Trends, Networks, and Critical Thinking in the

Governor Pack Road, Baguio City, Philippines 2600 21st Century

Tel. Nos.: (+6374) 442-3316, 442-8220; 444-2786;
442-2564; 442-8219; 442-8256; Fax No.: 442-6268 Grade Level/Section:
Email: email@uc-bcf.edu.ph; Website: www.uc-bcf.edu.ph

MODULE 1 – TRENDS Subject Teacher:

Unit 1: Understanding Trends

Objectives:

1. Describe the difference between a trend and a fad.

2. Identify a trend through its elements and characteristics, and
3. demonstrate awareness and develop appreciation of pattern recognition by identifying the
emergence of trends.

IDENTIFYING TRENDS
Technically, a trend is a directed movement or behavior. It is a movement or behavior that is
geared towards a certain direction. Furthermore, a trend also implies change. Since it is a movement
or behavior, the change can be positive or negative, good or bad, stable or erratic.

Trends and Fads

A fad is something that people are highly interested in for a relatively short period of time. This
means that a fad comes and goes. Consider, for example, the AlDub vs. Pastillas Girl phenomenon in
Eat Bulaga and It’s Showtime.
Although a fad is short-lived, what is important to know is that fads can help predict trends.
Look at the trends in education for example. Around 2010 up to the relative present, the trend is on
business-related courses such as accountancy and hotel and restaurant management. And at the
rate things are going right now, it seems that the future trend in education in the country will be
focused on TECH-VOC courses due to the demand for skilled-workers overseas and due to focus on
outcomes-based education.
Both fads and trends are results of reactions. This means that there are causes for emergence
of trends and fads, although, these causes may be vague or unapparent. At any rate, the important
point of concern is whether a reaction will just be fad or will transform into a trend.

Elements and Characteristics of a Trend

FAD TREND
Characteristics Elements Characteristics
Attractive to the public bec. It is easy Appeal Attractive to the public bec. It is
to get, makes them look/feel better easy to get, makes them look/feel
or does not deviate much from status better or does not deviate much
quo from status quo

Hyped or advertised, if the hype stops Result Endures with or w/out publicity
then it also starts to disappear
Caters to and accepted by a limited Scope Caters to and accepted by a wide
group of people audience or large group of
consumers
No clearly established support Support Supported by a number of fads,
existing trends, and prevalent socio-
economic, political, and religio-
cultural factors, among others
Persists only for a short period of time Sustain-ability Can be sustained for a long period
(weeks to around few months) (usually years)
Limited to the areas it relates to (e.g., Value Extensive even as far as areas not
clothing fads in relation to fashion; directly related to it (e.g.,
movies in relation to entertainment implications of market trends affect,
industry) areas such as education, health,
environment, gov’t. policy, and
techno.
 Trends, Networks, and Critical Thinking in the
Governor Pack Road, Baguio City, Philippines 2600 21st Century
Tel. Nos.: (+6374) 442-3316, 442-8220; 444-2786;
442-2564; 442-8219; 442-8256; Fax No.: 442-6268 Grade Level/Section:
Email: email@uc-bcf.edu.ph; Website: www.uc-bcf.edu.ph

MODULE 1 – TRENDS Subject Teacher:

EMERGENCE OF TRENDS
How do we recognize that a trend is starting to merge? The capacity to identify emerging
trends is rooted in our capacity to recognize patterns. Our encounter with patterns was facilitated by
experience and processed by the mind through abstraction and generalization.
According to Duin and Pekalska (2007), pattern recognition is characterized by three stages,
namely, representation, generalization, and evaluation. Adaptation, which serves as an intermediary
stage is also involved in the process. Visit link: http://rduin.nl/papers/CSChallanges_07_PRScience.pdf

1. Representation - Real world object have to be represented in formal way in order to be analyzed
and compared.
2. Adaptation – The representations are processed for the mind to be able to make generalization or
inferences out of available representations.
3. Generalization or Inference - in this stage we learn a concept from a training set, the set of known
and appropriately represented examples, in such a way that predictions can be made on some
unknown properties of ne examples.
4. Evaluation – This stage is meant to test if a person is adept in pattern recognition. This is important
because this can be determined whether a person is capable of learning new knowledge or not.

Reference:
Azardon. M. M., Romerosa, P. & Zarate, M. J. (2018). Trends, Networks and Critical Thinking: Vibal
Group Inc.
Marquez, Leander. (2018). Trends, Networks, and Critical Thinking in the 21st Century Culture:
Understanding Trends. C&E Publishing, Inc. 839 EDSA, South Triangle, Quezon City. pp. 2-9.
Urgel, E. (2017). Trends, Networks, and Critical Thinking in the 21st Century Culture Module: DIWA
Learning Systems Inc.