problem solving skills identity formation and development

Erik Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development

Saul Mcleod, PhD

Editor-in-Chief for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MRes, PhD, University of Manchester

Saul Mcleod, PhD., is a qualified psychology teacher with over 18 years of experience in further and higher education. He has been published in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Clinical Psychology.

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Olivia Guy-Evans, MSc

Associate Editor for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MSc Psychology of Education

Olivia Guy-Evans is a writer and associate editor for Simply Psychology. She has previously worked in healthcare and educational sectors.

On This Page:

Erikson maintained that personality develops in a predetermined order through eight stages of psychosocial development, from infancy to adulthood. During each stage, the person experiences a psychosocial crisis that could positively or negatively affect personality development.

For Erikson (1958, 1963), these crises are psychosocial because they involve the psychological needs of the individual (i.e., psycho) conflicting with the needs of society (i.e., social).

According to the theory, successful completion of each stage results in a healthy personality and the acquisition of basic virtues. Basic virtues are characteristic strengths that the ego can use to resolve subsequent crises.

Failure to complete a stage can result in a reduced ability to complete further stages and, therefore, a more unhealthy personality and sense of self.  These stages, however, can be resolved successfully at a later time.

Stage 1. Trust vs. Mistrust

Trust vs. mistrust is the first stage in Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development. This stage begins at birth continues to approximately 18 months of age. During this stage, the infant is uncertain about the world in which they live, and looks towards their primary caregiver for stability and consistency of care.

Here’s the conflict:

Trust : If the caregiver is reliable, consistent, and nurturing, the child will develop a sense of trust, believing that the world is safe and that people are dependable and affectionate.

This sense of trust allows the child to feel secure even when threatened and extends into their other relationships, maintaining their sense of security amidst potential threats.

Mistrust : Conversely, if the caregiver fails to provide consistent, adequate care and affection, the child may develop a sense of mistrust and insecurity . 

This could lead to a belief in an inconsistent and unpredictable world, fostering a sense of mistrust, suspicion, and anxiety.

Under such circumstances, the child may lack confidence in their ability to influence events, viewing the world with apprehension.

Infant Feeding

Feeding is a critical activity during this stage. It’s one of infants’ first and most basic ways to learn whether they can trust the world around them.

It sets the stage for their perspective on the world as being either a safe, dependable place or a place where their needs may not be met.

This consistent, dependable care helps the child feel a sense of security and trust in the caregiver and their environment.

They understand that when they have a need, such as hunger, someone will be there to provide for that need.

These negative experiences can lead to a sense of mistrust in their environment and caregivers.

They may start to believe that their needs may not be met, creating anxiety and insecurity.

Success and Failure In Stage One

Success in this stage will lead to the virtue of hope . By developing a sense of trust, the infant can have hope that as new crises arise, there is a real possibility that other people will be there as a source of support.

Failing to acquire the virtue of hope will lead to the development of fear. This infant will carry the basic sense of mistrust with them to other relationships. It may result in anxiety, heightened insecurities, and an over-feeling mistrust in the world around them.

Consistent with Erikson’s views on the importance of trust, research by Bowlby and Ainsworth has outlined how the quality of the early attachment experience can affect relationships with others in later life.

The balance between trust and mistrust allows the infant to learn that while there may be moments of discomfort or distress, they can rely on their caregiver to provide support.

This helps the infant to build resilience and the ability to cope with stress or adversity in the future.

Stage 2. Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt

Autonomy versus shame and doubt is the second stage of Erik Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development. This stage occurs between the ages of 18 months to approximately 3 years. According to Erikson, children at this stage are focused on developing a sense of personal control over physical skills and a sense of independence.

Autonomy : If encouraged and supported in their increased independence, children will become more confident and secure in their ability to survive.

They will feel comfortable making decisions, explore their surroundings more freely, and have a sense of self-control. Achieving this autonomy helps them feel able and capable of leading their lives.

Shame and Doubt : On the other hand, if children are overly controlled or criticized, they may begin to feel ashamed of their autonomy and doubt their abilities.

This can lead to a lack of confidence, fear of trying new things, and a sense of inadequacy about their self-control abilities.

What Happens During This Stage?

The child is developing physically and becoming more mobile, discovering that he or she has many skills and abilities, such as putting on clothes and shoes, playing with toys, etc.

Such skills illustrate the child’s growing sense of independence and autonomy.

For example, during this stage, children begin to assert their independence, by walking away from their mother, picking which toy to play with, and making choices about what they like to wear, to eat, etc.

Toilet Training 

This is when children start to exert their independence, taking control over their bodily functions, which can greatly influence their sense of autonomy or shame and doubt.

Autonomy : When parents approach toilet training in a patient, supportive manner, allowing the child to learn at their own pace, the child may feel a sense of accomplishment and autonomy.

They understand they have control over their own bodies and can take responsibility for their actions. This boosts their confidence, instilling a sense of autonomy and a belief in their ability to manage personal tasks.

Shame and Doubt : Conversely, if the process is rushed, if there’s too much pressure, or if parents respond with anger or disappointment to accidents, the child may feel shame and start doubting their abilities.

They may feel bad about their mistakes, and this can lead to feelings of shame, self-doubt, and a lack of confidence in their autonomy.

Success and Failure In Stage Two

Erikson states parents must allow their children to explore the limits of their abilities within an encouraging environment that is tolerant of failure.

Success in this stage will lead to the virtue of will . If children in this stage are encouraged and supported in their increased independence, they become more confident and secure in their own ability to survive in the world.

The infant develops a sense of personal control over physical skills and a sense of independence.

Suppose children are criticized, overly controlled, or not given the opportunity to assert themselves. In that case, they begin to feel inadequate in their ability to survive, and may then become overly dependent upon others, lack self-esteem , and feel a sense of shame or doubt in their abilities.

How Can Parents Encourage a Sense of Control?

Success leads to feelings of autonomy, and failure results in shame and doubt.

Erikson states it is critical that parents allow their children to explore the limits of their abilities within an encouraging environment that is tolerant of failure.

