Peer Pressure in Adolescent Development
Sondra Hotchkiss
University of Guelph
FRHD*2280 Adolescent Development
March 28, 2014

For this reflection piece, I have chosen to reflect on the affects that peer pressure has on adolescents during development. I will briefly discuss what I have learned about peer pressure and why it tends to peak during mid-adolescence. Furthermore, I will discuss how peer pressure exists in a variety of teen television shows, including One Tree Hill. This example also demonstrates how other teens respond to peer pressure and how it is often connected with bullying. Finally, I will discuss how peer pressure can affect one’s ability to achieve both academically and socially in the school environment.
According to the lecture notes (Glozman, lecture notes, FRHD*2280, January 9, 2014) adolescence is defined as a period of the life course between the time puberty begins and the time adult status is approached. During this stage, young people are in the process of preparing to take on the roles and responsibilities associated with adulthood in their culture. During adolescence, we have noticed that peers play a large role in a young person’s life and typically replace family as the center of a teen’s social and leisure activities. Often time’s adolescents have various peer relationships and interact with a wide range of peer groups. As adolescents begin to pull away from their parents in search for their own identity, their friends usually become a more important aspect in their life. This is often because teens feel like their close friends understand them better than their parents; they learn more from their friends and feel like they can be more themselves around their friends. There is no doubt, as people form closer relationships with one another they are influenced and affected by one another’s choices. To me, peer pressure seems