Macleans Girls

Is it true that todays tween and teenage girls look confident on the outside but have a dangerously fragile "sense of self" ? Well according to Dr. Leonard Sax, of the National Association for Single Sex Public Education, this is true. Dr. Sax interviewed teenage girls from around North America and collected data on habits that have been found to occur amoung these young women. Dr. Sax speaks about the rising number of girls who are cutting and burning themselves, how anxiety is at an all time high for girls of this age, and how social status severily affects their lives.

According to Dr. Sax "one in five girls [are] cutting themselves and/or burning themselves". I had heard of girls cutting themselves but never at such a high rate as one in five. In 2008 a report from the Yale school of medicine found that "24 per cent of girls between the ages of 10 and 14 were cutting or burning themselves". When shown these statistics and hard facts its hard not to believe that it is happening. I agree with Dr. Sax that girls around this age are cutting and burning themselves but I'm not to certain if the numbers would be as high as recorded. Dr. Sax stated that succesful girls are amoung the many that cause harm to themselves. He reports that this is because "they havent been living, they've been performing".

"the average teenage girl today is more anxious than the average girl admitted to a psychiatric unit for in-patient treatment...". When I read this it was very hard to believe but after reading more information that Dr. Sax had found , it could be possible. Girls today have many more worries such as how they look in photos and what their peers think about them, so much to the point that it keeps them up at night and makes them sick. Small issues such as brand name clothes and popular boyfriends have now caused major problems with girls and keep them in a fragile state. I would have to agree with Dr. Sax that anxiety is at a all time high with teen and tween girls of this decade.

Dr. Sax's last main point is that social status amoung girls has become a major issue. He found that girls are using their sexuality to obtain popularity , that it "raises [their] status in the eyes of other girls". I agree that girls are quite obsessed about their heirachy in the school and strive to always look "perfect" and act certain ways. Some girls want to be popular so bad they drink to get it. Dr. Sax found that "55 per cent of univsersity students being treated for alcohol abuse are female" and that many teenage girls have started binge drinking as a way to gain status amoung their peers. I completely agree with Dr. Sax that social status has become a major issue amoung teenage girls.

Dr. Leonard Sax's study on the lives of teenage girls has brought up many important issues. Self harm, anxiety, and social status are just a few topics that he brought up and talked about. Whether the facts are 100 per cent true or not they still shine light on the fact that girls in this day and age face many more problems than their previous ladies.