Yandere origins, part three.

Continued from part two.

When a teenager or younger person is introduced to a show that focuses on yanderes or yandere-like characters (such as yangires, or people who are obsessive in general), even if they don't emulate the characters they see, they're still likely to think about these characters, and simply thinking about them can be enough to have an impact on that child's behavior and development. All these age-based factors surrounding being a yandere and the fact that they usually only work for younger people is exactly why there's a much greater lack of yanderes in their thirties, forties, and so on.

As people age, they tend to become more moderate in most aspects of their life. Getting a bad grade is no longer the end of the world, a scraped knee no longer causes crying, and the hysterics of teenage drama are usually replaced with quieter, more measured responses. Being a more extreme approach to romance than nearly all others, yandere tendencies often die down as a person matures. Just as a person can become yandere through a long series of events or just one particularly intense one, a person can stop acting like a yandere, too.

Citing one of the previous reasons for them existing in the first place, as teens and young adults age, their hormones die down, giving them a greater clarity of thought that's less dependent on emotions. These people are still capable of love, obviously; nobody's questioning that. But after leaving puberty behind once and for all, they'll be less obsessive in matters of romance than they were prior to becoming an adult. This also ties in with experiencing more relationships and becoming more accustomed to them over time.

Another age-based reason why yanderes mellow out as they age is that they're less impressionable, less willing to be eccentric, and develop a stronger preference for fitting in with just about everyone their own age, not only those they like. These - and others - are the reasons why you so rarely, if ever, see adults in the real world dressed along the lines of the "gothic lolita" style, or other, similar styles worn almost exclusively by teens and very young adults. And while some businesses permit casual attire on a daily basis, it's well-known that only an exceedingly tiny minority would allow their employees to dress in that same style, or like an extreme punk rock enthusiast.

The near-total inability to get a job without adhering to the social norms of that area and the growing need to get a job as a person grows up are two more influential decisions in why people stop behaving like yanderes. People recognize that they need to keep at least some of their quirks to themself if they want to find and hold down a job, and working a part time job just twenty to thirty hours a week, every week, is easily enough to temper a person's peculiarities over time.

Also, as a person grows, other people tend to become less willing to put up with their stranger traits. They may forgive them or find them endearing in a child, but in an adult, odd mannerisms are often seen as undesirable - things that should have been eliminated in adolescence, giving purpose to the phrase, "They should know better[ than to behave like that]." Although that person's friends may support their quirks in private, while that person is serving fast food in the real world, it's vital that they recognize the need to keep such characteristics from having a negative impact on their work.

Yet another reason why yanderes frequently stabilize with age is due to finding the love they sought for such a long time. Recalling a story that an old acquaintance once told me, she was once in a relationship with someone who was clingy. Apparently their partner was so obsessive that they spoke to one another all day long for a few years straight. (However, I assume that by "all day," she really meant "about six or more hours a day," not a full, endless twenty four hour cycle, or whatever period of time the sun was up on a daily basis.)

One of the underlying factors why most yanderes are yanderes is that they have low self-esteem. Her partner was no different. As time went on and she gradually helped her partner feel more secure about themself, they felt less of a need for her or her affection. It turns out that, even for a clingy person, there can be such a thing as too much love - hence why we refer to it as "too much." Just as a yandere can be born from a normal person due to a severe drought of affection, so too can a yandere be transmuted back into a normal person, if given a sufficient abundance of love.