The Effects Of Homework On My Behavior

Rosa Silvermen proclaims a tragic story of a girl, Arabella Campbell, who was a young 16 year old girl who collapses and dies from doing homework. According to Telegraph News, she had no injuries or a disease that could've caused her death but thinks that sudden adult death syndrome or natural causes. Many will say that homework is benefiting students but more people would say that homework is eating students alive. Homework does everything but benefit a student's life and education. Homework should be not allowed because it increases stress levels in students, it gives students a negative connotation of school, and is not scientifically proved to benefit a student's education. Homework is doing more harm than good.

When you think about school one of the first things that pops into people’s mind is homework. Basically if you have asked your parents or your grandparents they would say that they remember the homework load. Now we all know that homework can be beneficial but also can be very unhealthy with all of the stress that it causes. Over the years the homework load has increased because of the fact that schools think that they need to try to keep up with other countries in academics. And will doing all of this homework now be all for nothing later? The homework load has increased these past couple of years and it is causing a lot of stress on kids and overall is not helping their academics in the long run.

According to Noble, Ashby, and Gnilka (2014), adaptive perfectionists set realistic standards, were ready for a challenge and accepted their mistakes. The authors indicate that students with moderate perfectionism gained satisfaction after achieving imposed expectations and had positive self-esteem. Those students had significantly lower level of depressions compared to maladaptive perfectionists (Noble et al., 2014). Thus, the adaptive dimension of perfectionism implies a relatively lower level of stress among college

A research study had shown that perfectionism has a link to anxiety and depression. Perfectionism is the refusal to accept anything standard short of perfection the tendency to set unrealistically high standards for performance of oneself and sometimes significant others, along with the inability to accept mistakes or imperfections in matters of personal appearance, care of the home, or work; may be accompanied by an obsession with completeness, purity, or goodness.

Number of different ways in which perfectionism is conceptualized and measured is one of the biggest challenges when designing research in this field (Hill, Appleton & Hall, 2014). Nevertheless, when going through various sources, we can see a common point of view among researches looking at perfectionism as a multidimensional and multifaceted personality trait characterized by imposing high standards on oneself with the tendency to engage in overly and unrealistic critical evaluations of one’s achievement (Cumming & Duda, 2012; Flett & Hewitt, 2002). Individual’s need for flawlessness (perfection) and setting of excessively high standards of performance accompanied by tendencies for extremely critical evaluation of one’s performance are the core of this phenomenon (Stoeber & Otto, 2006). In general population, perfectionism is usually perceived as a negative psychological phenomenon leading to other unfavourable results (e.g. experiencing high level of stress). This extremely polarized attitude used to be also kept by many researchers connecting perfectionism with psychopathology outcomes.

Some define perfectionism into two categories, perfectionistic strivings, and perfectionistic concerns. Perfectionistic strivings reflect perfectionistic personal standards and a self-oriented strive for perfection. Perfectionistic concerns on the other hand, reflect concerns over mistakes, fear of judgment from others, and doubt about actions (Stoeber, 2016). Clinical psychologists regard perfectionism as a “personality disposition associated with psychopathology and mental health problems” (Stoeber, 2016). With that being said, perfectionism is defined as

They used a variety of other tests along with the APS-R to find these cut off scores and validate their data (dependent variables). These included: Frost’s Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (FMPS), Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS), the Center for Epidemiological Studies – Depression Scale (CES-D), Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), students grade point average (GPA), and self reported perfectionism rating. I believe the authors provided a strong theoretical perspective and that their literature review backed the need for this type of research and their hypothesis.

In the first place, homework should not be assigned because it has a negative impact on the student's ability to focus. The lack of focus developed can lead to negative habits. According to the Journal of Experimental Education, students spend an average of 3.1 hours on homework every night (Strauss). Exhaustion created from the hours spent on homework leads to the lack of focus and the development of bad habits such as cheating. On the contrary, others believe homework can build important characteristics such as independence and responsibility (Reilly). Although this may be true, homework could help students develop negative characteristics such as cheating. Donald L. McCabe a professor at Rutgers University and the leading cheating researcher states, “there has always been struggling students who cheat to survive, but more and more, there are students at the top who cheat to thrive” (Pérez-Peña). In conclusion, students can become exhausted and lack focus due to homework and can develop bad characteristics.

