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Running Head: AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 1

At-Risk Adolescent

Student’s Name

Institutional Affiliation

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 2

At-Risk Adolescents

The adolescence developmental changes often make the adolescents become alienated

from family and their relatives and thus engage in the risk-taking behaviour such as violence,

homelessness, pregnancy and early marriages (Jessor, 2001). Additionally, most of the problems

and disorders that an adult may suffer from usually begin during adolescent stage. Risk behaviours

in adolescents lower the quality of life and decrease chances of becoming a well-adjusted adult

(Steinberg, 2010). Thus, this paper aims to describe more about these at-risk adolescents for

students and its relations to decline in their population and some of the solutions that can help them

to connect with education and change their future.

According to Dube et al., (2003), about 1 to 1.7 million children in the United States who

stay away from their homes become homeless yearly. Homelessness in children can result due to

irreconcilable family conflicts or non-existent family home. Children, who are rendered homeless

during adolescents, often get exposed to unfavourable outcomes, such as violence and minimal or

lack of opportunity to school. Research shows that about 39% of the sheltered homeless children

miss more than a week in every two months of study and moves from one school to another more

than five times in every twelve months (Steinberg, 2010). More often, this homeless kid faces

series of serious problems academically, such as failure to read thus resulting in considerably poor

performance. Therefore, such cases usually contribute to a decline in student’s population.

Also, sexual behaviour is one of the most critical health issues for children in the adolescent

stage. The adolescents involve themselves in sexual activity at an early age without the use of

protectives and having multiple partners (Silverman, Raj, Mucci and Hathaway, 2001). Such

unprotected sex exposes them to teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections such as

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 3

Gonorrhea (Garnefski and Arends, 2008). Most often, such cases result in adverse health and social

outcomes. Eventually, they will drop out of school and hence contribute to the current decrease in

student’s population. Such incidences also cause friction between the student and the parents thus

contributing to family instability.

Furthermore, drugs abuse is one of the most disturbing health problem affecting the

adolescents across the world nowadays. Drugs abuse among the adolescents usually relates

significantly with a mental disorder (Jessor, 2001). In fact, most of the school going youths in

adolescence are prone to mental illness, either temporarily or permanently. Most of them become

mad, disturbed by the school situations (Steinberg, 2010) and they eventually drop out of school

resulting in a reduced student’s population. As a result, while the adolescents are expected to be

the leaders of tomorrow, it is evident that most of them are already dealing with disrupted

interpersonal relationships, especially within the family and educational setting. Such issues

contribute to poor performance in school, and eventually, it will force them to drop out of school

altogether thus resulting in a decline in student’s population and family instability.

Moreover, early marriage has been one of the problems affecting the adolescents.

According to Sawyer et al., (2012), married men seduce or even compel the adolescents to have

sex with them in the context of marriage. The urge to have sex more frequently increases typically

during adolescence (Jessor, 2001), and it is at this time that most adolescent risk pregnancy, which

could eventually lead to early marriages. Ignorance and poverty often cause early marriage among

the young school going adolescents. Thus, parents marry off their daughters in order reduce their

economic budget or as a way of connecting to wealthy individuals. Also, parent’s ignorance makes

them think that it is better to marry off their children to avoid the shame of having kids outside

wedlock. Early marriages affect the girls’ school enrolment significantly. Most of the child brides

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 4

are often forced to drop out of school while they lack skills to aid in lifting their family out of

poverty ( Steinberg, 2010). Besides, child brides are frequently kept apart from their friends,

resulting in gender inequality and separation from family. All those factors often contribute to

decreasing student’s population.

The primary cause of homelessness is the current housing affordability gap. Over the past

decade, New York City has lost hundreds of thousands of affordable housings (Dube et al.,2003;

Steinberg 2010), hence rendering most of its people who cannot afford increasing cost homeless.

Thus, the government should consider expanding permanent supportive housing, since it has

proved successful in solving the housing problem. Once this problem is solved, it is clear that most

homeless children will get an opportunity to reconnect with schooling and therefore secure their

future.

Besides, the only way that teenage sexual behaviour can be solved is by having consistent,

open communication and distinct family roles (Silverman, Raj, Mucci and Hathaway, 2001). Such

factors enable children to acknowledge and embrace their parents as their teachers and that they

are still learners. Thus, it is vital for the family to have more time for themselves (Steinberg, 2010).

