The boundaries of adolescence: description, definition, psychological aspects

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

Stanley Hall said of him that this is a period of storm and stress. Stanley Hall spoke of him. J-J. Rousseau called it a period of storms and passions, a process of "birth into adulthood." For L. S. Vygotsky, he was a turning point, critical, transitional. Parents and teachers believe that it is difficult, unbearable, nightmarish. And that's all he is - adolescence. When to expect it? How to prepare for it, understand and survive?

When a teenager became a problem

Adolescence as an independent and isolated period of human life is a relatively modern phenomenon. The studies of anthropologists and culturologists describe the harmonious and conflict-free course of the process of growing up in primitive cultures, as well as in the era of pre-industrial development of civilization. Children from an early age were included in the working and everyday life of others. Had duties that were physically feasible at their age, were responsible for the result to the family, tribe.

After graduationIn infancy, the rigid division of forms of behavior into children's and adults ceased. Thus, a person from an early age acquired the skills and knowledge necessary in later life. Under such conditions, learning the ways of adult behavior proceeded smoothly. By the age of puberty, the child was fully prepared to fulfill the requirements of an independent mature life. Only from the middle of the 17th century began to single out a special period in a person's life - adolescence as a new social phenomenon.

Who and when determined these boundaries

All the main directions and schools of foreign psychology have not ignored the question of what are the age limits of adolescence. S. Hall was the first psychologist to give a scientific justification for this phenomenon. He believed that the age limits of adolescence constitute the period from the onset of puberty (12-13 years) to the onset of adulthood (22-25 years). His followers already distinguished two periods in this range - from 11-13 years to 17-20 years. Until now, it has not been possible to develop a unified approach to determining clear age boundaries for this period. Despite the fact that in English only persons aged 13-19 fall under the definition of a teenager, in foreign psychology the definition of adolescence prevails - growing up with a range from 12-14 to 25 years.

The boundaries of adolescence in domestic psychology

In Russia, the problems associated with this age were the first to be studied by L. S. Vygotsky and D. B. Elkonin. main reasonfeatures of this period, they considered a radical change in interests and leading activities.

Based on this, the general age period from 11 to 17 years is divided into two: the first from 11 to 15 years, and the older adolescence within the boundaries of 15-17 years.

Interests typical of teenagers at this time are as follows:

• Towards self.
• Craving for opposition, resistance.
• Interest in romance, heroism, risk.
• Installation on a large scale, globalization of interests

The boundaries of adolescence according to Vygotsky are marked by crises of 13 and 17 years, which separate childhood from adolescence and adolescence, respectively. It is at this time that teenagers tend to do extraordinary things.

View from the outside

Medical science has a different answer to the question of what are the boundaries of adolescence. In age physiology, the following stages of growing up and their norms are established.

	boys (yo)	girls (yo)
1 stage	10-13 to 12-14	8-10 to 9-12
2 stage	from 12-14 to 13-16	9-12 to 10-12
3 stage	from 13-16 to 15-17	from 10-13 to 11-14
4 stage	from 15-17 to 17-18	from 11-14 to 15-16

The first stage is the beginning of increased growth of bone and muscle tissue. The appearance of signs of sexualformation.

Second stage - the main sign is growth spurts (gain reaches up to 8 cm per year) and an increase in body weight (up to 8 kg per year). The development of secondary sexual characteristics continues: swelling of the breasts and mammary glands (in boys it subsequently disappears), weak pigmentation, the beginning of penis growth.

The third stage - the maximum activity of testosterone and estrogen leads to rapid sexual formation. Active growth of body hair (according to male and female type), voice breaking, first ejaculations in boys and menstruation in girls

The fourth stage is the final formation of the reproductive system.

Features of physiological maturation

Intensive restructuring of the endocrine system marks the beginning of adolescence in medical terms. The end of this period is the achievement of puberty.

In this difficult time, the child is constantly adapting, adapting to the physical and physiological changes that occur in his body at an extraordinary speed. New proportions of the body underlie the clumsiness, teenage angularity. This does not add self-confidence to a young person. Boys, during a change in the timbre of their voice, sometimes break down on high notes, which can also be painful for a child.

The timing of the formation of secondary sexual characteristics has a large individual variation within the general age norm, which leads to feelings and rejection of one's body. Rapid development causes problems in the work of the heart, lungs, circulatory system, which leads tochanges in muscle and vascular tone, as well as physical condition and mood. Emotional instability is enhanced by a new feeling of sexual arousal for the growing personality. All this adds to the complexity and controversy of adolescence.

From the point of view of the law

Legal legal norms for boys and girls in the Russian Federation are governed by the Civil Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

According to them, the legal boundaries of adolescence are set between 14 and 18 years. This category of citizens of the Russian Federation is called minors.

