As a psychologist reflecting on his impending fortieth birthday, perhaps it is natural to find myself reflecting on adolescence. Maybe it is because, after working with hundreds of adolescents and their families, I feel I understand them better than I used to.

Learning about adolescence as a therapist started with the first family who was brave enough to bring their 13 year old girl to therapy. She was already running away from home, had assaulted her parents on occasion, and, it appeared, had taken a blood oath never to take "no" for an answer. As I interviewed her family and heard their complaints, I watched her. The anger was easy to see. . . the crossed arms, the glaring eyes, the enormous sigh every time her parents broached a new topic. But beneath the contempt, I saw something else. . . a feeling I could identify with completely - fear. In fact, at that moment I don't know who was more terrified, her or me. I imagine she was wondering what I would do to her. Meanwhile, I was wondering what I was going to do with her. How could I ever connect with her at any sort of emotional level?

After all, she must see me as the agent of her parents and by default conspiring against her. And besides, I was just an old, bearded, bald guy. How could I possibly understand her feelings?

To my delight, she surprised me.

Once her parents were out of the room, and my full attention was on her, she transformed. This angry, cynical, oppositional girl didn't wait for me to "establish rapport" or say something therapeutically spectacular (thank goodness). She was the one who dragged me into her world. She revealed more about her feelings and dreams in 45 minutes than my adult patients usually revealed in weeks. She seemed to feed off of my listening to her, and required little else from me. Over the weeks we spent together, I was an honored attendant to important changes in her life. As she worked through the anger and frustration, she made some simple, but important discoveries. For instance: 1.) I need my parents, at least for clothing and shelter, and 2.) If I keep them happy they tend to keep me happy.

I wish I could say that every adolescent I have worked with so effortlessly got better and easily had such epiphanies. Unfortunately, for every child like her, there is another who sits sullenly for 45 minutes daring me to make him say a word, or reports on how much better he is doing this six weeks, only to bring home four F's instead of three. Adolescents can certainly behave in mysterious, disappointing, and maddening ways.

In spite of this, however, I believe I have come to like and enjoy adolescents more than I used to. Perhaps, at almost forty, I identify with the same concerns they have to some degree. The teen years and the forties are like "developmental" book ends of the extremely productive twenties and thirties. In my teens, I asked, "What will I be when I grow up?" Now I ask, "What have I become?" Then I asked, "Do you think I'm losing my hair?" Now I ask, "Do you remember when I had hair?" So I guess I've come full circle on the Merry-Go-Round of the Eternal Return and find new affinity with those impulsive, visionary "live in the moment" adolescents.

So, you may ask, if these young people are at once so promising and so difficult, how do we as helping professionals, parents, and friends communicate with them more effectively? I have given some tips below which I hope will help. They fall roughly into two categories: understanding and relating. How can I understand adolescents better and how can I communicate with them in such a way that our relationship is strengthened and we can both learn from one another.

 

Understanding the Adolescent

Everyone who has had an introductory psychology class or who has read at all about human development has run into Jean Piaget. Piaget studied his own childrens' development in depth and identified what appear to be stages of cognitive development. The last stage, formal operations, begins around 11 or 12 years of age and is characterized by the fully developed ability to comprehend abstract ideas and to deal with symbolic representation. This is seen as the last and final quantum leap of cognitive development, after which the young person can presumably understand things on an adult plane. While this is true about many endeavors, like algebra, geometry and the value of democracy, it is also true that teens often think in ways that seem foreign at best and downright aggravating at worst. These "cognitive errors," which were identified by Elkind & Bowen in 1979, are critical to understand if we are going to understand adolescents better

These errors revolve around a phenomenon pattern called "adolescent egocentrism." while children have an egocentrism of their own, adolescents have a particular form which is characterized by four errors.

The Imaginary Audience

"You won't buy me any Doc Martens, and everybody thinks I'm a loser." The adolescent lives in a world where it seems everyone sees virtually everything they do. If she stumbles and falls down, if she wears something that is not "in", if she is not in attendance at the big events, then everyone will notice and will talk about it. Obviously, it is tough to disabuse a kid of this notion. How can you prove that everyone is not talking about her?

 

The Personal Fable

"No one understands me! Least of all you!" The adolescent commonly voices the feeling that his pain, his loss, his disappointment represents a special form of suffering heretofore unheard of which has been visited especially on him and not on his peers, and certainly not his parents. If parents or other adults attempt to establish rapport and an empathetic relationship with the old tried and true "I know how you feel," the adolescent looks contemptuously on the obviously "clueless" adult and only feels more isolated than ever.

Hypocrisy

(My personal favorite)

"No! It doesn't matter that I cussed out the teacher, She shouldn't have lost my homework!" Adolescents have a peculiar form of morality in which the inappropriateness of actions they take is entirely obscured from them. However, if someone else makes even a minor mistake it is viewed as a major breach of faith. It's okay to copy someone else's homework, but if the teacher steps out of the classroom for a personal phone call, it is unforgivably irresponsible.

Pseudostupidity

"Shelley is so stupid! If she doesn't want to be a cow, why doesn't she just stop eating so much." Oversimplified logic is the result of having the ability to use formal operations thinking, but not having much experience with real life. They are unable to see the many variables which might go into a weight problem, or alcoholism, or any other complex issue.

The result is statements on the adolescent's part which sound hopelessly naive.

All of these cognitive errors are common in adolescence. The more we understand them and expect them as normal parts of growing up, the more the stage is set for effective communication, and a closer, more mutually gratifying, relationship.

Relating to the Adolescent

After reading the above, you may be ready to give up. How can we hope to connect with teens if they think and reason so differently? Well, do not despair. Here are a few principles, the implementation of which may improve the probability that an adolescent will respond and even stay with the conversation:

· If the adolescent is caught up in her own personal fable, agree with her! Then remind her that while her circumstance is unique, it is still her responsibility to create a solution. She is responsible, able to respond to her own problems.

· Pseudostupidity from an adolescent can often be countered by subtly providing contact with those who might otherwise fall under his prejudice. When they begin to gain experience with such people, the complexities involved begin to emerge. Ethnic and culture biases and stereotypes know no greater enemy than relationships which cross the old lines.

· Sometimes you can combat the imaginary audience, by helping the adolescent see as heroic the person who dares stand out from the crowd. Admittedly, many teens are fearful of this. But here you can actually make use of the personal fable, and use it to combat the imaginary audience. "You are unique in all the world, and although that can be bad, it can also be good.. As long as everyone is watching, let's do and say something important!"

· Excessive hypocrisy is the toughest of these errors for me to take when I see it in an adolescent and I am not always sure how to approach it. One thing that helps, however, is for me to realize that it is also the toughest error for me to avoid. In fact, the acknowledgment that we all demonstrate these errors from time to time may go a long way in finding mercy for those impossible kids.

Since I work daily with troubled adolescents it is also important for me to realize that adolescence is not always a hurricane of emotions, flawed logic, and raging hormones. In fact, studies consistently find late adolescents rating their teen years as basically happy, fulfilling times. And beyond the research, I now have an adolescent of my own, and being her dad is enormously meaningful. We can laugh and talk and dream at a level never before possible.

In the movie Parenthood, a comedy about the chaos of childrearing, being a parent is likened to a riding a roller coaster, having sometimes hair raising ups and downs, The secret is learning to enjoy the ride. Good Luck!

editor@medmag.org