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This article focuses on the negatives that both men and women experience, due to societal expectations being put onto them. Additionally, the article also talks about how these expectations, are put onto almost any age of a person, whether young or old. This can be connected to “Romeo and Juliet” by the fact that women are meant to be thought of as trophies and people with limited freedom. As women often have the expectation to do what they are told and be molded and shaped into what is wanted of them, while men in “Romeo and Juliet”, are meant to be brave, fearless, and tough. We can also make a connection to “the Perks of being a Wallflower”, men are expected to be tough and not show emotion. While woman are supposed to be sought after by men. As you can see, a connection can be made between the article, “Romeo and Juliet”, as well as “the Perks of being a Wallflower” when it comes to the gender expectations women and men are supposed to portray.

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Maja Đundić Gender Equality Portfolio Manager

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Gender Differences: How Society Shapes Our Gender Roles from the Earliest Age

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From the moment we are born, aside from biological differences based on sex, there are virtually no other disparities. However, from the earliest age, society begins to create differences between boys and girls and molds us into “suitable” roles, laying the foundations for our opportunities in adulthood.

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This article narrows in on what defines loyalty and betrayal, while also explaining how one leads to the other. The article also helps us to create a connection between it and “Romeo and Juliet”, as well as ‘the Perks of being a Wallflower”, by giving us bits of information about what aspects go into loyalty and betrayal in a relationship (Family and not). In “Romeo and Juliet”, Juliet builds up loyalty within her family as she grew older and spent more time with them. But then she ends up betraying her family by choosing to not marry Count Prince, this shows how Juliets loyalty to her family, as well as her betrayal to her family, is intertwined. When looking at “the Perks of being a Wallflower”, Charlie’s loyalty to Sam, eventually led to his betrayal of Mary Elizabeth, as Charlie had liked Sam for a long time, but ended up dating Mary Elizabeth, who he is not the most fond of. Charlies betrayal of Mary, (kissing Sam), was built up from his loyalty to Sam that he had all along. In conclusion, we can see how the article, helps to teach us that loyalty and betrayal, can be connected to each other. Moreover, we can see how this article can be connected to “Romeo and Juliet” and “the Perks of being a Wallflower”.

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Loyalty and betrayal are two powerful concepts that play a significant role in human relationships and interactions.

Understanding the value of loyalty is essential for comprehending the profound impact of betrayal.

Loyalty is a steadfast commitment to a person, group, or cause. It involves unwavering support, trust, and faithfulness.

Loyalty is built on the foundation of trust and mutual respect, and it forms the basis of many enduring relationships, whether in personal friendships, professional partnerships, or family bonds.

When you understand the value of loyalty, you recognise its importance in fostering deep connections and establishing a sense of security.

Loyalty is the glue that binds people together, creating a sense of belonging and mutual support.

It promotes cooperation, reliability, and the expectation that those you are loyal to will have your back in times of need.

However, with this understanding of loyalty comes a profound recognition of the damage inflicted by betrayal.

Betrayal, in its essence, is a violation of the trust and loyalty that had been established.

It is the breaking of promises, the undermining of commitments, and the shattering of expectations.

When someone betrays your trust, it can cause emotional pain, damage relationships irreparably, and shatter the sense of security that loyalty provides.

The pain of betrayal is often compared to the feeling of being stabbed in the back.

It can result in feelings of anger, sadness, confusion, and even trauma. The consequences of betrayal can be long-lasting, affecting not only the individuals directly involved but also those who witness or are indirectly affected by the breach of trust.

To truly grasp the damage of betrayal, one must first appreciate the value of loyalty.

Without a strong foundation of loyalty, betrayal may not resonate as deeply. Understanding that betrayal is a breach of trust and a violation of a fundamental human bond reinforces the significance of loyalty in our lives.

In conclusion, loyalty and betrayal are connected. To understand the profound impact of betrayal, one must first recognise the immense value of loyalty in human relationships.

Loyalty is the cornerstone upon which trust and support are built, and betrayal represents a painful rupture of that trust.

By appreciating the role of loyalty and its importance, we can gain a deeper understanding of the damage caused by betrayal and work to foster stronger, more resilient relationships based on trust and commitment.

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Betrayal's Sting: Unmasking the Power of Loyalty

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Loyalty and betrayal are two powerful concepts that play a significant role in human relationships and interactions. Loyalty is a steadfast commitment to a person, group, or cause. It involves...

