Importance of Biological and Social Influences during Adolescence Development

This essay explores the importance of biological and social influences during the adolescence developmental period, discussing the impact of these influences on physical, cognitive, and social development. It highlights the role of hormones, puberty, peer pressure, and decision-making in shaping the development of individuals during this crucial stage of life.

The Individual and
Society

Importance of biological and social influences during the adolescence’s
developmental period
Individual and society has the close relationship among them such as society is basically the
set of regularities and customs along with the ground rules of anti-human behaviour whereas the
individual lives in the society and acts within the society in which the society is nothing without
individuals and therefore combination of individuals are the cooperative effort in the formation
of society. So basically individuals have to obey the different types of laws and social norms
which are formulated and implemented for harmony in the society and they are accepted by the
community. As per the research, the individual has the essential role in permitting the society to
function and this is because the individuals have the nature and originate from the natural
freedom in order to form the society so that they can establish and appropriate governance with
proper ethics and rules and legislations which must be followed by each and every individual in a
respected manner. The following discussion is in the form of an essay and has a topic of
importance of biological and social influences during the adolescence developmental period.
Which means that there is a time period for phases for the teenagers or adolescence in the society
where they develop into either a good human being or a bad human being. Therefore this
discussion can help to gain the knowledge that what can be the biological and social influences
that can positively or negatively affect the adolescent developmental period and what are the
importance of such influences so that the positivity can be encouraged and negativity can be
rectified and this is because the dollars and are the very sensitive and crucial age group where
people find their career development and the societal development in terms of individualism and
as a whole group. Hence the biological influences and importance of biological influences along
with the social influences and importance of social influences are discussed in the essay along
with the individual perspective and societal perspective with proper conclusion (Dahl, Allen,
Wilbrecht and Suleiman, 2018).
Biological influences at the time of adolescent development till period are such that this is a
period of teen years which means that teenagers grow and develop more in adult like physical
features and can also grow suddenly from double their height and weight as well. This is because
this is the period where the biological influences are uncontrollable in nature even by the parents
and by the teenager also. Moreover, biological influences include the sexually mature nature
among the adolescence which includes more than physical changes because there are the large
1

fluctuations in their hormones and it changes rapidly and this is because it develops new feelings
about their bodies along with the sexuality and intimate relationships. This is also known as the
puberty age and there are different changes in males and females such as in terms of male, their
voice gets lower or deeper, penis and testicles get bigger, growth of hair on the face and chest
along with the back, chest and shoulders become broader. In terms of females, development of
breast, hips get wider and body becomes curvy, starting of the menstrual cycle, change in colour
and size of labia. In terms of common biological influences, people get acne, start sweating
more, hair grows under arms, growth of hairs around genitals which is called the pubic hair and
sometimes it also feels pain in the arms and legs at the time of growth and development (Sawyer,
Azzopardi, Wickremarathne and Patton, 2018).
At the time of adolescence development period, there are greater health implications which
can affect the adolescence throughout their life and the changes happening during the
adolescence period can impacts the thinking and acting capacity among the people and therefore
it is important to understand the whole process taking place at the time of adolescent
development period in order to contribute positively in their development because adults mind
and heart are very sensitive in nature and therefore taking care is the priority. Importance of
biological influences during the adolescence developmental period are such that if these changes
would not happen among the males and females then they can be estimation that cannot grow
and develop and therefore in order to better grow and develop in their life in physical terms for
example height and weight along with the figure and looks, because people are more conscious
about physic and is important to take care so that they can be physically fit and fine along with
the healthy nature. Health of the person is the most important part in an individual's life so in
order to get better health in the adult’s period that is important to better grow and develop in the
adolescence period for the future life because it can directly e impact the health in a negative
manner and that is why biological influences importance during the adolescence developmental
period (Large, Pellicano, Mojzisch and Krug, 2019).
Social influences at the time of adolescent development till period are such that the peers
and friends along with family and relatives plays the major role in such influences to adolescence
at this period. The most important is the decision making process because in this age there is a
lot of confusion in which the adolescent has to decide what to do and what not to do because this
is the very crucial age where the important decisions are to be made for better career and
2

personal development. They can also face risky and maladaptive decisions such as illegal
substances as well. Most of the adolescence start smoking and drinking along with the drugs
taking when the state with the society and friends so that they can look cool and also the reason
is the peer pressure which is the most harmful for the adolescence because any decision making
out and the peer pressure is harmful and can spoil the life for the future also. Social changes are
notable in adolescence and they also become autonomous from their parents and thus spend more
time with their peers and begin exploring different types of relationships and sexuality other than
friends and family relationships such as romantic one. Some examples of social influences in
adolescence such as career choices and values along with the morals which are followed by the
short-term choices such as experience and interest. Moreover, obedience and conformity along
with the persuasion and social loafing which is followed by social facilitation and
deindividuation along with the observer effect and bystander effect or peer pressure (Lerner,
Lerner, von Eye and Tubman, 2018).
Importance of social influence during the adolescence developmental period is because it is
characterized by the cognitive and social changes along with the biological changes which are
the most important in the development of adolescence because it helps the people to explore
different relationships to get experience for the future. There are different reasons that why the
people permits social influences in order to affect their behaviour and ideas such that one of the
reason is that it is basic in nature that in the society and the individual confirms to the rules and
norms of the group in order to gain the acceptance of its members and moreover the group
conformity supports the signs of cohesion within a society which is essential for the growth and
development of the adolescence not only professionally but also on the personal basis. Social
influencers have a great effect on teenagers and this is because the adolescence are exposed to
the different kinds of norms and behaviour was along with the thoughts and ideas of others and
they observe and examine the positive results that other people receive from such behaviour and
therefore it is also known as the exposure and learning for the adolescence. Adolescence
internalizes these kinds of social behaviours and norms for future instances so that it can
maintain proper ethics and good behaviour in the society (Foulkes and Blakemore, 2018).
Period of adolescence starts with puberty and overs with the transition to adulthood
approximately in the ages of 10 to 20 years. Hormones play the major role in physical changes of
the adolescent which is associated with puberty. At the time of adolescence there are many
3

