Sheriffa Mahama¹, Karina Weichold², Nora Fehmer², Eunice N. Mvungu ³ & Misaki N. Natsuaki^4
1University of Ghana, Legon, Ghana
²Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, Germany
³Kenyatta University, Kenya
⁴University of California, Riverside, USA

During adolescence, research (primarily based on samples from Europe and Northern America) has shown that both boys and girls can have a somewhat mixed perception of the changes their bodies are going through. These issues are different between males and females. For males on the average, they tend to have a more positive view of their body changes because puberty changes lead to more muscle and height gains etc., which are perceived as more attractive. For girls, they increase in body weight, and more rounded figures and experience menstruation among others which is seen in a more negative light and, thus, leads to more negative body and appearance perceptions. In this research we wanted to find out whether these assertions are true of adolescents in Africa since most of these previous studies were conducted in western countries. We also wanted to find out if there were differences in the puberty experiences of adolescents from Ghana and Kenya because usually, Africa countries are considered homogenous with respect to research. We therefore investigated the body image perceptions and puberty experiences of a sample of Ghanaian and Kenyan adolescents. 

We used questionnaires to collect the information from 86 adolescents between the ages of thirteen to fourteen from basic schools in Ghana and Kenya. Among the Ghanaian sample, 46 in total, 26 (56.5%) were female and the rest male. Among the Kenyan sample, 40 in total, 20 (50%) were female and the rest male. The respondents answered questions on their levels of pubertal maturity – ranging from ‘puberty not started’ to ‘puberty seems complete’. They also rated how they feel about their bodies (e.g. during puberty, my body becomes ugly vs. beautiful). In addition, 13 questions were open-ended and so allowed the adolescents to write out in their own words on their own experience of puberty (e.g. What does puberty mean to you personally). A multinational team of researchers looked through their responses and categorized them according to the themes which formed the results.

The experiences and perceptions of adolescents in the two African countries were in some ways comparable but also quite different. In the quantitative section of the findings, Kenyan adolescents were found to reach puberty a little later than Ghanaian adolescents and were also found to have generally more negative puberty experiences and perceptions of their bodies compared to the Ghanaian adolescents. Kenyan boys, who were more advanced with puberty had more significantly negative perceptions of their bodies compared to those who were less advanced with physical changes. For the Kenyan girls, the opposite was true, more advanced girls were more positive about their bodies than less advanced. This is contrary to what past research has indicated for boys and girls and so provides new and interesting insight.

In the qualitative analysis, the adolescents from the two countries expressed common themes in their own experiences of pubertal changes. In all, seven major themes were obtained from their written comments. The first was that they overwhelmingly believed that puberty and the changes they were going through were natural and universal, a necessary experience of being human and attaining adulthood. The second theme commonly mentioned was that puberty comes with physical and mental changes and growth some of which were appreciated and others not. In terms of physical growth, the boys appreciated the increase in strength and height but expressed discomfort and lack of knowledge to deal with the growth in body hair, developing acne and the sexual changes. The girls, in contrast, mostly expressed discomfort with the weight gain, acne, the menstruation, described as painful and sometimes causing embarrassment especially in school. The third theme expressed by some of the adolescents was of puberty sometimes being scary. This tended to come from adolescents who had little or no prior information or preparation for puberty. Due to misunderstanding of puberty, they expressed fear of getting pregnant or catching diseases because of pubertal changes. The fourth theme focused on the duality of puberty experience with both good and bad changes and facets. In some ways becoming an adult is positive, in other ways, getting acne or menstrual cramps is bad. In the fifth theme, the importance of being synchronized with peers in the pubertal journey was highlighted. Experiencing puberty at the same time as one’s peers makes it bearable since they can rely on each other for support. For girls, reaching puberty earlier than peers was worse than later and for boys, earlier puberty was preferred over later. The sixth theme further highlighted this concept of shared experience since the adolescents expressed the fact that other significant persons in their lives namely, parents, older siblings and teachers have had similar experiences of puberty. This knowledge is comforting and makes their own experiences tolerable. The final theme was that going through puberty makes other people (e.g. teachers, parents, and older siblings) perceive them as bad without valid reasons. They are considered rebellious, aggressive, and disruptive which they attribute to the pubertal changes experienced.

The results suggest that the adolescents recognized and derived comfort from the universality of puberty. However, African adolescents like other countries in the global south do not have a singular experience of puberty and do have differences and diversity in their experiences which are driven by various aspects of their environment. We therefore need further research to foster a better understanding of these environmental and contextual influences and to understand in more depth adolescents’ experiences and their body image appraisals. Based on that, culture-specific measures to promote wellbeing and health during puberty can be developed and implemented.

Mahama, S., Weichold, K., Fehmer, N., Mvungu, E. N., & Natsuaki, M. N. (2024). Pubertal status and body image: An inquiry into experiences of adolescents in Ghana and Kenya. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 34(2), 257-271.