What is peer pressure?
Peers: the people who are the same - or a similar age to us.
Pressure: being pushed or squashed.
Peer Pressure: the force our peers put on us to behave in a certain way.
This leaflet aims to help you think about
peer pressure and to think of ways of
dealing with it.
Peer pressure
Peer pressure is what we all experience when our friends make us feel bad
in some way for doing something or not doing something. For example, if
we wore an item of clothing that was really unfashionable and our friends
teased us, this peer pressure would stop us from ever wearing the same
item again, even if we liked it.
What can peer pressure be like?
Peer pressure can come in the form of:
• teasing;
• sneering looks;
• comments;
• not including someone;
• talking to only those people who have a
certain thing or behave in a certain way (the 'in' crowd);
• bullying;
• conversations about what is 'cool'.
What kind of things can peer pressure make us do?
Peer pressure can make people do things that they might not want to
do like:
• Try a cigarette and start smoking.
• Spend lots of money on things you don't particularly want.
• Drink alcohol.
• Take drugs.
• Get a boyfriend or girlfriend - even if you don't like the person much.
• Break rules and take risks.
• Bully people and treat people badly.
• Ignore school work or deliberately do badly at school.
• Disobey the adults in our lives.
• Do dangerous and unsafe things.
• Worry unnecessarily about how we look.
• Have sex.
• Many other things....
Why does peer pressure make people do these things?
Most of us like to fit in and belong to the crowd - especially when we are a
teenager. Often we are understandably scared of being laughed at or
teased for something we have done or not done. Being 'cool' is one way of
trying to make sure that no one teases us. Unfortunately, a lot of the things
that are considered 'cool' are things that are not necessarily good for us or even what we really want to do. This has been the case for teenagers for
many years - your parents/carers probably did things that their parents
would not have approved of - probably because of peer
pressure!
How can you protect yourself from peer pressure?
The best protection that a person can have from peer pressure is
something that is known as 'self-esteem.' A person with lots of self-esteem
feels good about themselves and is confident. This confidence means that
they will stick to being true to themselves and only do what they want to
do because they want to do it and not because they have considered what
anyone else will think of them for doing it! These people are often
respected for being so strong and if, occasionally, they are not respected,
they are strong enough to cope and still do not give into peer pressure.
Where does self esteem come from?
People with self-esteem are usually positive thinkers;
ready to have a go; enthusiastic; praise other people
rather than criticise and are kind to themselves by
ignoring nasty comments and concentrating on what
they are good at. You can start to improve your
self-esteem by thinking positively - start giving
compliments, try to never moan and try not to be scared
of having a go at things - it really does work! If people
laugh at you - remember, it's their problem and keep
telling yourself that you are great!
Being assertive
One skill that you can learn to help you with peer pressure is learning to be
assertive.
If a person tries to persuade you to do something that you don't really want
to do - there are three ways of responding:
Aggressively: get angry and insult the person trying to persuade you.
Passively: give in to the person.
Assertively: state that you do not want to, but in a way that does not
upset the other person.
Some peer pressure!
Come on have
a puff on that
- or are you
too scared?
Shove off - you're
stupid. Leave me alone.
O.K. then.
Which response
works best and why?
Aggresive
Passive
I've always said that I
would never smoke - I
really don't want to end up
spending money on
something I'm addicted to
- so no thanks!
Assertive