For example, rather than put on a child’s clothes, a supportive parent should have the patience to allow the child to try until they succeed or ask for assistance.

So, the parents need to encourage the child to become more independent while at the same time protecting the child so that constant failure is avoided.

A delicate balance is required from the parent. They must try not to do everything for the child, but if the child fails at a particular task, they must not criticize the child for failures and accidents (particularly when toilet training).

The aim has to be “self-control without a loss of self-esteem” (Gross, 1992).

The balance between autonomy and shame and doubt allows the child to understand that while they can’t always control their environment, they can exercise control over their actions and decisions, thus developing self-confidence and resilience.

Stage 3. Initiative vs. Guilt

Initiative versus guilt is the third stage of Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development. During the initiative versus guilt stage, children assert themselves more frequently through directing play and other social interaction.

Initiative : When caregivers encourage and support children to take the initiative, they can start planning activities, accomplish tasks, and face challenges.

The children will learn to take the initiative and assert control over their environment.

They can begin to think for themselves, formulate plans, and execute them, which helps foster a sense of purpose.

Guilt : If caregivers discourage the pursuit of independent activities or dismiss or criticize their efforts, children may feel guilty about their desires and initiatives.

This could potentially lead to feelings of guilt, self-doubt, and lack of initiative.

These are particularly lively, rapid-developing years in a child’s life. According to Bee (1992), it is a “time of vigor of action and of behaviors that the parents may see as aggressive.”

During this period, the primary feature involves the child regularly interacting with other children at school. Central to this stage is play, as it allows children to explore their interpersonal skills through initiating activities.

The child begins to assert control and power over their environment by planning activities, accomplishing tasks, and facing challenges.

Exploration

Here’s why exploration is important:

Developing Initiative : Exploration allows children to assert their power and control over their environment. Through exploration, children engage with their surroundings, ask questions, and discover new things.

This active engagement allows them to take the initiative and make independent choices, contributing to their autonomy and confidence.

Learning from Mistakes : Exploration also means making mistakes, and these provide crucial learning opportunities. Even if a child’s efforts lead to mistakes or failures, they learn to understand cause and effect and their role in influencing outcomes.

Building Self-Confidence : When caregivers support and encourage a child’s explorations and initiatives, it bolsters their self-confidence. They feel their actions are valuable and significant, which encourages them to take more initiative in the future.

Mitigating Guilt : If caregivers respect the child’s need for exploration and do not overly criticize their mistakes, it helps prevent feelings of guilt. Instead, the child learns it’s okay to try new things and perfectly fine to make mistakes.

Success and Failure In Stage Three

Children begin to plan activities, make up games, and initiate activities with others. If given this opportunity, children develop a sense of initiative and feel secure in their ability to lead others and make decisions. Success at this stage leads to the virtue of purpose .

Conversely, if this tendency is squelched, either through criticism or control, children develop a sense of guilt . The child will often overstep the mark in his forcefulness, and the danger is that the parents will tend to punish the child and restrict his initiative too much.

It is at this stage that the child will begin to ask many questions as his thirst for knowledge grows. If the parents treat the child’s questions as trivial, a nuisance, or embarrassing or other aspects of their behavior as threatening, the child may feel guilty for “being a nuisance”.

Too much guilt can slow the child’s interaction with others and may inhibit their creativity. Some guilt is, of course, necessary; otherwise the child would not know how to exercise self-control or have a conscience.

A healthy balance between initiative and guilt is important.

The balance between initiative and guilt during this stage can help children understand that it’s acceptable to take charge and make their own decisions, but there will also be times when they must follow the rules or guidelines set by others. Successfully navigating this stage develops the virtue of purpose.

How Can Parents Encourage a Sense of Exploration?

In this stage, caregivers must provide a safe and supportive environment that allows children to explore freely. This nurtures their initiative, helps them develop problem-solving skills, and builds confidence and resilience.

By understanding the importance of exploration and providing the right support, caregivers can help children navigate this stage successfully and minimize feelings of guilt.

Stage 4. Industry vs. Inferiority

Erikson’s fourth psychosocial crisis, involving industry (competence) vs. Inferiority occurs during childhood between the ages of five and twelve. In this stage, children start to compare themselves with their peers to gauge their abilities and worth.

Industry : If children are encouraged by parents and teachers to develop skills, they gain a sense of industry—a feeling of competence and belief in their skills.

They start learning to work and cooperate with others and begin to understand that they can use their skills to complete tasks. This leads to a sense of confidence in their ability to achieve goals.

Inferiority : On the other hand, if children receive negative feedback or are not allowed to demonstrate their skills, they may develop a sense of inferiority.

They may start to feel that they aren’t as good as their peers or that their efforts aren’t valued, leading to a lack of self-confidence and a feeling of inadequacy.

The child is coping with new learning and social demands.

Children are at the stage where they will be learning to read and write, to do sums, and to do things on their own. Teachers begin to take an important role in the child’s life as they teach specific skills.

At this stage, the child’s peer group will gain greater significance and become a major source of the child’s self-esteem.

The child now feels the need to win approval by demonstrating specific competencies valued by society and develop a sense of pride in their accomplishments.

This stage typically occurs during the elementary school years, from approximately ages 6 to 11, and the experiences children have in school can significantly influence their development.

Here’s why:

Development of Industry : At school, children are given numerous opportunities to learn, achieve, and demonstrate their competencies. They work on various projects, participate in different activities, and collaborate with their peers.

These experiences allow children to develop a sense of industry, reinforcing their confidence in their abilities to accomplish tasks and contribute effectively.

Social Comparison : School provides a context where children can compare themselves to their peers.

They gauge their abilities and achievements against those of their classmates, which can either help build their sense of industry or lead to feelings of inferiority, depending on their experiences and perceptions.

Feedback and Reinforcement : Teachers play a crucial role during this stage. Their feedback can either reinforce the child’s sense of industry or trigger feelings of inferiority.

Encouraging feedback enhances the child’s belief in their skills, while persistent negative feedback can lead to a sense of inferiority.

