Parent Education Meeting: Middle School Boys and Girls: Same Age, Different Stresses

Come hear U.C. Berkeley Psychology Department Chair and author Stephen P.Hinshaw, an expert on ADHD and author of The Triple Bind: Saving Our TeenageGirls from Today's Pressures.  Dr. Hinshaw will lead an interactive discussion focusing on issues that affect our middle school girls and boys, including:

*What is puberty, and when does it happen?  Is puberty really occurring ever earlier--if so, why? Does puberty affect only the body, or the brain as well?

*Why is adolescence a time of unprecedented physical and cognitive strength--and simultaneously a time of great risk?  How do risk-taking, social pressures, and the frontal lobes play major roles here?

*What stressors in early adolescence do boys face?  What stressors do girls face? How do those relate to biological or genetic risk?

*Why is it particularly tough to be a girl during adolescence these
days...but no picnic for boys, either?

*What role do media images, and the objectification and sexualization ofgirls, have for both sexes?

 *What about sleep?  What about the teen cyber-world that parents know so little about?  What about the expectation that everyone must do it all, effortlessly?

*Can parents do anything to fight the tide of perfectionism, media images, and rising mental health problems in adolescence?  What role can schools play?