Third+Period-+Question+2

​Group Members: David Murphy, Lucia Moreno Lama, Sarah Hoffman, Alexa Holloway. **Question #2** ===To what extent does the average adult reveal his or her true emotions and thoughts to the people around him or her=== === __David__- I think it really depends on the person and how comfortable they are around their peers. Some people never talk about how they are feeling. They will keep their emotions 'bottled up' and to themselves; but before they know it, those little emotions build up over time and turn into severe problems.So I think it's a matter of how comfortable the individual is around people, and how willing they are to express their emotions. ===

**Sarah:**
====I would agree with what David said. I think that adults and teenagers oftentimes attempt to hide their true feelings about something. They may turn into problems, but on the other hand it might be best in some scenarios to keep emotions to oneself, especially for adults. I think as someone ages (for example, a teenager becoming an adult), the consequences for showing true emotions increase, or there is more on the line. For example, if you are a teenager or adult working and your boss says or does something you don't agree with and you show your negative emotions or react in a strong way, there is a high chance of a negative result. Especially if you are an adult, your job becomes more important to you because it is most likely what you depend on for income/support (as opposed to your parents). I think how you act and which emotions you display has a lot to do with what kind of environment you're in. In the workplace or school, it's probably best to not always display how you are feeling, whereas at home or with friends the chance of negative consequences is lessened. This goes back to what David was saying about how comfortable an individual is around certain people reflects how/which emotions they may/may not express.==== ====I agree with what Lucia said about experience being an important factor as to how one might behave in certain situations. When an child/adolescent is becoming an adult and beginning to see more in-depth how their actions outwardly affect others, it can change how open they are with certain people. Children are often perceptive of others, but as they grow up they begin to gage not only how their actions affect their wants (for example, a child will recognize that behaving a certain way results in more privileges, whereas behaving in other ways results in punishment), but how their actions affect their general situation and how people may view them. At certain age, many people act a certain way to please those around them, no matter if its truly how they feel.==== //**Lucía**//-

To complete David's and Sarah's ideas I would say that //experience // is a really important aspect in an individual's behavior. Teenagers are constantly learning how to handle any kind of human relation, interaction or situation and I think that although this is also present in adulthood, adults know or at least have some kind of reference about how to act in society. I believe that often people reach ages in which they keep their feelings in order to keep harmony, either within themselves or the people around them. I also like to think about the idea of //responsibility //. When a person gets a job, a family or some kind of compromise there is always a fear of disappointing those people/things or even losing them. When you are responsible for something or somebody you have to sacrifice yourself. It also depends on the people around them, with other adults it might be more social acceptable to show how you feel while children are more impressionable and it’s necessary to be more careful about it. Over time adults learn self control and become more regarded about how emotions are more valid and can affect other people. And there are different kinds of emotions there is anger, and when a person is mature enough to be aware of the consequences showing that anger could bring they hid it. There is also fear ; sometimes when an adult is with his peers he doesn’t want to show it because they could think less of him. Around children however the regard usually is make them afraid too. But that is from the point of someone who is mature. There is another perspective to talk about this. When Holden says that all the adults are phonies, he has a point on that. He doesn’t call them that way because he is angry with all of them but because he realizes how they have lost their genuineness from childhood; and that upsets him and also scares him because unfortunately sometimes most of their emotions are not even true.


 * Alexa - I’d definitely agree with David in that emotional communication depends on the specific individual and the situation, as these dictate the way people respond to situations. Also, to build on what Sarah and Lucia said regarding the difference between teen and adult emotional responses to situations, I think it’s interesting to look at the scientific aspects of the question. There’s a definite correlation between lack of emotional control in teens and neural development; during adolescence teens actually develop new neural pathways that specialize in controlling many different thinking functions, including control of emotions and impulses. So scientifically, adults actually can control their emotions better. This definitely contributes to extent that the average adult chooses to reveal their emotions to the people around them—this better restraint allows them to dictate when and if they want to reveal them. As Sarah and Lucia said, it’s often beneficial to control your emotions, especially as an adult, and because of this I think that the average adult is more likely to contain their emotions.

