Adolescence

How to spell adolescence

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce adolescence

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does adolescence mean?

1. nounThe stage of life between childhood and adulthood, roughly the teenage years.

Adolescence in a sentence

• Many lifelong habits are formed during adolescence.

• The book traces his difficult adolescence in a crowded city.

Where does adolescence come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word travels back to the Latin verb adolescere, which meant 'to grow up' or 'to ripen', built from the prefix ad- 'toward' and alescere 'to be nourished, to grow', itself rooted in alere 'to nourish'. The present participle adolescens described someone in the act of growing up, and from that came the noun adolescentia for the stage of life between childhood and adulthood. English took the word in through French in the fifteenth century, keeping the Latin spelling almost intact. A striking relative is the word 'adult', which comes from adultus, the past participle of the very same verb: an adult is literally one who has finished growing, while an adolescent is still in the process. That shared origin explains the tricky middle of the word, where the soft -sc- of the Latin growth verb survives as the silent-feeling -sce- spelling that catches writers out.

How the word is built

• ad- (toward)
• olesc- (to grow up, from alescere 'to be nourished/grow')
• -ence (noun suffix)