Building Life Skills : School also provides opportunities for children to develop crucial life skills, like problem-solving, teamwork, and time management. Successfully acquiring and utilizing these skills promotes a sense of industry.

Dealing with Failure : School is where children may encounter academic difficulties or fail for the first time.

How they learn to cope with these situations— and how teachers and parents guide them through these challenges—can influence whether they develop a sense of industry or inferiority.

Success and Failure In Stage Four

Success leads to the virtue of competence , while failure results in feelings of inferiority .

If children are encouraged and reinforced for their initiative, they begin to feel industrious (competence) and confident in their ability to achieve goals.

If this initiative is not encouraged, if parents or teacher restricts it, then the child begins to feel inferior, doubting his own abilities, and therefore may not reach his or her potential.

If the child cannot develop the specific skill they feel society demands (e.g., being athletic), they may develop a sense of Inferiority.

Some failure may be necessary so that the child can develop some modesty. Again, a balance between competence and modesty is necessary.

The balance between industry and inferiority allows children to recognize their skills and understand that they have the ability to work toward and achieve their goals, even if they face challenges along the way.

How Can Parents & Teachers Encourage a Sense of Exploration?

In this stage, teachers and parents need to provide consistent, constructive feedback and encourage effort, not just achievement.

This approach helps foster a sense of industry, competence, and confidence in children, reducing feelings of inferiority.

Stage 5. Identity vs. Role Confusion

The fifth stage of Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development is identity vs. role confusion, and it occurs during adolescence, from about 12-18 years. During this stage, adolescents search for a sense of self and personal identity, through an intense exploration of personal values, beliefs, and goals.

Identity : If adolescents are supported in their exploration and given the freedom to explore different roles, they are likely to emerge from this stage with a strong sense of self and a feeling of independence and control.

This process involves exploring their interests, values, and goals, which helps them form their own unique identity.

Role Confusion : If adolescents are restricted and not given the space to explore or find the process too overwhelming or distressing, they may experience role confusion.

This could mean being unsure about one’s place in the world, values, and future direction. They may struggle to identify their purpose or path, leading to confusion about their personal identity.

During adolescence, the transition from childhood to adulthood is most important. Children are becoming more independent and looking at the future regarding careers, relationships, families, housing, etc.

The individual wants to belong to a society and fit in.

Teenagers explore who they are as individuals, seek to establish a sense of self, and may experiment with different roles, activities, and behaviors.

According to Erikson, this is important to forming a strong identity and developing a sense of direction in life.

The adolescent mind is essentially a mind or moratorium, a psychosocial stage between childhood and adulthood, between the morality learned by the child and the ethics to be developed by the adult (Erikson, 1963, p. 245).

This is a major stage of development where the child has to learn the roles he will occupy as an adult. During this stage, the adolescent will re-examine his identity and try to find out exactly who he or she is.

Erikson suggests that two identities are involved: the sexual and the occupational.

Social Relationships

Given the importance of social relationships during this stage, it’s crucial for adolescents to have supportive social networks that encourage healthy exploration of identity.

It’s also important for parents, teachers, and mentors to provide guidance as adolescents navigate their social relationships and roles.

Formation of Identity : Social relationships provide a context within which adolescents explore different aspects of their identity.

They try on different roles within their peer groups, allowing them to discover their interests, beliefs, values, and goals. This exploration is key to forming their own unique identity.

Peer Influence : Peer groups often become a significant influence during this stage. Adolescents often start to place more value on the opinions of their friends than their parents.

How an adolescent’s peer group perceives them can impact their sense of self and identity formation.

Social Acceptance and Belonging : Feeling accepted and fitting in with peers can significantly affect an adolescent’s self-esteem and sense of identity.

They are more likely to develop a strong, positive identity if they feel accepted and valued. Feeling excluded or marginalized may lead to role confusion and a struggle with identity formation.

Experiencing Diversity : Interacting with a diverse range of people allows adolescents to broaden their perspectives, challenge their beliefs, and shape their values.

This diversity of experiences can also influence the formation of their identity.

Conflict and Resolution : Social relationships often involve conflict and the need for resolution, providing adolescents with opportunities to explore different roles and behaviors.

Learning to navigate these conflicts aids in the development of their identity and the social skills needed in adulthood.

Success and Failure In Stage Five

According to Bee (1992), what should happen at the end of this stage is “a reintegrated sense of self, of what one wants to do or be, and of one’s appropriate sex role”. During this stage, the body image of the adolescent changes.

Erikson claims adolescents may feel uncomfortable about their bodies until they can adapt and “grow into” the changes. Success in this stage will lead to the virtue of fidelity .

Fidelity involves being able to commit one’s self to others on the basis of accepting others, even when there may be ideological differences.

During this period, they explore possibilities and begin to form their own identity based on the outcome of their explorations.

Adolescents who establish a strong sense of identity can maintain consistent loyalties and values, even amidst societal shifts and changes.

Erikson described 3 forms of identity crisis:

• severe (identity confusion overwhelms personal identity)
• prolonged (realignment of childhood identifications over an extended time)
• aggravated (repeated unsuccessful attempts at resolution)

Failure to establish a sense of identity within society (“I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up”) can lead to role confusion.

However, if adolescents don’t have the support, time, or emotional capacity to explore their identity, they may be left with unresolved identity issues, feeling unsure about their roles and uncertain about their future.

This could potentially lead to a weak sense of self, role confusion, and lack of direction in adulthood.

Role confusion involves the individual not being sure about themselves or their place in society.

In response to role confusion or identity crisis , an adolescent may begin to experiment with different lifestyles (e.g., work, education, or political activities).

Also, pressuring someone into an identity can result in rebellion in the form of establishing a negative identity, and in addition to this feeling of unhappiness.

Stage 6. Intimacy vs. Isolation

Intimacy versus isolation is the sixth stage of Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development. This stage takes place during young adulthood between the ages of approximately 18 to 40 yrs. During this stage, the major conflict centers on forming intimate, loving relationships with other people.

Intimacy : Individuals who successfully navigate this stage are able to form intimate, reciprocal relationships with others.

