Contact Name
Barbara Dietsch
562-799-5126
bdietsc@WestEd.org

The passage to adulthood is challenging enough for any adolescent, but teen girls face a culture that offers conflicting–and often negative–messages about the value of being a girl and becoming a woman.

Research suggests that a disturbing number of teen girls struggle with emotional distress, eating disorders, sexual harassment, anxiety about their bodies, and drug and alcohol abuse. Teen boys also encounter such problems but they are more likely to act out, whereas girls turn inward. Many of these problems are associated with increased risks of pregnancy.

• By age 14-15, girls are twice as likely as boys to suffer from depression, a gender difference that persists into adulthood.

• Girls are more than twice as likely as boys to have attempted suicide.
• Abused girls and girls with depressive symptoms are at triple the risk of eating disorders and double the risk for drinking, smoking, or recent drug use.

Girls reach biological maturity earlier–and social maturity later–than in the past. Pediatric researchers believe that the onset of puberty has declined by six months to a year in recent decades. By age 12, slightly more than 62 percent of African-American girls and 35 percent of white girls have begun menstruating.

From Social Protections to Self-Protection. The cultural history of girlhood is, in part, a record of the changing messages and meaning assigned to girls’ sexual coming-of-age. In The Body Project Joan Jacob Brumberg points to two important changes in cultural attitudes about girls’ sexuality. The first is what she calls the "demoralization" of adolescent sexuality. By this, she means the shift from value-laden moral norms of sexuality to value-neutral health norms. The second is the shift in the locus of authority over adolescent sexuality from family, clergy, and other moral educators to girls themselves, health professionals, and the law.

Contemporary American girlhood is a prolonged and increasingly perilous life stage for many girls. Today’s girls are entering puberty and becoming physically mature at younger ages than in the past, and they are expected to postpone sex or to avoid the risks of sexual activity during the prolonged period of adolescence. Yet they are growing up in the midst of a media and marketplace culture that portrays sex and "sexiness" as the core of female identify and success.

The culture of girlhood is becoming degraded and unhealthy. Too many girls are growing up in an unfriendly environment where they have little supervision and support from parents or other responsible, caring adults and where they are overexposed at young ages to the exploitative sexual images and pressures of the media and marketplace. Too many girls from low-income families, poor neighborhoods, and bad schools have dreams for success in life but no real-life pathway to pursue them. Asking girls to avoid sex, get straight As, and win scholarships to college without providing the support and stepping stones to do so is like asking fledgling chicks to flap their wings hard and fly to the moon.

In the coming decades, the crisis of girlhood could deepen. Between 1995 and 2010, the number of girls aged 15-19 will increase by 2.2 million. If current fertility rates among teens remain the same, we will see a 26 percent increase in the number of pregnancies and births among teens. It is probably reasonable to anticipate increases in the incidence of other problems contributing to the crisis in girlhood as well.

The growing population of teenage girls lends urgency to the effort to create healthy and successful pathways through adolescence. But there is another dimension to the challenge. In American society, each generation is born anew. This means that our energies and commitment and social imagination must be summoned again and again, as each new generation approaches the threshold of adolescence.

Families — Model healthy eating and attitudes toward food and body image. Protect daughters from unwanted sexual attentions. Get to know the parents of their pre-teenager’s friends, and band together with these parents in the high school years to agree upon expectations and rules regarding dating, curfews, etc. Ensure fathers’ responsible involvement in their daughters’ lives.

Schools — Enforce a school policy of zero tolerance for sexual harassment. Create a parent-friendly school culture. Increase parent effectiveness through school- and community-sponsored parent education.

Faith Communities — Support teens’ religious education and participation in faith-based youth service and volunteer programs. Celebrate teenage girls’ coming-of-age with rituals.

Youth Development Organizations — Encourage girls’ participation in sports. Create secular rituals to promote identity and solidarity among girls. Wherever appropriate, create formal occasions for girls to make pledges/promises to be guided by a set of shared beliefs and values.

The Media — Develop media features and forums on issues that concern teenagers. Present media images that more accurately reflect racial and ethnic diversity as well as sizes and shapes among adolescent girls. Present features or storylines that clearly communicate the risks and problems that teen pregnancy and childbearing pose as well as ways to avoid teen pregnancy. Focus on girls’ achievements that have nothing to do with weight loss, fashion, diet, or "makeovers." Identify and exploit market "niches" for girl-friendly products and services.

There are reasons to believe that we can be successful. Only a few years ago, the upward trends in teenage pregnancy and childbearing seemed unstoppable. Yet we have seen a decline in the rate of teen pregnancy and childbearing. Although experts continue to speculate about the reasons for the decline, one thing seems clear: trend lines are not set in concrete. They can change in a positive direction once people decide to work together toward a common goal. The same lessons apply to the cultural trends threatening girlhood. If we summon our resolve and devote our resources and energies toward the common goal of creating a healthy girlhood, we can change today’s troubling trends and improve the lives of girls tomorrow.