Making the Science of Adolescent Development Part of Your Story
During adolescence, we are rapidly learning and adapting in ways that naturally take advantage of supportive relationships, environments, and experiences that promote positive growth and development.
In the past few decades, the science of adolescent development has changed researcher’s perceptions of what adolescence is and how it should be supported. Today we know that adolescence is a time of remarkable opportunity. The years between age 10 to about 25 mark a period of rapid growth, development, and learning as we discover and adapt to the world around us. We forge our sense of who we are and who we aspire to be. We learn to make decisions, manage our emotions, and create deeper connections with peers, romantic partners, and others in our communities. We also build resilience and develop interests, passions, and meaningful goals that shape our adult lives.
During adolescence, we are rapidly learning and adapting in ways that naturally take advantage of supportive relationships, environments, and experiences that promote positive growth and development. This makes adolescence a key window for learning and discovery, as well as an opportunity to build resilience and mitigate the effects of earlier adversity. Experiences that provide autonomy and choice as we explore are particularly important, as we are primed to learn from and give back to our environments in ways that benefit our society through things like community service and civic action.
Unfortunately, the social systems that serve us during this developmentally sensitive period are often not structured to provide optimal support for learning and positive adaptation. In some cases, barriers to successful development—such as poverty, discrimination, and earlier trauma—can reinforce inequities and amplify risks for negative outcomes.
Public understanding of adolescent development lags behind what current research tells us, and popular culture often reinforces our worst assumptions. But it doesn’t have to be that way. The new experiences we encounter during adolescence, the mistakes we sometimes make along the way, and the success or failure of the systems that should support all provide fodder for great storytelling. Coming of age movies as diverse as Fame, Real Women Have Curves, and Eighth Grade have successfully depicted how adolescents discover their identities and learn to navigate the world around them, often through a process of trial and error. They also show how important supportive, caring relationships with friends, family members, and other adults are to their wellbeing.
Stories about adolescence can also help writers explore situations like poverty, racism, and marginalization that are obstacles to healthy development. Movies like Boyz n the Hood, Moonlight, and Winter’s Bone tackle the harsh racial and social inequalities too many adolescents face to create powerful, contextualized stories. Importantly, these aren’t just stories of resiliency in the face of adversity - they show us why it is imperative that we address racial and social inequalities and transform dysfunctional and discriminatory systems.
Here are some actionable insights for storytellers who want to tell a more complete story about adolescent development, with all its complexity and promise:
Make adolescents multi-layered. Avoid one-dimensional characterizations of adolescents as “the nerd” or “the bully.” Adolescent development is complex, and so are adolescents.
Show adolescents failing, then trying again. Adolescents are resilient and stories about finding your way through difficult times are always compelling. Just don’t forget to include the supportive relationships – with parents, peers, and others – that make that resiliency possible.
Include supportive adult characters who are outside the family. Adolescents are forming a lot of new relationships, which creates a lot of potential for different characters and connected storylines.
Tell stories about adolescents contributing to their communities and engaging in activism. Black Lives Matter, youth voting organizing, and stories of young people helping their neighbors and peers during the pandemic all have the makings of a great plot line.
Contextualize stories of adversity by talking about racism, discrimination, and social class. Conversations around racism, LGBTQ+ rights, and growing income inequality are changing the narrative landscape. They should be part of how we depict adolescents, as well.
We’ll return to these insights and more as we continue with this blog series.
Freelancer
Coming of Age in the Digital Age: Telling a Stronger Social Media Story
Although recent revelations show how damaging social media can be, it also allows adolescents to do important developmental tasks like exploring their identities and making independent decisions in a new way.
“Eight years after the original website went dark, a new generation of New York private school teens are introduced to the social surveillance of Gossip Girl. The prestige series will address just how much social media—and the landscape of New York itself—has changed in the intervening years.”
So reads the official series summary for the 2021 reboot of early aughts TV hit Gossip Girl. We’re currently steeped in ‘90s/‘2000s nostalgia, and the show was highly anticipated. But it’s since been widely panned in reviews as failing to recapture the vitality of its predecessor. Why?
One reason is that the primary storytelling device—an omnipresent narrator using social media— feels a little stale. For many years social media has been the bogeyman in portrayals of modern adolescence, to the extent that it has become a trope (see for example Hard Candy, 2005; Nerve, 2014; and 13 Reasons Why, 2017). And as use of social media as a storytelling device becomes more repetitive, these stories become more dark and cynical—and more predictable.
