Ever wondered if you’re an adult? Experts explain sensation

Living alone. Have a car. To marry. When we are still children and teenagers, the idea we have of ourselves as adults can be very different from reality. After the end of adolescence, the “young adult” phase brings together a set of experiences such as college, internships and entering the job market.

With the rush of everyday life, it is possible to enter straight into adult life without realizing exactly what the transition point was. The concept of “being an adult” goes through nuances such as financial balance, changes in perspective, behavior and relationships. But you’ve certainly wondered: am I really an adult?

The so-called “late adolescence” is when adults remain with a sense of the mental age of teenagers, not experiencing psychological maturity and emotional intelligence. This leads them to have certain social attitudes that differ from what is expected for that age.

Psychology student Julia Ravizzini, 32 years old, from Niterói, in Rio de Janeiro, says that she has had the feeling that she is not an adult.

“When I am faced with some responsibilities and obligations that I have not yet had contact with, such as, for example, transferring an electricity bill to my name or when I search for apartments to live in and I have no idea of ​​the bureaucratic process or what is relevant to the decision-making,” he says.

She says that when she was younger, she imagined adult life a little differently. “I didn’t like being a child because I didn’t have autonomy for anything, so I really wanted to become an adult to do the things I wanted to do, pursue my own experiences, get to know myself through them. I didn’t think much of the ‘boring part’ and challenging,” she says.

The association with adult life is also related to financial autonomy, career stability, moving house, marriage or children. For Julia, this reference began to appear and reinforce itself as she matured.

I dropped out of some graduations, started studying psychology at the age of 25 and that was the age when my friends were graduating, leaving home and moving on with their own lives. That’s when I started to compare myself and feel ‘less of an adult’ for not having a defined career, still living with my mother, not having a driver’s license and not having experiences with bureaucracies that all my friends have had at some point.

Julia Ravizzini, psychology student

“Also, the fact that I have much less ability to solve problems on my own – I have to ask for help a lot – I am much less independent and self-sufficient than I thought I would be when I was 32 also contribute a lot to this feeling of not being adult,” he adds.

For LGBTQIA+ people, adolescence can be an even bigger problem, as explained by psychologist and specialist in Diversity and Inclusion, Pedro Augusto Pinto.

“Adolescence is a time of many physical, psychological, social and behavioral transformations. It is a time when many teenagers have their first affective-sexual experiences, in addition to discovering and transforming their bodies. For a long time, the LGBTQIA+ community still lacked positive representation in the media and other spaces. For years we saw in the stories that this community brought something tragic or comic, which was not normally portrayed with other sexualities”.

According to experts, the difficulties faced by LGBTQIA+ adolescents, including fear of prejudice, contribute to delays in experiences typical of adolescence.

After all, what is being an adult?

Legally, an adult is a person who has reached 18 years of age. From the biological point of view, it is that individual who has reached the peak of his growth and biological functions. However, being an adult is also linked to emotional, intellectual and social issues. That’s why young adults often don’t really feel like adults.

An Australian study from 2018, published in the scientific journal Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, states that adolescence lasts until the age of 24. More and more, young people have dedicated themselves to studies, such as graduation and post-graduation, postponing marriages and starting a family.

“This new conformation is understandable considering some contexts. We see that in some families young people have left home later, a significant experience for achieving autonomy, responsibility and maturity. However, we must reflect on the social, physical and material conditions of each individual, given that in some contexts where maturity comes earlier, either because of a change of city, because of the parents or because of material conditions, this configuration [dos 24 anos] does not apply”, evaluates Marina Celestino Soares, psychologist and master in Cognitive Processes from the Federal University of Uberlândia (UFU).

Researchers assess that the sense of meaning of an adult life is also associated with cultural and social aspects of each generation. While it is more common for generation Z and millennials to dedicate more time to training and studying, previous generations had to face the challenges of the job market earlier.

“Today, we still have overprotection from parents, who don’t let their children ‘go out into the world’, so they prefer that they stay at home and dedicate themselves to their studies. Contact with the job market also influences a lot and many undergraduate courses still do not provide this”, explains Denise Tardeli, psychologist and doctor in school psychology and human development from the University of São Paulo (USP).

Experts explain that the concept of being an adult is a feeling that can fluctuate. Many young people leave their parents’ house or their hometown in search of a job or study and end up feeling like adults for some occasions, such as going to parties, being free and living alone, but they don’t have that feeling when they need to go to a bank or doctor , for example. According to Denise, this often happens due to insecurity.

“Being alone is different from being lonely. For this reason, many times, even though we live alone and have freedom, we are still afraid to do bureaucratic things and end up calling a friend to get a document together or go shopping. Relationships are fundamental, they just cannot become something mandatory and prevent our independence”, says the psychologist.

fear of aging

The fear of aging has a technical name: gerascophobia . The problem, enhanced by the influence of social networks, can lead to physical and psychological disorders.

The feeling of anguish can affect people of different ages, being more common at the end of high school, which marks a moment of decision about the future, and between the ages of 35 and 40, when individuals tend to take stock of the achievements achieved and than may have definitely been left behind.

Psychologist Marina Soares details differences between being an adult and having maturity, which consists of accumulating lived experiences that provide some kind of learning and experience.

“Being an adult is a constant process of maturing one’s social situations, responsibilities and self-knowledge, which, despite having physical markers, is a fluid and dynamic process. Seek to understand in what ways it is possible to gain more autonomy and challenge yourself. Everyone is on the path, so try to learn from those who have walked a little further than you and take hold of these teachings, they will be useful ”, she says.

(With information from Gabriel Reis and Túlio Daniel from Portal Comunica UFU)