Adolescence: A Case Study (1978)

Well, for one thing, I'm a Gemini, and I go back and forth a lot. Change my mind, and my moon's in Pisces, and that means that I'm going to fall in love a lot. This is Andy. I don't mind that. She's 17 years old. In the past few years, she's grown physically and she's matured emotionally. At the same time, she's entered a new phase of mental development. one that's causing some changes in her life. At 17, Angie now finds herself asking why, about things that in her earlier childhood she would have taken for granted. She's no longer inclined to accept things as they are. Instead, she's now able to think about how they might be or how they should be. School, I I'm getting to the point where I don't like it anymore. You know, I'm getting good grades and stuff, but the whole idea of being locked up, I don't I don't like the idea that they have to be there on time. You you have to get out on time, certain time. Hey, I just heard dangerous dance. You told me you kids. My sister says I'm I've got senioritis. That can't be because I'm only a junior. Hurry up. We're late. Hi. All you kids out at I'm sorry you guys. I didn't know what time it was. My alarm clock broke and I just didn't know what time. I'm sorry guys. I don't even know what time it is. What time is it anyway? It's time to go. We're late. Sorry. The other day my boss asked me how long songs should be. I said, "Well, pretty much the same as short songs should be." Good. And if it's good you're looking for, this certainly is. It's Terry the content people. Sweet orphan lady. Mental development in adolescence is rather different than that in the middle years. Angie and her friends are now capable of what psychologist Jean Pia called formal operations. That means they think not only about things and events, but also about abstract concepts, ideas, relations, and assertions. Professor John Favl of Stanford University. uh the older child, the adolescent is more capable, it seems, of thinking about things in general, uh asking himself or herself, well, you know, what if such and such were the case? Or let's suppose that such and such were the case. What would then follow from that imaginary state of affairs? You can fly. No, it only takes about an hour. I'm sure costy bucks for both of us. That's fast. Well, Joe can afford it. Suppose he asked you. Would you go? I don't know. I might. What would happen if your if your parents found out? First of all, I don't find out. What would your sister say? Uh, she'd probably get mad at first, but she would she can't say much because her I know for a fact her and Gary used to take off like that before they were married. So, the child is able to engage in hypothetical thinking. able to set up hypotheses and effect and then imagine what consequences follow from those hypotheses. Gosh, my dad found out he's going to punch Joe. He's always told me he wish. PJ did a lot of research and others have too with children of of in this age period and uh found that in many simple situations at least they were able to reason a little bit like a scientist reasons by adopting a hypothesis actually testing it out trying to control variables to find out which variables affect an outcome and which variables do not much in the same way that a scientist does. So sometimes PI's formal operational reasoning as it's called in his theory uh can be described as resembling scientific reasoning in the way today class we're going to play a game. I'm going to be a Martian today. All right. Now what I would like you to do is I would like all of you to think about the definition of a circle. Now can anybody give me in everyday terms the definition of a circle? Anyone? Louise, it's round like a circle or a ball. Okay, that's that's not clear enough. Now, as a Martian, if I didn't know what a circle was, I probably wouldn't know what round was. In adolescence, the thinking skills that have been developed in the middle years expand and become more refined. In high school, the work becomes more theoretical in nature. Teenagers are challenged to use their new hypothetical or formal thinking skills. Is that a circle? No. is it is a close line though. So, we're getting closer. Yeah. Does it have anything to do with pi? All right. Now, I said in everyday terms, let's not get into mathematical definitions. Let's just define a circle in everyday words. Okay. Something else. Now, we need to know, we need to get clearer on this. I don't think some of you realize how important a circle is. Angie, you have to establish a reference point within a closed line. As far as the adolescent is concerned, much of what he encounters in his schoolwork is really uh a new form of abstraction. He's taught uh uh geometry which uh then is a process of starting with some axioms and reasoning from these to certain conclusions then testing and proving the conclusions. Uh he's can move on to trigonometry. he can move on to uh the study of physics where he appreciates that the rules of physics are not real life roles and but for ceremony such a wretch ending days with toil and nights with sleep had the forehand advantage of a king now what do you think that Shakespeare was trying adolescence become quite capable of understanding things that in the middle years would have been meaningless to them they begin to think in symbolic terms. Somebody's got to know. Barbara, what do you think Shakespeare was trying to say to us? Um, I think he was trying to say that kings uh don't have