MIDDLE CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE DEVELOPMENT

Middle Childhood and Adolescence Development

Middle Childhood and Adolescence Development

Introduction

Middle childhood is the time between the ages 6-12 years when children attend school. At this time, they attend school and make new friends. They learn different skills and want to live an individual life. Adolescence is a stage of development that has no fixed time limits. However, the changes that occur at this time are so significant that it is useful to talk about adolescence as a distinct period of human life cycle. This period ranges from biological changes to changes in behavior and social status, thus making it difficult to specify its boundaries accurately.

In early adolescence, the individual continues to seek independence but with new vigor and new areas. An adult wants more privileges and freedoms, as well, less adult supervision. He wants to be primarily concerned with their "status" and immediate peers. Individual differences are more marked, but only as an individual is not yet fully understood or accepted. Older teens share many of the concerns of early adolescents, but also have the problem of getting a place in adult society, feels obliged to find their own identity.

Changes in peer relationships

Adolescence begins with puberty, when a series of physiological changes that lead to full development of genital organs, and the ability to breed and sex. The time interval begins on 11-12 years and extends to 18-20. Early adolescence ranges between the age of 11-14 years (coinciding with puberty), and after a second period of "youth" or " late adolescence "between 15-20 years, its extension to reach adulthood, will depend on social, cultural, environmental and personal adaptation (Lisa, 1993).

Entry into the adult world requires a number of changes, ripening at all levels of being that lead to attitudes and behaviors of maturity. This change shows that the true meaning of the adolescent stage is the maturation of personal autonomy. The teenager in the midst of their confusion and conflict has three closely interrelated objectives:

Conquest of maturity seen as responsible personality,

Achieving an independence,

Making the quality of independent existence, if, ultimately, individual

In this time, the teenager is concerned about himself only. He gets influenced by friends and wants to be like them. He makes friends who are elder in age.

Interpersonal relationships

Adolescents are influenced by two major sources in its development: The friends who take on a role in this period, and the family (especially parents). After puberty, the choice of partners is based mainly on individual aspects of character. The sympathy at the time of adolescence is increasingly directed towards the total personality of another and takes into account, especially, the affective qualities of it.

After puberty, adolescents begin to experience new needs for independence. As a result of this independence, they wish to engage in activities without the parental control, home occupations bothers them, the parents' questions about what they consider "private life "(friends, places they frequent, etc.). Teenagers do not know what they want or what they ...