The 2nd Decade: Debates and Perspectives on Adolescents

Dr. Bhagbanprakash HRD Lead Officer CYP Asia Centre

Adolescence: The Facts

There are about 1.2 billion adolescents in the world between ages 10-19 500 million of them are not in schools There are atleast 73 million adolescent workers between the ages 10-14 Each year 1 in 20 adolescents contracts an STI Each year upto 4.4 million young women in age group of 1519 undergo unsafe and induced abortions often carried out by unqualified practitioners

Half of all HIV infections take place among people under 25 years of age

 The suicide rate of adolescents has increased more than 200 times in five decades Recent studies show that more than 20% of adolescents undergo emotional turmoil One third of the attending psychiatric clinics suffer from depression

And by the age 18 the rate of depression among girls is twice as high as that among boys
Every year an estimated 3 million adolescents are reported to be sexually exploited

Adolescence : Issues
Adolescent live and grow in the families familys bonding getting weaker Adolescent are demanding changes in family rules and routine Consumption patterns assumes more importance than production patterns Peer groups more than parents dictate personal behaviour Social and economic freedom weakens Adolescents connections with family

 Female adolescent are taking traditional male roles not vice-versa Adolescent attitudes to achievement to motivation changing Effects of maternal employment on adolescents less maternal supervision Adolescents attitude to authority figures changing More skill - less experience versus less skill more experience

Sexual equality and freedom in relationships being projected as a social and political value

Adolescent Questions
Is it really a decade long drama ? A turbulent journey of transition from childhood to adulthood ? Is adolescent a rapid traveller left one station of life and not yet reached the next ? Is it an ambiguous and awkward age ? Or just a repetition and prolongation of infancy ? An impulsive period of defiance and rebellion ?

A high tide of puberty and destructive passion ?

 Or an emotional battleground on which past and future struggle for supremacy ? A second birth in the Second Decade of Life ? Is it an arbitrary academic invention to segregate a passive period for active study and research ? Is it not a myth generated by an outdated generation of psychoanalysts ? Or a time of active deconstruction, construction and reconstruction ? A period in which past, present and future are rewoven and strung together on the threads of fantasies and wishes ?

 Is compulsory mass education of children from six to sixteen created adolescence ? Or child labour laws designed to protect youngsters from adult responsibility ? Why do we need to banish children from a natural and real life to stifling confines of a class room and the family cocoon ? From open spaces and freedom of medieval age to closed fortress like separation of modern education system ? Are todays mass education, democracy, individuality and self actualisation desirable social values ? Or is it preparatory to assume the sexual and moral responsibilities of adulthood ? ( J.J. Rousseau) Is an Adolescents desire to be loved stronger than the capacity to love? ( Ernest Jones )

A Bloody Fluid Break with the past

Puberty Defined as biological condition of acquiring mature genitals & functional capacity to reproduce

Girls menstruate and produce the fertile ova

Boys begin to ejaculate semen and produce sperm These two important body fluids signify physical rupture with the past
Menstruation separates girls from a sexual world of

childhood to a new world of sexual identity.

 Societies and cultures respond differently to this new feminine status Puberty also brings in issues of sexual morality In some societies the socio-physical response is reflected in : Mutilation of body Tattooing the face, legs, arms and back Perforating the hymen Circumcising the penis, cutting of foreskin Pulling out a tooth Piercing the earlobe on nasal septum

 In some cultures Girls are bound to domestic sphere Boys initiated to outdoor tasks Girls focus on issues on relating to others Boys focus on individual competence and knowledge

These differences persists beyond adolescence leading to traditional sex role stereotypes

Why Adolescence is Challenging

Humans, unlike other primates, undergo an intense parental care They have a longer life span Late sexual maturity A complex social life Protracted biological and psychological helplessness

Thank you