The reason this storyline is so common is that it reflects the popular narrative that social media is inherently damaging to adolescents. Our research has found that the “Social Media and Mental Health” narrative popularized in the media reinforces the deeply ingrained assumption that the modern world poses a series of threats to children and teenagers. Technology, in this narrative, exposes adolescents to “too much too soon,” damaging self-esteem, increasing the risk of bullying, and driving the fragmentation of community relationships and the breakdown of the nuclear family. In this line of reasoning, little good can come from social media, a perception reflected in Euphoria’s plot line about revenge porn and underage pornography, and the anonymous trolling that propels the story forward in Gossip Girl 2.0.
In reality, the role social media plays in adolescents’ lives is more nuanced. Although recent revelations show how damaging social media can be, it also allows adolescents to do important developmental tasks like exploring their identities and making independent decisions in a new way. Young people who feel marginalized at home and school often find support online, where they can connect with others who share their experiences and interests—especially important for young people who may feel stigmatized, like LGTBQ+ youth. Social media makes it easier to find community and become involved in civic action and volunteering. Adolescents organize for change online, connecting, learning, and building support for social justice in their communities. Social media has been critical for young people’s political advocacy around BLM, climate change, voting, gun safety, and other high-impact issues. These examples include all the hallmarks of good stories, including conflict, tension, and controversy—but also relatable characters and relationships an audience can root for.
Depicting social media as inherently dangerous does a disservice to adolescents who need support as they navigate their digital lives, and these days doing so may not even make for a good story. So how can we tell better stories and convey social media as a potential force for good?
Center stories around concepts of discovery and exploration over “doom and gloom,” to help people think about how technology helps young people find their identities.
Through plot, use social media as a device that connects adolescents to their communities, rather than tearing them apart.
Tell stories about how social media fosters civic and political engagement. Avoid stereotypical portrayals of young people as zombies glued to their phones, and instead show how they are becoming active and engaged citizens.
Create characters who connect through social media to lift each other up, rather than spread mean-spirited gossip.
When exploring the connection between social media use and mental health, lead with the positives, don’t just dwell on the over-familiar risks and harms. Social media can support young people’s mental health in important ways, too.
Now more than ever—with so much of our lives online due to COVID—it’s time to tell stories that capture the reality of social media and adolescence. Social media isn’t just a risk, it’s an opportunity, and in 2022 it’s only becoming more important for young people. Social media continues to evolve, as does adolescents’ use of it as a tool and a medium for expression. Stories about social media and adolescence should evolve, as well.
Freelancer
What We Talk About When We Talk About Middle School
Our research has identified the need for a new narrative around early adolescence, one that recognizes it for the remarkable period of discovery it is.
As Gen Xers entered and passed through adolescence in the ‘90s, they got a glimpse of what coming of age was like in the late ‘60’s through the eyes of Kevin Arnold and Winnie Cooper, the main characters on The Wonder Years. What they - and the countless viewers who’ve watched the Emmy award-winning series - since found was that the world around them had changed, but puberty and the middle school years hadn’t. As the particular upheaval of the 1960s and ‘70s unfolded around them, the show’s characters also experienced familiar turbulence and triumphs of early adolescence: exploring new interests, forming new relationships, and, discovering who you want to be in the world, all while your body is rapidly changing and maturing. By depicting middle school years as a time of discovery and yes, wonder, the show challenged our expectations about early adolescence.
What made The Wonder Years so compelling, both for nostalgic Boomers and Gen Xers who were the same age as the show’s stars, was how accurately it captured the experience of becoming an adolescent. The first few seasons were full of early adolescent milestones. Kevin had his first (and second and third) crushes, dealt with awkward physical changes, and experienced evolving relationships with friends and family. The show also tackled some of the higher-stakes events in adolescence like bullying, drinking, and difficult break-ups. Kevin and his friends sometimes made mistakes, faced disappointment, tested their own limitations, and failed. In The Wonder Years, early adolescence was often difficult and confusing, but it was also a time of transformation and discovery and joy. Both the difficulties and the joyful discoveries are critical to healthy adolescent development. They also make for very good television.
In 2021, ABC rebooted The Wonder Years, this time focusing on a Black middle-class family living in Alabama in the same period as the original series. Like the original series, it promises to share the ubiquitous moments that add up to the experiences of early adolescence—the “little things,” says the trailer: first crushes, first kisses, new experiences, newfound freedoms. The change in location and race of the family suggests that the show will also depict challenges that the white, middle-class Kevin and friends never faced (this will be explored further in a future blog).