They can form close bonds and are comfortable with mutual dependency. Intimacy involves the ability to be open and share oneself with others, as well as the willingness to commit to relationships and make personal sacrifices for the sake of these relationships.

Isolation : If individuals struggle to form these close relationships, perhaps due to earlier unresolved identity crises or fear of rejection, they may experience isolation.

Isolation refers to the inability to form meaningful, intimate relationships with others. This could lead to feelings of loneliness, alienation, and exclusion.

Success and Failure In Stage Six

Success leads to strong relationships, while failure results in loneliness and isolation.

Successfully navigating this stage develops the virtue of love . Individuals who develop this virtue have the ability to form deep and committed relationships based on mutual trust and respect.

During this stage, we begin to share ourselves more intimately with others. We explore relationships leading toward longer-term commitments with someone other than a family member.

Successful completion of this stage can result in happy relationships and a sense of commitment, safety, and care within a relationship.

However, if individuals struggle during this stage and are unable to form close relationships, they may feel isolated and alone. This could potentially lead to a sense of disconnection and estrangement in adulthood.

Avoiding intimacy and fearing commitment and relationships can lead to isolation, loneliness, and sometimes depression. 

Stage 7. Generativity vs. Stagnation

Generativity versus stagnation is the seventh of eight stages of Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development. This stage takes place during during middle adulthood (ages 40 to 65 yrs). During this stage, individuals focus more on building our lives, primarily through our careers, families, and contributions to society.

Generativity : If individuals feel they are making valuable contributions to the world, for instance, through raising children or contributing to positive changes in society, they will feel a sense of generativity.

Generativity involves concern for others and the desire to contribute to future generations, often through parenting, mentoring, leadership roles, or creative output that adds value to society.

Stagnation : If individuals feel they are not making a positive impact or are not involved in productive or creative tasks, they may experience stagnation.

Stagnation involves feeling unproductive and uninvolved, leading to self-absorption, lack of growth, and feelings of emptiness.

Psychologically, generativity refers to “making your mark” on the world through creating or nurturing things that will outlast an individual.

During middle age, individuals experience a need to create or nurture things that will outlast them, often having mentees or creating positive changes that will benefit other people.

We give back to society by raising our children, being productive at work, and participating in community activities and organizations. We develop a sense of being a part of the bigger picture through generativity.

Work & Parenthood

Both work and parenthood are important in this stage as they provide opportunities for adults to extend their personal and societal influence.

Work : In this stage, individuals often focus heavily on their careers. Meaningful work is a way that adults can feel productive and gain a sense of contributing to the world.

It allows them to feel that they are part of a larger community and that their efforts can benefit future generations. If they feel accomplished and valued in their work, they experience a sense of generativity.

However, if they’re unsatisfied with their career or feel unproductive, they may face feelings of stagnation.

Parenthood : Raising children is another significant aspect of this stage. Adults can derive a sense of generativity from nurturing the next generation, guiding their development, and imparting their values.

Through parenthood, adults can feel they’re making a meaningful contribution to the future.

On the other hand, individuals who choose not to have children or those who cannot have children can also achieve generativity through other nurturing behaviors, such as mentoring or engaging in activities that positively impact the younger generation.

Success and Failure In Stage Seven

If adults can find satisfaction and a sense of contribution through these roles, they are more likely to develop a sense of generativity, leading to feelings of productivity and fulfillment.

Successfully navigating this stage develops the virtue of care . Individuals who develop this virtue feel a sense of contribution to the world, typically through family and work, and feel satisfied that they are making a difference.

Success leads to feelings of usefulness and accomplishment, while failure results in shallow involvement in the world.

We become stagnant and feel unproductive by failing to find a way to contribute. These individuals may feel disconnected or uninvolved with their community and with society as a whole. 

This could potentially lead to feelings of restlessness and unproductiveness in later life.

Stage 8. Ego Integrity vs. Despair

Ego integrity versus despair is the eighth and final stage of Erik Erikson’s stage theory of psychosocial development. This stage begins at approximately age 65 and ends at death. It is during this time that we contemplate our accomplishments and can develop integrity if we see ourselves as leading a successful life.

Ego Integrity : If individuals feel they have lived a fulfilling and meaningful life, they will experience ego integrity.

This is characterized by a sense of acceptance of their life as it was, the ability to find coherence and purpose in their experiences, and a sense of wisdom and fulfillment.

Despair : On the other hand, if individuals feel regretful about their past, feel they have made poor decisions, or believe they’ve failed to achieve their life goals, they may experience despair.

Despair involves feelings of regret, bitterness, and disappointment with one’s life, and a fear of impending death.

This stage takes place after age 65 and involves reflecting on one’s life and either moving into feeling satisfied and happy with one’s life or feeling a deep sense of regret.

Erikson described ego integrity as “the acceptance of one’s one and only life cycle as something that had to be” (1950, p. 268) and later as “a sense of coherence and wholeness” (1982, p. 65).

As we grow older (65+ yrs) and become senior citizens, we tend to slow down our productivity and explore life as retired people.

Success and Failure In Stage Eight

Success in this stage will lead to the virtue of wisdom . Wisdom enables a person to look back on their life with a sense of closure and completeness, and also accept death without fear.

Individuals who reflect on their lives and regret not achieving their goals will experience bitterness and despair.

Erik Erikson believed if we see our lives as unproductive, feel guilt about our past, or feel that we did not accomplish our life goals, we become dissatisfied with life and develop despair, often leading to depression and hopelessness.

This could potentially lead to feelings of fear and dread about their mortality.

A continuous state of ego integrity does not characterize wise people, but they experience both ego integrity and despair. Thus, late life is characterized by integrity and despair as alternating states that must be balanced.

Strengths and Weaknesses of Erikson’s Theory

By extending the notion of personality development across the lifespan, Erikson outlines a more realistic perspective of personality development, filling a major gap in Freud’s emphasis on childhood.  (McAdams, 2001).

• Based on Erikson’s ideas, psychology has reconceptualized how the later periods of life are viewed. Middle and late adulthood are no longer viewed as irrelevant, because of Erikson, they are now considered active and significant times of personal growth.
• Erikson’s theory has good face validity . Many people find they can relate to his theories about various life cycle stages through their own experiences.