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This article talks about the way a brain functions during adolescence (teenage years), and how adolescence can lead to stronger relationships. Additionally, the article also talks about the different ways that the teenage brain, helps form better bonds with others. This can be related to “Romeo and Juliet”, by looking at the fact that Romeo and Juliets relationship, was formed solely because of their adolescent brains. This information helps us to understand how Romeo and Juliet’s relationship was able to improve over time, due to their adolescent ways of thinking. We can also relate this article to “the Perks of being a Wallflower”, by seeing how Charlie was able to form stronger friendships with those around him, due to his adolescent thinking, and the new things his brain encouraged him to do (explore new things: typically happens in adolescences). This shows that the power of the teen bran, can be affected in positive way by adolescence, which then can help teenagers, form stronger relationships with others. In conclusion, we can see how “Romeo and Juliet”, and “the Perks of being a Wallflower”, can relate back to the article, and how the power that teen brains have in that story, are shifted by the affects of adolescence, as well as leading teenagers to form stringer relationships with other people.

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This month, we feature videos of a Greater Good presentation by Daniel Siegel about his new book, Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain. In this excerpt from his talk, Dr. Siegel describes how the transition from childhood to adolescence changes how kids relate to peers and parents.

Imagine you are asleep in bed and the light begins to come in through your window. Your father comes into your room, kisses you gently on the forehead, and says, "Good morning, Sweetie. What would you like for breakfast?"

"I'd like some oatmeal," you say.

Thirty minutes later, you come down dressed and you have your steaming bowl of oatmeal.

That's the way it is in childhood for many of us, when we're looked after by our parents or other caregivers. Now, why would you ever give it up? Your mind would have to change in a way that drove you away from your dad's oatmeal.

That's why we have adolescence. Nature needs to do something to this child's brain to make it so that when this child is 50 years old, they are not living at home anymore. Nature's got to do something so that the child will move away from familiarity and toward what's unfamiliar and new-and toward what's potentially unsafe.

The key lies in the oatmeal-or rather, who we turn to for the oatmeal. The adolescent brain transforms our relationships, so that we no longer look to parents or caregivers alone for our oatmeal. Instead, we look also to our friends and to society.

So how does nature do that? The adolescent brain goes through a lot of changes, but here I just want to focus on three that transform our relationships to other people-and I'll explore the practical implications for parenting and education.

1. More intense emotion

As a child approaches adolescence, their emotions become more intense. How do we know that? It's not just from slamming doors and sometimes intense sulking at the dinner table. The limbic area of our nervous system works closely with the brainstem and the body to create emotion-and in the adolescent brain, we see that those structures exert much more influence on higher-level reasoning from upper regions of the teen brain than in children or adults.

One study, for example, put kids, adolescents, and adults into a brain scanner and showed them a picture of an emotionally expressive or neutral face. They found more intense emotional responses among adolescent, and a relatively mild response among both the kids and adults.

Teens are also more likely to see emotion in other people, even when there is none. When you show a neutral face to an adolescent in a brain scanner, their amygdala activates-they think that the person is having a negative emotional response rather than a neutral one.

The downside of this increased emotionality is that teens can become more easily irritated, upset, and moody-and they can have a relationship with themselves that's confusing. These intense subcortical influences can seem to come from nowhere. As one adolescent said to me when he heard I was writing this book, "You've gotta tell the adolescent, and especially the adult reading that book, that adolescents will feel one way one minute, another way the next. Tell the adults to back off! Just let us feel whatever we feel at the time."

That's a good tip. If an adult jumps on a teen and tries to give him a consequence just for being emotional, they'll just push the teen away. Their brain is just doing what it is designed to do: to be more emotional.

2. Risk and novelty becomes more compelling

There's a neurotransmitter called dopamine that connects the brainstem, the limbic area, and the cortex-and one of its jobs is to make us feel good when we get a reward.

Compared to a kid or an adult, the baseline levels of dopamine in an adolescent are lower. But the release amounts are higher-and novelty is one of the major things that can trigger dopamine release. This means new things feel really, really good to a teenager. This is brilliant. Nature has created a system that drives us to seek change and novelty, a push for the unfamiliar and even the uncertain, which is what a teen must do if they're ever going to get out of the house.

But there's a downside, of course: What happens when dopamine levels drop? The teen gets bored with the same old, same old-which is why middle schools and high schools have got to change the way they approach the school experience. They need to play more to the teens' innate drive for novelty.

There's something else going on in the adolescent limbic area-specifically, the orbitofrontal, amygdala, and anterior cingulate portions-which is that the brain is changing how it evaluates whether something is good or bad. In the shift from childhood to adolescence, the brain starts to focus on the positive, thrilling aspect of a choice and minimize the negative, dangerous aspects.

