Study Guide

Physical Development:

Probably the biggest changes you’ll experience are changes in your body. The only other time your body changes this much and as quickly is when you’re an infant.

The basic shape of our bodies changes as we grow and develop. Girls become more curvy, narrower at the waist, and broader at the hips and shoulders. Boys become broader at the shoulders and more muscular.  Both boys and girls voices deepen.

Both girls and boys grow body hair and develop sweat glands. Chemicals called hormones control many of these changes.

A physical growth spurt has nothing to do with how mature a person acts or feels. Many adolescents whose bodies have matured and developed still often think and feel like children. It can be confusing for them and their parents.

Intellectual Development

For example you start changing from concrete to abstract thinking.

 Concrete thinking is looking at the moon and seeing it is the size of a basketball.

By age 10 or so, we understand that the moon only appears to be small because it is so far from Earth. This is an example of abstract thinking.

Social Development

Social development is developing new relationships and new ways of relating to others; changes in relationships with the opposite sex.

Most people your age want to be liked and accepted by other people your age.

 This need to be accepted can work for you or against you. On the positive side, it can encourage you to do your best so people will like you.

 On the negative side, it may cause you to do things that are wrong or that you really don’t want to do just so you will fit in with the crowd or so people will like you.

Resisting negative influences is one of the greatest challenges you will face in the next few years. We’ll be looking at ways to do this throughout this course.

Emotional Development

Because of all the changes adolescence brings, you may sometimes feel worried or uncertain about the future.

 You may have the feeling that no one understands what you’re going through. You may be moody and angry one minute and then feel happy and excited a short time later. It can be like riding on a roller coaster.

In adolescence your emotions can change rapidly from one moment to the next. Some of this is related to the physical changes in your body. The hormones that cause physical changes also affect your emotions.