How Do You Act Like An Adult? Pointers, Experiences & Theories Please!

[freakofnurture]

I love seeing all the independent thoughts about adulthood here, and how positive a meaning that word is given by you all.

Since we are all injured, vulnerable people this might implicate yet another dimension of meaning:

Being an adult means to be able to defend oneself, to be able to stand up, to speak up, to insist that your rights and needs are respected. Being an adult means to demand that you're taken seriously. It also means that you aren't a helpless victim.

 

[Helliepig]

Being an adult means to be able to defend oneself, to be able to stand up, to speak up, to insist that your rights and needs are respected. Being an adult means to demand that you're taken seriously. It also means that you aren't a helpless victim.

This is so true. Being able to get away from bad people, to choose your friends, to learn about healthy relationships, to exercise control

 

[Deleted member 1860]

Freak,
I am well aware of what society thinks. I am in my early 30's and haven't been able to work for almost 4 years. Employment status is more of a core "who are you" kind of thing rather than defining me as an adult.

Meh, this topic is triggering as I fight tooth and nail to move back into functional society but then have it pointed out that I'm still a second class citizen.

Good day to you all...

 

[freakofnurture]

... but then have it pointed out that I'm still a second class citizen.

You aren't a second class citizen and damn everybody who thinks you are or treats you like one, just because you don't fulfill society's indiscriminate, unrealistic demands.

 

[maddog]

Others have beaten me to the key point here, the one thing that I feel distinguishes adults from children, and indeed, adult humans from all other life forms...

It is the ability to make choices, to choose one's behaviours and one's path through life. It's the ability to utilise resources or to seek to access them if necessary, the ability to take control of one's immediate destiny.

I'm not saying that adults have the ability to control it all of course, we can only ever control our own behaviour, but what separates adults from children isn't intellect or employability, it's the ability to choose, to take control and to be responsible for one's own actions. Children rely on adults for this, and adults have a responsibility to children in these areas, where children do not have such control or the ability to choose or to act in their own best interests.

It's why child abuse is never the fault of the child, no matter what.
It's why adults always have the responsibility to do right by the child, even when that adult may feel disempowered or unable to do so.
It's why parenthood is the greatest, yet the most brutally disrespected, responsibility that we humans can ever have.

Maddog

 

[Srain]

I changed my post...it's best at this time that I stay passive ;)

Great post.

Peace,
Rain

 

[sea]

I think it basically comes down to responsibility. For self & for others.

Re: Anthony I guess it is more of a philosophical question. For example in most countries adults are any individual over 18, but why that age? Why not another age? In the United States you can't drink until you're 21. You can't drive until you're 16. I mean, in all honesty, ages are pretty arbitrary.

As you've stated, you can be a responsible and mature child as well. I think adult is more of a legal term than it is a particular philosophical or subjective connotation. For example Everyone Is An Adult when they become of legal age. But, not Everyone is afforded the same capacity as an adult due to their individual capacity (such as, example, a mentally retarded person being ineligible to participate in specific things).

So I think the real question is what precisely does a person measure when they attempt to measure a person's capacity or maturity? (As, this process does also work in reverse. A person can become emancipated if they go through the right channels, therefore becoming a legal adult sooner.) Why is the legal age what it is? (Considering that most people's brains do not enter the later stages of development until like 25+ years of age, which is when rational/decision making skills become more heightened, most legal ages just seem whimsical.)

 

[freakofnurture]

... ages are pretty arbitrary.

(EDIT: please forgive the redundancy of this first point, my brain's not quite awake -.-)Not really. Developmental psychology and neurobiology can inform legislation when it comes to ages. As cognitive abilities and emotional maturity can be measured and you can pinpoint ages at which a certain percentage of people score high enough on this or that scale.

People between 18 and 21are evaluated psychologically to determine if the legal system should treat them as an adolescent or an adult before they are sent into trial. In this age range there's a lot of heterogenity when it comes to psychological development. In other age ranges there's less difference.

