In a study done by three BYU professors, it was discovered that 80 percent of parents do not consider their 18-25 year-old college students to be adults. The students agree.
The time period for which parents are responsible for their children is lengthening and parents have new expectations for their children once they reach their 20s.
The study shows evidence that a distinct life stage has emerged between adolescence and adulthood. Larry Nelson, associate professor in the school of family life, and lead author in the study refers to students in this stage as “emerging adults.”
“The message parents are sending to their kids is “You may be 18 but that doesn’t magically make you an adult. There are things you first need to develop and that hasn’t happened yet,” Nelson said. “It’s not that their kids refuse to grow up, it’s that they are still in the process of doing that.”
When parents of college-age children had reached adulthood, only 16 percent of mothers and 19 percent of fathers said yes. Most parents said “in some ways yes and in some ways no.” The students responded in much the same way, with only 16 percent saying they had reached adulthood.
The study also showed evidence of disagreements among generations about what it takes to be considered an adult. Parents said their children needed to be responsible for things like driving, drugs, alcohol, sex, and language in order to be considered an adult.
For both students and parents in the study, the most important steps toward adulthood belong to a category of attributes researchers call relational maturity. Both groups ranked the ability to accept responsibility for the consequences of their actions as the highest determining factor of all.
The study, titled, “If You Want Me to Treat You Like an Adult, Start Acting Like One!” will be published in the Journal of Family Psychology.