Nick in response to Alexa: Alexa, I throughly agree with you. Adults develop a different mind set as they grow older and so do teenagers. It is beneficial to control your emotions but its not always easy for a person to do so. Adults can sometimes control their emotions but sometimes, adults reveal their feelings more than they are mean to. When you grow older, you are able to control your emotions in certain situations. Adults, in a way are kinda like teenagers. They only reveal what they want to, and teens are always doing just that. But, for the majority of your response, I would have to agree about 95%. Yes, the specific individual determines what how they would communicate their feelings to the outside world. I would personally say that adults do in a way, reveal more about their emotions then teens but they are more discreet about it.

Rachel Horton- (comment) In agreement with David, I feel that as adults, sharing information about true, deep, inner feelings are reduced as a person ages. Although, sometimes some adults do open up their feelings with others, usually this tends to be to a peer, like a spouse, or sibling. To an extent though, adults seem to keep many things to themselves. In my perspective, it seems like many adults don't feel the need to share their feelings with others. They feel that, for the most part it's not something that they should share with others. As an adult, responsibilities are raised from pre-adulthood. One responsibility is being able to deal with problems single handed, and if really needed, talking to a peer can be acceptable. **

Neel Patel I, too, agree with David in that much of this matter deals with the actual person, and it can vary depending on who the person in. I like Alexa's scientific approach reasoning why adults tend to share their innermost feelings with others less and less as they age. This is due to the fact that adults can more easily control their emotions. From a non-scientific standpoint, we can also understand how and why adults tend to not share their emotions with others. For the most part, parents have to be the foundations of the family. There is no time to fuss about emotions. They must take care of their progeny, as well as help their children succeed. Many adults suppress their emotions to stabilize their children. They want to set and example of anger management and the sort. Also, pragmatically, many adults do not have the time to doddle in matters of emotional softness. They are too busy to deal with such things.

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Andie Aldana (commenting on Sarah's post) I think that adults aren't really allowed to open up as much as they wish, because they have greater consequences than if teens do. They could lose jobs and incomes, and they aren't really allowed to say everything that's on their minds. As kids, we always got the "oh, come on. you're 10 years old now. you should know better." and they put us in time-out for like 5 minutes and the slate was wiped clean. But if you're 30 and say something that wasn't appropriate, you're not just going to get scolded and put in time-out. You're going to suffer much heavier consequences. Adults are restrained by the potential consequences of their actions, therefore, like Sarah said, they can't express themselves as openly or as freely as teens. Because they should know better by now.

__Lucía 3rd comment.__ Parents? Sometimes they pretend to be young. All a bunch of phonies, that really makes me sick. I also hate to when they tell you something twice even if you've already admitted it the first time, and then they say it again. It kills me. Grownups always forget they were young, if you want to know the truth. And yet I still act sometimes like I was only about twelve. Everybody says that, especially my father. It's partly true, too, but it isn't all true. People always think something's all true. I don't give a damn, except that I get bored sometimes when people tell me to act my age. Sometimes I act a lot older than I am--I really do--but people never notice it. People never notice anything. Mostly the goddam adults. Young people try to get their own identity, which is really goddam hard, and above all, nobody understands us. Adults make it even more difficult for us. If you want to know the truth, I'm a little bit scared of growing up. I admit it. It was so much better when before, when I was a child, like Allie. Allie was a great kid, he really was. You should have seen him. My parents were different when he was arround,he made them better people. But now he's gone and my parents just get phonier each time. Not that I care to much, but my mother, she's destroyed since Allie's death. I don't know what they think, adults I mean I just can't stand when they tell you what to do.

