Influence Of Polygamy On Behaviour Patterns Of In-school Adolescent As Expressed By Secondary School Teachers
[A CASE STUDY OF ILORIN METROPOLIS]

One way of classifying personality characteristics is through the use of the Type A and Type B behaviour patterns. According to Sanni (1999), the concept of Types A and B behaviour pattern dated back to the 19th century. Meyer Friedman, an American Cardiologist, noticed in the 1940’s that the chairs in his waiting room got worn out from the edges. He hypothesized that his patients were hard driving, impatient people, who sat on the edge of their seats when waiting. They were labelled “Type A” personalities. Type A Behaviour Pattern personalities are workaholics, always busy, driven, somewhat impatient and so on.
The Type A behaviour pattern is a set of behavioural responses to life or challenges of the environmental variables more often aggravated by situations which constitute significant changes in our lives (Rosenman & Chesney, 1982).
Friedman and Rosenman (1974) defined Type A individual as a person who is aggressively involved in a chronic, incessant struggle to achieve more and more in less and less time, and if required to do so, against the opposing efforts of other things or other persons. They went further to explain Type A behaviour traits to include the following: extreme ambition and competitiveness, impatience, time pressure and a high degree of propensity to anger and hostility.
The behaviour pattern B individual denotes a person who is more ‘relaxed’ in his or her approach to life, somewhat opposite to Type A (Rosenman & Friedman, 1974). With regards to time, the Type B individual is not in a hurry. He tends to be friendly and often competes with himself, believing that he can always do better than before. He is intuitive, spontaneous and patient. When it comes to change, he sees it as a rhythm of the universe and believes that all change is inevitable. He is open to criticism and tries to make others feel accepted and at ease. When he is angry, he uses humour subtly to make his point and his anger is in most cases directed against issues and not at persons. He is supportive of others and more likely to express positive feelings, so he has a lesser chance of anxiety related disorders.
Behaviour patterns among the adolescents cannot be understood without considering some factors like gender and family background. It has been contended that the gender factor is of paramount importance to cognitive, affective and behavioural actions of individuals. Ossal (2004) reported that there are biological based differences in brain components of males and females which account for men’s higher spatial, numerical and independent cognitive styles. In other words he was of the opinion that boys and girls behave differently because of variations in their psychological constitution along gender lines without much consideration to environmental influences.
The family is one of the primary groups of social organization where a child first receives the informal type of’ education. Everyone starts life in a family, irrespective of the kind of family. The family, as a major unit of socialization is very vital for the development of a child. It is with this unit the child first identifies himself before the ethnic group, or the society at large (Moors 2003).
According to Moors (2003), family background could be of various types. Generally, there are the extended and nuclear family patterns. The extended family includes a span of three generations within the total household. The nuclear family comprises basically the father, the mother and the children. In addition to the types of families mentioned above, some family are polygamous. The pattern or type of training given to child within a family system affects his/her personality make up. This has to do with the type of rearing techniques that a family adopts. It also has to do with the role played by the father and the mother i.e. child rearing procedure.
It has been observed by Sears, Maccoby and Levin (2003) that many variables like the family type, family child rearing practices, birth order and socioeconomic status of the parent affect the personality of the individual in the school. Various families show different attitudes towards their children and both the favourable and unfavourable attitudes of parents have effects on the personality characteristics of their children in school.