Parents often have “headache” when their teenagers in the house. Though teens are more independent with self-care physical skills, this is their time of exploration. They love to experiment in almost every facet of their lives, including making friends. “Friends are the relatives that you make for yourself.” Though it’s part of our parental role to protect them from ill intentions, it’s also our job to guide teens about why friendship is important for teenagers.
Related Reading:
- 11 Best Birthday Party Ideas for Teenagers
- 12 Jobs That Benefit Both Motherhood and Career in 2022
- 12 Things can Help Raise Kids with Diversity and Inclusion in Mind
- How to Talk and Teach Kids about Shaving (for Teen Boys and Girls)
- Top 10 High Paid Jobs for Women Career Consideration [2022]
- 8 Youngest Child Traits: Does Birth Order Matter?
- 11 Tips for a Meaningful Summer Holiday for Both Kids and Teens
- 8 Practical Tips to Help Teenagers in Career Selection
- 10 Ways to Be an Upstanders in Bullying
- 14 Script Example to Tell Kids About Separation and Divorce
- Teach Teens About Money (including credit card and mobile app)
- Talking About Birds and Bees (sex) to Your Kids: Tips for Every Parent
Table of Contents
The 6 Reasons Why Friendship is Important for Teenagers
1. Natural Inclination to Make Friends
Nobody in this world is indeed an island. Humans are highly social, so it’s hard to go through life without friends. And, in teenagers, this need to have friends is heightened.
Photo Source: pressfoto on Freepik
Psychology Today explains that during adolescence, people start breaking away from childhood attachments. Included in this “breaking away” period is having a set of friends one can associate with. Hence, it’s not unusual for most parents rearing teenagers to feel “left out” once this happens.
But, Dr. Daniel Siegel points out on Newport Academy that teens spending more time with friends is what they’re wired to do. Yes, teenagers can always depend on their families for support, but there will always be a time when they must leave home. And who else can teens turn to for help once they leave home but their peers, right?
Hence, don’t shun your teens from spending time with their friends. They must make all the connections they need at this stage. Once they leave home or whenever they’re out, they’ll be better at weathering the obstacles in life if they have supportive friends.
Even if they have made only one close friend, this will help your teen battle loneliness. After all, we don’t want our teenagers to engage in any risky behavior they deem necessary to gain the popularity — and the friendship — they need.
2. A Way to Explore Independence
Aside from being wired to make friends, teenagers would like to assert their independence in almost all aspects of life. They may even take more risks than any parent would allow, which includes befriending “bad-influence” peers.
But, while most of us deem this behavior as rebellious, it’s a way for teens to develop their identity. Erik Erikson explains in his psychosocial development theory that adolescents must explore their independence to create a positive sense of self. They need to experiment with various roles, behaviors, and activities to solidify who they are in society. If not, they’ll experience role confusion — not being sure where they fit or who they are, resulting in disappointment.
Hence, it’s not our role as parents to choose who they befriend. Though we can guide them, teens have an ultimate say with who they want to associate themselves. Yet, when we sense that their friends hurt how they view themselves, we probe further and drop hints on the signs of a bad friendship. After all, teenagers need to experience the joys and pains of building friendships to be self-secure adults later.
Though adolescents need to experiment with handling friendships, they still need guidance in solving tricky situations. These situations can sometimes involve differences in opinion, ideas, or values. But, again, we’ll have to give teens the space they need to handle them. Be ready whenever they holler for your help.
Just know that independence in teens is not a bad thing at all. Raising Children explains how teens value independence and how we, as parents, can help them go through what they’re experiencing.
3. Build a Network of Support
If teens fear one thing the most, that’s not having a circle of friends to whom they belong. Aside from helping teenagers learn more about their identities, having friends is another support network they can count on.
Once teenagers feel that their peers are supportive of who they are and their decisions, their self-confidence gets a boost. They feel accepted without needing to put on another persona just to fit in. Even dressing the same way or joining similar clubs and activities helps confirm their identity. Simi Psychological Group explains that such similarities tell your teens that it’s okay to enjoy what they’re doing.
Having friends is also a teen’s haven about all the changes he’s experiencing related to puberty. Though most parents are more than willing to talk about it, what they have to say usually comes from the standpoint of authority. Hence, most teenagers are hesitant to open up about it with their parents unless they consider them their confidants.
But teen friendships don’t always have a happy ending. Whether the friendship grows out or a rift has happened between peers, it can cause teenagers to feel judged. Their self-confidence goes down, and they may even question their self-worth. They may even hide their true selves and what they genuinely think not to lose the support they get from their peers. This is where peer pressure can negatively influence how teenagers decide.
Yet, if this peer pressure is used by a teenager’s friends to influence each other positively, there’s nothing to worry about. This can even help them make a more authentic connection with each other. They eventually share their thoughts and feelings, which will help them make better decisions and find ways to handle their problems.
Think of teen friendships as another inner voice telling them what they shouldn’t and should do.
4. Fosters Sense of Belongingness and Acceptance
Acceptance of their identity is another reason why friendship is important to teenagers. Having like-minded persons by their side helps teens know that they don’t have to be someone else to be accepted.
