Essay

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Chapter Nine

Moving into the Adult Social World: Socioemotional

Development in Adolescence

The Myth of Storm and Stress

• Research shows that most adolescents: – Love their parents; feel loved, appreciated,

and wanted by them – Look to parents for advice and embrace

many of their values • 25% of parent-child conflicts are more serious

and can lead to behavior problems – More common when adolescents cannot

well regulate their emotions

9.1 Identity

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The Search for Identity

• Erikson: identity achievement vs. identity (role) confusion involves adolescents’ – Balancing between selecting a single self

vs. trying out many possible selves – Identify qualifiers and integrating principles

Identity Statuses

E xp

lo ra

tio n

Commitment

High Low

High identity achievement

identity moratorium

Low identity foreclosure

identity diffusion

Marcia’s Four Identity Statuses

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Game!

• Directions: Read each of the following scenarios. Based on the information provided, indicate which identity status best describes the adolescent.

Scenario 1

• Jacob’s father, grandfather, and two of his uncles are all police officers. Since he was in middle school, Jacob has planned to become a police officer, too. During his first semester of college, Jacob declared criminal justice as his major.

Scenario 2

• Janeesa spent her senior year of high school exploring career options within the field of education. She attended career fairs and shadowed a social worker, school principal, special education teacher, and a speech and language pathologist. During her second year in college, Janeesa declared her major in special education.

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Scenario 3

• Yuri is about to finish high school. Although she plans to attend college, Yuri has not decided what she wants to do with her life. She has considered medicine, law, and social work. Yuri has volunteered at a nursing home and currently works part-time as a secretary for a small law firm. Yuri plans to spend her first year or two of college exploring her options before settling on a major.

Scenario 4

• Ashton is a junior in high school and seems uninterested in college or trade school. He has worked several part-time jobs but quit each within a few weeks. When asked what he wants to do with his life, Ashton usually says, “It really doesn’t matter to me what I do. I’m not in any hurry to go to college or start a career. There’s plenty of time for that later.”

Fluid Identity Development

• Factors that affect Identity Development – Personality

• Assuming absolute truth is attainable: foreclosed • Doubt about certainty: diffused • Use of rational criteria to explore alternatives:

moratorium/achieved – Parenting

• Secure attachment: moratorium/achieved • Lack opportunities for separation: foreclosed • Low levels of support: diffused

– Peers and friends • Diverse perspectives

– Schools • Opportunities for exploration

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Fluid Identity Development

• Life-long process – Appearance of attachment è Basic

sense of self è Basic independent è Improvement in behaviors è taking responsibility for behaviors è enjoying fruits of labor è life review/ego integrity

• Moratorium è Achievement è Moratorium è Achievement (MAMA)

Characteristics of Adolescents’ Thinking

9.4 The Dark Side

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Drug Use

• 2/3 of teenagers drink or 50% get drunk • Teens’ drinking can be reduced by:

– Teaching effective coping mechanisms – In-school student-led discussions of facts

about drinking and how to resist peer pressure

• Smoking usually begins in 6th-7th grade • Comprehensive school programs can reduce

teen smoking by 33%

Depression

• Depression during adolescence – Involves pervasive feelings of sadness,

emptiness, irritability, anger, poor sleep, low self-esteem, and inability to concentrate

– Involves feeling lonely; believing family, classmates, and friends to be unfriendly

– Can result from negative events, even events that no one could have controlled

• Occurs in 5-10% of adolescents & is more common in girls

Depression Risk Factors

• Some risk factors for adolescent depression – Poor emotion regulation – Extremely negative self-beliefs – Emotionally distant, uninvolved parents – Punitive discipline – Poverty – Disturbed levels of serotonin and/or

norepinephrine

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Treating Depression: Two Approaches

• Antidepressant drugs correct imbalances in neurotransmitters, but increase suicide risk

• Therapy needs to focus on rewarding social interactions and to correctly interpret them

• Left untreated, depression can: – Disrupt school performance/relationships – Increase risk of adult depression

• Prevention programs reduce high-risk youth’s number of depressive episodes

Preventing Teen Suicides

• Suicide: rare before 15, attempted by 10%, completed by 1/10,000

• Rare in girls; more frequent in older adolescent boys

• Native Americans have the highest rate, while Asian and African Americans have the lowest

• If someone shows signs of committing suicide, never ignore or leave them alone – Ask if person is planning to hurt the self – Remain calm and supportive

Preventing Teen Suicides: Warning Signs

• Depression and/or drugs are frequent precursors; other common warning signs: – Threats of suicide – Preoccupation with death – Change in eating or sleeping habits – Loss of interest in formerly activities – Marked personality changes – Persistent feelings of gloom/helplessness – Giving away valued possessions

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Delinquency

• Adolescent-limited antisocial behavior: relatively minor criminal acts by those who aren’t consistently antisocial – Short-lived, usually vanishing by late

adolescence or early adulthood • Life-course persistent antisocial behavior:

antisocial behaviors emerging at an early age and continuing throughout life (5% of youth) – Ex.: hitting at 3, shoplifting at 12, and car

theft at 16

Causes of Delinquency: Biology and Cognition

• Contributors to life-course antisocial behavior – Heredity: identical twins more similar than

fraternal ones in physical aggressiveness – Biology: being temperamentally difficult,

overly emotional, or inattentive; testosterone levels; neurotransmitter deficits

– Cognitive processes – poor skills in interpreting another’s intentions, impulsive actions, inability to delay gratification

Causes of Delinquency: Social

• Family processes – harsh discipline, poor monitoring, marital conflict

• Stress due to poverty, or poverty’s higher chance of yielding poor parenting and exposure to violent crime – Risk factors build on each other

• Ex.: poverty è poor parenting è school problems è conduct problems è lesser parental monitoring è becoming involved with deviant, aggressive peers

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Treatment and Prevention

• Benefits of certain intervention programs outweigh their costs

• Fast Track teaches: – Academic & social skills to elementary-

school children – Life and vocational skills to adolescents – Childrearing skills to parents – How parents can monitor and stay involved

with older children