Adolescence

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Adolescence

MARCIA’S DEVELOPMENT OF

ADOLESCENT IDENTITY • As Erikson noted, the crisis of

adolescence is ego identity versus identity confusion. The struggle for a sense of identity is heightened by the ability to think abstractly, by rapid physical changes and by a decreasing reliance on parents to make decisions and to define reality. According to JAMES MARCIA, there are four identity orientations that adolescents adopt to deal with identity formation.

MARCIA’S DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENT IDENTITY

• Some enter FORECLOSURE, a premature commitment to an identity defined by parents, adopting the roles, values of others, foreclosing their own struggle.

Marcia

MARCIA’S DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENT IDENTITY

• Others delay commitment, taking a MORATORIUM while experimenting with alternative lifestyles and values. Often college allows this moratorium which can be quite valuable in ultimately achieving a strong personal identity.

Identity Moratorium

MARCIA’S DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENT IDENTITY

• Some teenagers become apathetic and refuse to either commit or confront the challenges of developing an identity and enter IDENTITY DIFFUSION, making no commitments.

• (Low Commitment, Low Crisis)

IDENTITY DIFFUSION

MARCIA’S DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENT IDENTITY

• Others struggle with the multitude of issues and possible belief systems and develop a strong personal identity, IDENTITY ACHIEVEMENT, the cornerstone for a psychologically healthy and fulfilling life. Marcia noted that the struggle for a sense of identity is a continuing struggle, but is most intense in adolescence.

IDENTITY ACHIEVEMENT

Marcia

Marcia, Marcia, Marcia

HUMANISTIC THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT

• HUMANISTIC THEORISTS believe we are born with an innate drive to develop our potential -to actualize the SELF. In a loving environment in which the parents give UNCONDITIONAL POSITIVE REGARD, unconditional loving respect and acceptance, the child will SELF-ACTUALIZE his potential.

HUMANISTIC THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT

• Carl Rogers theorized that we all need positive regard, love, attention, warmth and approval to develop a positive self-image and feelings of worth. Given this nurturance, we fulfill our self and become loving, kind, intelligent and free to determine our own destiny. If however we receive CONDITIONAL POSITIVE REGARD and CONDITIONS OF WORTH we begin to be defensive. Criticisms from others make us doubt our self-worth and we develop a negative self-concept.

Carl Rogers

HUMANISTIC THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT

• Given UNCONDITIONAL POSITIVE REGARD in a loving environment we develop a positive SELF-CONCEPT that enables us to SELF-ACTUALIZE our potential and become a FULLY-FUNCTIONING PERSON who is spontaneous, open, loving and free.

• Given CONDITIONAL REGARD AND CONDITIONS OF WORTH in a cold, critical and unloving environment we become MALADJUSTED, unsure of ourselves, critical of ourselves and others.

HUMANISTIC THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT

• We develop defenses and masks to protect ourselves that we hide behind never fulfilling our potential, losing our unique identity. As we defend ourselves and deny our real feelings, we become incongruent.

Humanism

BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL-LEARNING

PRINCIPLES OF DEVELOPMENT • BEHAVIORISTS believe we are born into the

world as a "blank slate". We LEARN who we are from early SOCIALIZATION. We are products of our conditioning, SHAPED by our early histories of REINFORCEMENTS. Children "learn what they live" in their early home ENVIRONMENT. Hopefully a child will live in an environment of approval, fairness, encouragement, security and praise so that he/she will develop trust, confidence and affection for self and others.

BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL-LEARNING PRINCIPLES OF DEVELOPMENT

• COOLEY, a prominent social psychologist, developed the idea that our self-concept is formed through interactions with others in our environment. Cooley proposed that we develop a "LOOKING-GLASS SELF', our self-concept becoming a mirror of the reactions of others to our actions. Cooley stated that all children act in response to their needs and desires without a strong sense of self.

BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL-LEARNING PRINCIPLES OF DEVELOPMENT

• According to the looking-glass theory, when children ACT, significant others REACT, giving praise, criticism, encouragement, shame, approval and other strong personal REACTIONS. It is on the basis of the REACTIONS one receives from others that one's SELF-CONCEPT is formed. Thus we LEARN how to feel about ourselves, our SELF-CONCEPT, from others, and we begin to see ourselves through the reflections of their feedback.

