Zosimo T. Literatus, R.M.T.
Breakthroughs

THE American Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention recently released results on its latest survey on youth behavior. Here is some of what they found:

Alcohol use. Twenty percent of the teen boys who tried alcohol did so while they were still 12 because of peer pressure. By the time these teens reached 14 through 17, more than 66 percent have tried it.

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Smoking. Adolescents started smoking at age 13 as a result of peer pressure, 20 percent of them.

Sex. Around 30 percent of kids aged 14 to 15 has had sexual intercourse often to be considered “in” with their peers.

Drug use. Slightly more than 25 percent of teenagers aged 14 to 17 have used illegal drugs. One-third of them used marijuana at age 14 and became regular users by reaching age 18 to 21.

Obviously, these are American teens, with its peculiar cultural and environmental confounding factors. But that’s beside the point.

Peer pressure is a very strong influence in youth at a period when they’re not yet very sure about their own identity and seeks their peers to help validate the little they knew of it. The hunger to belong is actually the hunger to be affirmed.

Peer pressure admittedly works in both ways. And parents need to exactly know what group their teens have been hanging with and what are they capable of.

Alec Miller, chief of Child and Adolescent Psychology at Montefiore Medical Center in New York says that “developmentally, these kids really want to conform.”

Teens who also have known few parental limits in their lives are increasingly vulnerable to peer pressure during middle-school years. Another factor is the emergence of an “independent youth culture,” wherein values don’t come from parents (no real connection to adult values) — whereas half-century ago these same adolescents were normally integrated into the adult culture.

Here’s what experts advise parents to protect their teens from peer pressure:

• Maintain an open dialogue with teens. That’s the only way you’ll what’s going in their peer-level situations. It also ensures that both of you understand each other.

• Prepare them to handle peer pressure. Think of scenarios wherein bad behavior is offered by the peer, say, being offered to try a cigarette puff. Teach your kid why it is not good, and how to handle the situation. Role-play if necessary.

• Involve your kids in the adult life. You can encourage your kid to help you cooking or even assign him a routine responsibility at home.

• Be calm and reasonable. When you are too late in keeping your kid away from bad behaviors introduced by peers, talk to him to understand what happened, why, and how. Then discuss the problem with him and the ways to stop these behaviors.