle school level. This is because most of the students in the middle school level are adolescents who are faced with a myriad of challenges and issues in their development stage. Having such training will go a long way in helping these adolescents to overcome many f the social problems and will also impart skills that will help them to avoid unhealthy social relationships in their adolescents which are responsible for messing up the lives on many adolescents all over the world.

Such training will be successful because young people always appreciate and find it easy to learn about issues that directly touch their lives in their youthful age. Other subjects like mathematics and physics might not have such a strong grasp of the real life situations of the adolescents as the training is social skills which are the centre of the activities of the young people. The students are therefore likely to feel good and be happy towards introduction of social skills training in their curriculums because it will also go a long way in breaking the monotony of learning serious matters only.

References

Berger, C., & Dijkstra, J. K. (2013). Competition, envy, or snobbism? How popularity and friendships shape antipathy networks of adolescents. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 23(3), 586-595.

Whitty, M., & Gavin, J. (2001). Age/sex/location: Uncovering the social cues in the development of online relationships. Cyber Psychology & Behavior, 4(5), 623-630.