Not drinking or driving, teens increasingly put off traditional markers of adulthood
Source: The Washington Post
By Tara Bahrampour September 19 at 12:01 AM
When 17-year-old Quattro Musser hangs out with friends, they don’t drink beer or cruise around in cars with their dates. Rather, they stick to G-rated activities such as rock-climbing or talking about books.
They are in good company, according to a new study showing that teenagers are increasingly delaying activities that had long been seen as rites of passage into adulthood. The study, published Tuesday in the journal Child Development, found that the percentage of adolescents in the U.S. who have a driver’s license, who have tried alcohol, who date, and who work for pay has plummeted since 1976, with the most precipitous decreases in the past decade. The declines appeared across race, geographic, and socioeconomic lines, and in rural, urban, and suburban areas.
To be sure, more than half of teens still engage in these activities, but the majorities have slimmed considerably. Between 1976 and 1979, 86 percent of high school seniors had gone on a date; between 2010 and 2015 only 63 percent had, the study found. During the same period, the portion who had ever earned money from working plunged from 76 to 55 percent. And the portion who had tried alcohol plummeted from 93 percent between 1976 and 1979 to 67 percent between 2010 and 2016.
Teens have also reported a steady decline in sexual activity in recent decades, as the portion of high school students who have had sex fell from 54 percent in 1991 to 41 percent in 2015, according to Centers for Disease Control statistics.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/neither-drinking-nor-driving-more-teens-are-putting-off-traditional-markers-of-adulthood/2017/09/18/b46027a0-93f1-11e7-8754-d478688d23b4_story.html
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Has been waiting to drive since she was 2. I don't think she will put off taking driving lessons.
She went on two dates with one boy then summed it up by saying "he's dumb." She asked another girl to go to the homecoming dance; but I believe it is just for the company. We'll see how that turns out.
We let her have a sip of alcohol when she was 12 and immediately swore it off for life.
We can't get her to work around the house for pay let alone a job
Her recent personal passage to adulthood was I took her to the range for her birthday. She has asked for a long time to be allowed to go to shoot one of my pistols. My wife and I agreed she had achieved the maturity to handle a pistol on a range and, following an hour-long safety course, she was allowed to shoot with me. Although she enjoyed it I don't think she is going to be a future Annie Oakley.
into the neoliberal serfdom the pukes have been pushing the U.S. into, ever since that evil old bastard raygun started dismantling the New Deal in earnest?
They know it will be a struggle to even do as well as their parents. If they do go to college, they likely will face a mortgage-sized mountain of debt. Their employment prospects afterwards will be dubious, at least for a good job. And after dump and his corporate coup, the American Dream will be well and truly dead.
(I'm not saying they don't need to mature and participate in what's here, no matter what. But, if I was college age, I would be looking into attending a Canadian university and finding a way to stay there, if that's possible.)
And they don't seem to be interested in dating or sex all that much.
I totally cannot relate. My teen years were spent in old 60s muscle cars, canoodling with various crushes, great rock and roll blasting on the radio. I wouldn't trade that for all the video games in the world.
But as a parent, I am relieved that my child is not doing what I did when I was his age.
You'll meet no more lackadaisical slacker than Orrex in his History 101 class.
But that was a long, long time ago...