When this problem is solved, most students education would not be interrupted and that most of

them will have a chance to study and secure their future. The student’s population will begin to

rise.

Similarly, according to Jessor, (2001), the best way of solving drugs and substances abuse

is by dealing with peer pressure efficiently. Most students often use drugs just because their friends

are using them. Such notion should be trained off their brains entirely. Such is possible only if one

will change the kind of friends they associate together (Steinberg, 2010). It will ensure that students

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 5

do not fall into the trap of drug abuse and therefore reduces the number of dropouts, a situation

which will ensure that most students graduate and get the future they have always yearned to have.

Finally, the legislation against child marriage should be supported (Bayisenge, 2010). The

women rights activist had fought for the enactment of the rules prohibiting teenage marriage.

However, such laws must be recommended to ensure that they are applied as expected (Sawyer et

al., 2012). Thus, early marriages will reduce significantly hence giving room for young girls to

further their studies and have the bright future they could be yearning to have.

It is therefore evident that the adolescence is a developmental stage that can either make or

break children. The parents and teachers should be too vigilant on how they deal with children at

this stage. They should instil a moral sense to them before it becomes too late (Jessor,2001), as

those children are the next leaders of this great nation. Additionally, a lot needs to be done to

salvage those who have already felled to the at-risk behaviours associated with this developmental

stage (Bayisenge,2010). Some of the at-risk responses and their impacts on children academically

has been described in this paper, together with some of the recommended ways in which such

problems can be dealt with once and for all.

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 6

References

Jessor, R. (2001). Risk behaviour in adolescence: a psychosocial framework for understanding

and action. Journal of Adolescent Health.

Silverman, J. G., Raj, A., Mucci, L. A., & Hathaway, J. E. (2001). Dating violence against

adolescent girls and associated substance use, unhealthy weight control, sexual risk

behaviour, pregnancy, and suicidality. Jama, 286(5), 572-579.

Steinberg, L. (2010). A dual systems model of adolescent risk‐taking. Developmental

Psychobiology, 52(3), 216-224.

Dube, S. R., Felitti, V. J., Dong, M., Chapman, D. P., Giles, W. H., & Anda, R. F. (2003).

Childhood abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction and the risk of illicit drug use: the

adverse childhood experiences study. Pediatrics, 111(3), 564-572.

Ellis, B. J., Bates, J. E., Dodge, K. A., Fergusson, D. M., John Horwood, L., Pettit, G. S., &

Woodward, L. (2003). Does father absence place daughters at particular risk for early

sexual activity and teenage pregnancy?. Child development, 74(3), 801-821.

Ennett, S. T., Bailey, S. L., & Federman, E. B. (1999). Social network characteristics associated

with risky behaviours among runaway and homeless youth. Journal of health and social

action, 63-78.

Linnet, K. M., Dalsgaard, S., Obel, C., Wisborg, K., Henriksen, T. B., Rodriguez, A., ... &

Jarvelin, M. R. (2003). Maternal lifestyle factors in pregnancy risk of attention deficit

hyperactivity disorder and associated behaviours: a review of the current

evidence. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160(6), 1028-1040.

AT-RISK ADOLESCENTS 7

Brent, D. A., Perper, J. A., Goldstein, C. E., Kolko, D. J., Allan, M. J., Allman, C. J., & Zelenak,

J. P. (2008). Risk factors for adolescent suicide. Arch Gen Psychiatry, 45(6), 581-588.

Kilpatrick, D. G., Acierno, R., Saunders, B., Resnick, H. S., Best, C. L., & Schnurr, P. P.

(2000). Risk factors for adolescent substance abuse and dependence: data from a national

sample. Journal of consulting and clinical psychology, 68(1), 19.

Garnefski, N., & Arends, E. (2008). Sexual abuse and adolescent maladjustment: Differences

between male and female victims. Journal of Adolescence, 21(1), 99-107.

Sawyer, S. M., Afifi, R. A., Bearinger, L. H., Blakemore, S. J., Dick, B., Ezeh, A. C., & Patton,

G. C. (2012). Adolescence: a foundation for future health. The Lancet, 379(9826), 1630-

1640.

Bayisenge, J. (2010). Early marriage as a barrier to girl’s education. Retrieved on, 1(10), 2010.

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