CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY:
No nation can rise above the standard of her education because; it is an instrument per excellence”. Education is defined as a life long process that begins from birth and ends at death. It transforms the helpless infant, who is regarded as “tabular rasa” into a matured adult that will be useful to himself and functional to this society at large. This transformation or development is achieved through the contribution or with help of various agents of socialization which include; family, school, peer group, mass media and the society.
Children begin their lives in social world of their families; however, as they mature they are introduced to the social world of peers and spend increasingly amount of time with kids of their age. In ways similar to the community, the peer group becomes an agency of enculturation and learning. The types of relationship they form with their peer are quite different from those they form with their parents and siblings and they are taught unique skills that impact their development. As early as pre-school, children face such challenges as making a new friend, maintaining existing friendship, fitting into peer group and avoiding bullies. All of these interpersonal skills require both complex thinking and behavioral skills, social and emotional adaptations; academic and cognitive development and citizenship are influenced by social interaction and experience of the child with the peers. The infants and the toddler are observed reaching to others infants by touching them, by crying when others cry, and later by offering nurturance or comfort. By the age of three (3), early friendship begin to form and children’s peers begin to have a more lasting influence (Parke, 1990).
Social-economic status, ethnic identity, and parent’s occupations affect how families view themselves and the process by which they socialize their children (Borntein, 2002). Harris (1998, 2002) and Rowe (1994) maintained that peer groups have an even stronger influence than that of parents, although that extreme position has been related by other researches (Berk, 2005); gradually, children discover that others can share their feelings or attitude or have quite different ones.
The peer group also influences development of children’s socializing skills. This early friendship help children learn how to negotiate and relate to others including their siblings and other member of the family. The extent of this influence, however, depends on other situational constraints such as the age, the personality of children and the nature of the group (Harris, 1998; Hartup, 1993).
Most people believe that friend matters, not just for personal well-being but for achieving goals in life. Nowadays, most primary schools are facing academic setback as a result of rapid negative influence of peers on teaching and learning activities. Schools seem often to be judged on the kind of children they enroll, rather than the quality of their teaching or other facility they offer. However, children spend much of their time with peers (Hamburg, 1992).
It has come to the realization of researcher that apart from peer group influence, there are other factors affecting the social development of a child: parenting style, improper implementation of national policy on education program’s non-availability of adequate facilities in the school, unconducive learning environment, social-economics status of the parents, pedagogical skills of the teachers; to mention but few. However, the research study tends to find possible solution to the discovered problems and even make a room for further study.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
Peer group is an important influence throughout one’s life, but they are more critical during developmental years of childhood. Recent studies show that parents continue to have significant influence even during adolescent. It appears that the power of peer group becomes more important when conflict between parents and children, during a child’s development, becomes so great that child feel pushed away among or neglected and seek closeness elsewhere. The early research network and Duncan (2003) post four (4) factors that influenced children development status; qualities and quality of care, resources available in the child’s home, child’s characteristics and family attributes.
Children are expected to behave in a certain way that is consistent with family affiliation and if the parents find out their child is engaging in unacceptable behavior and not performing well in the school, they blame no other person than teacher. Whereas, peer group plays vital roles in the child development and this has evolved the researcher to carry out research study on the peer group influenced on child development so as to provide comprehensive information for the educational-related professionals and the parents on how they can assist peer with caution.
1.3 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
The following questions would provide guide in the conduct of the research study:
– Does a peer have any positive influence on the child development?
– Does a child have any influence on the group?
– Does social-economic status of parents affects social development of pupils?
– Does a peer have any influence and teaching and learning activities?
1.4 SCOPE OF THE STUDY
This research work focuses on influence of peer group on social development of primary school pupils. It covers school pupils in Ogun state using Abeokuta south local Government Area due to the largeness of the area, time coverage and other constraints. This study was carried out on some primary schools that are randomly selected within Abeokuta south local government area in Ogun state.
1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY.
This finding will help the parents to understand the influence of peers on child development. It will also provide comprehensive information for the teacher, parent, counselors, caregiver and the guardians on two they can assist children to deal with peers or cheese their peers with caution.
The research work focuses on the of children and it will be useful for the educational –related professional in the sense that it will uncover the factors responsible for setback in the social development of a child and provide corrective measures. It will contribute to the knowledge of child development in Nigeria.
Moreover, it will be an eye-opener for other researchers towards digging deep into other areas of this study which could be of great help to the society. At the end of the research work, suggestions will be made available on how to curb negative influence on social development of children.
1.6 OPERATIONAL DEFINITIONS OF TERMS
– Social development: It is the cognitive, affective and psychomotor changes in a child and his or her relationship with the environment.
– Social-economics status: It is financial ability of a person.
– Peer pressure: It is the force of the group that makes a child behaves in a manner acceptable to them.
– Peer group: It is the number of in-school children of the same age who interact together.
– Exogenous effect: It is the effect a child’s behavior has on the group; that the behavior and individual is bringing into peer group norms or behavior as it affects individual member of the peer group.
– Endogenous effect: It is the group norms or behavior as it affects individual member of the peer group.
– Nature: It is child’s behavior or baits without environment influence (inborn or inherited traits)
– Nurture: A child exposition to the environment and parental care received while developing.
– Child: In- School pupil