Phobias are common among adolescents and criticism happens to be one of the fears experienced. To reduce the fear of criticism among adolescents, parents are encouraged to act as good role models and show their children what to expect from the outside world. This paper will exhaustively discuss the phobia of criticism and give explanations from three contemporary factors that may contribute to the development and persistence of the phobia. The paper will then explain one way in which parents and guardians might be helped in supporting their adolescents to overcome the fear of criticism.
Fear of Criticism in Adolescents
Normal development changes in adolescents make it harder for adolescents to accept the changes as they break their childhood boundaries and become freer. Criticism can be seen from different angles involving separation, opposition, and differentiation. For the case of separation, most adolescents develop fear of criticism as they interact with other social groups different from their families since not all of the group members may welcome them to their groups. Opposition can also be experienced from the family perspective as most parents will criticize the adolescents for ignoring them and taking unauthorized freedom (White, 2000). For the case of differentiation, the adolescents often fear getting criticized for their unique personalities as they interact with their respective groups. Moreover, unfamiliar families may not always like their preferences and they can also get criticized for their ideal self-definitions.
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Apart from the family, the culture of the adolescent can also criticize their decisions to define themselves on grounds of moral decay. Most adolescents are restrained from most behaviors and practices rather than seeing their potentials. As a result, one’s culture may most likely criticize their adolescents for most developments that they try to make out of the ordinary hence reducing the youth’s participation in the development of the cultural landscape.
Criticism from the society can also be seen as adolescents from lower social statuses families. This is especially due to their parent’s poor educational background or lower social status. Adolescents from this families are often criticized and they often experience little social support (Silk et al., 2017). Among the criticism experienced by lower social status adolescents were higher antiforeigner attitudes and authoritarian orientations.
As a clinician, I would encourage parents and guardians of adolescents to act as good role models. This is because as kids, they always emulate characters from the strongest characters in their families especially those of the same gender. According to Yu & Gamble (2009), it is the responsibility of the parents and guardians to ensure that their children familiarize with the outside world. The parents should teach and encourage their children to be decisive in life, especially when faced with hard choices.
Conclusion
The fear of criticism is common among adolescents as they interact with the outside world for the first time in their lives. Most adolescents often fear being criticized and separated for their unique personalities.
References
Silk, J. S., Lee, K. H., Kerestes, R., Griffith, J. M., Dahl, R. E., & Ladouceur, C. D. (2017). “Loser” or “Popular”?: Neural response to social status words in adolescents with major depressive disorder. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 28, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2017.09.005
White, F. A. (2000). Relationship of Family Socialization Processes to Adolescent Moral Thought. Journal of Social Psychology, 140(1), 75–91. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224540009600447
Yu, J., & Gamble, W. (2009). Adolescent Relations with Their Mothers, Siblings, and Peers: An Exploration of the Roles of Maternal and Adolescent Self-Criticism. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 38(5), 672–683. https://doi.org/10.1080/15374410903103528
