Girls in America - Research

In Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls, psychologist Mary Pipher finds that in spite of the women's movement, teenage girls today are having a harder time than ever before because of higher levels of violence and sexism. The current crises of adolescence - frequent suicide attempts, dropping out of school and running away from home, teenage pregnancies in unprecedented numbers and an epidemic of eating disorders - are caused not so much by "dysfunctional families" or incorrect messages from parents as by our media-saturated, "girl-poisoning" culture. Young teenagers are not developmentally equipped to meet the challenges that confront them. Today's teens face serious pressures at a much earlier age than teenagers in the past. Pipher claims that these pressures are responsible for girls' plummeting math and science scores and the rise of depression levels when they reach junior high. As they encounter situations too complex for them to handle, their self-esteem crumbles.

Author Peggy Orenstein was motivated to explore the causes of low self-esteem among girls when she read the disturbing findings of a 1990 landmark poll from the American Association of University Women (How Schools Shortchange Girls). The study revealed that girls' self-esteem plummets as they reach adolescence, with a concurrent drop in academic achievement - especially in math and science. By sixth grade, both boys and girls have learned to equate masculinity with opportunity, and assertiveness and femininity with reserve and restraint.

In her book, Schoolgirls : Young Women, Self-Esteem, and the Confidence Gap, Orenstein learned that girls who are generally outspoken, remain silent in the classroom, while their male classmates vociferously respond to teachers' questions. The girls confessed to Orenstein that they were afraid of having the wrong answer and of being embarrassed. She found that girls are overly involved with their appearance, clothes and beauty products, instead of their studies. Sexual desirability becomes the central component of their self-image, with negative feelings often translating themselves into eating disorders.

"The fact that American girls now make the body their central project is not an accident or a curiosity," writes Joan Jacobs Brumberg, "it is a symptom of historical changes that are only now beginning to be understood." In The Body Project : An Intimate History of American Girls, Jacobs Brumberg chronicles how growing up female has changed over the past century and why that experience is more difficult today than ever before. Traditional social supports for girls' growth and development - the moral guidelines and supervision provided by earlier generations - have collapsed. The media and popular culture exploit girls' normal sensitivity to their changing bodies, and many girls grow up believing that 'good looks' - rather than 'good works' - represent the highest form of female perfection.

Voices of a Generation: Teenage Girls on Sex, School, and Self, is a 1999 report concluded from summits sponsored nationwide by the American Association of University Women (AAUW) to bring together teenage girls, ages 11-17, of all ethnic backgrounds, to talk openly with each other about the issues they face today.

Key findings of the report include:

Pressure to have sex starts early (11 year-olds were the only group not to mention sex) and comes not just from boys, but from girls, too.

While virtually all girls feel the "pressure to fit in," white and Asian American girls worry more than others about losing their individual identity to the group.

Girls of all backgrounds blame the media for promoting an unattainable body image.

Latinas and African American girls voice more concern about pregnancy than do white and Asian American girls. Few girls name AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases as concerns.

The research makes clear: there is not one "girl culture" in the United States, but several, often with different struggles, different perceptions of school, and different views of sex, peer pressure and family. Yet across all groups, teens today say they are forced to grow up too fast as they face an environment filled with drugs, violence, sex, and pregnancy.

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