Deconversion is a biographical change in which one goes from claiming adherence to a religion to departing from it. A meaning system model can help us understand the processes through which deconversion occurs. Drawing on that framework, we explored how perceiving hypocrisy in one's religious setting influences adolescent deconversion. Irrational…

According to social identity theory, individuals self-categorize into groups and then differentiate between groups based on stereotypical norms to create a perceived hierarchy to benefit their self-esteem. The purpose of this study was to explore the presence of social identities among adolescent musicians related to the career paths of music…

The currently proposed meanings of paid work among adolescent girls who attend school neglect their negotiation of their belonging to their communities, calling for additional exploration of the field while focusing on belonging as achieved through respectability production. We investigate the meaning of adolescents' paid work by examining it in…

Neurotypical adults often form negative first impressions of individuals with autism spectrum disorder and are less interested in engaging with them socially. In contrast, individuals with autism spectrum disorder actively seek out the company of others who share their diagnosis. It is not clear, however, whether individuals with autism spectrum…

Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) is characterised by a distressing preoccupation with perceived defects or flaws in one's appearance. BDD most typically emerges in adolescence and is estimated to affect 2.2% of the UK adolescent population. There is a dearth of research into children's and young people's lived experiences of BDD, particularly in…

Being identified with a learning disability makes students vulnerable to experiences of stigmatization, which can be associated with negative academic and emotional effects. Yet, research with other vulnerable populations demonstrates that individual perceptions of stigmatization, or stigma consciousness, are not uniform and that variability in…

The developmental significance of youths' racial identities during adolescence is well established. It is less clear how puberty, a normative process, influences the relationship between racial identity and adjustment outcomes during adolescence. This study examined whether puberty moderates the relationship between racial identity dimensions and…

This paper explores the experiences of 12 young people, all teenagers, who have chosen to attend alternative schools known as flexible learning options within the Australian context. Using a phenomenological approach, the study seeks to understand their experiences outside the normalised public discourse that they had "disengaged" from…

In this paper, we explore how physically disabled youth who participate in mainstream education discursively construct and position themselves in relation to dominant discourses about sport and physicality that mark their bodies as "abnormal" and "deviant". We employ a feminist poststructuralist perspective to analyze the…

In Sweden, school nurses are part of the School Health Service with the main objective of health promotion to support students' health and attainment of educational goals. The aim in this phenomenological study was to illuminate the experiences of school nurses in promoting the health and well-being of adolescent girls. Seventeen school nurses…

Background and Aims: The purpose of this project was to examine body dissatisfaction and the degree of acculturation to Western media body ideals among Japanese adolescents. Furthermore, sex differences in body esteem were examined between male and female participants. Methods: Male and female participants (N=158) aged 15 to 18 years in Okinawa,…

In this article, the author explores the existing research on the characteristics of Millennials within historical, social, and economic contexts. While many researchers have made claims about Millennials, they fail to consider how parenting styles, economic factors, historical events, and shifts in educational priorities may have created the…

The current study examined normative beliefs about aggression as a mediator between narcissistic exploitativeness and cyberbullying using two Asian adolescent samples from Singapore and Malaysia. Narcissistic exploitativeness was significantly and positively associated with cyberbullying and normative beliefs about aggression and normative beliefs…

This article explores gay and bisexual male adolescents' positive perceptions of their sexual orientation identity. In-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with an ethnically diverse sample of 63 gay/bisexual male adolescents in Chicago (N = 42) and Miami (N = 21). Data revealed two major conceptual categories: (1) positive personal…

The current study examines the role of mental illness-related stigma on romantic or sexual relationships and sexual behavior among youth with mental illness (MI), including youths' experiences of stigma, the internalization of these experiences, and the behavior associated with managing stigma within romantic and sexual relationships. We conducted…