Many children are ready to be potty trained as early as 18 to 22 months. For some students of Wheaton, that statistic is 18 to 22 years. What is it about the prospect of college that makes the students forget proper toilet etiquette?
I have seen it all: footprints on the toilet seat, an apple (with pee) in the toilet, a whole roll of toilet paper stuck in the toilet bowl, pee on the floor, and so much more. All of those things were seen on the same day.
If you can imagine it, it has happened in a Wheaton bathroom.
Reports from anonymous Wheaton students, on the confession account @wheaconfess, have stated:
Now, why is it that people resort to their more feeble years when attending college? Is it the lack of parental guidance? Is it the complete disregard for others’ comfort? Has the pandemic forced college students to regress? Have people always been this unsanitary? The Wheaton students can wipe away their tears knowing that this may not ~entirely~ be their fault. The answer is in fact, possibly all of the above.
Wheaton Adolescent Psychology professor and expert, Elizabeth Pufall-Jones Ph. D, stating, “These shenanigans, while unsanitary, might be related to some of the social-cognitive shifts occurring during adolescence. For instance, during adolescence young people become aware that the social rules and conventions we follow, like not putting food in toilets, do not need to be followed absolutely, especially when others are not around to tell us otherwise. Related to this, as college students leave home, where behavior like this might have been called out by a family member, in a large collective setting the blame is diffused, thus they can violate these social norms and get away with it. This is also a time when young people are driven by a desire for social inclusion, so if someone, especially a desirable someone, was to tell them to throw the apple into the toilet, they might do so to fit in”.
It is actually within the nature of adolescents to defy what many people may define as necessary sanitary norms. So to some students, slices of bread in the toilet bowl filled with unflushed feces are seen as socially encouraged.
The overarching conclusion can be drawn that college students may need more parental control than previously thought — at least within the aspect of bathroom respect. Maybe it is a matter of proper bathroom education, or maybe it is a matter of telling them we know, either way, it needs to come to an end.
To all the students who defile the bathrooms, we see you, we hear you, please stop.