The power of influence shapes the life of a person in various ways. From birth, the parents play a huge role that contributes to the adoption of certain attitudes and behaviors. However, at a later stage in life, celebrities’ influences children to act in specific ways and this may contradict with the influence brought by the parents. If the parents fail to be keen on their children to avoid the influence from celebrities, the children may copy the celebrity's dressing mode, their behaviors and social life. Celebrities may also contribute to the way interaction in the community level is conducted.
Thesis
It’s clear the door is open in which each environmental influence matters. Studies show us the ongoing battle between parents and celebrities. This paper sheds light to show that the parental influence is more effective than the influence from the celebrities.
The influence of parents to children is completely different from that of celebrities. The roles of parents and celebrities contradict with each other in a child’s life. When the bond between a parent and the child is strong, the influence may serve a long-term effect. The strong links will make the children adore parents as their role models and always remain ready to offer their best without causing disappointments to the parents (Cashmore, 49). The child will always mimic the behaviors of their parents to avoid coming into conflicts with them. They will always portray acceptable behaviors in the society to avoid neglect that may arise with opposing the parents.
During the adolescent age, the child encounters the external world. This is a very critical time since celebrities may influence the perception and preferences about the life of the children. The celebrities have the power to influence either positively or negatively. An example of celebrity influence to the society involves a young girl who made the decision to kill her cat so that she could use the fur on her jacket to appear like Lady Gaga. There is also another instance where a little boy who used to watch batman cartoon and ended up breaking his leg when he tried to jump from the balcony after wearing a cape like batman.
Good intentions by parents may establish long-term effects in the relationship with the children. The parents stress on the need to be ethical and respect the opinion of others in the society. Negativity in the way parents and children handles situations may destroy the good relationship between them. The contempt may affect the influence of parents to the children since the kids will always resist any explanation from their parents. The good links should not be interfered with if the parents want to influence their children to live an organized and accepted life. The parents are in a position to determine the future of their children since they have a chance to interact with them during the upbringing (Gross, Richard, and Jean-Marc, 78).
On the other hand, the influence of celebrities to children should never be undermined. Children compete and compare themselves to popular celebrities in the universe. Curiosity killed the cat; therefore, children inquisitiveness makes them portray certain celebrities as their idols. The king of pop music, Michael Jackson bleached himself to appear white and this demoralized the spirit in the black people. Most of the black children will feel outcasts because of their race and color, and some have tried to use lotions so that they can transform to look like whites. Such influences are negative, and they do not help the children to have a positive understanding of the real meaning of life (Schaefer, 12).
Parental involvement in the life of a child has either positive or negative influence. It is hard for parents to soothe a teen who wishes to keep away and the efforts are left unrecognized. When the involvement of parents is enhanced, they contribute to the life of a child in a positive way and influence the type of school and friends that the children will have. Parental involvement helps the children to shun away from risky behaviors like smoking, fighting, theft and alcoholism. Contrary, lesser involvement may give an upper hand for the celebrities to influence the way of life in children, and they fail to employ proper behaviors. The involvement of parents will influence the life of children since they will have a better self-esteem by accepting themselves and performing excellently in school.
Between the age of 18 and 35 years, the individuals should ready to accept guidance from the people that are close to them. At this age parent have the greatest impact to their children because the mature youth can be able to put into practice of what they have learned for their parents. When those mature youth undertakes actions that are contrary to their parents’ advice, the parental advice is strengthened because they realize that they are not influential enough. At this age, the children should accept their parents as more of mentor. On the other hand, celebrities are more of motivation to the mature adults. The youths usually follow up on the success of the celebrities with intention of finding out the factors behind their success. Through the successful celebrities, adults acquire goals, dream and motive to achieve success in their lives. However, without the guidance of the parents to follow the correct path, the influence of the celebrity to the children would turn out to be less effective. As Charles L, states ““The adult stage of generativity has broad application to family, relationships, work, and society. Generativity, then is primarily the concern in establishing and guiding the next generationthe concept is meant to include productivity and creativity.” As the battle becomes to an end the gap between the child and the celebrity widens while on the other hand, the child and the parents becomes closer than before. As human, children require relationships that are built from the people who are close and who relate to them. Therefore, being closer to the children, parents have greater influence to the mature adult than the celebrities do.
The current technological advances have not succeeded in diluting the role of the parent in influencing a child’s development. Apparently, parents have only realized that they have a lot more influence than they realize. Their potential to influence their children’s development is utterly high as they superintend their development especially in the critical stages during infancy. An important part of parenting is being present in the life of the child during activities such as birthdays or their first dating. Parental involvement with the child’s activities during such critical milestones reduces the chances of the child to be involved in risky behaviors such as using drugs or having irresponsible sex. They adopt unerringly what the parents say or do thus concocting them to be adults who are more responsible (Haines et al., 82). A research recently conducted in Sweden reiterates the importance of a parent in a child’s development. The research established some startling facts. It discovered that if the father regularly attends church, children are 44% likely to go to church and 34% if the mother attends church (Haines et al., 106). Evidently, parental influence plays an important development in teens. Many children believe that what the parents do is the right thing. They end up doing exactly as the parents do or tell them to do. Consequently, they end up walking the parents’ talk. Although celebrities also significantly influence the lives and development of children, children turn to their parents whenever they need to learn important philosophies and/or aspects in life.
Children exist in a society. The society is composed of various forces that conjointly make life interesting and worthwhile. Despite the fact that many religions and cultures reiterates the importance of the traditional family structure and cultures, the powerful force of celebrities has proved to be excessively difficult to resist (Haines et al., 172). Often, children find themselves living the life of a celebrity that they adore. This is a total indication that they do not only mimic or follow the celebrities to acquire basic information about fashions and design but also essential life skills. However, celebrities cannot simply substitute parents. Their ro0lre in influencing the child’s life is eminent.
Conclusion
As depicted above, studies clearly show that t parental influence weighs more on their child’s development relative to the influence from the celebrities. The difference is the relativity; a child can automatically develop internal change immediately after realizing where they stand in perspective to life. Such change cannot be influenced by the age, maturity or forceful thought. However, parents play a vital role in influencing the children since they can identify potential change in child’s behavior and then work on it.
Work cited
Cashmore, Ernest. Celebrity Culture. Abingdon [England: Routledge, 2006. Print.
Gross, Richard, and Jean-Marc Lawton. Gross Guides to Psychology. London: Hodder Education, 2012. Print.
Haines, Jess, Dianne Neumark-Sztainer, Peter Hannan, and R. Robinson-O'Brien. "Child versus Parent Report of Parental Influences on Children's Weight-related Attitudes and Behaviors." Journal of Pediatric Psychology (2008): n. pag. Print.
Schaefer, Charles E. How to Influence Children: A Complete Guide for Becoming a Better Parent. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1982. Print.
Slater, Charles L. Generativity versus stagnation: An elaboration of erkison’s adult stage of human development, Journal of Adult Development, 2003
