Challenges of Emerging Adulthood Coping

ADULTHOOD CHALLENGES

ADULTHOOD CHALLENGES 3

Challenges of Adulthood: Emerging Adulthood

Adulthood is associated with a fair share of challenges. This assignment focuses on the challenges that young people face in one phase of adulthood - emerging adulthood – the age between 18 and 25, where one has to make crucial decisions about marriage, career, employment, housing, and so on (Sulimani-Aidan, 2017). Sources identify this as the nest-leaving stage, where young people acquire the experience and skills to take on adult responsibilities (Sulimani-Aidan, 2017).

Common challenges in the emerging adulthood phase include financial shortages as one has to provide everything for themself, yet they may not have stable employment; complex family relationships especially when one has to spend a lot in supporting their family’s material needs; and lack of awareness about suitable interventions or services that could be beneficial to them (Sulimani-Aidan, 2017). Such challenges could be risk factors for stress among young people, and could significantly affect their quality of life.

Young adults could adopt different coping mechanisms to handle challenges and minimize stress in the emerging adulthood phase. Tremolada et al. (2016) found that seeking social support from family and friends was the most effective coping mechanism for young people in the emerging adulthood phase. Friends and romantic partners emerged as the best sources for support for young people at this phase, with family having a smaller impact (Tremolada et al., 2016). Another study found that both problem-focused coping and meaning-focused coping effectively moderated stress in young adulthood, while seeking social support had a less significant impact (Leipold et al., 2018). Meaning-focused coping is where an individual draws on their values, goals, and personal beliefs to motivate and sustain well-being, while problem-focused coping is where one tries to modify or eliminate stress by changing their behaviour (Leipold et al., 2018).

In light of these findings, this post concludes that the ability to cope with the challenges of emerging adulthood depends on individual characteristics and the availability of effective social support networks. Thus, there may be no standard, one-size-fits-all strategy for coping with stress in emerging adulthood. Effective support for young adults will take on a personalized approach depending on individual characteristics.