By Jayme Scott
Editor’s Note: One student – who will be identified as Jane Doe – agreed to be interviewed only if she could remain Anonymous. Knights Media Network editors thought her insight was valuable to this story and agreed to use pseudonym.
Growing up with a curfew may teach you discipline and cause you to be frustrated with the parent who enforced that curfew, but it may also shape who you are as a person.
However, once in college, those curfew restrictions are likely to be lifted because you are on your own. The question is, “Does having a curfew growing up cause you to have a wild college life because of those restrictions?”
Junior Molly Nunn said she had a midnight curfew until her senior year of high school. She said she can remember breaking curfew one time during her junior year. She went to a party, which resulted in her mom calling to ask her where she was. She lied and told her mom she was at a friend’s house in bed, but her mom could hear the music in the background. She said, “After that incident, my mom started tracking my phone location.”
Junior Kami Yantz also had a curfew growing up and said she feels like her life did not really change all that much once she got to college. She said, “I still text my mom to tell her where I am going just because I was so used to doing that in high school.”
Junior Jane Doe had a curfew as well and said, - once she got to college she “felt like I had a better sense of freedom being able to stay out whenever I wanted to.” Doe also said she was more motivated to go out on the weekends knowing she could go out whenever/and wherever. However, she left her phone in her dorm room so that her mom could not track her location.
On the other hand, sophomore Carson Goatley did not have a curfew growing up but constantly updates her parents on her plans for the upcoming weekend because she did that growing up. She said she feels that she goes out just as much as she did in high school because she did not have restrictions as a teenager.
Dr. Pam Cartor, associate professor in psychology, she said she believes if a curfew in a student’s childhood years worked and fit the lifestyle, then the transition from high school to college would most likely be less overwhelming in terms of socializing. But, if the curfew was viewed more as a constraint, it could cause students to want to experiment with staying out later in the night.
Cartor said it is difficult to say whether there is evidence that having a curfew growing up played a role in how people acted or changed when they got to college. “For some people I am sure there is a difference. Other people were probably thankful to have a curfew because it helped them self-moderate their social limits,” Cartor said.
Comments