Sarah Hoffman - Holden Adults are just as phony as anybody else. They all try and keep stuff to themselves and practically act like another person sometimes, it makes me sick. Take my parents for example. My parents would have two hemorrhages apiece if I told anything personal about them. They're quite touch about anything like that, especially my father. They're nice and all--I'm not saying that--but they're also touchy as hell. I'll be honest with you, if there's somebody I can't stand its a phony, but that's all people are these days--just a buncha goddam phonies. Especially in New York, don't get me started on New York. Everyone there just tries to act like they're someone really important, some big hot-shot or something. It really gets me, all these people going out to the movies and bars, pretending to know what they're even talking about. What really gets me is actors. People who get paid for pretending to be other people, most phony job I've ever heard of. I mean most of them aren't even good actors--they don't even act like people. Sometimes you can tell they think they're really something, and they just act like celebrities and all, they don't even try and act like normal people. Even the good actors are //too// good, and it still turns out phony! It doesn't even matter whether you act like a phony or not because nobody is even gonna notice. People never notice anything.

__Alexa Holloway - Holden__ Grownups in general are all a bunch of goddamn phonies. You can’t ever tell what they’re thinking because they always have to act all responsible and never want people to know what they think about things. I think it’s a goddamn waste because what’s the point of being your own individual person if you don’t have your own thoughts and feelings about what’s going on? I mean, take my Father for example. You never know if he’s happy or sad or what because he’s always putting on this front of being a strong man and only does what his clients and big hotshot friends want him to do. I mean you don’t even know why he’s a damn lawyer in the first place. It’s all right if you go around saving innocent guys’ lives all the time, and like that, but you don’t //do// that kind of stuff if you’re a lawyer. All you do is make a lot of dough and play golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot. And besides. Even if you //did// go around saving guys’ lives and all, how would you know if you did it because you really //wanted// to save guys’ lives, or because you did it because what you //real// ly wanted was to be a terrific lawyer, with everybody slapping you on the back and congratulating you in court when the goddam trial was over, the reporters and everybody, the way it is the dirty movies? How would you know you weren’t being a phony? The trouble is, you //wouldn’t//. And when grownups don’t actually say or show what they’re thinking it just becomes part of them, all that phoniness that they show just takes over. And then they don’t even know they’re being a goddamn phony.

Caitlyn Threadgill responding to Alexa as Holden: I completely agree with the way you portrayed how Holden would have answered this question. I like how you supported your point of making your comment sound like Holden when you included that "grownups are a bunch of goddamn phonies," I also liked how you talked about adults not being their own individual self. The quote you used to also support your point was perfect and was a really good example about adults not showing any emotions. I could picture Holden going on one of his usual rampages and it sounded something like this. I think you gave good, bold arguments and it is convincing enough that Holden night have said it. I like how you finished it how about making the point again that adults are phony and they might not even know they are being phony but their phoniness takes over anyways. I also liked the point made about "the dirty movies," because Holden definitely hates movies and you described a good view Holden probably thinks about his father. I think you did a very good job at backing up your point and it sounded a lot like I was reading a paragraph out of __The Catcher In The Rye__.

Nancy Perez responding to Alexa as Holden - I also agree that you did a really great way you have also responded. You have protrayed Holden really goood. I like how used his favorite word " phonies" to respond like him. Its very true that he seems to belive that every adult is a phony. In the book it makes me laugh that he can't just help himself and needs to say that every actor in the movies are phonines. I just can't help but laugh because I can vision someone just complaining and critizising the movie. The thing is that he can not do anything about it. I see it more like a little boy crying out and doesn't kno what the word "no" means. When I read your paragrahp I saw that. You did quite an awsome job. Also how you put his dad as input. I aswered the same qustion and I aslo included his father.

Whitney (to Lucia) I agree with you about Holden's views on adults as "phonies", Lu. He sees growing up as losing your childhood and all the innocence that comes with it. As children we are so much more open to others, only because we don't really know any better. We are comfortable to with expressing our every emotion and sharing them with the world. As people grow up though they lose that. Adults today are so much more closed off than I think children and young people are. They keep all their emotions bottled in because that's "the thing to do". In our society you don't see adults throwing tantrums in the street, or pouring out their souls to someone on a bus like you might see a child do. Adults tend to keep to themselves and gloss over their true thoughts and emotions to avoid conflict or awkwardness. People tend to agree with what is being said around them as to avoid uncomfortable situations, whereas children embrace disagreements and say what's on their minds. That's one main reason Holden is scared of growing up, losing that openness children have with the world.