Our research has identified the need for a new narrative around early adolescence, one that recognizes it for the remarkable period of discovery it is. People already think that adolescence is a difficult, risky time when we either need to be protected from ourselves, or we just need to “get through it” to the better parts of our lives. We need more shows like The Wonder Years, shows that portray early adolescence in realistic, sensitive (but still funny) ways. Of course, these depictions should also evolve to explore LGBTQ+ identity, racism, and other topics that were still backgrounded or even unspoken on network television in the late 1980s.
Here are some ways to tell better stories about early adolescence that show audiences what a remarkable time of opportunity - and wonder - it really is:
Accentuate the positive. Too often, narratives about early adolescence focus on negative stereotypes, emphasizing risk and vulnerability rather than opportunity. Instead, look for balance: when portraying the typical trial and error of early adolescence, avoid the temptation to overplay the ridicule angle and balance it with stories of resilience.
Avoid depicting stereotypical bullying and peer-pressure scenarios and instead show positive, supportive peer relationships. Early adolescent relationships are about much more than peer pressure—friends help us explore our identities and are crucial sources of support. And when depicting the joys and heartache of crushes, first kisses and break-ups, don’t belittle these experiences—they also help make us who we are.
Make early adolescents relatable. This is a time of life every adult has been through, and everyone has experienced both the difficulties and the joyful discoveries. Emphasize universal challenges and truths associated with the coming-of-age experience, but depict it in all its complexity—including diverse voices and storylines.
Have adults play a supportive role. Healthy relationships with adults are just as important for early adolescents as peers. Parents, teachers and other adults shouldn’t just be adversaries in your story—they can also be guides and resources (and sometimes comic relief).
So many of the milestones, feelings, and experiences that color our “wonder years” have not changed over time. Neither has one of the winning formulas to frame those years in a way that wins hearts and minds—by portraying them not as a period to just “get through,” but rather as an opportunity to experience life-defining development and growth. The reboot of The Wonder Years does just that, but makes the show relevant for an audience that is more diverse and, importantly, in need of storylines that represent their experiences of this period of discovery.
Freelancer
Foster Youth Storytelling: Less Vulnerability, More Resiliency
Both news and popular media are used to portraying foster youth as permanently damaged, either by the circumstances that led them to foster care and/or by the broken system that failed them.
Tune into any crime series for an episode or two and odds are you’ll come upon at least one plot line involving foster youth. After all, we assume that these young people make perfect characters for crime-and-punishment storytelling: they’re vulnerable, abandoned, and hopeless. The Law & Order franchise, and Law & Order: SVU in particular, regularly feature these types of storylines. Both news and popular media are used to portraying foster youth as permanently damaged, either by the circumstances that led them to foster care and/or by the broken system that failed them (for instance Dexter and Killing Eve). The central characters of both Dexter and Killing Eve are both cold-blooded killers shaped by their experiences as foster children. As a result, transition age foster youth are stigmatized and “otherized,” worth saving but never really capable of integrating into families and communities.
When they are not being demonized, the experiences of foster youth are often trivialized instead. From Diff’rent Strokes, to The Blind Side, we’ve seen the temptation to fast forward to the simplistic, happy ending without the complex, difficult aspects of healthy development and identity formation. These storylines don’t leave room to depict the varied resources and supports that transition-age foster youth need to thrive, or the ways in which their needs and desires are similar to other adolescents.
Each of these storylines - the hopeless and the minimized - demand greater nuance. A good example of how to do it is The Fosters (2013-2018). The show took a big step towards compelling storytelling about foster youth with a modern-family dynamic that avoided many of the common traps. The characters faced abandonment, abusive situations, and trust issues, but in ways that spoke to the complexities of finding your footing on the way to adulthood when you don’t have the usual connections to family and a stable home. It also demonstrated the resiliency of foster youth who have the right supports, like stable, ongoing relationships and a sense of community.
Over the course of its five seasons, The Fosters also showed the challenges and experiences that adolescents have in common, whether fostered or not. These included struggles like sibling rivalry, bullying, and racism, as well as the joyful discovery of talents, passions, and sexualities.
Depicting these shared challenges and opportunities for growth brought the characters out of the realm of “the other” and made them identifiable, winning audience fandom and critical acclaim in the process.
Our research provides a framework for better, more nuanced storytelling when it comes to portrayals of transition-age foster youth. Here are some ideas for how to do it:
Include the ways in which foster youth are similar to other adolescents, not just what makes them different. Realistic storytelling should show the everyday challenges and discoveries transition-age foster youth face as they become adults.
