Teenagers

Adolescents.. For the My Chemical Romance song, see "Teenagers (song)".

American high school students

Adolescence (Latin adolescentia, from adolescere, to grow up) is the period of psychological and social transition between childhood and adulthood (gender-specific, manhood or womanhood). In common usage in western, English language countries, "adolescent" and "teenager" may be considered synonyms (though it should be noted that the term 'teenager' is an artifact of the English counting system, not something that occurs in most languages), though the exact endpoints of each category don't always coincide depending on the definition of "adolescent" being used. Adolescence is the transitional stage of human development in which a juvenile matures into an adult. This transition involves biological (i.e. pubertal), social, and psychological changes, though the biological ones are the easiest to measure objectively.

"Adolescence" is a modern cultural and social phenomenon and therefore its end points are not easily tied to physical milestones and historically this stage of development has not existed in its current form. The time is identified with dramatic changes in the body, along with developments in a person's psychology and academic career. In the onset of adolescence, children usually complete elementary school and enter secondary education, such as middle school or high school. A person between early childhood and the teenage years is sometimes referred to as a pre-teen or tween.

The ages of adolescence vary by culture. The World Health Organization (WHO) defines adolescence as the period of life between 10 and 19 years of age.^[1] In contrast, in the United States, adolescence is generally considered to begin somewhere between ages 12 and 14, and end at 19 or 20. As distinct from the varied interpretations of who is considered an "adolescent", the word "teenager" is more easily defined: it describes a person who is thirteen to nineteen years of age.

During this period of life, most children go through the physical stages of puberty which, in recent times, has begun between the ages of nine and thirteen, while historically began much later. (See Puberty below)

Most cultures regard people as becoming adults at various ages of the teenage years. (See Social and cultural below)