The transition from childhood to young adulthood, known as adolescence, is a challenging process both for the individual forming their identity and for the relationships formed with family and the social environment during this time.
Adolescent counseling is a structure that provides support during this transition process, addressing the problems encountered or situations that cannot be overcome.
What is Adolescent Counseling?
Adolescence is the stage where an individual is no longer a child but not yet an adult, where they begin to assert themselves and form their identity. During the self-assertion phase in adolescence, the individual critically examines all previously accepted truths and pursues their own truths. In this sense, adolescents desire more freedom and, in many ways, more flexibility while also trying to adapt to their changing physiological structure and emotional state. The complex nature of adolescence, which is both hormonal and physiological as well as psychological, leads to more anger and rebelliousness. At this point, the newly formed identity of the adolescent may clash with the established family structure. Adolescent counseling plans to ensure the proper tracking of adolescence, a period of physiological, psychological, and social transition, by the family while also supporting the construction of the individual's identity.
Additionally, with adolescent counseling, efforts are made to prevent issues such as depression, substance use, and antisocial behavior that may occur during adolescence.
Adolescent counseling helps create individuals who are able to express themselves, positive, capable of constructing their own truths, and can establish healthy communication both with their family and socially. In this regard, sessions are conducted with adolescent individuals and families, either simultaneously or at different times.
Adolescent counseling functions as a balancing element in the relationship between the individual who is forming their identity and their family.
Why is Adolescent Counseling Necessary?
Adolescence is a complex process in terms of both physiological and emotional states, as well as social relationships, and is often a conflictual transition. During this process, the individual struggles to understand themselves, and this situation is reflected in family and social relationships as well.
Adolescent counseling aims to balance and support the individual who is trying to understand and build themselves during this process. Adolescence is a search for self-expression. Adolescent counseling plays a critical role in properly guiding this search and ensuring that the individual first establishes communication with themselves.
It is crucial for families to understand this challenging transition process, as this understanding will help the process unfold more healthily. Adolescent counseling aims to help families understand the process and shape their approach to their children based on a clear understanding of the general characteristics of adolescence.
When Can You Seek Adolescent Counseling?
Adolescent counseling addresses the process as a whole by examining both the individual's communication with themselves and their family and social relationships. In this regard, situations where adolescent counseling can be sought are as follows:
- Adapting to physical changes
- Behavioral problems in adolescents
- Experiencing exam anxiety
- Experiencing fluctuating emotional reactions during adolescence
- Commonly encountered anger and aggression behaviors in adolescence
- Providing family support during adolescence
- Observing difficulties in forming friendships
- Conflicts or communication problems between the adolescent and their family
- Turning to substance use during adolescence
- Emerging self-confidence issues in the adolescent
- Guidance and support for making the right choice of friends
- Social phobia or the emergence of social anxiety
- Adolescent depression
- Providing necessary support for identity formation during adolescence
- Attention deficit observed during adolescence
- Emergence of anxiety disorders in adolescents
- Noticing behaviors such as stealing, committing crimes during adolescence
- Social exclusion
- Development of antisocial behaviors
- Emergence of obsessive-compulsive behaviors in adolescents
