hello everyone for today we are going to talk about the challenges during middle and late adolescence and most of the things that we're going to talk about are psychological emotional and psychosocial challenges that almost all adolescents face at this stage of development so let's begin so here are the common challenges that an adolescent face and this includes attitudes and behavior towards sexuality and sexual relationship which means that adolescents are in the experimentation stage and because of their curiosity and tendency to engage in risky behaviors they should be able to draw limits in their sexual expressions and they should be responsible to see the consequences of their behavior that's why it's important to educate people about the risks of the different behaviors that we engage in because sometimes we are not aware that if we do something there is a consequence that we have to face and sometimes we are not psychologically ready to face those consequences hence we will be in the place that we don't want to be other than that i know that all of you are facing academic concerns maybe you are anxious that your performance may not be enough to pass this semester or perhaps you are worrying that you may not be able to attain the standards set by your parents or the standards that you set upon yourself because sometimes there are people who pressure themselves to perform better and the common answer is that they're doing it for their parents however they will eventually know that no one is pressuring them but themselves and why do we pressure ourselves because initially we may have been pressured by our parents so we carry the idea that we need to perform well even though they are not looking sometimes there are tendencies for parents to only praise their children if they perform excellently in their academics so in other words if your performance is just average there's a tendency that other people will not accept that because for some everything is always a competition and that is a very unhealthy attitude also when you are in school there's a tendency for you to compare yourself with your peers or those who are in your age group and you might be envious of others who are performing better than you so you want also to be good sometimes not because you want to be a better version of yourself but rather sometimes you just want to surpass your inferiority issues so there are a lot of things that influence your academic concerns and as a future parent i hope that you will learn how to be more accepting towards your children don't just accept their personality you also need to accept their limitations because all of us have our own strengths and weaknesses okay and be and you need to be aware that problems in the family may carry over to academic problems that's why you need to provide a psychologically healthy environment for your children so that they will not face extreme challenges we may also face issues related to group belongingness or the urge to be independent and autonomous from family members and there's a there's an urge to seek a replacement of the support system hence in this stage you may have a tendency to isolate yourself away from your family and be closer to your peers sometimes this is because we want to feel more independent however in some cases they want to be independent because they are being bullied by their classmates saying that at this stage you don't have to depend on your parents anymore there there are people who bully other people who are very close to their parents and that type of bullying damages relationships also there's a tendency for us to seek social support from our brands so you need to be wise in selecting your friends because if your friends will not be there for you when you need them then that raises a lot of concerns because they are your support system in your adolescence and you tell secrets to them you share personal experiences to them and i hope that your friends will allow you will support your mental health needs and they will not laugh about your personal experiences but rather they must show empathy and concern so those are the traits that you need to look for okay in finding a support system also you may face issues related to health and nutrition because of your growing bodies and brains you are gifted with so much energy but sometimes you abuse your bud in your mind you are taking part in a lot of activities and some of these activities may not be necessary or they may be too much for you to handle you are not sleeping anymore because of your hobbies or perhaps your eating habits are not healthy and they are not nutritious so you need to be aware that there are people who may suffer from what we call eating disorders or some may suffer from what we call obesity that's why we want people to be more confident about their bodies and if you want to diet don't do it because you want to be accepted but rather if you want to diet and to stay healthy do it because you want to be healthy you may have issues with developing self-esteem this is still related to physical concerns people who have been bullied about their body image about their physical bodies may have low self-esteem and that is very alarming so we want people to be more confident about who they are and we want people to be aware of their strengths and weaknesses so if you are aware of your weaknesses for sure you also have strengths and your strengths may not always be academic that can be about music that can be video editing that can be public speaking that can be dealing with customers and you need to be able to discover them so that you will feel good about yourself and you will not say that you're not good enough it's also important for you to know your strengths so that you can ask the right people for help for example if you're not good with music there's nothing wrong with asking for help from another person who is good in music so that you will not always say that you're not good enough but rather you will say something like all of us have our own strengths also in this stage