Having peers helps adolescents cope better with the challenges they’re experiencing at this crucial stage. Knowing their friends also face the same struggles sends a subtle message that they’re not alone. Through both the good and bad times, someone out there always owns the same (experience). Their friends can become another avenue for them to vent out without fear of judgment or being scolded.
Teen friendships positively impact a teenager’s overall health, including physical and mental health. Even having one peer is enough for a teenager to feel good about who he is. But, like all other relationships, not all teen friendships have positive impacts. Teenagers who has experienced negative peer pressure and bullying, they start isolating themselves.
Once teens start to isolate themselves from the world, they won’t be able to trust others readily. They then would be unable to create a friendship, let alone a casual conversation. They will always feel afraid that other people will do the same things. their bullies do. All these can lead them to feel stressed and eventually depressed. Though we’ll never fully know why teens bully other adolescents, we parents can help them realize it’s not their fault that it’s happening to them. In that way, we can help them restore their faith in friendship and aid them in creating close ties with other teens.
5. Provide Positive Influence
When two or more teens spend time together, they’re bound to rub some personalities onto their friends. Without them consciously knowing it, teenage friends will soon have almost the same way of doing and thinking through things. Before any one of them realizes it, they both have influenced their pal.
The word influence is usually associated with negatively affecting other people. But like a coin, influence can also be a positive force that helps teenagers be the best version of themselves. As teenage peers share the same interests, they’re likely to share the same goals. With that, they can motivate each other to do good in whatever activity or goal they’re working on. When one feels like giving up and taking the easy way out, the other can persuade him to focus on the goal and not do otherwise.
And, in cases when one of the teenagers has strayed from their goal, his friend can help him get back on track. They will then learn valuable lessons and even grow from the experience. This is because a teenage pal’s words and actions are more influential to a fellow teen compared to their parents. This is what the experts call positive peer pressure.
So, when we parents see our teens coming out of their shells by spending time with their friends, support it. Don’t feel jealous and plot ways to hinder their budding relationship. Yes, we still need to guide them through the process, we should be the ones encouraging them to spend more time with positive role models outside the home. After all, we won’t always be at their side to give the advice they need.
6. Better Mental Health
Friendships forged during the teenage years are one of the foundation blocks to having better mental health in adulthood. The more secure the friendship is, the higher their self-worth levels. When they feel more confident about themselves, teens also experience lower social anxiety and depression.
If you find it hard to believe, think of it this way. If you have peers that stick with you no matter your season in life and accept your quirks with no question, you won’t doubt yourself. Your pals serve as one of the inner voices that tell you to pursue what you want in life, aside from the never-ending support you get from your immediate family.
However, for better mental health to be the end goal, a teen doesn’t have to have a large circle of friends. Newport Academy’s article reveals that popularity doesn’t equate to great mental health. The larger a teen’s friendship circle is, the shallower the connections he’s making. One wouldn’t be able to know one’s life as intimately as possible if he has lots of peers. That’s impossible for anyone, let alone teenagers, to achieve. After all, having a large friendship circle means more stress for teens as they’ll have to switch to different personas to maintain that relationship.
Hence, fewer but more intense teenage friendships make it easier for teens to maintain. It’s because they’ll have more time to spend getting to know their peers better with an emotional intimacy only the closest of friends have. Add the companionship that one gets from having a close pal since your teenage years.
Though popularity is good in other aspects, it’s not the end-all and be-all to gaining your fellow teenagers’ friendship. Simply being authentic and honest is the key to forging an epic teenage friendship guaranteed to stay for a lifetime.
Be the Most Supportive Parents to Your Teens!
It’s a tricky balancing act for parents to be a supportive voice for their teens while keeping a close eye on their safety. Though they need to start making independent decisions like who to forge a friendship with, we can’t help but watch out for how these relationships affect them. However, we don’t want to be helicopter parents as it doesn’t have a good effect on them.
Even if our teens start to spend more time with their peers, it’s a definite must to let them know they’ll have our support always. But, we still need to be vigilant for any signs that teenage kids are experiencing bullying. If they are in that situation, let’s help them become upstanders to bullying without doing all the work for them. We can talk to them about it, but how our teens respond to it is ultimately their decision.
While teens generally love hanging out with their friends, some are too shy to do so. If you have an adolescent like that, help him build the friendship skills he’ll need. The best way to do so is to model to them what a great friendship looks like. If you need to, allow him to mingle with your peers. It will be through a close look at your dynamic with your pals that they’ll know how to go ahead with making friends of their own.
Once they manage to connect with their classmates and become besties, don’t withhold any praise. Even if they’re not a child anymore, hearing good words on how they’re handling a situation is a big confidence booster for your teen. Who knows, you’ll soon be planning a special birthday party for your teenager as he has made more friends.
About Me
Hi, there. I am Lin. Together with my husband and two kids, we live in the beautiful Netherlands in Europe. I am dedicated to self-development, creating quality time for the whole family, and fully supporting kids with their potentials and possibilities with all I have learned from engineering, MBA, and 10+ years of working experience in the energy sector.
2 Comments
Comments are closed.