it any better than regular people. All right, not bad. During this period, teenagers start to talk about the meaning behind they start to experiment with expressing themselves often times through the arts, music, poetry. Novelist is a poet who has failed. I guess that a novelist takes a whole book to try to get the point across and yet a poet just takes a few lines. The advent of formal thinking skills doesn't mean however that each and every teenager suddenly turns into a poet philosopher or a rocket scientist. Indeed, research has shown that the development of hypothetical thought occurs at different ages and to different degrees depending on such variables as intellectual capacity and socioeconomic status. And what does dowoing mean? What we can say, however, is that adolescents, like most of us, focus their powers of thought on practical day-to-day matters. Angie, uh, Angie, could you uh give me your attention for a second? Why do you think that Shakespeare the fact of the matter seems to be all these words that when you look at real life adolescence in their real life situations they're much more preoccupied with matters of the self the presentation of the self relations between the sexes uh future vocations values uh and indeed to ask them to perform intellectual tasks is almost like asking them to focus on something that is very remote and uh not part of their ordinary existence. Uh it might even be not too radical a proposal to say that the high school years and the college years are a very poor time for formal education to take place. If as Dr. Church suggests the adolescent period is a poor time for formal education to take place, it's ironic that the reason should be the development of new thinking skills. It is a fact, however, that mental development doesn't occur in a vacuum. It's completely intertwined with aspects of physical and personality development. Oh, yes. Hi, you guys. Look, Brenda Mo is wearing a dress. About time. She's now wearing dresses. No, she wore a dress cuz just to wear one. I asked her if uh if she wore for a special reason. She said no. She's wearing it because she's wearing to impress somebody. She's trying to get That's the only reason why I felt that. Angie, like most teenagers, will concentrate her mental abilities towards things that most directly affect her. Are we going to eat interaction with friends, self-concept, relations with the opposite sex? Well, I'm sorry. Very brutal. Yet at the same time, Angie has a newfound ability to look at larger situations, to become intensely involved in issues that only remotely affect her. Such is the dichotomy of the teenager. But the thing that I'm saying is these illegal aliens come up from the border and they take the jobs that that should be had by Americans. Take all jobs. Take all wet jobs. The jobs that we have here that that Americans could get. The jobs that they have here aren't are jobs that nobody wants anyways. But we should take care of of Americans who live here first, not aliens. What do you mean aliens? You're an alien. I'm not. Where did your grandparents come? They came from Germany. But so what? I Okay, Germany. We're Indians. We belong here and probably even more than you. I don't think so. We've lived here a long time. You've got Mexico anyway. That's that's your guys country. No. What about the Statue of Liberty? Give us uh your tired and humble masses. It's huddle masses, Barb. Huddle mass. Huddle? What is the Statue of Liberty? There is what is often referred to as personal fable involved in adolescent mental development. Angie is convinced that she is totally unique. That no one in the history of the world has ever felt as she does, ever loved so much, ever been so misunderstood, ever been so exquisitly sensitive to the injustices of modern society. Angie firmly believes this about herself, and each of her friends firmly believes the same about themselves. in any other country. Do you have Of course, I don't want to say that my girlfriend's dumb, but the other day she tried to overhaul the engine in her car by going through the ignition keyhole. Another aspect of adolescent mental development is something that might best be described as teenage paranoia. For the first time, the adolescent is capable of thinking about what other people are thinking. The shag across the gym floor, tear the crate paper off the wall. was Bob Badam and uh he's singing a thousand from the sun. It's hard to pass a mirror without looking in it. But anyways, I think it's hard for any anybody. I think it's hard not to. If I see something's wrong, my hair sticking up or something, it really upsets me because I think of all the people who have seen me that way. Like I pass by the mirror and I have lipstick smeared all over my mouth. I just think of how long it's been there and how many people have seen it and what they thought. One of the reasons that many teenagers are so self-conscious is because they often mistakenly assume that other people are as preoccupied with them as they are with themselves. Dr. John Favl of Stanford University. One of the interesting things about this, it seems to me, is that say the seven-year-old doesn't have that kind of a semi-paranoid feeling, partly because he doesn't have the intellectual equipment to do it. It's only after you develop the ability to think about the thoughts of others and to imagine what they might be that you can get yourself into those kinds of hang-ups. So I think a lot of the the self-consciousness of