Indeed, Erikson (1964) acknowledges his theory is more a descriptive overview of human social and emotional development that does not adequately explain how or why this development occurs.

For example, Erikson does not explicitly explain how the outcome of one psychosocial stage influences personality at a later stage.

Erikson also does not explain what propels the individual forward into the next stage once a crisis is resolved. His stage model implies strict sequential progression tied to age, but does not address variations in timing or the complexity of human development.

However, Erikson stressed his work was a ‘tool to think with rather than a factual analysis.’ Its purpose then is to provide a framework within which development can be considered rather than testable theory.

The lack of elucidation of the dynamics makes it challenging to test Erikson’s stage progression hypotheses empirically. Contemporary researchers have struggled to operationalize the stages and validate their universal sequence and age ranges.

Erikson based his theory of psychosocial development primarily on observations of middle-class White children and families in the United States and Europe. This Western cultural perspective may limit the universality of the stages he proposed.

The conflicts emphasized in each stage reflect values like independence, autonomy, and productivity, which are deeply ingrained in Western individualistic cultures. However, the theory may not translate well to more collectivistic cultures that value interdependence, social harmony, and shared responsibility.

For example, the autonomy vs. shame and doubt crisis in early childhood may play out differently in cultures where obedience and conformity to elders is prioritized over individual choice. Likewise, the identity crisis of adolescence may be less pronounced in collectivist cultures.

As an illustration, the identity crisis experienced in adolescence often resurfaces as adults transition into retirement (Logan, 1986). Although the context differs, managing similar emotional tensions promotes self-awareness and comprehension of lifelong developmental dynamics.

Applications

Retirees can gain insight into retirement challenges by recognizing the parallels between current struggles and earlier psychosocial conflicts.

Retirees often revisit identity issues faced earlier in life when adjusting to retirement. Although the contexts differ, managing similar emotional tensions can increase self-awareness and understanding of lifelong psychodynamics.

Cultural sensitivity can increase patient self-awareness during counseling. For example, nurses could use the model to help adolescents tackle identity exploration or guide older adults in finding purpose and integrity.

Recent research shows the ongoing relevance of Erikson’s theory across the lifespan. A 2016 study found a correlation between middle-aged adults’ sense of generativity and their cognitive health, emotional resilience, and executive function.

Interprofessional teams could collaborate to create stage-appropriate, strengths-based care plans. For instance, occupational therapists could engage nursery home residents in reminiscence therapy to increase ego integrity.

Specific tools allow clinicians to identify patients’ current psychosocial stage. Nurses might use Erikson’s Psychosocial Stage Inventory (EPSI) to reveal trust, autonomy, purpose, or despair struggles.

With this insight, providers can deliver targeted interventions to resolve conflicts and support developmental advancement. For example, building autonomy after a major health crisis or fostering generativity by teaching parenting skills.

Erikson vs Maslow

How does Maslow’s hierarchy of needs differ from Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development?

Erikson vs Freud

Freud (1905) proposed a five-stage model of psychosexual development spanning infancy to puberty, focused on the maturation of sexual drives. While groundbreaking, Freud’s theory had limitations Erikson (1958, 1963) aimed to overcome.

• Erikson expanded the timeline through the full lifespan, while Freud focused only on the first few years of life. This more holistic perspective reflected the ongoing social challenges confronted into adulthood and old age.
• Whereas Freud highlighted biological, pleasure-seeking drives, Erikson incorporated the influence of social relationships, culture, and identity formation on personality growth. This broader psychosocial view enhanced realism.
• Erikson focused on the ego’s growth rather than the primacy of the id. He saw personality developing through negotiation of social conflicts rather than only frustration/gratification of innate drives.
• Erikson organized the stages around psychosocial crises tied to ego maturation rather than psychosexual erogenous zones. This reformulation felt more relevant to personal experiences many could identify with.
• Finally, Erikson emphasized healthy progression through the stages rather than psychopathology stemming from fixation. He took a strengths-based perspective focused on human potential.

Summary Table

Like Freud and many others, Erik Erikson maintained that personality develops in a predetermined order, and builds upon each previous stage. This is called the epigenetic principle.

Erikson’s eight stages of psychosocial development include:

Bee, H. L. (1992). The developing child . London: HarperCollins.

Brown, C., & Lowis, M. J. (2003). Psychosocial development in the elderly: An investigation into Erikson’s ninth stage.  Journal of Aging Studies, 17 (4), 415–426.

Erikson, E. H. (1950). Childhood and society . New York: Norton.

Erickson, E. H. (1958). Young man Luther: A study in psychoanalysis and history . New York: Norton.

Erikson, E. H. (1963). Youth: Change and challenge . New York: Basic books.

Erikson, E. H. (1964). Insight and responsibility . New York: Norton.

Erikson, E. H. (1968). Identity: Youth and crisis . New York: Norton.

Erikson E. H . (1982). The life cycle completed . New York: W.W. Norton & Company.

Erikson, E. H. (1959). Psychological issues . New York, NY: International University Press

Fadjukoff, P., Pulkkinen, L., & Kokko, K. (2016). Identity formation in adulthood: A longitudinal study from age 27 to 50.  Identity ,  16 (1), 8-23.

Freud, S. (1905). Three essays on the theory of sexuality.  Standard Edition 7 : 123- 246.

Freud, S. (1923). The ego and the id . SE, 19: 1-66.

Gross, R. D., & Humphreys, P. (1992). Psychology: The science of mind and behavior . London: Hodder & Stoughton.

Logan , R.D . ( 1986 ). A reconceptualization of Erikson’s theory: The repetition of existential and instrumental themes. Human Development, 29 , 125 – 136.

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What is Erikson’s main theory?

Erikson said that we all want to be good at certain things in our lives. According to psychosocial theory, we go through eight developmental stages as we grow up, from being a baby to an old person. In each stage, we have a challenge to overcome.

