Most adolescents are quite careful in their choice of partners. Promiscuity and repeated, risky unprotected intercourse are often signs of underlying emotional problems. Behaviour problems Teenagers and their parents complain about each other's behaviour. Parents often feel they have lost any sort of control or influence over their child. At the same time as wanting their parents to be clear, wanting some structure and boundaries, adolescents resent parental restrictions on their growing freedom and ability to decide for themselves.
Disagreements are common, part of the young person's struggle to forge a separate identity.
This is all normal, but may get to the point where parents have really lost control, not knowing where their children are, what they are up to, or what is happening to them. Experience suggests that children are at greater risk of getting into trouble if their parents don't know where they are, so it is important that they let their parents know where they are going and that parents ask. School problems Refusal to go to school is commonly due to difficulties in separating from parents, and may have happened before in primary school. Such children commonly suffer physical symptoms such as headache or stomach-ache. Those who go to school, but then play truant, are usually unhappy at home and frustrated at school, so spend their days with others who feel the same way.