Culture and Adolescent Development

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Cultural factors can strongly influence depression and suicide. In some cultures, including my own Fijian Indian background, mental health is often not openly discussed and can carry shame or stigma. People may be encouraged to “stay strong” or keep problems within the family, which can stop individuals from seeking help. Cultural expectations to uphold family reputation or meet community standards can also increase stress. Over time, this silence can lead to feelings of isolation and hopelessness. Encouraging open conversations and culturally safe support can help break these barriers and promote healing.

I can account for all given examples, Alcoholism and substance abuse at a young age, violence was the norm, I was a Dad at 19, suffered from Depression and suicidal ideals, stress, work vs education, my overeating habits, being a gang member, and the challenges and barriers that come with being a Māori-Pacific male.

My culture had a profound impact on how I viewed the world, myself, and my thoughts. The toxic masculinity aspect of my culture placed me in a box for so long that it stopped me from living life to its fullest e.g. Men are hard, we are tough, we are here to protect, provide, make sure everyone else is happy expect for ourselves, as opposed to me trying to take care of me and mine or allowing myself to explore my emotions so that I can better grasp and handle situations without resorting to violence.

After coming out of that dark tunnel, I understand a lot of the inequalities that we are faced with, and it's through my lived experience and self-development that I am sitting in this class, learning how to utilize my experience and knowledge to better serve my people. 

Although my family was influenced by Māori culture, we ultimately still lived in a Western reality. With my parents working and studying, and the natural process of me becoming less emotionally attached to my parents and discovering my individuality and identity,  a very big split developed between my parents and me. I became far more influenced by my peers than my parents, and I didn't treat my parents with respect or take in any of their advice or wisdom. An indigenous culture would have more focus on relationship, community, family values, respecting elders and tending to the emotional, spiritual aspects of wellbeing. I wonder if there was more focus on these things in my family, if I would have stayed more connected to whānau, leading to me being less vulnerable to peer pressure and several of the challenges mentioned above. In families where multiple generations are present/part of a child's upbringing, it's more likely that there is an adult available to guide and understand where an adolescent is at. 

I believe that sexual health and teen pregnancy is influenced by cultural factors such as family, peers, religion, society and education. In Western culture in Aotearoa, it has been my experience that sex is treated as a shameful and down to an individuals responsibility to navigate. Looking back, I can see how honest, non-judgemental conversations with family, teachers and peers about sexual health and teen pregnancy could have made my adolescent experience on this topic much safer and less confusing. 

Alcohol and substance use are commonplace in our Western culture.  Alcohol particularly is widely accepted and almost expected in many social situations during adolescence and into adulthood.  In NZ binge drinking is considered normal, as is drinking while watching big sports games, at BBQs, weddings and other social events.

Exam stress

Generally western society places high value on individual academic achievement and economic success. While these can be important for other cultures too, in Māori and Pasifika cultures, there is equally or may be more importance on achieving the overall success of the family and community.  The pressure of exam success in western culture is immense.  It can also been seen in some Asian cultures too such as Japanese, Chinese and Indian where families push for high academic achievements in their children in order to gain a better future for their child.  The demands for success in exams creates huge stress on adolescence. 

From my own upbringing this pressure created a stress where I felt that if I did not do well in my exams I would go on to being an academic failure for the rest of my life and I would have a low level dead end job (as my mother put it).  My mother often thought by threatening me with comments like - "if you don't do well at school you'll only be a check-out girl at the supermarket" - that these comments would encourage me to work harder at school.  Due to this kind of pressure, I certainly felt at the time that if I didn't do well at the school exams then I wouldn't do well at life at all.  My future success and happiness all seemed to hinge on my exams.  I think this kind of exam stress is typical in western culture.  This kind of pressure can lead to young people rebelling, not trying at all because of the fear of failure, feeling like life's failure, family tension, bullying where one might be called dumb if they don't do well, suicide, depression and anxiety.

Now that I am an adult and know the truth about the many ways and possibilities of what a successful future can be for young people, I certainly will not be placing such high stress and values on my children. 