If we do well in these challenges, we feel confident, our personality grows healthily, and we feel competent. But if we don’t do well, we might feel like we’re not good enough, leading to feelings of inadequacy.

What is an example of Erikson’s psychosocial theory?

Throughout primary school (ages 6-12), children encounter the challenge of balancing industry and inferiority. During this period, they start comparing themselves to their classmates to evaluate their own standing.

As a result, they may either cultivate a feeling of pride and achievement in their academics, sports, social engagements, and family life or experience a sense of inadequacy if they fall short.

Parents and educators can implement various strategies and techniques to support children in fostering a sense of competence and self-confidence.

7 Psychosocial Theory of Identity Development

At the end of this chapter, you will be able to:

• Identify key elements of psychosocial theory of identity development
• Explain strategies utilized to implement psychosocial theory of identity development
• Summarize the criticisms of and educational implications of psychosocial theory of identity development
• Explain how equity is impacted by psychosocial theory of identity development
• Identify classroom strategies to support the use of psychosocial theory of identity development.
• Select strategies to support student success utilizing psychosocial theory of identity development.
• Develop a plan to implement the use of psychosocial theory of identity development.

Mr. Bates was planning his lesson on the Oregon Trail for his fourth graders. Last year, he used an online curriculum and it all felt a little stale when he tried to deliver it. Kids were kind of bored, which frustrated Mr. Bates because he had followed the trail the prior summer and had interacted with a lot of live history. Mr. Bates loved history, especially local history! This year, he wanted to do something different, something that would allow students maximum choice in their projects in terms of content and  presentation.  He also wanted to expose students to the topic in a variety of ways: field trips, film, and the online Oregon Trail game to appeal to all of his diverse learners. Mr. Bates recognized that his kids did not all learn the same way and this had to do with their psychosocial development.

As you read about Erikson’s psychosocial theory of identity development, consider how options for learning and student choice create opportunities for strong engagement.  Creating more options and building student autonomy ensures that educators are meeting students where they are!

Check out the following videos as an introduction:

Video 8.1: “Erikson’s Psychosocial Development”  

Video 8.2: “Erik Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development Explained” 

  Image 8.2: Erik Erikson

Introduction.

Erik H. Erikson (1902-1994), was born in Germany. He was a world-renowned scholar of the behavioral sciences, and his contributions ranged from psychology to anthropology. Moreover, his two biographies, one of Gandhi, the other a Pulitzer-Prize study of Martin Luther, earned him distinction in literature. Serious students of personality theory underscored his seminal contribution: linking individual development to external forces (structured as the “Life Cycle,” the stages ranging from infancy to adulthood). Rather than the negations of pathology, Erikson welcomed the affirmation of human strength, stressing always the potential of constructive societal input in personality development. Erikson’s dual concepts of an (individual) ego and group identity have become an integral part of group psychology, with terms such as adolescent “ identity diffusion ” or adolescent “ moratorium ” having been mainstreamed into everyday language.

In 1933, when the Nazi power was gaining power in Germany, Erikson, his wife, and young son left for the US. The Eriksons settled first in Boston and Erikson began teaching at Harvard Medical School, in addition to his work under Henry A. Murray at the university’s Psychology Clinic. It was here he met Margaret Mead, Gregory Bateson, Ruth Benedict, and Kurt Lewin. In 1936, Erikson moved to Yale University where he was attached to both the medical school and to the Yale Institute of Human Relations. His first field study of the Sioux Indians in South Dakota was launched from New Haven. The subsequent work with the Yurok Indians, commenced after he had gone to the University of California in 1939 to join Jean MacFarlane’s longitudinal study of personality development. During World War II, Erikson did research for the U.S. Government, including an original study of “Submarine Psychology.” In 1950, the same year in which his book Childhood and Society was published, Erikson resigned from the University of California. Though not a Communist, he refused to sign the loyalty contract stating, that “…my conscience did not permit me,” to collaborate with witch hunters. He returned to Harvard in the 1960s as a professor of human development and remained there until his retirement in 1970. In 1973 the National Endowment for the Humanities selected Erikson for the Jefferson Lecture, the United States’ highest honor for achievement in the humanities.

Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development, as articulated by Erik Erikson, in collaboration with his wife Joan Erikson (Thomas, 1997), is a comprehensive psychoanalytic theory that identifies a series of eight stages, in which a healthy developing individual should pass through from infancy to late adulthood.

All stages are present at birth but only begin to unfold according to both a natural scheme and one’s ecological and cultural upbringing. In each stage, the person confronts, and hopefully masters, new challenges. Each stage builds upon the successful completion of earlier stages. The challenges of stages not successfully completed may be expected to reappear as problems in the future.

However, mastery of a stage is not required to advance to the next stage. The outcome of one stage is not permanent and can be modified by later experiences. Erikson’s stage theory characterizes an individual advancing through the eight life stages as a function of negotiating his or her biological forces and sociocultural forces. Each stage is characterized by a psychosocial crisis of these two conflicting forces (Figure 8.1). If an individual does indeed successfully reconcile these forces (favoring the first mentioned attribute in the crisis), he or she emerges from the stage with the corresponding virtue (Figure 8.1). For example, if an infant enters into the toddler stage (autonomy vs. shame and doubt) with more trust than mistrust, he or she carries the virtue of hope into the remaining life stages (Crain, 2011).

Figure 8.1: Psychosocial Identity Development Stages, Virtues, and Crisis

Stages of psychosocial identity development.

Hope: Trust vs. Mistrust (Infancy, 0-2 years) Existential Question: Can I Trust the World?

The first stage of Erik Erikson’s theory centers around the infant’s basic needs being met by the parents/guardians and this interaction leading to trust or mistrust. Trust as defined by Erikson is an essential trustfulness of others as well as a fundamental sense of one’s own trustworthiness (Sharkey, 1997). The infant depends on the parents, especially the mother, for sustenance and comfort. The child’s relative understanding of the world and society comes from the parents and their interaction with the child.

