Every day
we grow whether it’s physically or mentally. We are always in a period of
development even as adults. There are many challenges to every stage of life
yet we have to go through it and enjoy it as much as we can.
Adolescence can be defined as the period
between the normal onset of puberty and the beginning of adulthood. Puberty is
the physical maturing that enables individuals of physical reproduction. The
characteristics of adolescence are biological growth and development.
Here the body’s glands produce various hormones that control biological
development. Then there is having an
undefined status, expectations for children are known and expectations for
adults are also known but expectations for teenager are vague. Increased
decision making is another characteristic and increased pressure as
well. Finally the search for self is when adolescents are mature enough to
think for themselves and know what they want in life. Preparing for future
roles is an important aspect to finding oneself. Anticipatory socialization
is learning the rights, obligations and expectations of a role that will be
taken in the future.
Adolescents
Dating is a universal phenomenon that is
practiced a lot by adolescents. Dating was influenced by the industrial
revolution when people were moving to cities and were less dependent on their
parents. This made the idea of courtship decrease. Yet it was till after World
War I that dating was practiced. This was because of the increased gender equality and the new sources if entertainment such as cars and cinemas. There
are many functions to dating. First and probably most important is entertainment.
It allows young people to go out and have fun especially in the stage of causal
dating. Second, dating acts as a mechanism of socialization. It teaches
individuals about members of the opposite sex and how to behave in social
situations. Third, dating fulfills basic psychological needs such as
conversation companionship and understanding.
Fourth, dating can help an individual attain status. It was shown in
various studies that dating between college fraternities and sororities was
mostly for status attainment. Fifth and final, in later stages of dating the
person might select his/her as their spouse.
Adolescence
has many challenges and consequences that come with those challenges. One of
those challenges is teenage sexual behavior. Before the 1960’s the majority of
Americans held the belief that sexual activity should be confined to marriage.
However this changed in the 1960’s and 70’s due the development of birth
control, contraception and the feminist movement led to the “sexual
revolution”. Consequently teenage sexual activity has increased to 50 percent
in 1995. There were also higher percentages of unmarried teen mothers. There
are many consequences to teenage sexual activity which are that babies born
from teenage mothers are usually underweight and more likely to die within the
first year. Teenagers who become parents have a lower chance of finishing high
school or college. Individuals who become parents at a young age also tend to
have a lower income and teenage mothers also go through a lot of emotional
stress. Another problem is teenage drug use. Though some drug use decreased
during earlier years, some are starting to rise again. Influences of drug use
are having friends who constantly do drugs, having social and academic
adjustment problems and living in a hostile family setting. Finally there is
teenage suicide which are contributed to drug and alcohol use. The rate of
teenage suicide exceeds that of the general population.
After adolescence
one enters the adult world. Male and female adult development is different. The
adult male development is characterized by a life structure or a
combination of statuses, roles, values, beliefs and life circumstances. An
adult’s life is divided in early adulthood, middle adulthood and late
adulthood. It is suggested that the adult female development is categorized
in three phases. The first is leaving the family where the adult makes
psychological break from parents. However many women put more emphasis on marriage
than on careers. Then comes the entering the adult world phase which is
when an adult gets married and has children. Finally entering the adult
world again phase comes when the children enter grade school.
An
important part of adult life is work. Labor force consists of all individuals
age 16 and older who are employed in paid positions. The composition of the American
labor force is changing and one of the biggest changes is the amount of working
women. Women now hold about half of the professional jobs in the United States.
A profession is a high status occupation that is obtained through formal
education. Examples are Lawyers, teachers, dentists, engineers, etc. Unemployment
is the situation that occurs when a person does not have a job but is actively
seeking employment.
Professional Adults
With improved
health care and other factors, people are living longer. Therefore the late adult
era cannot be viewed as a single period of development. Late adulthood is
divided into young-old (ages 65-74), middle-old (ages 75-84) and old-old
(ages 85 and above). In many cases, when one reaches late adulthood they retire
to pursue other careers or hobbies. One of the changes is adjusting to retired
life. Another change is physical and mental functioning. As one ages, the body
deteriorates which causes wrinkles, grey hair and losing physical capacity. Contrary
to popular belief, as one ages the mind doesn’t necessarily deteriorate. Actually
the mind can get stronger than ever before, however the elderly are more prone
the Alzheimer’s disease which causes deterioration of the brain. Many
elderly have issues with dependency and death. When an elderly person becomes
dependent on a grown child the roles reverse and now the child takes over the
role of caregiver and authority figure. Though many have problems with
dependency, the elderly don’t seem to have a problem with death since they feel
they have less to lose.
Late Adults
As we go
through life we pass through many stages: childhood, adolescence, early, middle
and late adulthood until we die. Each stage has challenges that we have to
overcome but that doesn’t mean we cannot enjoy ourselves in any stage we are
in.
No comments:
Post a Comment