Female "tweens" and sexual development

Sexual development as a component of interpersonal relationships is essential to healthy personality development. Nurses, as health professionals who advise and counsel "tweens" (early adolescent females) in a variety of settings, have important roles to play in promoting their healthy sexual development. To date, empirical documentation has contributed to health professionals' ability to describe factors that influence early sexual debuts, but it has contributed minimally to their understanding of the processes of sexual development. The purposes of this article are (a) to generate thoughtful discussions about the sexual development of early adolescent females and (b) to discuss how societal constructions of female sexual development and identity create particular challenges for open communication about sexual expression.