Show what foster youth need to make their journey to adulthood happy and successful. Don’t just depict their adolescence as a time to survive, but as a time to thrive, when they have caring relationships and stable living situations.
Avoid the overly simplistic “shame and blame” plots when it comes to birth and foster parents. Instead, place foster youth’s experiences within a larger narrative about the racial and economic inequalities that set the stage for a youth’s trajectory.
Widen the lens beyond the family and show community connections. The reality is that foster youth are often disconnected from the communities around them, and this can be as challenging as the lack of family. Make the place they live a protagonist too—opening up new opportunities for the central characters to grow, and new possibilities for original stories.
Freelancer
Reckoning with Race in Adolescent Stories
Diversity and inclusion in film and television contributes to young people of color’s identity formation in positive ways when they avoid stereotyping.
This year ABC rebooted the classic 1990s series The Wonder Years, a show we discussed in our previous blog as a portal for talking about middle school and early adolescence. The time period of the late 1960s remains the same and the two series share many of the same coming-of-age themes, but there is one big difference. Instead of focusing on a middle-class white family in California, the family at the center of the reboot is a middle-class Black family living in Alabama.
Changing the race of a character or the cast of a show or film, or racebending, has a long history in America. While it has often been a tool of discrimination and whitewashing, it’s been used more recently to increase representation of people of color and disrupt established narratives. The Wonder Years reboot does the latter.
Research has consistently shown how important it is that children and young people see characters who not only look like them but also sound like them. Diversity and inclusion in film and television contributes to young people of color’s identity formation in positive ways when they avoid stereotyping (and the same can be said for LGBTQ+ youth). The new Wonder Years joins shows like Reservation Dogs and On My Block in mixing coming-of-age comedy with the drama of growing up in a society plagued by discrimination and structural racism.
Based on an early viewing, the reboot accurately depicts the universals of early adolescence - not just its awkwardness and heartbreaks, but also the ways in which young people explore their identities, make discoveries about themselves and the world around them, and benefit from the support of caring adults. It has to tread the fine line between overgeneralization and authentic portrayal of the experience of Black families in the South in the late ‘60s. In the original series, Kevin getting pulled over and ticketed is an annoyance. In the reboot, Dean gets the “police talk” from his parents well before he can even drive.
These shows have a delicate balance to strike. We know that all portrayals of adolescence better serve development when they address this stage of life not just as one to survive - filled with heightened risk - but also as a unique opportunity to build lifelong resilience and agency. That’s why narratives that effectively tackle race and equity in adolescence are ones that not only present adversity in believable ways, but also authentically show characters growing in resilience by navigating through it.
Here are a few recommendations, informed by our research, to support that approach.
Portray racism as embedded in everyday institutions, not just through transient interpersonal interactions. Highlighting how our institutions and social norms maintain racial inequality, limit opportunities, and create unequal access for people of color helps audiences to see their own roles in perpetuating these norms—and how it harms adolescents. For instance, in the fourth season of The Wire, the show portrayed to wide acclaim, an accurate view of Baltimore Schools: dysfunction, waste and mismanagement, a dearth of resources. The viewer absorbed the ways in which adolescents in such a large, underfunded school system struggle with navigating education and social pressures without the safety nets provided by more advantaged districts.
Use storylines that connect young people to their communities in positive ways. When adolescents are connected to their communities, both adolescents and communities thrive. Centering young people’s stories in the communities that shape them also makes for compelling narratives. The success of Hulu’s Reservation Dogs comes in part from its showing how the characters’ lives and outlooks are shaped by their experiences living in a reservation community. The characters and conditions that surround the four main adolescent characters are often played for laughs, but they also help make the story more meaningful.
Tell stories of resilience and agency, not just adversity. Authentic depictions of adolescents of color cannot ignore the challenges of growing up in a racist society. But depictions of some young people, particularly young Black men, being “lost” reinforces harmful stereotypes and can have a negative effect on identity formation. Stories that show young people not only confronting but also tackling oppressive, racist systems - not just racist individuals - makes for engaging storylines and shows audiences how structural racism works (see The Hate U Give).
Freelancer
When Dramatizing Adolescent Advocacy, Keep It Real
While a search for identity through advocacy tends to be the primary theme in works that explore adolescent engagement, a search for community can be an equally compelling source.
