Working with Adolescents

Erik Erikson (1950), among other developmental theorists, referred to adolescence as a time of “psychosocial moratorium”, a phrase that represents the transition from childhood to adulthood. During that phase, the most important developmental task is to explore alternative identity approaches and lifestyles, striving to discover one's unique preferences and form a coherent personality (Erikson, 1968). However, until adolescence the child's parents were responsible for the management of those matters. One might argue that parents are not always aware of the need to pass on this authority to their child, or know how to recognize the right timing to do so. Naturally, such a situation creates possibilities for frequent conflicts, challenging parental authority and establishing behavioral problems. It is, therefore, a period characterized by extreme emotional alterations presenting as passion, affection, and altruism, as well as rebellion, anarchy and chaos (Cooper, Grotevant, & Condon, 1983; Hill & Holmbeck, 1986; Waldron, et. al, 2007; William, 2009; Steketee, 2012). While in most situations adults actively refer themselves to therapy, adolescents usually do not initiate therapy but submit themselves to different levels of compliance to their parent’s (or other adults) demand for treatment. Since they are subjected to their guardianship authority, legally and practically, adolescents are often brought unwillingly to therapy. Because their parents are those who perceive the situation as problematic and demand a therapeutic solution, the adolescents may not even sense the existence of a problem or aspire to change. Although they might be cooperative to a certain degree and allow interaction with a therapist while in session. That it is not a result of their planning and will (Ollendick & Vasey, 1999; Shirk & Saiz, 1992 in Hawley & Weisz, 2003; Barrett, & Rappaport, 2011; Yeh & Weisz, 2001, in Truneckova & Viney, 2008; Gatta & Spoto, 2010). The power parents have over their children does not always enable those to convince them to engage in therapy, especially if their child demonstrates persistence and determination and does not readily cooperate with the parents. Additionally, even if the parents are successful in convincing the adolescent to engage in treatment, the adolescents often perceive the therapist as an "accomplice" of the parents or other authority figures and a part of the adult system. Naturally, most of the information the therapist receives at the beginning of the process came from the parents and shaped by their point of view. Furthermore, the parents are usually in charge of ensuring that the adolescent will attend therapy, and play a primary role in deciding whether and for how long to continue treatment (Armbruster & Kazdin, 1994; Cottrell, Hill, Walk, Dearnaley, & Ierotheou, 1988, in Hawley & Weisz, 2003). In addition, when the therapeutic process is conducted in private practice, the parents a``````re those who are paying for the therapy sessions. All those facts being known to the adolescent, they expect the therapist, being an adult assigned by their parents, to serve their parents interests in the conflict between them. They expect the therapist to be judgmental, detached from their adolescent world and incapable of understanding their perspective. As a result, they tend to feel threatened and demonstrate suspicion. Therefore, adolescent clients tend to be actively resistant to psychotherapy from the start, especially if the therapy was forced upon them. Successful psychotherapy with adolescents, therefore, requires an open mind and flexibility, integration of contemporary empirical knowledge with diverse theoretical perspectives. Moreover, a respectful approach towards the adolescents, the values they cherish and their autonomy (Szapocznik et al. 1988; Barrett & Rappaport, 2011; Sommers-Flanagan, Richardson, & Sommers-Flanagan, 2011; Thornberry, 2005). It is a natural desire of parents to share their experience and the conclusions they have reached in life with their children, as part of their education. In fact, most parents take an active role in defining many aspects of their children life. The process of adolescence is in many ways the transition from being determined by one's parents to defining oneself. One might say that "adolescence rebellion" is a byproduct of the collision between the adolescent attempt to attain the right to define themselves and the parent's refusal to give up their role as definers. The struggle over the definition of the situation is a typical phenomenon that might occur whenever there is an interaction between several participants. In a dyadic struggle, both sides do not recognize the sovereignty of the other. In contrast, genuine negotiation occurs when all parties recognize the right of the others to express their input. The more complicated the parent makes it for the adolescent to gain the right of definition, the less the adolescent will acknowledge the parent's input and advice (Goffman, 1959; Steketee, 2012). That may be demonstrated by envisioning a piece of land covered with a plastic sheet. Any plant wishing to grow beyond the layer blocking its way would then turn to alternative paths of growth until reaching an outer zone. The outcome would plant that were sown in one place but grow in a curved (diverted) path away from their original path. Similarly, even an ordinary adolescent facing repression and lack of independence might turn to an unaccepted path in order to find a "corridor" to the place in which he expect to be appreciated and allowed to bloom. In many cases, he might do so even if the "social price" would be being defined as "problematic" by their environment and he will experience the consequences of it.