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BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL-LEARNING PRINCIPLES OF DEVELOPMENT

• SOCIAL-LEARNING THEORISTS also stress the importance of LEARNING in child development. They emphasize the importance of the processes of MODELING and IMITATION in OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING. Children not only model and imitate their parents but other models represented through television, movies, games, sports and other early childhood experiences.

Bandura: Social Learning Theory

BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL-LEARNING PRINCIPLES OF DEVELOPMENT

• They question the practice of allowing the television to be a baby-sitter six to eight hours a day and place some blame for the amount of violence and aggression and maladjustment in the society today on aggressive, power-oriented television models that children imitate.

Alfred Adler

ADLER’S PSYCHOANALYTIC IDEAS ON DEVELOPMENT

• ALFRED ADLER observed that there was an innate "drive for power and superiority" that was evidenced in sibling rivalry. He suggested that many of our traits were developed as we struggled for attention and power in our earliest social setting, the family. First-born gained approval from parents for achieving and taking responsibility. Being the oldest they were able to wield power over siblings through overt power and dominance.

First Born

ADLER’S PSYCHOANALYTIC IDEAS ON DEVELOPMENT

• Middle children often feel defeated and inferior in attempts to complete with and surpass the older sibling. They may strive to achieve affection from parents by developing different "superior" qualities but may often feel anxious that they are not as loved as the first born.

Middle Child

ADLER’S PSYCHOANALYTIC IDEAS ON DEVELOPMENT

• Adler noted that the youngest child is often spoiled and allowed to be immature and irresponsible as older children were already responsible for household chores. Love showered on the last-born does allow the child to be secure, confident, spontaneous and happy. Although these are generalities, Adler felt the early childhood family dynamics held the key for the development of very specific ways of achieving attention and power and basic personality styles of interacting with others in the world.

Youngest Child

BAUMRIND’S PARENTING STYLES

• DIANE BAUMRIND also thought that parenting styles were important to the development of the child. She researched styles of socialization between parent and child and noticed that parents tended to be either PERMISSIVE toward their children, AUTHORITARIAN and dominating or AUTHORITATIVE, teaching children skills and rules while allowing them to make their own important decisions.

AUTHORITARIAN

Permissive

BAUMRIND’S PARENTING STYLES

• Her research clearly showed that AUTHORITATIVE PARENTS tended to have more competent and cooperative children who were happy with themselves and others.

AUTHORITATIVE

HARRY HARLOW’S ATTACHMENT IN MONKEYS

• HARRY HARLOW also researched the nature of the parental relationship in his classic research with monkeys. Monkeys raised with mother love, warmth and physiological contact called CONTACT COMFORT were found to be normal, happy and able to engage in fulfilling peer love and became excellent mothers. Monkeys raised with "mother surrogates", wire monkeys who provided food and water but no contact comfort, were emotionally deprived and developed hostile, aggressive tendencies toward peers or withdrew completely.

Harry Harlow

HARRY HARLOW’S ATTACHMENT IN MONKEYS

• These distressed monkeys developed maladaptive tendencies as parents, biting off ears of their young or totally depriving them of warmth, contact and motherly love.

HARRY HARLOW’S ATTACHMENT IN MONKEYS

• From this important classic research we found that motherhood is not instinctual, but LEARNED. We began to understand the cycles of abuse seen in mother-child relationships as learned and we developed treatment programs that incorporated this new understanding. We began to understand the importance of CONTACT COMFORT and human touch upon BONDING. If one did not feel this warm human bond of attachment to a caring person early in life one could turn uncaring, cold and commit "inhuman" aggressive acts.

Adolescence

• Research on human development gives us pause to consider the deep abiding effects of early childhood experience on the adult personality - on health, happiness, sanity, achievement, intelligence, self-confidence, friendliness, inner security and our ability to enter into nourishing relationships with others in our lives.

In Conclusion

• Adolescence may be a time of confusion, but the clues are there for success.