Today’s Youth​—The Challenges They Face

“RESEARCH shows that the teen years are without a doubt among the most confusing and stressful times of life.” So wrote Dr. Bettie B. Youngs in her book Helping Your Teenager Deal With Stress. In times past, youths had their hands full just being young. Nowadays, though, they must deal with both the travails of adolescence and the formidable adult pressures of life in the 1990’s.

Wrote Dr. Herbert Friedman in World Health magazine: “The transition from child to adult has never before taken place in a period of such dramatic change, be it the extraordinary increase in the world’s population, the accelerated urbanisation which has accompanied it, and the technological revolutions in communications and travel that have almost overnight created conditions never seen before.”

One teenage girl named Kathy thus says: “It is so hard growing up in a time like ours.” Drug addiction, suicide, alcohol abuse​—these are the reactions of some youths to the stresses and strains of these “critical times hard to deal with.”​—2 Timothy 3:1.

Revolution in the Family

Dr. Youngs recalls: “Our parents had time for us. Many of us had mothers who made full-time careers of child rearing.” But today, “many women cannot or choose not to stay at home and rear their children full-time. They work and have to juggle careers and families. There aren’t enough hours in the day; something has to give. Too often, what gives is the time and support a parent can give her child. During the most vulnerable time of life, a teenager is left alone to cope with physical, mental, and emotional changes.”​—Helping Your Teenager Deal With Stress.

The 1990’s will no doubt continue to see family structures dramatically altered by divorce (50 percent of marriages in the United States end in divorce), illegitimate births, and the growing trend for couples to live together though unmarried. Already, about 1 out of 4 families in the United States is headed by a single parent. A growing number of families are stepfamilies formed by remarriage.

Are children in such family structures at risk of emotional or psychological damage? Some claim, for example, that children in single-parent households are more prone to loneliness, sadness, and insecurity than are youths raised in traditional families. True, many single-parent families and stepfamilies function with little apparent detriment to the children. The Scriptures make it clear, though, that God intended for children to be reared by two parents. (Ephesians 6:1, 2) Variations from this ideal situation are sure to bring added stresses and strains.

A revolution in family life is also going on in many developing lands. There, the traditional structure was the extended family, in which all adult family members had a share in raising children. Urbanization and industrialization are rapidly cutting extended family ties​—and the flow of needed support for youths.

Writes one young African woman: “There are no aunts or any other relative to counsel me on what it means to grow up. Parents expect this subject to be covered at school​—and the school leaves it to the parents. The sense of children belonging to the community is no longer there.”a

Economic Anxieties

Young people also feel much anxiety over the world’s worsening economy. In fact, 4 out of 5 youths live in developing lands and face the prospects of life-long poverty and unemployment. Says 17-year-old Luv, a resident of India: “Amongst youth in our country, at present there is a great deal of unemployment, so is it surprising that young people get sick and unhappy, fall victim to vices, run away from home or even commit suicide?”

Youths in the affluent West have money worries of their own. Consider, for example, a U.S. teen survey reported in the magazine Children Today: “When questioned about specific topics that concerned them, teenagers tended to identify issues relating to money and the future.” Among the top ten concerns of teens were “paying for college,” the “country heading for [an economic] depression,” and “not earning enough.”

Ironically, though, some experts believe that even financially advantaged youths will suffer in the long run. Newsweek magazine observed: “By the ’80s, three out of four [U.S.] high-school seniors were working an average of 18 hours a week and often taking home more than $200 a month”​—probably more pocket money than their parents had! Predictably, these “earnings were immediately spent on cars, clothing, stereos and other artifacts of the adolescent good life.”

Writer Bruce Baldwin notes that such youths “grow up with expectations . . . that the good life will always be available for the asking whether they develop personal accountability and achievement motivation or not.” But they “suffer a rude awakening when they leave home. The artificial home environment may in fact be so far removed from the real expectations of the marketplace and the demands of mature adult functioning that they may experience something akin to culture shock.”

Shifting Moral Codes and Values

Dramatic shifts in morals and other values are also a source of confusion among youths. “Sex . . . in my grandmother’s youth was a word unheard of,” says Ramani, a young woman from Sri Lanka. “Sex in marriage was not discussed, not even in the family or with the doctor, and sex outside marriage was nonexistent.” However, old taboos have all but vanished. “Teenage sex has become almost a way of life,” she reports.

Not surprisingly, when a survey was taken of 510 high (secondary) school students in the United States, their number two concern was “that they might contract AIDS”! But now that the door of the “new morality” has been flung open, few youths seem willing to take seriously any talk of closing it by practicing monogamy​—much less by waiting till marriage. As one French youth asked: “At our age, can we commit ourselves to be faithful all our life?” AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases will thus continue to threaten the life and health of many youths.

What Kind of Future?

Young people have another nagging concern. The prospect of inheriting a ruined earth​—its atmosphere depleted of ozone, its temperatures soaring under a global greenhouse effect, its lush forests stripped away, its air and water unfit for breathing and drinking—​worries many youths. Although diminishing at present, the threat of nuclear war makes some wonder if mankind will even have a future!

It is clear, then, that young people today face enormous challenges.

Today’s Youth​—Meeting the Challenges of the 1990’s

NOVEMBER 1985. Dignitaries from 103 lands gathered at the United Nations headquarters to map out “a global strategy addressing the problems of the world’s young people.”​—UN Chronicle.

Five years have elapsed, and the problems of youth loom larger than ever. Clashes of political philosophy, a dearth of funds, and ever-shifting priorities have frustrated the well-meaning attempts of governments to work together in behalf of young people.

Religion has likewise failed to be an effective force for good. Recent Gallup surveys in the United States reveal that while the vast majority of youths (about 90 percent) believe in God (or a universal spirit), only a minority consider religion to be very important in their lives. Furthermore, religion has done little or nothing to curb promiscuous sexual behavior.

Then there are the so-called experts​—psychologists, sociologists, counselors, and the like—​who dispense advice to youths. Some of it is sound and helpful. Their advice, though, tends to focus on physical concerns: the economic hardships of teen pregnancy, avoiding AIDS, the physical dangers of drug abuse. Rarely, if ever, do they confront the far more important moral issues involved. The “experts” are generally content to follow the current swings of popular sentiment or to repeat catchy slogans, such as “Safe sex” or “Just say no!”

What about parents? All too many are preoccupied with the business of living. Insecure as to what guidance to give or uncomfortable with discussing delicate matters, many parents tend to beg off when touchy issues arise. Little wonder, then, that many youths turn to inexperienced peers for help.