Adolescence: Psychological Development, Challenges, and Role of Nurses

This essay provides a comprehensive overview of adolescence as a critical developmental stage, emphasizing the significant physical, cognitive, and social changes that occur. It explores the physiological changes driven by hormonal influences, the internal turmoil, and the impact of social and cultural factors on adolescents. The essay highlights the development of independence, self-identity, and sexuality, along with the cognitive shifts in thinking and decision-making. It also examines the risks adolescents face, including mental health issues, risk-taking behaviors, and social challenges, and stresses the importance of guidance and support from counselors and nurses. The role of nurses is particularly emphasized, highlighting their ability to address adolescents' health concerns, provide counseling, and bridge the gap between teenagers and their parents. The essay also discusses the development of self-identity, self-concept, and self-esteem during adolescence, concluding with a call for support to help adolescents navigate this challenging phase and address the decline in positive self-concept observed in some populations.

Adolescence
Adolescence is a transition phase. It is a period of growth from child to adult. In this phase of
life great physical and psychological changes takes place. This phase lasts from 10 years of
age to 11 years of age in girls and 11 years of age to 12 years of age in boys. There are
particularly physiological changes under the influences of hormones. Along with great
physiological changes, it is the time of internal turmoil. There are many social and cultural
factors which affect the adolescence. Adolescence can prove time for both psychological
and physiological changes such as issues of independence, self-identity, sexuality etc. In
adolescence, phase teenagers develop their own thinking, choice of perceiving the world
around them. All teenagers don’t display same behaviour pattern in adolescence. It is a
confusing time for teenagers as well as their parents. Parents also need to accept the rapid
change taking place in their kids.
There are a number of physical changes which takes place during adolescence. It includes
changes in height, weight and body systems. There is the appearance of secondary sexual
characters. Further, the male and female reproductive systems are active. There is secretion
of testosterone in males and oestrogens in females. Facial hair in form of beard and
moustache starts appearing on faces of male and in the case of females it is the onset of
menarche and appearance of breasts. There is a rapid growth of height seen. The brain
attains full maturity. All these development and changes are completed by 16-18 years of
age. It is also the time for cognitive development. The teenagers have their own perspective
and way of thinking. They go independent in their thoughts. They no longer agree to their
parents. There are also improvements in their memory. They learn to take decision more
quickly. The processing in their brain takes place faster than that of children. They begin to
understand people. They have the capacity to take a decision and judge others based on
their own experiences. Also, adolescences are great risk takers. The new surge of hormones
makes them vulnerable to many things. At times the situation may become life threatening.
This is a stage when the help of counsellors are taken. So that adolescent should not
become a danger to themselves and the society.
G.STANLEY HALL( 1844-1924), was the first psychologist to advance a psychology of
adolescence .According to him this the most turbulent transition phase. It is the inside war
between idealism, goal, passion and suffering. There are many predictable and
unpredictable changes in adolescence. The predictable changes include the physical
development in both boys and girls. These make the adolescences very self-consciences
about their body . In this, they become sensitive and worried about the changes taking place
in their body. Normally adolescence starts to separate from their parents. Their peer group
becomes more of a safe place for them. Their emotions and feelings become more complex.
They become risk takers. They may take some sexual risk . This can lead to infections like
HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. There can be things like abortion, unwanted
pregnancy and childbirth. There are many behavioural risks such as alcohol dependency and

drug dependency or chain smoking. They become very impulsive in their behaviour. There
are a lot of misguiding forces in the society. They sometimes fail to recognise threats. Also,
may indulge in anti-social activities and crimes.( UNICEF. Progress for children: A report card
on adolescents)
Adolescence is the time for development of self-identity. Self-identity means a sense of who
we are, to identify what defines us and makes us different from others. It is a change in our
response to our family, peers and society. Our surrounding has a very close impact on our
identity. Self-concept means how an adolescence evaluates himself or herself. The
evaluation might be based on the area of interest of the adolescence. Many times they have
a positive self-concept and at times a negative self-concept. ((Patton et al., 2014)).A positive
self-concept gives them a lot of confidence related to their work and area of interest. A
negative self-concept can cause serious problems in adolescence. When it comes to self-
esteem it is the way adolescence thinks about them and important they feel themselves in
their surroundings. It has an important effect on their peer group. This is the first time an
individual starts searching its own identity. As we all know identity forms the base of our
self-esteem. Our self-identity takes shape based on our peer group, family and
surroundings. They become emotionally more mature. They are able to control and express
emotions appropriately. As a person attains emotional maturity development of self-
identity and self-esteem takes place. The adolescence develops their own qualities and
abilities to express themselves as distinct individuals.
Self-esteem improves as youth begins to understand the outcome of their positive and
negative actions. They start to recognise their qualities. This is the time when every
adolescence develops their distinct personality and choice, for example, you can see them
colouring their hair. This is also a way of forming or establishing one's identity. This is the
phase when they determine who they want to be. They become much more confident in
themselves. Associate themselves with famous personalities without any identity crises. Few
adolescents who lack the ability to recognise their talent may go through a social
disconnect. They also maintain a distance from their peer group and also parents. They can
go into negative side. At this stage, a counsellor is required for consultation and proper
guidance. In the United States, children are experiencing a decline in their positive self-
concept. (Patton et al., 2014) The decline is severe in early adolescence but they generally
recover by their mid-teens. This decline is generally due to bad habits and wrongly adapted
behaviour. It is important to address this in youth as soon as possible.
The increasing domain of nurses can contribute in adolescence care. Nurses can help
breaking down the barriers by proper counselling techniques. The health problems of
adolescence are mainly psychological in nature. There is a good number of adolescents
exposed to alcohol and using other harmful substances. They expose themselves to
unprotected sex. They should be welcomed to discuss heath issues. Also, education related
general health and sexually transmitted diseases are equally important. Some adolescence

required counselling to maintain their mental health. Their mind and body go through rapid
changes during this phase. To prepare themselves to cope with the changes they need
frequent counselling and guidance at every stage. (. J Adolesc Health. 2012)They have a lot
of discomfit disclosing their health issue to others. It is through proper counselling they can
be encouraged to tell their health related problems to their parents or to any professional.
There is fear like confidentiality, costs etc which need to take care . As nurses have frequent
interaction with the patient they can achieve higher rates of satisfaction during counselling
as compared to the general physician. (United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), New York;
2011)
From all the above discussion we can conclude that during adolescence there is a great
degree of stress and pressure on the teens. The nurses can perform key roles in addressing
their concerns. This is the age of risk takes. Adolescence is an age in which teens never
hesitate to try something new. In this scenario, it becomes more important that they at
least they should have proper knowledge. As we know that it is very natural that
adolescences tend to get away from their parents. It is a natural response to this age. Still,
they need support and guidance. This gap can be bridged by the nurses.
References
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Moran, P. (2014). The prognosis of common mental disorders in adolescents: A 14-
year prospective cohort study. The Lancet, 383(9926), 1404–1411.
doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(13)62116-9
2) Patton, G. C., Coffey, C., Romaniuk, H., Mackinnon, A., Carlin, J. B., Degenhardt, L., …
Moran, P. (2014). The prognosis of common mental disorders in adolescents: A 14-
year prospective cohort study. The Lancet, 383(9926), 1404–1411.
doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(13)62116-9
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