The psychological problems of teenagers with addictive behaviour: the role of life meaning strategies

Abstract

There are various forms of addictions that teenagers indulge in. Teenage years is a stage in life that when physical and hormonal changes influence a person’s field of decision-making. During this time, teenagers are enticed to experiment on drugs and other dangerous habits. Results suggest that attention should be paid to how teenagers are thinking about their futures due to the associated links with long-term social and health behaviours. Overall, this study shows that there are considerable differences both in terms of individual indicators, and on the relationships between the meaning-life orientations and value orientations in the structure of personal life plans of teenagers with addictive behaviour and teenagers that are not prone to addiction. This result may indicate that the psychological aspects of personal life plans for teenagers influence the development of addictive behaviours. The values of communication: courage in defending one’s opinion, honesty, and advertence are more important for teenagers of the control group than for teenagers with addictive behaviour. In the meaning-life orientations and values of a teenager who is not prone to addictive behaviour, the central place is occupied by a strong will as a value – a means of achieving goal, on the second place it is possible to highlight by importance of interrelations the instrumental value – responsibility. The results of the study can be further used to carry out effective preventive and psycho-corrective work with teenagers. The carried out research has shown that psycho-corrective work should be built with taking into account the formation of personal life plans of teenagers. Identified characteristics of personal life plans for teenagers who are prone to addictive behaviour can be used for psycho diagnostic purposes when carrying out complex judicial psycho-psychiatric examination or forensic psychiatric examination.

Key words: addictive behaviour, life-meaning orientations, values.