the adolescent and so forth is could be thought of in a funny way as a result of his newly minted uh thinking skills. He's able to imagine for the first time how other people are thinking of him and regarding him and therefore he can as it were he can get himself into new kinds of worries and anxieties that he wouldn't have had at age five or six. [Applause] [Music] The reason that most teenagers believe that all eyes are on them is because they're still more or less egocentric. For all of their newfound adult thinking skills, they still retain the belief that the world orbits around them. Pretty much the same attitude they had as infants. In a way, babies believe that other people exist to feed and care for them. Teenagers believe that other people exist to be an audience for them. And that's why it's important for every little hair to be in just the right place because the audience is watching. This raises an interesting question. What happens when several adolescents get together? What are we going to do? Look, he's in the back with him. What are we going to do? What happens when several teenage egos meet? Each convinced that it's the real center of attention. Hold. It looks like they're going past. No. Oh, they're coming around the brush. Okay. Okay. Embarrassing you guys. Who's with them? Look. John's there, you guys. John, he's cute, you guys. Oh, Louise. Come on. Oh, shoot. They're coming. Okay, just turn around. Just turn around. Look around. Turn around. Hey, you guys want to go for a ride? We came to pick you up. What else? Where are you guys going? Anywhere party or anywhere you want to go? Please get in here. What does that have to do with anything? Hey, you guys want to go to the party or somewhere? Go to back in the box. Go. Come on. No, it's all right. We just don't wait. Go on. Yeah, we know what kind of parties you go to. Hey, have you ever known me to do anything that was that wasn't David Elkine observed that gatherings of adolescence are unique? Each is more concerned with being observed than with observing. Each is more concerned with being an actor than being an audience. Hey, her boyfriend told us to come pick her up. Guys, let's get out of here. Along about 17, however, this lingering egoentrism usually begins to fade. Angie, for example, is beginning to realize that she's not the center of everything. For the first time, she's beginning to consider the possibility that it's she who must adapt to the world and not the other way around. Her increased mental abilities are bringing with them increased perception, important insights into things that would have scarcely concerned her a few years ago. Sometimes it seems more lately I get depressed, like kind of down. I mean, just listening to the news. I mean, God, we're really running out of everything in the world. Teenagers suddenly have an infinite capacity for introspection, self-evaluation. Angie, like many adolescence her age, can take a good look around and ask, "How do I fit in? What are my chances? What are my values? And how do they compare with the values of others?" Abstract thinking allows Angie to place herself historically and to consider what might happen in the future. Sometimes the answers come easy, but most times they don't. [Music] In your eyes, I see. The ability to love is a very important milestone on the way to maturity. The ability to give oneself to another without feeling personally threatened or diminished. To understand that there can be a close intimate relationship that consists of three things. A you, a me, and an us. All three are separate and all three are related. Well, I don't think that means I'm going to spend the rest of my life with Al. I could, of course, but I don't think I will. I I like being with him cuz I trust him. Angie is becoming an adult slowly. Obviously, anyone who talks to her can recognize how sophisticated her thought processes have become. Indeed, her ability to formalize thought is the final stage in mental development. She will continue to learn, of course, but there will be no more qualitative leaps to improve her thinking [Music] processes. She is becoming an adult. Are you ready for Christmas? Huh? Yep. What do you want to get for Christmas? Clothes and pants and new shoes. The same thing. When she was 2 or three, the world was much simpler for Angie. It was dominated by what she could touch, taste, see, and hear. She never reasoned things out beyond that. She was the center of everything. And what she needed or wanted, she got. Like her three-year-old niece, Angie still has wants and needs. Unlike her niece, however, Angie now realizes that those wants and needs may not be automatically met. This final step in mental development is a bittersweet experience. On the one hand, Angie, like most teenagers, must come to grips with the fact that she is not the hub of the universe. She has wants and needs that may never be met. On the other hand, as her thought processes mature, she becomes much better able to think about her own identity, to form adult relationships with other people, and to determine how and where she fits into society. Who are you? Who Who am I? Well, I Oh, I don't know. Why is it every time we do this, you ask me the same question? I don't know what you want to hear. I don't know what to tell you. I mean, I know who I am, but I don't know what you want to hear. I don't I mean, I don't know what to tell you. I don't know what to say. Well, I don't I don't want to do this anymore. [Music]