Behind the Meanness: Psychological Concepts in Mean Girls

"Behind the Meanness: Psychological Concepts in Mean Girls"

Mean Girls is a comedy full of memorable quotes, amusing characters, and lots of laughs for its audience, but what many people may not realize is that this movie includes psychological concepts such as role identity, parenting styles, and birth order. Mean Girls is about a girl entering public school for the first time after being homeschooled all of her life and discovering many things about herself and others her age. She becomes involved with a well known school clique called "The Plastics" and many events begin to unravel. This movie shows very amusing yet real life examples of psychological concepts and can help people recognize them in their everyday lives.

As Cady enters the cafeteria on the first day of school, she thinks that all eyes are on her because she is the new girl. She has a feeling like she is on a stage being watched, everybody staring at her making an entrance. Psychologist Jean Piaget calls this feeling egocentrism which is usually experienced by adolescents in the formal operational stage of cognitive development. Egocentrism is when you think everybody notices you or something about you (Lecture). For example, "The Plastics," Regina, Karen, and Gretchen are standing in front of a mirror saying things like "My hairline is so weird" and "my pores are huge." There is a very likely chance they are paranoid about these minuscule details about themselves because they think that everyone is going to notice them.

When Cady visits Regina George's house for the first time, she is shocked at how Regina's mom is acting. "There are no rules in this house, I'm not like a regular mom, I'm a cool mom," expresses Mrs. George. She expresses that the girls can basically do whatever they want. This mother's style of parenting is called "permissive," which is one of the four parenting styles by psychologist Diana Baumrind. A permissive parent has little or no rules, is not big on punishment, and lets their children learn from their own mistakes and behavior. These children can end up being involved with drugs, breaking the law, and promiscuous sexual activity (Lecture).

Another scene in the movie shows Regina and a guy who she barely knows on her bed kissing, but it seemed like they were going to move on to something more. Mrs. George enters the room and offers them condoms. This scene shows another example of the permissive parenting style, and also the results of it, which are Regina and a guy she barely knows becoming sexually promiscuous. Regina also has a younger sister who was watching "Girls Gone Wild." Obviously, her mom did not make an effort to make sure she did not watch it because of her "no rules" policy.

As Mean Girls opens up, Cady's dad is telling her, "Here's your lunch,