Comparison Of Children Growing Up In Different Countries

The culture that we live in has a huge affect on how we raise our children and the resources, good and bad, that are available to our children.  Simple things such as the availability of public transportation and free educational resources can have a huge impact on the kind of life that your child lives.  It can be interesting to make comparisons between life in the United States of America and the United Kingdom.  These are two countries that speak the same language and yet are very different.

Most American children are groomed by their parents from a very young age to succeed.  In line with social norms in America, children of all economic backgrounds are taught to try their best, to work the system (get a college education, get a great job and to earn lots of money… live happily ever after, etc.).  This is the hope of every American family.  No matter the socio-economic status, race or religion, American children are taught that they have just as much chance of succeeding as the next guy.  In the UK, children tend to follow the paths that their parents have taken and traditionally speaking, the average parent does not place strong emphasis or pressure on their children to find great economic success.  This has however begun to change over the past 15 years and many young Brits are now out seeking their fortune.

Speaking very generally, American culture tends to place a higher value on familial relationships over friendships. British culture places a high value on friendship, with children choosing to spend time with friends over family from a very young age. This is likely heavily influenced by the fact that American children live at home with their families much longer than British kids, and are very aware of their need for support from their parents. Children in the UK tend to have a huge appreciation for friendships with their peers and for socializing.

The age at which US and UK children begin to break away from their family unit is very different between cultures.  UK teens experience the beginnings of separation in their early teens and it is often viewed as rebellion. US teens do not begin to separate from their family until their late teens, even early 20’s, when it is legal for them to do so and appropriate in the eyes of society.  In fact, the first time that many US children experience autonomy and freedom from their parents is when they leave home for college.  For many, this is their first chance to experiment with values that fall outside of those taught to them by their parents.

Many US teens will begin to party hard, get drunk, pursue sexual relationships for the first time when they go away to college, whereas the majority of UK teens experiment with and experience these things during their early to mid-teens.  UK teens are let loose at a much younger age.  I remember going to parties and getting drunk at the age of 12 and 13 whereas when I moved to the US a few years later, I found that youngsters there began doing those things around the age of 18 or at college.  By that time, I had outgrown the need to do this.  Of course, these are generalisations and there are many households in both countries in which the complete opposite is true.

Public transportation in the US and the UK are starkly different. Although in the inner-city of both countries things are quite similar, life in the suburbs and the rural areas is different. The larger percent of families live in a suburban or semi-rural environment. America’s suburbs are very large, spacious and very spread out. They are not generally places where people walk from place to place, and things are too spread out even to cycle to places. In fact, most roads are built without any pavement. Furthermore, creating a bus system in areas like this can be very complicated and costly and many regions do not have bus services. This in itself creates a unique and distinct culture very different to the UK where those in rural areas can ride bicycles from point to point.

When US children need to go somewhere it is usually their parents that drive them there. Therefore, in most US States a child can get a restricted driving license at the age of 14. UK teens first find their independence at a much younger age by taking a bus or riding around on their bicycle. The great thing about today’s technology is that it can take the mystery out of where your child might have cycled off to. Child Locate, a service that tracks location via mobile phone, can help parents know at all times where their children are.