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It's Not Easy Being Tween
Topics: Tweens, peer pressure, sex, Adolescence, Hannah Montana, body image, maturing
Posted by RaisingBakersfield Tue Apr 29, 2008 17:07:37 PDT
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Jenna Papasergia likes to wear clothes by Hollister and Abercrombie & Fitch.

A generation ago, such brand consciousness in an 11-year-old would've been amazing. But these days, middle school hallways overflow with children dressing and acting like hip teenagers -- with all the dangers that go with it.

"I think the girls are facing issues like body image earlier than they used to," said Stacy Papasergia, Jenna's mom. "My daughter tells me there's a girl in her class who sticks her finger down her throat if she eats too much."

This is the wobbly world of tweens, those 8- to 13-year-olds whom experts say are maturing faster than ever before.

Some are hosting parties that include beer and lewd acts. They listen to music, log on to Internet blogs and watch movies sprinkled with sexual references.

Eating disorders are occurring in 10-year-olds. Many as early as third grade are thinking not about schoolwork and coloring books but how to be popular with the opposite sex.

"Whatever happened in high school one generation ago is now happening in middle school," said Sylvia Rimm, a child psychologist in Cleveland and author of the best-selling book "Growing Up Too Fast."

Kids without boundaries

One of the things happening in middle school is dating. Kempton Coman, principal at Emerson Middle School, said it seems that every female student is out to find a boyfriend.

"A seventh-grade girl came in my office the other day upset because her boyfriend accused her of cheating," Coman said.

Experts blame the media, marketers and ingratiating parents for turning the Eden-like innocence of middle adolescence into the thorn and thistle of teen experience.

Amanda Madkins, a sixth-grade teacher at Mount Vernon Elementary, meets with many parents of disruptive students. She's come to believe that indulgent parents create wild tweens.

A few years ago Madkins met with the parents of a disorderly girl, who wore makeup and had several boyfriends over the school year.

At her huge birthday bash, the sixth-grader took a boy behind closed doors and "had her way with him," students told Madkins.

Madkins' impression was that the couple felt they were being good parents by letting their daughter do almost anything she wanted.

Rimm said this is typical. "Parents are overpowering their kids," she said, "giving them too many choices.

"They don't see what kids without boundaries are like in high school," Rimm said.

Marketing to tweens

Since the 1980s, tweens' desire to appear grown-up has been exploited by advertisers selling clothes, jewelry, makeup, dolls (such as Bratz), shoes and other items, experts say. Tweens who ignore these products won't be popular, advertisements suggest.

Alea Scanlan, a 12-year-old student at St. Francis (Catholic) School, has felt the pressure. "All my friends," she said, "say I should shop at Hollister," a clothing store.

At the same time, young entertainers send the message to tweens that sexiness is cool.

Jamie Robinson, who is 10, takes her fashion cues from teen singers and celebrities, such as Hilary Duff, Vanessa Hudgens and Miley Cyrus.

Cyrus is a 14-year-old who plays a tween on the Disney Channel's sitcom "Hannah Montana," in which her character dons a blonde wig, short skirt and black leggings to moonlight as a pop singer.

"I like Hannah's necklaces and scarves and dark sunglasses," said Jamie, who wears such attire at home and at parties with girlfriends.

"Dressing up is better than dolls," Jamie said. "It seems like more fun to accessorize."

Bakersfield mom Michelle Robinson said clothes shopping for Jamie is difficult. "Manufacturers make a lot of clothes for them that would be more appropriate for teenage girls," Robinson said. "It's hard to find clothing that makes them look little girlish. And when you find it, they won't wear it."

Papasergia sets strict guidelines on what Jenna can wear. Recently Jenna's been lobbying for a two-piece bathing suit. But her mother won't allow it, even though a majority of tween swimsuit styles are two-piece.

"Bathing suits are absolutely hard to shop for," Papasergia said.

Sexualized teens

Tween boys have not escaped the new pangs of adolescence. In a study for her book, Rimm found that 14.5 percent of third-grade children (about age 8) were angst-ridden about not being popular with the opposite sex. That figure increased to 36 percent by eighth grade.

"And more boys were worried about popularity than girls, which surprised me," Rimm said.

Boys interviewed for this story didn't fit that mold.

"Me and my friends aren't into (being popular)," said 8-year-old Javyn Madkins. "But one person (at school) is trying to be popular by playing football."

Girlfriends? "That's nasty," Javyn said. "We're too young."

Rimm's study, based on more than 5,400 interviews with 8- to 12-year-olds in 18 states, revealed that some tweens perform sex acts they see in movies, have oral-sex parties, experiment with drugs, are obsessed with body image, and drink beer and mixed drinks.

"It's a small percentage, maybe 10 to 20 percent, who do these things," Rimm said, "but it affects all the kids and how they think."

Sexualized tweens make for distracted students, Rimm said. "If they are thinking about girlfriends and boyfriends, it doesn't make school seem very important."

Ethel Katz, a local family therapist at Behavioral HealthCare Center, said sexualized tweens are courting disaster.

"They think they can handle these things that, emotionally, they cannot handle," Katz said.

As 8-year-old Kathryn Piper Carter enters her tweens, her parents are smoothing the way. Internet access for Kathryn is supervised and confined to the family room, her mother, Heidi Piper Carter, said. The family is also adding a game room to the house so Kathryn can socialize with friends in a controlled environment.

"Too much, too fast" is Carter's view of today's tween adolescence.

Adolescent perks

Despite the dangers of the tween years, it has its perks, parents say. The period can live up to its quaint appellation of "the golden age of adolescence," when children listen to and revere their parents and teachers.

Mom and Dad get to watch their kids navigate the path from childhood to young adulthood -- a maturation typically marked by two steps forward and one step back, or vice versa.

"She wants to be older sometimes, and other times she goes back to playing with dolls," Papasergia said of Jenna. "She acts really mature sometimes, than other times she's a spaz."

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Source: The Bakersfield Californian, Feb 10, 2007

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