A child’s first trust is always with the parent or caregiver; whomever that might be; however, even the caregiver is secondary whereas the parents are primary in the eyes of the child. If the parents expose the child to warmth, regularity, and dependable affection, the infant’s view of the world will be one of trust. Should the parents fail to provide a secure environment and to meet the child’s basic needs; a sense of mistrust will result (Bee & Boyd, 2009). Development of mistrust can lead to feelings of frustration, suspicion, withdrawal, and a lack of confidence (Sharkey, 1997).

According to Erik Erikson, the major developmental task in infancy is to learn whether or not other people, especially primary caregivers, regularly satisfy basic needs. If caregivers are consistent sources of food, comfort, and affection, an infant learns trust-that others are dependable and reliable. If they are neglectful, or perhaps even abusive, the infant instead learns mistrust-that the world is an undependable, unpredictable, and possibly a dangerous place. While negative, having some experience with mistrust allows the infant to gain an understanding of what constitutes dangerous situations later in life; yet being at the stage of infant or toddler, it is a good idea not to put them in situations of mistrust: the child’s number one needs are to feel safe, comforted, and well cared for (Bee & Boyd, 2009).

Will: Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt (Early Childhood, 2-4 years) Existential Question: Is It Okay to Be Me?

As the child gains control over eliminative functions and motor abilities, they begin to explore their surroundings. The parents still provide a strong base of security from which the child can venture out to assert their will. The parents’ patience and encouragement helps foster autonomy in the child. Children at this age like to explore the world around them and they are constantly learning about their environment. Caution must be taken at this age while children may explore things that are dangerous to their health and safety.

At this age children develop their first interests. For example, a child who enjoys music may like to play with the radio. Children who enjoy the outdoors may be interested in animals and plants. Highly restrictive parents, however, are more likely to instill in the child a sense of doubt, and reluctance to attempt new challenges. As they gain increased muscular coordination and mobility, toddlers become capable of satisfying some of their own needs. They begin to feed themselves, wash and dress themselves, and use the bathroom.

If caregivers encourage self-sufficient behavior, toddlers develop a sense of autonomy-a sense of being able to handle many problems on their own. But if caregivers demand too much too soon, refuse to let children perform tasks of which they are capable, or ridicule early attempts at self-sufficiency, children may instead develop shame and doubt about their ability to handle problems.

Purpose: Initiative vs. Guilt (Preschool, 4-5 years) Existential Question: Is it Okay for Me to Do, Move, and Act?

Initiative adds to autonomy the quality of undertaking, planning and attacking a task for the sake of just being active and on the move. The child is learning to master the world around them, learning basic skills and principles of physics. Things fall down, not up. Round things roll. They learn how to zip and tie, count and speak with ease. At this stage, the child wants to begin and complete their own actions for a purpose. Guilt is a confusing new emotion. They may feel guilty over things that logically should not cause guilt. They may feel guilt when this initiative does not produce desired results.

The development of courage and independence are what set preschoolers, ages three to six years of age, apart from other age groups. Young children in this category face the challenge of initiative versus guilt. As described in Bee and Boyd (2009), the child during this stage faces the complexities of planning and developing a sense of judgment. During this stage, the child learns to take initiative and prepare for leadership and goal achievement roles. Activities sought out by a child in this stage may include risk-taking behaviors, such as crossing a street alone or riding a bike without a helmet; both these examples involve self-limits.

Within instances requiring initiative, the child may also develop negative behaviors. These behaviors are a result of the child developing a sense of frustration for not being able to achieve a goal as planned and may engage in behaviors that seem aggressive, ruthless, and overly assertive to parents. Aggressive behaviors, such as throwing objects, hitting, or yelling, are examples of observable behaviors during this stage.

Preschoolers are increasingly able to accomplish tasks on their own, and can start new things. With this growing independence comes many choices about activities to be pursued. Sometimes children take on projects they can readily accomplish, but at other times they undertake projects that are beyond their capabilities or that interfere with other people’s plans and activities. If parents and preschool teachers encourage and support children’s efforts, while also helping them make realistic and appropriate choices, children develop initiative-independence in planning and undertaking activities. But if, instead, adults discourage the pursuit of independent activities or dismiss them as silly and bothersome, children develop guilt about their needs and desires (Rao, 2012).

Competence: Industry vs. Inferiority (School Age, 5-12 Years) Existential Question: Can I Make it in the World of People and Things?

The aim to bring a productive situation to completion gradually supersedes the whims and wishes of play. The fundamentals of technology are developed. The failure to master trust, autonomy, and industrious skills may cause the child to doubt his or her future, leading to shame, guilt, and the experience of defeat and inferiority (Erik Erikson’s Stages of Social-Emotional Development, n.d.). The child must deal with demands to learn new skills or risk a sense of inferiority, failure, and incompetence.

Children at this age are becoming more aware of themselves as “individuals.” They work hard at “being responsible, being good and doing it right.” They are now more reasonable to share and cooperate. Allen and Marotz (2003) also list some perceptual cognitive developmental traits specific for this age group. Children grasp the concepts of space and time in more logical, practical ways. They gain a better understanding of cause and effect, and of calendar time. At this stage, children are eager to learn and accomplish more complex skills: reading, writing, telling time. They also get to form moral values, recognize cultural and individual differences and are able to manage most of their personal needs and grooming with minimal assistance (Allen & Marotz, 2003). At this stage, children might express their independence by talking back and being disobedient and rebellious.

Erikson viewed the elementary school years as critical for the development of self-confidence. Ideally, elementary school provides many opportunities to achieve the recognition of teachers, parents and peers by producing things-drawing pictures, solving addition problems, writing sentences, and so on. If children are encouraged to make and do things and are then praised for their accomplishments, they begin to demonstrate industry by being diligent, persevering at tasks until completed, and putting work before pleasure. If children are instead ridiculed or punished for their efforts or if they find they are incapable of meeting their teachers’ and parents’ expectations, they develop feelings of inferiority about their capabilities (Crain, 2011).

At this age, children start recognizing their special talents and continue to discover interests as their education improves. They may begin to choose to do more activities to pursue that interest, such as joining a sport if they know they have athletic ability, or joining the band if they are good at music. If not allowed to discover their own talents in their own time, they will develop a sense of lack of motivation, low self-esteem, and lethargy.