The problem I want to solve has remained the same, but often times I find myself doubting whether or not I will be able to solve it. Through the Ted Talk, I learned that college undergraduate narcissism levels are at a record high due to social dynamics and the epidemic of bullying. It is comforting to know that I am not alone when I am having negative thoughts about myself, but the feeling of negativity is not something that comforts me. The lecture, readings, and Ted Talk discuss the importance of loving yourself and treating yourself. The Ted Talk also notes that we criticize ourselves because we believe we need to in order to motivate ourselves. However, self-criticism actually undermines our motivation levels. I realized that in order to escape my negative mindset, I need to find other reasons to stay motivated to someday solve my problem. Connie Skinner inspired me to start journaling and make a list of reasons why I want to be successful. Also, through the Ted Talk, I learned that we are motivated most when we feel safe and comforted. First and foremost, I need to develop a deeper level of emotional intelligence and truly become self-aware. Second, I need to surround myself with people who share similar beliefs and values as I do. This will help me practice reflective behavior.

Another pro of homework is that it has been linked to higher student achievement. “Duke University Professor Harris Cooper and his research team identified 35 studies that found a positive correlation between homework and achievement, but only after elementary school” (Fuglei). Younger students are less capable of fully reaping the benefits of homework because their study habits are not completely developed yet, among other reasons. However, older students have greatly benefited from homework when it comes to their test scores. Dr. Cooper again stated that “Across five studies, the average student who did homework had a higher unit test score than the students not doing homework” (Fuglei). However, those against homework disagree with these claims, and hold the opinion that homework is unrelated to student success. They attribute higher tests scores and other achievement to other factors, not homework. Another pro is that homework allows teachers to gauge how well students are understanding the material, and then modify instruction as needed. Teachers can also identify struggling students through their homework performance and provide more assistance for them. This way, students won’t feel like they are being singled out or feel embarrassed for not fully grasping the material. Homework also serves as a reference for teachers during parent-teacher conferences (“The Good Schools Guide”). Without homework, teachers would have to find other methods to gauge student

Lastly, homework results in a combination of corresponding negative physical and mental effects within students. In the survey conducted on high schoolers in California, 56% of participants admitted homework as their primary stressor, while less than 1% said homework was not a stressor (Strauss). Regarding physical symptoms, 72% of students disclosed their constant state of anxiety over school work, resulting in sleep deprivation, headaches, exhaustion, weight loss, stomach pain, and the lack of stability in their lives (Strauss). Over 80% of the students encountered a physical symptom in the timespan of a month, 44% of whom experienced three or more in that time period (Strauss). In addition to this, parents argued their children do not have enough time to complete chores, a skill that also trains a sense of responsibility within adolescents (Ponte). Furthermore, homework limits a child’s development of social skills, as it leaves them with little time to interact with friends (Ponte). In addition to the shortage of social interactions among friends, adolescents have limited time to converse with their family members as well. For example, junior Julia Jones was assigned a group project over Winter Break, a time specifically created for a vacation from school (Ponte). As expected, both of Julia’s partners were on vacation—one of which being out of country (Ponte). Julia experienced high levels of stress as she and her group members reached to finish the project before their

Physical and mental health are both wrongly affected by too much homework. A buildup of stress can lead to sleep deprivation and even depression. Often, the more stressed people are the more unhealthy eating habits occur. Those unhealthy eating habits can range from eating too much to eating nothing at all. From personal experiences in high school many of my friends and even myself have suffered from general anxiety over homework; it is not a good experience at all. As student’s homework amount increases their grades seem to plummet, causing mental breakdowns or actions relating to mental breakdowns. Now that students are having mental breakdowns it’s even harder to complete any of their homework at all. Homework overloads are an absolute threat to students’ lives; something has to change.

One of the major reasons as to why homework is unfavorable is because it causes high levels of stress. Studies “conducted at Stanford University found that students… who spend too much time on homework experience for stress, physical health problems, a lack of balance in their lives, and alienation from society.” This shows that homework has many negative qualities that are not

The homework controversy has been going on for a quiet a long time with no end in sight. Homework is defined as an out of class task assigned to the students to help with practice or prepare for the future. Homework has been around a long period of time. It has set and traced as a tradition of having teachers assigning work and students completing it. Parents say that teachers require it and teachers say’s that parents demand to help their kids to finish it. Teachers assign homework to help some students improve their grade, pass course, re-learn the subject you learn in the class, and pass the course for those of who do not do well on tests and exams. Can homework be considered helpful or harmful? This interrogation turns into an argument or debate between two reasonable subjects. Especially for the student’s athletes or any students who enjoys after school activities, homework hurts probably the most. The assignments take away time, which could be spent on doing more productive actions or spend time with your family or may cause unnecessary stress.

This report is written to explore what are the effects of homework to students and their development as there are arguments of the positive and negative effects of homework to students. Students’ family and teachers are also involved in this argument as well because they are one of the factors of affecting students when it comes to homework.