Dear White People begins with the character Sam White on her regular campus radio show, a device at the center of both the 2014 film and the Netflix series by the same name. The series questions whether and how the “post-race” claims from the ivory tower of a fictional Ivy League university translate to on-the-ground student life. Spoiler alert: those claims don’t always prove true to their idealistic word. Race relations at Winchester University remain, in a word, fraught. And a good number of its students are not okay with that.
As a reflection of our current, real-world moment, race is a central issue catalyzing advocacy among the series’ lead characters, but it certainly isn’t the only one. If anything, it’s the search for identity - who am I and how is that defined? - that drives the characters of Dear White People to challenge established systems. Unlike other depictions of adolescent engagement, such as The Hate U Give, which centers on a flashpoint of racial justice uprising, Dear White People focuses on advocacy as a workaday pursuit for its characters. True to life, these social justice storylines are peppered in with the rest of the adolescent experience: love and heartbreak, experimentation and error, friendship and betrayal. And that’s what makes it authentic.
While a search for identity through advocacy tends to be the primary theme in works that explore adolescent engagement, a search for community can be an equally compelling source. In Reservation Dogs, we meet four indigenous youths who are determined to cut ties with the Oklahoma reservation where they were raised, but who inadvertently strengthen those ties over the course of a season. They discover their craved sense of community right where they are and, as co-creator Sterlin Harjo explains, “decide to become vigilantes and clean up the community, but in a funny way.” The teens’ community engagement remains credible throughout every episodic adventure by avoiding sentimental simplicity and embracing how messy, funny, and sometimes painful these connections are. It’s life.
Our research-based takeaways for portrayals of adolescent advocacy:
Depict adolescence engagement in authentic ways. To be compelling, characters must be more than “do-gooders.” Let them seek out engagement organically, and as part of adolescents’ typical exploration of self-identity.
Don’t be afraid to be open-ended. Developing one's identity is complex and ongoing, lasting well into adulthood and one could argue a lifelong process of discovery. Similarly, our communities ebb and flow, while the fight against injustice is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon. Good stories embrace the open-endedness and ambiguity of this process of discovery, leaving open the possibility of new opportunities for growth and for making change.
Make community a character. The link between support for adolescent development and connected communities is proven and strong. Positive, meaningful relationships can be about more than just family and peers. Communities can also be protagonists – full of key players that help young people develop their identities as they become full members of the adult world. Reservation Dogs does this beautifully by connecting its main characters to various community members in hilarious and touching ways.
Comedy yields credibility. Engagement and advocacy can be portrayed as part of developing positive identity—but there’s a fine line between powerful and precious. Humor, especially around shared, everyday adolescent experiences (e.g. early romance) will keep characters relatable when they stand up for their still-evolving beliefs.
Freelancer
Nuance Needed in Adolescent Mental Health Stories
Even before the pandemic, mental health challenges were the leading cause of poor life outcomes for youth.
Though the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the mental health of adolescents in ways we are just beginning to understand, it’s also been a boon to our collective awareness of an issue that existed long before “social distancing” became a fixture in the national lexicon. Adolescence is a developmental period when many mental health problems like depression and substance use begin to emerge – and social and environmental factors can compound these issues. Even before the pandemic, mental health challenges were the leading cause of poor life outcomes for youth. In the 10 years before 2019, the number of high school students reporting persistent sadness or hopelessness had increased by 40% to more than 1 in 3 students. The pandemic has only magnified these pre-existing challenges with shuttered schools, social isolation, and compounded financial and psychological strain on families.
As the pandemic continues, general awareness of the importance of adolescent mental health has increased considerably. But awareness of a problem doesn’t automatically lead to sensitive storytelling. The backlash toward the television show 13 Reasons Why from media critics, educators, and parents points to the difficulties writers face when tackling mental health crises and suicide in adolescents. Graphic, sensationalized content about teen mental health often walks a thin line between relatability and exploitation.
When done right, though, fictional stories may lead to positive outcomes by reducing stigma and normalizing conversations about mental health. This was even the case with the controversial 13 Reasons Why, as research by the Center for Scholars and Storytellers found adolescent viewers were more likely to seek information about issues depicted in the show and have conversations with friends and parents about the topics. Nuanced portrayals of adolescents struggling with mental health and even suicide can be compelling and supportive of healthy development. Here are some recommendations for how to use our research in your stories about mental health:
Strive toward trauma-informed content. This means telling stories in ways that are sensitive - rather than sensationalizing - and empowering towards characters who are experiencing trauma. In the 2012 film The Perks of Being a Wallflower, we see the main character Charlie learn to cope with PTSD from sexual abuse through an evolution of methods – from friendships, to self-medication with drugs and alcohol, and finally to inpatient treatment. The Perks of Being a Wallflower reflects what we know about resilience in adolescence while telling a beautiful (and critically acclaimed) coming of age story.
