Effects of Puberty in Children and Adolescence

Ideally, puberty involves changes that individuals, explicitly children, undergo mentally, physically, and socially in variations such as anxiety issues as they adapt to the mature bodies (Viner,2017). Puberty stage differs depending on the reaction of the individual; some may experience new changes as early as seven years old while others may experience the changes in their late stages. Physicians widely recognize adolescence as a critical change that opens gateways altering the life course of an individual and may affect their performances throughout their entire life.

According to Viner (2017), puberty is accompanied by sexual maturation, changes in the reproductive capacities, semantic growths such as a change in the nervous system and psychological behaviors. Puberty stage can have adverse effects to both boys and girls such as exposure to sexual peers, may cause stress, exposure to drug abuse, teenagers may start piercing and tattooing their bodies, peer pressure and can cause a change in the self-esteem of the teenagers.

The adolescence stage is more critical than the puberty stage due to the transitions from the childhood stages to the adulthood stage. For example, high schools’ students have been exposed to college level education. Following an article review (n.d.) the transition may cause a change in the self-esteem where the teenagers develop a negative self-image about themselves, comparable things such as the teenagers having the urge to change certain body elements. Likewise, low self-esteem can be caused by unconstructive criticisms by colleagues, overprotection from the parents, thus the child cannot make decisions by themselves.

Besides, peer pressure is developed during the puberty and adolescence stage. Peer pressure is generated due to less parent-child relationships as the youngsters grow. Typically, as the youths grow, they tend to associate themselves with peers of age rather than their parents. Peer pressure can be constructive or adverse depending on the social group associated with. According to Alan (2000), positive behaviors may include motivations such as the scholars assisting each other in education and team building in activities such as sports. The negative actions may consist of the peers engaging themselves to drug abuse such as smoking and consumption of alcohol, unprotected sex, and other dangerous activities.

The changes can also lead to long term effects such as brain developments, physical activities and cognitive changes. Brain development often involves specific processes such as changes in the prefrontal cortex and standard growth criteria of the individual which is the environment. According to Viner (2017), the methods are reinforced to affect cognitive processes such as social relationships, reasoning capabilities, and emotion control mechanisms. The neurodevelopmental progressions jeopardize the individual's perceptions and may expose the teenagers to vulnerabilities and risks that cause an imbalance of the brain activities. For example, a long-term effect on cognitive processes may involve the ability to take risks. Some individuals are more likely to earn higher chances in life more than others or following the social imbalances, some individuals are more interactive compared to others.

Recent studies indicate that hostility and viciousness intensify vividly, at the central teenage years. Frequently, boys tend to be more aggressive than girls due to the increase in testosterone levels. The muscularity can be influenced by peer pressure from both genders either to show superiority complexity or to disturb the performances of others. The viciousness is affected by cognitive processes such as self-regulation to emotions.

The adolescence stage can intermittently cause depression and ultimately suicide. Following a recent study (2000), depression was found to be more familiar to the girls than on the boys. According to the study, the puberty stage was confirmed to predict foremost risks to depression than age. Teenagers may be vulnerable to depression due to factors such as been exposed to high-stress environments such as parents fighting and constant arguments. Likewise, teenagers can develop insignificant feelings such as low self-esteem due to poor school performance, under appreciations, weak social interactions and stumpy family relationships where the household does not follow on the children’s necessities and reactions. Depression in teens can result to effects such as loss of interest to regular co-curricular activities, withdrawal from friends, rebellious behaviors such as dropping out of school, a gradual drop in school performances and may also result to suicide.

From prospective research, the adolescent stage was linked to physical inactivity in adults. Some unhealthy behaviors in adults were rooted in teenage social-economic conditions. Following qualitative research, physical activities in sports, association to PE and other related activities found that most inactive individuals at their mature age were not exposed to such criteria on their teenage stage. Although individual factors such as the education background were considered to be optimal the remarks were confident. Therefore, the effects spot positive limelight on the areas that can be engrossed by the professionals during the developmental stages to not only improve the hypothetical performances of the teenagers but also ensure there is a cognitive balance to the individuals.

Did you like this example?

1290

68