Is your family physically affectionate with one another? Do you hug, hold hands, provide back scratches, put your arms around each other or cuddle?
If your family doesn’t show affection in that way, why do you think that is? Have you gotten less physically affectionate as you’ve gotten older? Or is touch just not one of the ways you express your love? Do you ever wish it felt easier to give your parents a hug?
In the guest essay “‘Adolescence’ and the Surprising Difficulty of Hugging a Teen Son,” Esau McCaulley writes about how the lack of physical affection between the fathers and sons in the TV show “Adolescence” made him consider how he expresses his love for his own teenage son. He writes:
My relationship with my teenage son is different and, I think, quite warm. Still, I know that struggle. As my eldest son exited early childhood, his shoulders broadening to match mine and his voice shifting a register, I wondered what to do with this emerging adult that now inhabited my house. As someone who grew up without a dad around, I lacked a healthy model to imitate. I didn’t know how to tear down that wall of silence and mystery that creeps up between parents and their teens. But I knew that such barrier destruction is an essential task for parents. Watching the show reminded me that I wasn’t alone.
In a past generation, researchers who studied the impact of fathers on their sons often focused on their physical absence from the home. Boys raised without their fathers around, the research showed, were at greater risk for all sorts of negative outcomes related to social development and criminality.
We know now that it’s not enough for men just to be living in the home, like both fathers in the show. Physical affection has powerful implications for male emotional and mental development.
The love (verbal and physical) that fathers display toward their sons is a key predictor of whether teen boys will experience problems managing aggression and violence during their teenage years. In “Adolescence,” Jamie is an extreme manifestation of a common problem. Too many of our boys are adrift without healthy paternal guidance.
As fathers, we serve as our sons’ introduction to masculinity. Too often we take that to mean that they don’t need the kind of physical affection we gave them when they were little. Or that sarcasm ought to fully replace affirmation as a means of relating to them.
Our physical affection shows them that it is OK to be strong and weak, to love and be loved. It’s one way we can give kids permission to be different.
Students, read the entire essay and then tell us:
What is your reaction to Mr. McCaulley’s essay? Which parts of it resonated with you most, and why?
When was the last time you hugged your parents? What was it for? How did it make you feel?
How important to you is physical affection in your family? Is it a significant way you feel loved, cared for or connected with them? Or does it not mean that much to you?
The essay speaks especially to the difficulty some fathers have in showing physical affection for their teenage sons. Do you think it’s harder for one gender than another to express love in this way? If so, why do you think that is?
Mr. McCaulley describes a “wall of silence and mystery that creeps up between parents and their teens.” He tries to get past that wall with physical affection and other ways of connecting, including what he calls “seven minutes with Dad,” where each child gets seven minutes to tell him whatever he or she wants. Do you experience that “wall” with your parents? What ways of connecting with them work best for you? Why?
If you were asked to share advice with parents who feel distant from their teenage children and who want to have better conversations with them, what would you suggest? If teenagers sought your advice about improving their relationships with their parents, what would you say?
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public and may appear in print.
Find more Student Opinion questions here. Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate these prompts into your classroom.