Some legal provisions also apply to children from 6 to 14 years old. These are minor minors.

Rights and obligations

As documented in regulations:

Underage minors have the following rights:

• Make small household transactions (purchases).
• Dispose at your own discretion the funds provided by legal representatives with their consent.
• From the age of 10, a child's opinions and actions are given legal meaning.

Minors have the following rights:

• Be the author of works of art, literary and scientific works.
• From the age of 14, get a job with parental consent.
• Find a job on your own from the age of 15.
• From the age of 16 to engage in business activities
• Dispose of your earnings and income as you wish
• have the right to openbank account, dispose of the deposit at your own discretion.
• from the age of 16 there is full administrative and legal responsibility.
• from the age of 16, legal emancipation is possible (recognition of full legal capacity by decision of the court or guardianship authorities).

What psychologists say

Why is the short (relative to total life expectancy) adolescence period so acute and often painful in the modern world?

L. S. Vygotsky noted three lines of human maturation in ontogeny. These development vectors have initial and final points of their direction. There are three types of maturation:

• Organic.
• Sexual (an integral part of organic maturation, but so important that it is singled out in a special direction).
• Social.

In primitive cultures and until the 17th-18th centuries, the final points of sexual and social maturation coincided. This was fixed by the rituals of initiation and the traditions of the hostel, which contributed to the beginning of an independent adult life, such as military service, learning a craft outside the family clan (apprenticeship), creating one's own family. Later (after a couple of years) organic maturation was completed.

How do you define the border of adolescence now? Due to the development of society and the complication of social interaction, the final points of growing up have diverged greatly in time. First, puberty is completed, then organic. The development of social independence is now verystretched out in time. Starting at 13, it often doesn't end at 25.

Why is it so hard to deal with them

Within the boundaries of adolescence, a new feature of the psychological development of a person arises - a sense of adulthood. As part of this neoplasm, the child strives for complete independence.

At the initial stage of the path of his new life, the child resorts to demonstrative manifestations of adulthood. There is a desire to be independent in choosing clothes, independent in choosing friends and entertainment. The young person has a need to resist the time frame of the regime established by parents and teachers. Quite often, teenagers use the attributes of adulthood that are forbidden to children - smoking, alcohol, profanity, thereby trying to expand the age boundaries of adolescence.

People often refer to younger adolescence as childhood. Therefore, they not only do not help the matured personality to establish itself, but also increase control, their pressure. This leads to an aggravation of the conflict, psychological and emotional distancing begins.

Family or street

The influence of peers becomes important and decisive. The idea of a teenager about himself, his significance and value largely depends on them. During this period, the status "I am a concept" begins to form. If earlier, in evaluating himself, the child was guided by the opinions of adults, then from the age of 11-12, interest in his own inner world is shown. At that timethe first experiences of reflection and self-knowledge take place. Understanding who he really is is the main component of the complex inner work of a teenager.

Estimates are very biased and do not always correspond to reality. Non-acceptance of one's appearance is only the tip of the iceberg of problems that a teenager is trying to solve by forming the image of the "real me". There is also the image of "I am perfect", which is formed under the influence of the environment: peers, the media, significant adults. The discrepancy between these images leads to feelings, deviant behavior. The task of parents is to bring these images closer together, gently correcting them.

To be or to seem

Trying with all their might to seem like adults, children of younger adolescence are not yet ready and cannot be fully mature. In difficult situations, when it is necessary to be responsible for their actions and decisions, they want to receive the protection and guardianship of adults. A sensitive and wise parent will never use this vulnerability of a child as a way to suppress his independence. Having protected and solved the problem, the right parent will try to suggest how to proceed next time in order to solve the situation without the help of adults.

At the beginning of life

In older adolescence, questions of life prospects, professional self-determination, and moral guidelines are acute. The family has the main influence on the formation of these personality criteria. Consciously, and often unconsciously, is writtenscenario for the future. During this period, a teenager tries to defend his social independence, as he may be required to simultaneously unquestioning obedience and making a responsible decision. He feels "on two chairs": you can vote, but you can't get married, you can work, but you can't buy alcohol. The trappings of adulthood are interspersed with the limitations of childhood.

Adult but still a child

Three tips for parents:

1. If you are confused about the age limits of adolescence, be careful with your child. All these norms are very conditional and have large individual differences.
2. If you think that your child's development does not correspond to the stages described in the article, read point 1 again.
3. If you compare your child to others (children of friends, colleagues, classmates), re-read point 1 again.

Knowing and understanding the characteristics of adolescence in the modern world, you can slightly weaken the "storms and passions" that accompany growing up. However, it is unlikely that they will be completely avoided.