We call this hyper-rational thinking, and it makes the adolescent more likely to drive fast, take narcotics, or engage in risky sexual behavior. That's why you are three times more likely to die or get seriously injured by a preventable cause during adolescence, despite the fact that our bodies are stronger and healthier than at any other time of life.

So, parents: You're not paranoid in generally being concerned about safety, because adolescence really is a dangerous period-necessarily so. But you know what makes it worse? Peer pressure, which leads us to the third change in the adolescent brain.

3. We seek attachment in peers

We mammals have attachment, which is built on four childhood needs: to be seen, safe, soothed, and secure. What happens with attachment in the early years is really important because infants depend on their caregivers to survive.

But as we grow older, attachment doesn't go away-it's a lifelong process. What happens when you're a kid moving into adolescence? What do you do with your attachment needs? Instead of turning only toward your parents, you start turning to your peers more, which is a very healthy thing to do.

Why would it be natural to turn toward your peers as an adolescent? Because that's on whom you're going to depend when you leave home. Often, in the wild, a mammal without an adolescent peer group is as good as dead. So connecting with a peer group can feel like a matter of survival. But this move toward peers can make parents feel bad. They're no longer in the role of being the primary caregiver, and that can feel like a rejection.

One really big downside is that membership with an adolescent peer group-even if it's just one other person-can feel like a matter of life and death: "If I don't have at least one peer that I'm connected with, I'm gonna die." That's what millions and millions of years of evolution are telling this adolescent. So if there's a party going on, the teen may very well feel as though she's going to die if she doesn't go.

Now, you may think that's stupid. But it's not stupid-it's evolution. And though you may still say "no" to the party-or to purchasing the latest shoes-it may help the relationship if you are still able to understand the incredible sense of life and death behind it. We need that closeness for another reason that goes well beyond just one party, which is that, given the psychological stakes, teens can sacrifice morality for membership. We have a name for that: peer pressure.

So what parents and teens need to do, together, is cultivate the upside of this shift from parents to peers as attachment figures. If you spend your adolescence developing social skills, your adulthood is going to be so much better. In fact, every research study on this finds that supportive relationships are key to longevity, medical and mental health, and happiness.

Lessons for adults

So adults need to honor this adolescent process-this intense, emotional turn away from the safety of parents and toward novelty and peers. The brain is helping the teen get ready to find his oatmeal outside the house. He's going to make his own and he's going to find someone to make it for him.

But that doesn't mean there's no place for parents and other adults. The child's brain is changing in a way that changes her relationships, and it's crucial for parents to learn to acknowledge that their role in relation to the child is changing. We might even ask ourselves: What does adolescence have to teach adults?

When you're a kid you look at adults and you think they know everything, especially your parents. I'm sure many adults wish we could still trust in that. But when you get to be an adolescent, suddenly your brain is changing in a way that undermines those childhood assumptions. As a teen, you realize your parents are not the heroes that you might have thought they were. You may still love them, but you realize they're human beings, a crucial step toward becoming an adult yourself. Now this can be very disorienting, for teens and adults alike-that's the downside.

What's the upside? It's that with a new brain comes a new world. Consider this possibility: The reason the human species, for good and for bad, is so adaptive to this planet is because of our adolescence. That is the moment at which everything is cast into doubt and we are fundamentally drawn to innovation and novelty. This can be dangerous for us as individuals, but it's very good for our species as a whole.

How many adults do you know who have held on to the essence of adolescence in their adult life? Who have held on to a passion, something they're really on fire about-our "emotional spark"? Who have stayed socially and politically engaged? Who keep up close friendships-our "social engagement"? Who keep trying new things and not settling for the same old, same old-our "novelty-seeking"? And who have kept their minds challenged with "creative explorations"? Which adults would you say are better off-those who have held on to those adolescent preoccupations or those who have "grown up"?

Neuroscience finds that our brains never stop growing, an idea called neuroplasticity. What spurs that growth and keeps you young? Emotional spark, passion, social engagement, friendships, novelty, and creative outlets. That's the essence of adolescence!

Think about that the next time you feel tempted to make fun of a teenager for being a teenager, or use the term "adolescent" as an insulting, demeaning comment. Instead of mocking their emotions or rebelliousness, you might try to be a little more adolescent yourself. Research suggests that's exactly what we all need to keep our brains young and nimble, helping us grow and imbuing us with a vitality that will serve us well throughout our lives.

Greater Good wants to know: Do you think this article will influence your opinions or behavior?

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How the Teen Brain Transforms Relationships

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Dr. Daniel Siegel explains how changes to the adolescent brain transform relationships with peers and parents-and what adults can learn from those changes.