you might face role transitions and what are these role transitions going into college or perhaps being separated from your family because you have to study in the capital of the country other than that there might be death in the family parents or grandparents and that will result the role transitions that's why as family members we must be supportive to individuals who are undergoing role transitions and let us not judge them in case they are making mistakes but rather we must be there to guide them so that their role transition will be easier and let us be there to support them psychologically okay also another issue is material poverty and materialism other people they are suffering because they don't have the right resources for them to study or it may take a lot of time for them to go to school or it may cost a lot of money for them just to commute to school especially if you are in far away places and the other side of the equation there are people who are well off but they keep on asking for more they do not get contented they keep on upgrading their material belongings so if their cell phone is outdated they will look for a new cell phone although it's not really necessary so those are the things that we need to be able to overcome and overcome that let me tell you that according to psychological research materialism doesn't make us happy and materialism include search for high grades the search for acceptance by having quote unquote the perfect body the search for having your latest gadgets those are the things that will not make you happy in the long run because they can only make you happy at first but in the long run you get used to these things that's why you're not happy anymore what psychology want to tell us is that we should look for the right happiness establishing good relationships with people having a sense of fulfillment in helping others or by being grateful thinking about the things that you are thankful for in your day-to-day lives so less materialism and more gratitude here's another related issue parents working abroad and i had a lot of classmates back then who had to cope with this problem psychological studies will show that those with parents who are ofws who are working abroad may have problems because they are psychologically and physically separated from their parents and some of them may be materialistic because their family is well off because their parents are working abroad they may wish for a lot of things and the reason why they may be looking for a new gadget or they may buy a lot of things is because psychologically they're looking for the presence of their parents and that's the only way for them to feel the presence of their parents so thanks to social media right now it's easier for us to be able to connect to our parents and it's not that hard anymore to communicate with our loved ones abroad so that's the positive side of social media addressing issues when it comes to being physically separated from your loved ones also another problem is career choice so you might be pressuring yourself to identify the course that you want to take right now or to be able to establish a career in the future however just take your time with this because in some cases because in some cases it's not easy to find out your dream career perhaps you will not know it at this point but rather you will know about your career goals when you are in college sometimes there are people who shift courses because they think that their goals doesn't align with the goals of their course so this is a an important dilemma that we should face that's why in schools we have guidance counselors who can guide individuals in their choice of careers and in order to do so typically we help people to understand their strengths for them to be able to know the right career for them also we may have problems with relationships and these may include relationship with parents or relationship with peers you may have problems with your partner you may have problems with your friends sometimes this results to permanent damage in friendships or relationship with parents that's why when things go out of hand it's important for you to know that we have mental health professionals who can help you deal in your problems when it comes to friendships perhaps you need to go to counseling so that you will know how to handle your issues effectively perhaps you need family therapy so that you will be more welcoming to each other and you will be more you your attitude will be more accepting instead of judgmental values and beliefs different people may endorse conflicting values and beliefs for example in politics you may have different opinions and your opinions may clash with each other's opinions that's why we need to learn that we that we should respect the values and beliefs of other people so that we won't be in conflict with their values and belief and learn how to agree to disagree although you don't settle your conflicts learn how to respect each other's differences so you might endorse different values and beliefs and you need to find a balance in order for you to look for strategies that will work for both parties those are just some of the different issues that adolescents may face at this stage and i hope that you become aware that you're not the only one facing these issues and in case that your issues are getting out of hand there's no shame in seeking help from mental health professionals because they will be there to guide you and listen to your mentors listen to your teachers because they have been through these issues as well and hopefully they will be there to guide you or to give you advice in your career choices and also i hope that you have good relationships with your parents because their experience are also valuable when it comes to what advice can they give to younger generations and how were they able to conquer these issues when they were younger so those are the different challenges faced by adolescence at this stage and i hope that this made you more aware and i hope that you learned a lot