1) Overall, would you say that group members’ responses closely correspond to or differ noticeably from the material about adolescent behavior that is presented in the textbook, lectures and video? Use examples to explain your assessment.
2) What factors at various levels of the ecology in Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model of Development contribute to the behavior that is perceived to occur frequently among teens? Provide examples to illustrate the factors that you identify; for these examples, draw upon the your fellow group members’ posts about their “risky and rebellious adolescent behaviors (or lack thereof) if you can; if you cannot (for example if your fellow group members who have posted before you have “used them up” so that ours would be repetitive, use examples from other adolescents that you have known. Really try to incorporate in your analysis concepts related to the Bioecological Model. The objective of discussion is to help students to reflect on and understand major perspectives on development as well as important concepts and, in particular, to think about how they apply or do not seem to apply to their own development and that of people around them. (And in case you haven’t guessed this already, this course emphasizes the importance of Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model as a model of influences on development across the life span!)
3) What, if anything, can adults do to curb risky and/or rebellious behavior by adolescents? Think about such questions as,
a) Do teenagers need to have their freedoms limited so that they will be
protected from the dangers of today?
b) If freedoms must be limited, whose responsibility is it to limit them? Does it “take a village” in the words of Hillary Clinton when she was first lady? Again, try to think about what adults at various “levels” of the ecology might do.
c) How do issues of confidentiality, privacy, consent and autonomy apply to
the behavior of adolescents? Again, use examples from your own experience and from your fellow group members’ posts
