What Changes During Adolescence?

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Children learn what body changes mean through cultural and social messages.

Puberty is a period when identity development and social interpretation unfold together.

Cultural context shapes how body changes are understood, discussed, and experienced.

Supportive relationships can help children make meaning of puberty in healthy ways.

Puberty is a biological transition characterized by hormonal changes, physical growth, and the emergence of visible signs, including breast development, body hair, increased height, voice changes, and changes in body composition (Dorn & Biro, 2011; Byrne et al., 2017). These physiological changes mark the transition into adolescence, but they also increase the visibility of gendered expectations and social interpretation.

As bodies change, meaning is also constructed through how peers, adults, and broader social environments respond to those changes and how children make sense of those responses. In this way, puberty is also a period of interpretation.

Children begin to ask new questions about themselves: What does this mean about who I am? How do others see me now? Where do I fit? What is expected of me? These questions are not answered in isolation. They are shaped by the messages children receive from the world around them.

Learning Through Cultural Messages

Children learn what their changing bodies mean through a range of cultural messages, some broad and widely shared, others more specific to their families and communities. In the United States, dominant cultural messages about bodies and adolescence often emerge through media, schools, peers, and broader societal norms. These messages can shape expectations about appearance, attractiveness, maturity, femininity, masculinity, and social status.

For example, visible signs of puberty are sometimes associated with assumptions about adulthood, independence, or emotional maturity, even when children are still navigating the developmental tasks of childhood (Epstein et al., 2017). Research suggests that adolescents quickly become aware of these expectations and often use them to interpret their own development (Harter, 2012).

At the same time, culturally specific messages—those communicated within families, communities, and cultural traditions—also play an important role in shaping how puberty is experienced and understood.........

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