 

[sea]

Most conclusive studies on developmental psychology and neurobiology indicate that the brain does not begin to enter the later stages of growth (in which one could be considered a fully rational cognizant human being) until at least 25.

http://www.johnpreston.co.uk/pictures/items/4/9/3/100394/synergy comfi range guide.pdf
[DLMURL]http://www.childrenshospital.org/dream/summer08/the_teenage_brain.html[/DLMURL]
The Killing Joke
http://www.johnpreston.co.uk/pictures/items/4/9/3/100394/synergy comfi range guide.pdf

The prefrontal cortex is the area of the brain that is associated with response time, decision making, sequencing, precision and executive functions. Which are all items measured when testing for cognitive capacity. An 18 year old scores much, much, much lower than someone even 23 or 24. It's an entirely irrational system.

The complete jumps in the standard legal age for adulthood over the last, even a hundred years, definitely support my statement. I have no doubt that as we learn more about the brain, that legal age will end up changing in the future as well.

If one wanted to measure the legal system by cognitive development, a legal adult wouldn't begin to surface until at least 25. Take a look at car crash statistics when you get a chance. The median population providing those statistics are below the age of 30.

You're referring to legal competence in trial, which is a different matter altogether (and, with reference, you are correct regarding the procedures relating to legal competence, which is a different matter than legal age [subtle as the differences may be, I suppose]).

 

[BloomInWinter]

I have been thinking for some days now. What is an adult?

Hmmm....good topic!

I don't want to act like most adults.

I want to be a dependable, responsible, caring, assertive, compassionate, independent person who can be safe in the world but enjoy my time with my loved ones.

To 'be' this, I only need to 'act as if' I already am this, and then not beat myself up when I do it less than perfectly. :>

Not easy at all!

 

[freakofnurture]

I have no doubt that as we learn more about the brain, that legal age will end up changing in the future as well.

Of course, but change doesn't necessarily imply arbitrariness, especially not when you're talking about the process of understanding natural phenomena like brain- and personality development. The cultural variability could certainly be seen as a factor of arbitrariness, but I, personally, don't do that since there is reasoning (and not a pair of dice) at the basis of each decision.

If one wanted to measure the legal system by cognitive development, a legal adult wouldn't begin to surface until at least 25.

This depends on what you want from a legal adult.

Take a look at car crash statistics when you get a chance. The median population providing those statistics are below the age of 30.

A practice effect could explain that. And the tendency to overestimate of one's own competence turns people over 30 into dangerous participants in motorised traffic, too. You have to weigh different factors against each other, also you have to consider the fact that when new legal freedom is given to a person, no matter at what age, they will start out clumsy; that can't be combatted by postponing the legal age.

... legal competence, which is a different matter than legal age [subtle as the differences may be, I suppose]).

Is it a coincidence that this legal competence thing overlaps with the legal ages of 18 and 21?

 

[sea]

Of course, but change doesn't necessarily imply arbitrariness, especially not when you're talking about the process of understanding natural phenomena like brain- and personality development.

It implies arbitrariness when you look at the cultural standards of employment over the last two hundred years. It goes from age 8 all the way to 18. What it implies is that people really have no idea what the heck they are doing, and they barely know what they even know, let alone what they don't. My initial point was that the age at which a person becomes a legal adult is not reflective of some kind of universally understood maturity.

A practice effect could explain that.

It could explain that but you are basing your responses off of self-theorization and guesswork. If you look at actual causes for crashes and documented neuromotor development of teenagers, their reaction time and ability to make the correct logical decisions the quickest is significantly, drastically lower. This is usually the number one cause for accidents. Everything else is as you said a product of individuality. But if you bring individuality into it, you don't really have an argument at all, do you? You just have a bunch of people, lol.

Is it a coincidence that this legal competence thing overlaps with the legal ages of 18 and 21?

A child can be declared legally competent to stand as a witness in trial or even be a defendant, of which there are many documented cases (controversial though they are, because most people tend to say that "anyone under the age of 18 cannot be tried as an adult", because, of course, the Legal Age Of Adulthood). It is up to the individual jurisdiction to decide each and every one of these cases. There was recently a child charged with murder, there's a thread about it somewhere around here.

My original point, as it was stated, is that legal age seems to encompass a socially recognized advent of "maturity" upon suddenly reaching this "miracle number" of 18. But, as is clearly noted, maturity is not often related and is a different concept to adulthood. In my opinion, "adult" is a legal term and maturity and responsibility are what that legal term attempts to measure.