Teenage Drug Addiction and Social Influence

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Recommended: Thirteen Days, movie analysis

Teenage drug abuse is usually the outcome of children becoming adolescents, ages 13 to 19. Wanting to fit in and to be accepted amongst their peers is the main cause in the rising rates of teenage drug abuse and social influence. Between ages thirteen to nineteen children are more likely to become susceptible in making bad decisions because their bodies are going through so many different changes that they may not know how to deal with. The movie Thirteen, directed by Catherine Hardwicke, displays an excellent portrayal of the psychological construct of social influence and how children act when going through the adolescent stage by depicting how children cope with fitting into their new found world of sex, drugs, and crime.

The movie Thirteen involves was based on a true story about a teenage girl and the problems she had run into with growing up. A single mother named Melanie of two teenage children, Mason and Tracy. The main focus of the movie is on the thirteen year old daughter named Tracy who is having a hard time coping with the coming of age issues, with no one to look to. Tracy’s mother is a hairdresser who works from home and is always busy with clients, leaving little or no time for Tracy. Melanie also has a boyfriend named Brady who Tracy cannot seem to accept. Tracy’s father is only available for her and her brother when it is of his convenience, so she cannot look to him either. At this very tough stage in Tracy’s life she turns to drugs, sex, and crime introduced to her by a new friend, Evie. Evie has always been the center of boys attention and very popular at school. Tracy who was once an outstanding kid cannot pass up the chance to become friends with someone so popular that she falls into the social influence...

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...irteenth year of so many individual’s lives. This movie has broken down the psychological construct of a thirteen year olds life and has shown a new area of this time in their life to people who were not once familiar.

Works Cited

Dishion, Piehler, Farrington (2009). Parents and Peers. Experience Psychology, 291.

Kline, Rex B., Canter, William A., Robin, Arthur (August 1987). Parameters of Teenage Alcohol Use: A Path Analytic Conceptual Model. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 521-528.

Newcomb, Michael D., Bentler, Peter M. (February 1988). Impact of adolescent drug use and social support on problems of young adults: A longitudinal study. US: American Psychological Association, 64-75.

Newcomb, Michael D., Bentler, Peter M. (February 1989). Substance Use and Abuse among Children and Teenagers. American Psychologists, 242-248.

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