NCJ Number
120764
Date Published
1989
Length
375 pages
Annotation
While adolescence is a time of opportunity and growth, statistics indicate that it is also a time of severe distress and trouble for many teenagers.
Abstract
Adolescents need help generating new ways of experiencing themselves, of satisfying their needs, and of replacing maladaptive behaviors with adaptive, growth-enhancing strategies to cope with frustration and distress. In the psychosocial model, the causes for maladaptive behavior are excessive current stresses, conflicts, frustrations, and negative psychosocial learning, faulty interaction between the adolescent and the psychosocial environment, and vulnerabilities carried over from incomplete previous developmental stages. When adolescents run into conflicts and stresses that overtax their support systems and coping resources, maladaptive behaviors or psychological disorders are likely to occur. The role of conflict, frustration coping, prevention and treatment in troubled adolescent behavior is reviewed; the clinical and behavioral syndromes of running away, depression, suicide, eating disturbances, schizophrenia, drug abuse, and juvenile delinquency are covered as well. Each syndrome is discussed from a perspective that includes historical notes, descriptive symptoms, statistics, etiology, causation and dynamics, consequences and outcomes, treatment, prevention, discussion questions, and suggestions for parents, educators, counselors, and youth workers. Case histories are used to illustrate the behavioral and clinical symptoms.