Elena O. Nightingale

Facilitating the transitions of adolescence: Council on Adolescent Development.

The Council on Adolescent Development has been launched by the Carnegie Corporation of New York to foster sustained and informed attention toward reducing the number of serious casualties in adolescence to promote healthier adolescent development and to help young people make a more successful transition to adulthood. The council will work to interest American society in adolescents and to stimulate more concern caring and knowledge about this age group. The onset of adolescence is a critical period of both biological and psychological change. Recent events have changed markedly the experience of adolescence making it more difficult than previously in some ways. For many adolescence also involves dramatic changes in the social environment such as the transition from elementary to middle or junior high school or the easy access to potentially life-threatening activities and substances. Erosion of traditional family and social support networks adds to the problems. Yet there appear to be fundamental human needs that endure and are crucial to survival and healthy development despite the biological social and technological changes surrounding adolescence. These include the need to find a place in a valued group that provides some sense of belonging along with the need to feel a sense of worth as a person. About 15% of the 36 million people between the ages of 10-19 years in the US are black and 9% are Hispanic. It is estimated that about 6.5 million of these young people live in poverty. And almost every form of damage is more prevalent among the poor including educational disability early pregnancy alcohol and other drug abuse school dropout serious injury and failure to become economically self-sufficient. Early adolescence is a time of particular vulnerability and adolescent from all social groups drop out of school commit violent or otherwise criminal acts become pregnant take up smoking abuse alcohol and other drugs succumb to mental disorders attempt suicide die or become disabled from injuries. There were 4.5 million adolescent females 15-19 years in 1982 who were sexually active and at risk of becoming pregnant. 1 in 10 adolescent females becomes pregnant during adolescents and most of the pregnancies are unintended. Illicit drug use in the US is greater than in any other developed country. There is an opportunity for preventive intervention before health damaging patterns become firmly established. A particularly promising intervention focuses on peer-mediated approaches and life-skills training. Another useful kind of intervention provides opportunities for constructive activities for adolescents in the community. It is encouraging that the American Medical Association has launched an Adolescent Health Initiative.