Adolescence:
Have you ever noticed that
*Your friend has suddenly started gaining weight.
*Girls and boys in your group have started becoming more conscious about their looks and appearance.
*Suddenly your friend starts talking about his or her crush.
*You feel like having a girlfriend or boyfriend.
Hold on, you have reached adolescence.
Age between late childhood and youth is called adolescence. This age ranges between 12-13 years to 19-20 years. During this age, rapid physical development takes place. This stage begins with puberty. Height and weight of adolescent increases. Monarch in girls and nocturnal emission in boys occur. This is due to maturation of organs. Secondary characteristics develop during this stage like breast development among girls, growth of mustache and pubic hair among boys and their voice becomes hoarse.
At this point, The search for identity and independence develops. Thoughts are more logical, abstract and idealistic. Adolescents like to spend more time with their friends.
Some other adjustment problems faced by adolescents:
(1) Internet addiction :
Adolescents are indulging more in social media like Instagram and face book and in online games, which in turn leads to problems like lack of concentration and social interaction.
(2) College dropouts:
Some students may leave college before completing their graduation due to financial problems or problems in academics.
(3) Identity crisis:
Adolescents are, confused about who they are as they are neither child nor adult. Parents treat them differently in different situations.
Some adolescents pursue psychological moratorium. A period in which they take time off from upcoming responsibility of adulthood to explore various roles and possibilities.
(4) Depression :
When adolescents experience break up in relationship, failure in exams or in particular activity or death of loved one, they experience feeling of sadness, loss or grief. Sometimes, they feel so hopeless that they stop following normal routine.
Depression could be due to genetic and environmental factors. Environmental factors like parental, over expectations, unhealthy competition, peer, pressure, unpopularity, having less number of friends, getting bullied, rejection are associated with depression
(5) Suicide :
The rate of adolescent suicide is higher for boys, although girls attempt suicide more frequently than boys. In case of boys, it is more fatal as they use violent means to commit suicide.
Social inhibition, perfectionism and high level of stress and anxiety also create higher risk of suicidal attempts.
Warning signals of suicide
Look for such signs among your friends/classmates and if someone has such signs, talk to them. Encourage them to talk to Psychology teacher/ school counselor.
If a friend talks like I wish I was dead or 'I am worthless, I must die'.
Do you know this?
World suicide prevention day is observed on 10th September every year in order to provide worldwide commitment and action to prevent suicides with various activities around the world. This activity is observed since 2003.
The characteristics of Adolescence are as follows:
(i) Adolescence is an important period because this period has its immediate effect on attitudes and behavior of an adolescent.
Adolescence is a transitional period, as it is a bridge between childhood and adulthood.
(iii) Adolescence is a period of physical changes.
(iv) Adolescence is an age of challenges, childhood, majority because during of problems are solved by parents and teachers, but an adolescent wants to be independent.
(v) Adolescence is a time for searching one's own identity.
(vi) Adolescence is a time of unrealistic ideas. They have a tendency to look at life through rose-tinted glasses, and they daydream a lot. As a result, they face a problem of lack of concentration.
(vii) Adolescence is a threshold of adulthood.
Nice!!!
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