people who experience different types of changes which includes the physical and behavioural
along with the cognitive and emotional social development. In this type of age group, parents
generally offer guidance to the adolescence on how they can take care of their reproductive and
sexual health in a very sensitive and effective manner. There are basically improvements in the
thinking abilities of adolescence such as attention and memory along with the processing speed
and Organisation. There are major three physical changes in the adolescence that is the growth
spurt which is an early sign of maturation, primary sex characteristics which occurs changes
related to reproduction and secondary sex characteristics in which the bodily signs of sexual
maturity. There are different theories involved in adolescent development such as the lifespan
perspective and the learning perspective along with the human perspective and the ecological
perspective which is followed by the socio-cultural perspective and the positive youth
development perspective (Mendle, Beltz, Carter and Dorn, 2019). Moreover, along with the body
changes adolescence also faces the social perspectives in the society which is related to the peer
pressure and behaviour with the family and relatives along with the friends and also with the
strangers which defines the character, personality, thoughts and ideas along with the career
progression and decision making process of the teenager. All these are the perspectives of
individual and social perspectives on the biological and social influences during the adolescent
development period (Harris and McDade, 2018).
It is concluded that the essay on the importance of biological and social influences during
the adolescence developmental period is an important concept to learn and study so that it's not it
can be applied in the real world matters of individualism and society. the importance of this
study is that the adolescence period is a very imperative period for every human being and
everyone has to pass the stage in their lifetime and the reason behind that why it is very sensitive
because this is the stage where people lose and gain relationships along with their career which
helps them in the growth and development of the personality and along with their profession or
occupation. All these influences are in the terms of biological and social because body features
change in a very rapid way along with societal nature also changes suddenly at the time of
adolescence. this can affect the adolescence in both the manner that is positive and negative that
is the behaviour of society and biological influences are in the favour of adolescence then they
will grow and develop in a positive manner and if the behaviour of society and biological
influences are not in the favour of adolescence then they will grow and develop in a negative
4

manner which can even spoil and destroy the life. Therefore, it is important to take care of the
people in their adolescence stage developmental period so that they can be successful in their life
not only in terms of individualism but also in terms of society (Parke, Roisman and Rose, 2019).
Therefore it is important to analyse the concept of individual and society along with their
relationship, it is essential to analyse the biological influences during the adolescence
development will period, it is necessary to examine the importance of biological influences
during adolescence developmental period, it is significant to gain the knowledge about social
influences during the adolescence in developmental period, it is crucial to assess the importance
of social influences during the adolescence developmental period, it is imperative to investigate
about the individual perspective at the time of adolescence developmental period and it is vital to
study about the social perspective at the time of adolescence developmental period. Hence this
essay covers all such areas in order to better understand the conception of individuals and society
in terms of importance of biological and social influences during the adolescence developmental
period.
5

References
Books and journal
Dahl, R.E., Allen, N.B., Wilbrecht, L. and Suleiman, A.B., 2018. Importance of investing in
adolescence from a developmental science perspective. Nature. 554(7693). pp.441-450.
Foulkes, L. and Blakemore, S.J., 2018. Studying individual differences in human adolescent
brain development. Nature neuroscience. 21(3). pp.315-323.
Harris, K.M. and McDade, T.W., 2018. The biosocial approach to human development,
behavior, and health across the life course. RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of
the Social Sciences. 4(4). pp.2-26.
Large, I., Pellicano, E., Mojzisch, A. and Krug, K., 2019. Developmental trajectory of social
influence integration into perceptual decisions in children. Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences. 116(7). pp.2713-2722.
Lerner, R.M., Lerner, J.V., von Eye, A. and Tubman, J.G., 2018. Continuity and discontinuity
across the transition of early adolescence: A developmental contextual perspective.
In Transitions through adolescence (pp. 3-22). Psychology Press.
Mendle, J., Beltz, A.M., Carter, R. and Dorn, L.D., 2019. Understanding puberty and its
measurement: ideas for research in a new generation. Journal of Research on
Adolescence. 29(1). pp.82-95.
Parke, R.D., Roisman, G.I. and Rose, A.J., 2019. Social development. John Wiley & Sons.
Sawyer, S.M., Azzopardi, P.S., Wickremarathne, D. and Patton, G.C., 2018. The age of
adolescence. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health. 2(3). pp.223-228.
6