Many say that we are the product of our environment.
Some say, that our life experiences
determine the kind of person we have become. Early childhood has long been thought to be a
period in the life cycle, when children are open to social influences on characteristics that they
will carry with them long after they have left their family of origin. With their immature minds,
youngsters can easily fall prey to the influence of their parents, friends and surroundings. While
all these factors can affect our characters to a certain extent, in my opinion, family’s influence
especially parents, is second to none. So, family plays the biggest or the most significant role in
the way we act, feel and think. This is because our parents shaped us at the time when we were
most vulnerable to being shaped, parents are their children’s role model and the core values that
we learned from our parents during our formative years do not erode with time.
To begin with, our family has a great impact in shaping and influencing our lives as they
are our first and sometimes our best teachers. The saying ‘as the twig is bent, so shall the tree
grow’ gives us the idea that parents are the ones assigned primary responsibility for ‘bending’
the children in desirable directions, by supervising, teaching, and disciplining them as they grow
up. This early influence has a permanent and profound effect on the young ones. As children
grow, they will act the way they were taught to act or behave. For example, most people who
have criminal tendencies acquire them as the result of bad parenting during childhood. However,
parents who teach their young children the fundamental social roles, the rules and behaviours
that is accepted in our community, these children will grow to become wholesome individuals.
Remember that young children do not get many opportunities to interact with the world outside
their family. Almost everything that they learn as a child comes from their parents. Our parents
taught us all the basics of ‘proper’ behaviour. We did not know that it was socially unacceptable
to eat without being invited, to play with the vase on the coffee table, to hit our brother, to break
our toys. These and a million other rules were drummed into our heads by our parents. Proper
manners, leading by example, and giving us responsibility around the house all help to instill
values which in turn defined our characters. All these help to lay the groundwork for a strong
moral compass in us. Thus, it is without any doubt that parents are the biggest influence on one’s
character as they are the very first people who are responsible to imbibe their children with
values.
In addition, parents are indeed the biggest influence as they are the role models to their
children from young. Children always want to walk on the foot-prints of their parents. When we
were deciding on our goals and dreams, our parents were the best source of inspiration. Their
views become ours and even when we grow older and start having our personal beliefs, which
may differ from our parents, we still have many characteristics resembling theirs. Youngsters
most of the time take a leaf out of the successful journey of their parents and learn from it. They
want to emulate their parents’ success and many even choose the same profession just like their
parents. Therefore, it is not surprising to see how a family of doctors produce children who are
doctors too. Unfortunately, we also see how children from dysfunctional family become juvenile
delinquents themselves. Arrogant parents with irresponsible behaviours may intrigue their
children to behave similarly. So the saying “the apple does not fall far from the tree’ clearly
supports the notion that family has the biggest influence on one’s character. They stand as a
living example to their children in many ways. Thus, parents play an instrumental and pivotal
role in their children’s lives as they are looked upon as role models.
Some may argue by saying that friends are the biggest influence in one’s life when we
grow up as we tend to spend more time away from our parents and home. As a social being, we
are always surrounded by friends. Although friends can influence us, their influence in my
opinion, is limited to certain activities and does not erode one’s values and beliefs. This is
because a family’s influence on its children spans across different phases of their lives and what
they have been taught since childhood do not get erased so easily. For example, friends can be
very persuasive when the subject is something more superfluous, like which music they should
listen to, what kind of clothes they should wear or which places they should go for fun. However,
when the subject is something really significant, important and decisive to their lives-like what
career they should follow or if they should get married to a certain person-the parent’s influence
and advice are indispensable to their decision. So, no matter where we are and what we are
doing, our behaviour and thinking are often affected by our families’ social status, relationships
within the family and academics of our family members. Friends and environment will change as
we journey through our lives but our core beliefs, attitudes and principles in life do not change as
these are the values our family has long ingrained in us and these values will always remain in
us. Hence, it is clear that family has the biggest influence in determining our character and this
influence does not erode with time nor tide.
