The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth - Alexandra Robbins [67]
This pressure can add not only emotional strain, but also academic stress. A number of students told me that because classmates viewed them as nerds or smart kids, they felt extra pressure to pull straight As. An eighth grader in Indiana told me he didn’t mind being labeled a nerd—“it’s a lot better than being a nobody”—but he was tired of feeling like he had to continue to get perfect grades to be socially accepted. “That’s what defines my group, and if I don’t live up to their expectations, I would be letting them down.”
When so much of students’ brainpower is concentrated on their peers, it can be challenging to distinguish their social identity from their personal identity. Granted, this struggle is a natural part of growing up. But the process of group polarization is not so different from groupthink (defined by Merriam Webster as “a pattern of thought characterized by self-deception, forced manufacture of consent, and conformity to group values and ethics”). In both cases, individuals feel less personal responsibility for the consequences of the group’s decisions. They can take a more risky stance, because if the group is unsuccessful the responsibility is shared. Groups threaten to de-individualize people in a process that primatologist Richard Wrangham called “the mindless sinking of personal identity into the group of Us.”
This mindlessness can occur both in small groups and large crowds. Some psychologists have espoused the controversial theory that in the midst of a crowd, an individual’s layers of restraint peel away, revealing potentially barbaric instincts and a susceptibility to “crowd contagion.” This theory could help to explain why kids in the bleachers at a pep rally or a football game can get so out of hand so quickly, or, as a Pennsylvania high school teacher told me, “Usually one person starts making fun of a weird kid or nerd to his face and everyone else in the class joins in.”
More subtly, groups can trigger the brain’s inclination to take shortcuts. “The human brain takes in information from other people and incorporates it with the information coming from its own senses,” neuroscientist Gregory Berns has written. “Many times, the group’s opinion trumps the individual’s before he even becomes aware of it.”
This tug-of-war between the group and the individual has been a matter of deliberation for centuries. Does one act in his own interest or that of the group? Follow the urge to be unique or give in to the yearning to belong? Psychologists say these needs are in opposition, that “the satisfaction of one tends to come at the expense of the other.” As Concordia University psychologist William Bukowski described, “Insofar as groups require consensus, homogeneity, and cohesion, they eschew individuality, diversity, and independence. As homogeneity and conformity within a group increase, diversity and individuality decrease.”
These elements can characterize groups of any age. But students in middle and high schools might have neither the cognitive development to be able to extricate themselves easily from the influence of a group nor the awareness that they are mentally programmed to be so vulnerable to its whims. For them, the struggle between individuality and inclusion both adds to the confusion of adolescence and counters likely the strongest lure toward groups that they will ever experience in their lives. Which makes it all the more remarkable when a student is bold enough to swim against the tide.
Chapter 5
IT’S GOOD TO BE THE CAFETERIA FRINGE
NOAH, PENNSYLVANIA | THE BAND GEEK
The hotel wake-up call rang ten minutes before midnight, less than three hours after Noah had fallen asleep. The boy nearest the phone missed the receiver in the darkness, accidentally knocking someone’s glasses to the floor. Noah and his roommates groggily put on their uniforms and wished each other luck.
At about 3 A.M., Noah steered the golf cart taxi into Herald