After visiting Finland as an adolescent and then as an adult I have seen that while Finland as a country has an excellent education system and high academic achievement, as a society they place value and happiness on a much wider range of career choices.  In fact there is no stigma in having a low level job.  A larger emphasis is on the happiness and well being of the individual as a preferred outcome rather than whatever job they have, and they are seen as a valuable person because they are contributing to society and that in itself is a success.  My mother said she got her driver for placing high academic achievements on us from her own mother because her mother wanted her children to strive for better outcomes for their future.  This may be similar to Chinese and Indians where they have come from poor backgrounds, generations of difficulties(war, starvation, lack of jobs) where the answer to getting out of those situations is to get higher level jobs.

Sexual Health and Teen Pregnancy - 

I think these risks are affected by culture because in Western culture, it is more normalised for your parents to talk to you about safe sex and contraception. Where is in Maori and Pasifika those topics may be more taboo, and since the medical system is less trusted, contraception may be frowned upon in some cultures/families. My parents didn't have the talk with me, but made sure I was aware and put me on contraception. 

With regards to the above issues, depression was a massive stressor in my culture as mental health was not widely acknowledged in my mums generation in Korea therefore as my main caregiver it was difficult for her to relate to these issues. Another was alcohol and substance abuse as in Korea smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol is very culturally accepted and drugs were not widely known so it was difficult for her to manage first generation Kiwis engaging in these activities that were directly related to depression 

Depression rates among Māori teens are high, which is a major reason I chose counselling as a vocation. Intergenerational trauma makes life especially hard for Māori youth. Challenges they face include substance abuse influenced by family and community habits, and pressures related to relationships or predators leading to teenage pregnancies. These struggles deeply affect their mental health and well-being. At such a young age, and not having a strong identity due to lack of strong influences, it can lead to a lifetime of confusion and low self esteem. Therefore not breaking the chain and ended up another statistic.

Alcohol and other substance abuse:

From a pakeha cultural background,  drinking and drug use are seen as the default bonding activity. That the default assumption being you must do it all alone can only be suppressed by an altered state of consciousness. The value of personality, personal interests or thoughts are at odds with the false narrative that no one's better than anyone else. There is a deep insecurity of social isolation and drinking/drug use alleviates that insecurity so that pakeha culture can actually form social bonds. 

The use of alcohol and drugs removes the need for actual empathy and replaces that with a comfortable "I won't let it harsh my vibes" mindset.

Even more concisely, pakeha rely on alcohol and drug use for emotional tolerance instead of developing their own.

Alcohol and other substance abuse

I remember my school ball after party and getting very drunk and I was only 16. It's considered the norm to have these experiences. My parents didnt drink so i didn't see Alcohol being consumed while growing up. I think mine came from the pressure of fitting in. It was like it was considered cool to drink and smoke. Drinking is a very western value and yet its still legal to consume and easy to get. New Zealands age to buy and consume alcohol is 18 

Social rules and ideas are elemental to how sexual health and teen pregnancy are perceived and approached in a society. In the environment and time I grew up in there was open education about sexual health and contraception (as well as abortion) through school, organisations and youth magazines. These were autonomous decisions I could make, outside of my family's views. The focus definitely lay on avoiding teen pregnancy, as something that would very much limit your life opportunities and economic future.

A very western perspective, based on individualism, valuing personal advancement through education for any gender... Although, differences between western societies too, American SexEd was abstinence based and moralising.

In another cultural context , teen pregnancy might be the norm and children are brought up communally by elders.

Or there are societal norms around abstinence, gender roles, monogamy/polygamy....entirely defined by culture.

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Alcohol and other substance abuse – I always saw alcohol as a rite of passage to adulthood, as that is what adults did, especially at special events. I can remember going to a family friend's wedding who was from India, and no one was drinking alcohol. It was so strange that people were celebrating without raising a glass to "cheers" the occasion. I can remember a lot of the adults complaining they couldn't have a drink. I can definitely see that if you are surrounded by drinkers and alcohol, it makes it the norm. 

I would say that alcohol and substance abuse among adolescents is influenced by cultural factors like attitudes towards drinking, how families deal with this, and the guidelines and availability in social situations / gatherings. I feel that in New Zealand the drinking culture is similar to that of the UK and often seen as a rite of passage. 

From my own experience, my parents were not big drinkers, so it wasn't really on my radar.  However the moment I was given the freedom to interact with my peers without the supervision of an adult, alcohol was introduced to our social gatherings.  From this there were good, and not so good experiences.  I wonder if I had of been exposed to alcohol (indirectly) I would have been aware of boundaries and limitations.  

