The author offers clinical examples of ways in which the attainment of formal operations in adolescents both exacerbates chronic disabilities and contributes to the etiology of new disabilities (such as in teenage obesity, anorexia nervosa, and depression). He suggests treatment guidelines. (CL)

Stresses the development of complex cognitive processes during adolescence and sees the challenge of the curriculum in the question of greater match between the learner's cognitive level and the material to learned. (JOW)