Professor of Psychology at the University of Nebraska Omaha, answers the question:
When does a kid become an adult? – Avery, age 8, Los Angeles
Santo essentially says that it depends on the person, which is both true and somewhat of a cop-out.
Kids like straight answers.
I felt like an adult at 17 years old — still in high school but also managing a McDonald’s restaurant and essentially paying for everything I needed except for the roof over my head.
That’s almost certainly early compared to most people, but I was also the eldest of three and later five, and I was a leader in Scouting from an early age, so I took on a lot of responsibility early in life.
After graduation, I left home and never returned. Never enjoyed a financial safety net ever again. I suspect that when you don’t have a home to return to or a parent willing to assist in an emergency, you can’t help but feel like an adult.
It’s required, or you’re doomed.
But the differences in when someone feels like an adult, at least according to Jonathan Santo’s research, are astounding.
Psychologist Jeffrey Arnett, for example, coined the term “emerging adults” to describe Americans aged 18-25 who don’t yet feel fully grown.
This may be true in terms of how people truly feel, and it’s biologically accurate in terms of brain development, but it also strikes me as a little silly.
A 25-year-old who doesn’t feel like an adult sounds like a disaster to me. America sends 18-year-old Americans to war to protect our freedom, but a 24-year-old college graduate can’t find their way to feeling like a grown ass adult?
According to researchers, in some families, it’s expected that children will remain financially dependent on their parents until their mid-to-late twenties as they get a college education or job training.
This sounds lovely.
Also infantilizing and disastrous.
It’s the struggle, setbacks, and uphill climbs that make people strong, resilient, and relentless problem solvers. If you roll out the red carpet for your child into their late twenties, I suspect you’ll be rolling it out again and again for a long time.
Imagine not having to pay a bill or negotiate rent or apply for a loan until you’re approaching your third decade on this planet.
As my son would say, I think those people are probably cooked.
I think that 17 is admittedly young to consider oneself an adult, but I also think that if you’re 27 and still not feeling like an adult, you are failing at life.
Santo is probably correct when he says that adulthood depends on the person, but at some point, probably after high school but well before their mid-twenties, people should probably be assuming the responsibilities of adulthood and thinking of themselves as grown-ups.