• Depression and suicide

There has been a major shift in a lot of ways in terms of mental health from just a generation ago to now and many people "don't believe in" a lot of the problems that youth are facing. It's majorly cultural because of the way that social media has made everybody's life so accessible and normalised having this much access to others' worlds. Cyber bullying is huge now as is "flexing for the gram" and essentially lying about your life or only showing the best 5% which causes all of the youth to see themselves as fake without realising it. Similarly with editing photos and filters which cause huge amounts of dysmorphia and delusion around what a 'normal' looking person is. A lot of this began in my youth but the generation above me have no idea how it works and no idea how to deal with it which speaks to the progress vs understanding gap in the article.

My daughter as a teenager suffered from anorexia.  Western culture influenced her belief that a young person's self worth is about your appearance and how thin you are.

depression in Maori culture is seen as an imbalance in one of the four walls of te whare tapa wha. for me experiencing depression in adolescence was dismissed by whanau because of the "harden up" and "weak" stigma that surrounded mental health. my family at the time were under their own struggles which were more important than dealing with my depression and it was seen as a phase

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My chosen issue—“following the system but not feeling like I belong or understand”

This issue was really influenced by culture. Growing up in Korea, school was very strict and focused on following rules. I remember getting told off for my art in primary school just because it didn’t follow the exact standard. Looking back, it made me wonder, what’s the point of art class if you can’t be creative to some extent? This strict approach stayed through university. I even once walked out of a mock test in high school because I thought, “What’s the point of all this?” On the other hand, I did really well in subjects like critical writing and creative art where I could think and create my own way. This shows how the cultural focus on rules and standards influenced how I felt about learning and belonging while I was growing up.

Alcohol and substance abuse.

Where i grew up acting like an "adult" was considered cool and most adults would idolise the idea of Friday 4.30 so they could start drunk until monday morning.
Many adolesence would steal alcohol or get older teens to buy it for them and get drunk or high at school.

I will choose exam stress because it is a big challenge in many cultures, including mine. In Punjab culture, education is seen as very important for success and respect in the community. Parents often encourage their children to work hard and achieve high marks, which can sometimes create pressure and stress during exams. For example, as a teenager, I felt nervous because I wanted to make my family proud and meet their expectations. At the same time, this pressure also motivated me to study harder and aim for a better future. This shows how culture can shape both the stress and the drive that come with exams.  

Sexual health and teen pregnancy:

Sexual health and teen pregnancy can be immensely influenced by cultural factors and parents form very alternative ideas and values around the subject. While some adults would be very distressed to find out their adolescent is sexually active, others who were sexually active as adolescents themselves may not be- on the other hand being sexually active themselves and having negative experiences may promote the values of avoiding sexual activity as an adolescent. Therefore while some caregivers promote sexual education, others do not, and I have witnessed this myself as a sexual heath nurse within a high school. Some teens were able to discuss issues with parents, as we promoting this communication, while others could not. Within my own cultural background, I did not have set rules around sex but I did not feel comfortable discussing this with my mum as I would get in trouble. 

Depression and suicide are one of the least common factors spoken about in Indian culture. The stigma around it has led a lot of adolescents in long term depression because there isn't cultural support provided by communities. It is expected that adolescents are more study focused and not much attention is paid on their mental health, hence to the declining amount of family support and high rates of depression and suicide rates. Personally speaking, if there was a bit more encouragement and support given to adolescents the rate of depression would've lowered in our community. 

Eating disorders in my culture: the media and society influence of being skinny vs cultural influence like 'finish your meal, in other countries, kids starve' or 'are you ok you didn't eat well?' are putting pressure on young teenagers because they want to fit in and being accepted. The German culture is all about self discipline and achievements and that can contribute to eating disorders. 

Exam stress.

The severity of exam stress can be influences by expectations of education in different cultures. My experience of this was that success was the only thing that was celebrated. My success was used as a source of prestige for my mother; I was often compared to my cousins who were close in age to me. This pressure to perform increased my stress and I viewed failure as letting others down. Love received was also attached to how well I achieved. Through the reading I have done so far, this semester I have realised that some cultures education and success is more balanced with other aspects of life and development.

Exam stress is influenced by cultural factors for adolesence especially in the western world as a high level of success in achievement is expected. This can lead to issues with self esteem and inadequacey. I felt this pressure to suceed as a teenager, not wanting to disapoint my family and teachers.