Essay: How does peer influence affect academic performance? (proposal)

The teenage phase of human development is the start of independence and it helps to form the ideals that will shape one’s personality. The teenager years are a time where people must set up an identity to escape identity confusion. At this age, teens give much importance to friends and people who have power over them. This gives rise to peer pressure which is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘the influence from members of the same group.’ Peer pressure can have both a positive and negative influence on an individual. Peer pressure affects people of all ages but it is important among teenagers since it influences the adolescents’ personality and intervenes in the development of their morality and most significantly on their psychological development. (Owens, 2006)
Why are teenagers influenced by others?
Students’ sense of school belonging has been recently identified as have an important influence on academic motivation, participation and performance, especially from peer groups with risk of school dropout. (Goodnew, 1993) Finding comfortable affiliates and gaining peer acceptance plays a big part in the development of teenagers.  This can influence how they identify themselves. This is a tricky time for teenagers and the question of ‘who am I?’ is one that they struggle to answer at a conscious level. They begin integrating the opinions of those around them into how they see themselves and into their likes and dislikes. (Huebner, 2012)  Teenagers are very easily influenced during their high school careers because they are at a stage where they don’t really understand who they want to become.
Who influences teenagers?
The relationship adolescents have with their peers, family and members of their social sphere play a vital role in their development. (Boundless Psychology , 2015)They not only become influenced by their friends but also by other influential people around them for example parents, teachers and other caring adults. They can also be influenced by things they see on TV and by the media. In spite of the large number of studies examining peer pressure, most research has only focused on examining how peer pressure is related to well-being and risk behaviour, rather than on identifying the key features that are affected by peer pressure. Social and economic status can also affect the behaviours of teenagers. A number of young people from disadvantaged background are prone to partaking in risk behaviours like drugs, alcohol etc.
Peer influence.
Peer pressure refers to the influence that a peer group has in encouraging a person to change their attitudes, values in order to conform to group norms. (Force)  It is within friendship groups that teens can develop and practice social skills. (Huebner, 2012)There is a feeling that by being part of a peer group helps to answer the difficult social questions that face teenagers. They spend twice as much time with peers as compared to parents or other adults and they spend the majority of their time at school. This is reason enough to study the influence or pressures that peers place on each other at school. The level of influence that peers that peers have over on teenagers makes this the relationships important in the personal development of adolescents. (Boundless Psychology , 2015) It is especially therefore important to study how this affects boarders because school becomes their home and friends become their family. The peers are form part of the teenagers’ norms and how they behave.
Who are teenagers’ role models?
Role models are people that uphold high ethical or moral values. (Whitebourne, 2012) A number of pupils will start viewing their teachers, parents and peers as role models. They all provide adolescents with suggestions and feedback about what they should think and how they should behave in social situations. These role models can be a source of motivation or a lack thereof in terms of academics.  Observing others perform a particular can introduce an adolescent to new behaviours and viewpoints that may be different from his or her own original ones. This particularly affects the new grade 8’s as they are just entering their teen years. Role models can be classified into two groups, negative and positive role models. A positive role model can be an individual who has achieved outstanding success and influence others to achieve the same excellence while a negative role model refers to someone who has experienced misfortunes and motivate others to take necessary steps to avoid unpleasant outcomes. (Lockwood, 2002) There are a lot of these types of role models at school. For example school pupils strive to be like a first team sport player while they also strive ‘not to messed with’ like someone who is popular and rude.
Effect on academic performance
A school is an established institution in which the behaviour of an individual is moulded to equip them for occupational socialisation and it gets people into social groups with like-minded people. This is another area in which peers influence teenagers is when it comes to academics, motivation and work ethic. Researchers have been discussing and investigating the correlation between social interactions among peers in school and academic outcomes for many years. (Coleman, 1961)  This is not the only factor that affects academic performance but things like parents involvement and how much the individual values education however peer groups are influential in the intrinsic value of school and therefore the achievement. In a study performed by Dr. Daniel K. Korir and Felix Kipkemboi it was shown that students whose friends engage in negative activities such as use of drugs, sneaking out of school and being absent from school are likely to have lower their academic performance. (Korir, 2014)
Positive and negative peer influence
Many teens are forced to lead certain lifestyles due to the influence of their peers. This is negative peer pressure and can lead to a loss of individuality. It leads to teens feeling compelled to go with things they feel aren’t right. They imitate their friends and adopt the values and morals of the masses. (scarlet, 2010) This can lead is a concern to the academic performance of the individual. The problem is sometimes teachers expect the student to behave in the same way the as the peer group they associate themselves with. (Howard, 2004) Positive peer pressure on the other hand
The research task will examine the impact of peer pressure on the academic performance in high school pupils. The study will be based at Kingswood College, Grahamstown which is believed to “provide an education in a family-like environment, developing the self-worth and academic, leadership, spiritual, social, moral, cultural and physical potential of every pupil”. The reason this topic was chosen is because there seem to be many people who minimise their academic potential to fit in with their friends or because they want to keep up an image. I have had first-hand experience with this when one day I overheard a conversation where the people were talking about how they would tell their friends how they had not studied for a test meanwhile they had spent the whole night doing exactly that. This happens quite often and I would like to investigate how this affects the final academic mark received by individuals.
Research question
How peer influence in adolescents affects their academic performance at high school?
Aim
The aim of this is study is to determine how peer influences the academic performance of high school students. It is also to see whether it has a good influence and helps the individual perform better or worse. This is what will be investigated in this study:
1. Why are adolescents influenced by others?
2. Who influences adolescents?
3. Who are adolescents’ role models?
4. Effect on the academic performance
Hypothesis
Adolescents whose peers emphasise and engage in positive activities have higher academic performance than those whose peers engage in negative activities
Limitations
The study will only be made specifically with regards with Kingswood College pupils and therefore the findings and results will be generalized and apply to Kingswood and similar private school. The reading cannot apply to public schools because they have different demands and learning resources. Subsequently, it will apply to schools in the Grahamstown area because the influences on adolescents in different town and parts of South Africa are different.
Method
The study will use a quantitative method where the peer influence will be the independent variable while the academic performance will be the dependant variable.  The study will be taken at Kingswood College, Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. The results will be determined using a correlation method which will attempt to determine the degree to which the peer influence will affect the results.
The school is a private boarding and day school. The target will be the junior pupils (grade 8 to 10) but also the senior grades. This is because in the senior grade the pupils are more driven to work hard because of the pressure to get into university. The study will also focus on the boarders because they are in constant contact with their peers and therefore can be greatly influenced. A minimum of 15 to 20 people in each grade will be randomly selected to take part in the study (an equal amount of boys and girls and an equal amount of boarders and day scholars.) There will be about a 100 respondents.
The questionnaire will use fixed choice response format. The responses will then be weighed at according to a rating scale and compare to the academic results. It is designed this way because the variables cannot be individually observed. The questionnaire is also better because then all the data collected will be confidential. The study will look at the influence of classmates and schoolmates on a students’ academic performance. It will also look at activities the student engages in with the peers and how the peers influence their academic performance. The positive and the negative aspects of peer pressure will be studied.