ABSTRACT
One of the more notable features of adolescence is the broad range of inter individual variation in the timing, rate, and pattern of physical maturational events. Even on the level of general experience and casual observation, it is readily apparent that adolescent peers differ markedly in appearance with regard to degree of physical maturation. Data on contemporary adolescents are taken mainly from a mixed longitudinal study of physical, social, and behavioral-psychological development of 9- to 17-year olds in a Kikuyu (Bantu) community conducted 1979–1981 under the auspices of the Department of Pediatrics, University of Nairobi Medical School. Social change and modernization proceeded rapidly in Ngecha during the British colonial and post-Independence periods, and has brought the cash crop, wage-earning economy, Christianity, schooling, and central government among other nontraditional elements. As has been detailed elsewhere, these changes have especially altered the structure of adolescent experience.
