When are you an adult?

In law you are finally free of your parents – and they free of responsibility for you – at the age of 18.

For many young people and their parents that may seem too soon, particularly in this era where so many children are protected it seems – some might say mollycoddled – from the realities of life.

This week we had the sad story of Southampton student Yunzhao Fan who tragically killed himself when he found he couldn’t cope with his studies at Southampton University.

The bright, straight A* student, who had attended St. George’s Catholic College and then Peter Symonds College, kept the fact he was missing lectures and was then dismissed from his maths degree course from his parents. It was his horrified father that found him dead at home.

Yunzhao’s family ask why the university didn’t inform them their son was struggling? The university says that at 19 the young man was an adult and responsible for his own life.

Who is correct? Certainly the university is legally correct and Yunzhao’s privacy as an adult needed to be respected. But there will be many parents who will identify with the heartache of the Fan family and the fact they were kept in the dark.

Becoming an adult means taking on the responsibilities of adulthood. But in an age where we appear not to put away ‘childhood things’ until much later in life, should that lead to added caution when dealing with young adults and their so-called independence?