Model resilience by balancing bleakness with hope. Experts suggest that talking openly about suicide can sometimes serve as a protective factor among adolescents, and CSS’s research reinforces this finding. The 2010 film It’s Kind of a Funny Story does an effective - and affecting - job of this. The main character Craig has the self-awareness to recognize when “normal” stress responses to external pressures become unhealthy, leading him to seek help for what has become full-fledged depression. It’s important to show viewers what supportive environments and relationships look like so that young people know these resources are available.
Move beyond “bootstraps” and “individual savior” storylines. Supporting adolescent mental health is not a one-person job or a matter of self-agency as many false narratives would have us believe. In reality, creating the kinds of deep and complex connections needed is a community-wide undertaking. Think about including not just families, but also schools, community-based organizations, and the healthcare system in supporting roles.
Finding an authentic balance in stories about adolescence and mental health can be difficult. But these narratives also have the potential to accurately and inspiringly show audiences what adolescent development looks like – and how we can support young people who are struggling, together.
Freelancer
Rebooting Adolescent Romance Stories
The experience of romantic awakening is individual and varied, but universal in its critical importance to developing social and emotional skills and discovering one's identity.
Young love is a story that’s been told in ways that both warm the heart and elicit sympathetic cringing. The experience of romantic awakening is individual and varied, but universal in its critical importance to developing social and emotional skills and discovering one's identity. These early relationships help us figure out who we are, make independent decisions, and learn to understand the concept of consent. And while they certainly have a biological component, understanding how to navigate them is not at all instinctive. That’s why young people need positive environments and supportive relationships with adults and peers to build healthy romantic relationships. But making authentic adolescent development a through line in stories about young romance doesn’t mean you have to give up the humor - or even the cringing.
The To All the Boys… franchise is a great example of how to do this. The Netflix film trilogy (adapted from the YA novel series) stays true to rom-com expectations while portraying adolescent love in an ever-evolving and age-appropriate way. What makes these movies so fun to watch - in addition to their appealing performances - is witnessing the main character Lara Jean figure out what she wants in her relationship, and what she wants for herself. Lara Jean and Peter’s relationship is filled with trial and error, ultimately culminating in a decision to give long-distance dating a go. Will it work out? The finale leaves it up in the air, but adolescent love is an exploration of the unknown, just as it is in adulthood. To All the Boys… doesn’t have to compromise the romance to tell a developmental story.
Here’s what our research shows about creative storytelling approaches that give adolescent romantic relationships the credit they deserve.
Treat them like the real thing. Romantic relationships in adolescence aren’t just “practice” for grown-up relationships—they are real, and they matter a lot to healthy development.
Make breakups matter, too. Break-ups are as important for healthy development as forming romantic relationships. You can make them dramatic without trivializing them - like Kurt and Blaine’s breakup in Glee - and play them for laughs while still making them consequential - à la She’s the Man.
More than just the two of us. Romantic relationships are never just about two people. They are supported and nurtured - and yes, sometimes hindered - by the relationships they already have. Compelling stories about adolescent love should portray these supports and the ways in which other relationships might work against them, too.
Zoom out. Social inequality plays a role in romantic relationships, as it does in every portrayal of adolescent development. Highlighting the big-picture social conditions that threaten positive relationship outcomes can help build tension in a more authentic portrayal of the challenges adolescents face, even when they have strong connections to each other. The now classic 2000 movie Love and Basketball does this brilliantly, in two ways. First, it is a thoughtful exploration of how gender norms play a role in romantic relationships. Second, it indirectly speaks to the ways in which stories about young people of color are marginalized in film by not making racism the central storyline.
Highlight positive identity development. Romantic relationships are a productive vehicle for identity exploration, and can be used to convey the importance of staying true to that identity. For instance, in the movie The Duff, main character Bianca holds her ground after a superficially cruel insult from classmates, and ends up rewriting the social order while finding romance in the process.
Don’t sell out for laughs. Sure, adolescent romance is rich territory for mining jokes, but there’s a fine line between extracting the universally human humor in them and trivializing them. So far, the new Mindy Kaling series The Sex Life of College Girls, finds this middle ground. Though it certainly portrays the messiness of college-age relationships and sex, it counter-balances these with real moments that illustrate the importance of romance to healthy self-discovery.
Freelancer