Sunday, January 26, 2014

First Reader Response - 1/26

I found the article “When I was Your Age” to be very relevant to society and this class. I have often found myself looking at people who are younger than me, especially high schoolers and middle schoolers and think of how different they are from me and often think I acted better than them in small ways such as being more respectful or even  focusing on my work. These are only a few years between us unlike adults who look at me with decades between us. I realized though that this is because I have already learned so much and have just learned to more about life and have matured. I am now able to reflect back on my past and see how those time periods shaped me and that is what the article was trying to point out. I can also see how this relates to the class by looking at how there are many different factors that shape how we act and how we view the past. When we are in positions that force us to “grow up”, then we step up to the challenge. Luckily the majority of us are offered that privilege to grow up at a more leisurely rate

What I noticed while reading through chapter 5 is somewhat similar that the article in that the society we are born into affects both how we grow up and our overall health. Looking at the studies that were done for development, I noticed the authors constantly had to address many factors that could have influenced the results. For example looking at milk and trying to determine if it was the calcium that actually helped us to grow or whether it was simply from all the nutrients. When the study just gave milk to students they noticed a different in growth, but when another study gave students either milk meat or fat, there was not a really noticeable difference. I think this is something important to remember throughout this class to look at how society affects health along with the actual biological processes. It is clear from the readings that these cannot always be separated and there are some conflicts between our biological processes and societal standards. For example the case of early menarche and how the authors talk about STDs, teenage pregnancy and psychological problems as possible results of society saying a person has reached maturity at one point and our bodies telling us differently. These differences will be helpful to look at to see how our society works and if maybe we need to change our thinking in order to help alleviate medical problems.

1 comment:

  1. I enjoyed reading your response on the readings we had to do for the week. I was intrigued by the point you brought up about how you look back at children in grammar school and high school, and notice how immature some of them are when it comes to respect as well as academically. I can relate because when I look back to the kids who attend my old grammar school and high school I don’t see mature individuals the way I was growing up around that time. Many of the students act younger than they are and when I was growing up I remember always trying to act mature and respectful to others, and when it came to my academic work, I was always on top of it. I think you brought up a good point that growing up depends on the situations we find ourselves in, when we are forced to “grow up” all of a sudden, and I think the younger generation hasn’t faced any of those scenarios yet.

    Chapter 5 did bring up some interesting points, and I was impressed with the way you were able to highlight those in your response. When you mention that the article was similar to chapter 5 when talking about how it depends on the society we are born into that shapes how we grow up as well as our overall health. The milk study is interesting, because the results and evidence proves that typically drinking milk will increase the calcium in your bones, and would help you grow stronger and bigger. Personally, I grew up hating milk, I didn’t like the taste of it, and because of that my favorite drink was orange juice (which also has calcium D). I have never broken a bone, and I am pretty tall compared to those in my family. I wonder if I would have drank milk (besides the milk in my cereal) if I would have grown taller or stronger. Putting that to the side, I think without drinking milk like I should have, I still grew up strong and healthy.

    ReplyDelete