Why Boarding Schools Produce Bad Leaders By Nick Duffell

In the article, Why boarding schools produce bad leaders by Nick Duffell, Duffell describes the linkage between the educational background of boarding school and the outcome of being an inadequate leader. Many boarding school educated people go on to ivy-league colleges and a significant number of them then pursue leadership positions in politics. Duffell is a psychotherapist that works with previous students of boarding schools. He argues that attending boarding schools turns children into adults that hector and have child-like qualities due to the fact that boarding schools force children to act as adults too quickly. In addition to this environment that encourages pseudo-development, children also lack the ability to be themselves or express

The behavioral perspective of psychology can be defined as when your surroundings determine your behavior (Hockenbury, Nolan, & Hockenbury, 2015, p. 11). This perspective relates to the article because the boarding school environment shapes the behavior of the children it produces. For example, the author discusses the former prime minister of Britain David Cameron and other British politicians with an educational background of attending boarding schools. Due to this background of not being surrounded by woman growing up, this tends to increase sexist behavior and attitudes towards women by British politicians. In addition, once these graduates inevitably join politics, they tend to exclude women (Duffell, 2014, para. 5). Therefore, the elite, exclusively male habitat that these boys grow up in, enables them to participate in sexist

Individualistic culture can be defined as a culture that produces individuals who focus on themselves and their own aspirations (Hockenbury, Nolan, Hockenbury, 2015, p. 13). Duffell argues that because children didn’t grow up in a family unit, they don’t have a perspective that values the needs of people other than themselves. Duffell goes on to give an example of boarding school educated David Cameron doesn’t value others opinions and engages in hectoring rather than teamwork. (Duffell, 2014, para.14). Moreover, Duffell believes this behavior is due to boarding school culture, which is an individualistic culture.

In conclusion, psychotherapist Nick Duffell discusses and educates readers on the exclusive world of boarding schools and counters the notion that this kind of school generates competent leaders. Duffell describes the behavior trends seen in boarding school students and relates it to British politicians whom have been boarding school educated. This article relates to the theoretical perspectives in psychology such as behavioral and cross-cultural perspectives. The article also relates to psychological concepts such as culture and individualistic