Fidelity: Identity vs. Role Confusion (Adolescence, 13-19 Years) Existential Question: Who Am I and What Can I Be?

The adolescent is newly concerned with how they appear to others. Superego identity is the accrued confidence that the outer sameness and continuity prepared in the future are matched by the sameness and continuity of one’s meaning for oneself, as evidenced in the promise of a career. The ability to settle on a school or occupational identity is pleasant. In later stages of adolescence, the child develops a sense of sexual identity. As they make the transition from childhood to adulthood, adolescents ponder the roles they will play in the adult world. Initially, they are apt to experience some role confusion-mixed ideas and feelings about the specific ways in which they will fit into society-and may experiment with a variety of behaviors and activities (e.g. tinkering with cars, baby-sitting for neighbors, affiliating with certain political or religious groups). Eventually, Erikson proposed, most adolescents achieve a sense of identity regarding who they are and where their lives are headed. The teenager must achieve identity in occupation, gender roles, politics, and, in some cultures, religion.

Erikson is credited with coining the term “identity crisis” (Gross, 1987, p. 47). Each stage that came before and that follows has its own “crisis” but even more so now, for this marks the transition from childhood to adulthood. This passage is necessary because “Throughout infancy and childhood, a person forms many identifications. But the need for identity in youth is not met by these” (Wright, 1982, p. 73). This turning point in human development seems to be the reconciliation between “the person one has come to be” and “the person society expects one to become.” This emerging sense of self will be established by “forging” past experiences with anticipations of the future. In relation to the eight life stages as a whole, the fifth stage corresponds to the crossroads.

What is unique about the stage of Identity is that it is a special sort of synthesis of earlier stages and a special sort of anticipation of later ones. Youth has a certain unique quality in a person’s life; it is a bridge between childhood and adulthood. Youth is a time of radical change-the great body changes accompanying puberty, the ability of the mind to search one’s own intentions and the intentions of others, the suddenly sharpened awareness of the roles society has offered for later life (Gross, 1987).

Adolescents “are confronted by the need to re-establish [boundaries] for themselves and to do this in the face of an often potentially hostile world” (Stevens, 1983, pp. 48-50). This is often challenging since commitments are being asked for before particular identity roles have formed. At this point, one is in a state of “identity confusion” but society normally makes allowances for youth to “find themselves” and this state is called “ the moratorium .”

The challenge of adolescence is one of role confusion-a reluctance to commit which may haunt a person into his mature years. Given the right conditions-and Erikson believes these are essentially having enough space and time, a psychosocial moratorium, when a person can freely experiment and explore-what may emerge is a firm sense of identity, an emotional and deep awareness of who they are (Stevens, 1983, pp. 48-50).

No matter how one has been raised, one’s personal ideologies are now chosen for oneself. Often, this leads to conflict with adults over religious and political orientations. Another area where teenagers are deciding for themselves is their career choice, and sometimes parents want to have some input. If society is too insistent, the teenager will acquiesce to external wishes, effectively forcing them to ‘foreclose’ on experimentation and, therefore, true self-discovery. Once someone settles on a worldview and vocation, will they be able to integrate this aspect of self-definition into a diverse society? According to Erikson, when an adolescent has balanced both perspectives of “What have I got?” and “What am I going to do with it?” he or she has established their identity (Gross, 1987). Dependent on this stage is the ego quality of fidelity-the ability to sustain loyalties freely pledged in spite of the inevitable contradictions and confusions of value systems (Stevens, 1983).

Given that the next stage (Intimacy) is often characterized by marriage, many are tempted to cap off the fifth stage at 20 years of age. However, these age ranges are actually quite fluid, especially for the achievement of identity, since it may take many years to become grounded, to identify the object of one’s fidelity, to feel that one has “come of age”. In the biographies Young Man Luther and Gandhi’s Truth , Erikson determined that their crises ended at ages 25 and 30, respectively.

Erikson does note that the time of Identity crisis for persons of genius is frequently prolonged. He further notes that in our industrial society, identity formation tends to be long, because it takes us so long to gain the skills needed for adulthood’s tasks in our technological world. That means that we do not have an exact time span in which to find ourselves. It doesn’t happen automatically at eighteen or at twenty-one. A very approximate rule of thumb for our society would put the end somewhere in one’s twenties (Gross, 1987).

Love: Intimacy vs. Isolation (Early Adulthood, 20-39 years) Existential Question: Can I Love?

The Intimacy vs. Isolation conflict is emphasized around the age of 30. At the start of this stage, identity vs. role confusion is coming to an end, though it still lingers at the foundation of the stage (Erikson, 1950). Young adults are still eager to blend their identities with friends. They want to fit in. Erikson believes we are sometimes isolated due to intimacy. We are afraid of rejections such as being turned down or our partners breaking up with us. We are familiar with pain and to some of us rejection is so painful that our egos cannot bear it. Erikson also argues that “Intimacy has a counterpart: Distantiation: the readiness to isolate and if necessary, to destroy those forces and people whose essence seems dangerous to our own, and whose territory seems to encroach on the extent of one’s intimate relations” (Erikson, 1950, p. 237).

Once people have established their identities, they are ready to make long-term commitments to others. They become capable of forming intimate, reciprocal relationships (e.g. through close friendships or marriage) and willingly make the sacrifices and compromises that such relationships require. If people cannot form these intimate relationships-perhaps because of their own needs-a sense of isolation may result; arousing feelings of darkness and angst.

Care: Generativity vs. Stagnation (Adulthood, 40-64 years) Existential Question: Can I Make My Life Count?

Generativity is the concern of guiding the next generation. Socially-valued work and disciplines are expressions of generativity. The adult stage of generativity has broad application to family, relationships, work, and society. “Generativity, then, is primarily the concern in establishing and guiding the next generation… the concept is meant to include… productivity and creativity” (Erikson, 1950, p. 240).

During middle age, the primary developmental task is one of contributing to society and helping to guide future generations. When a person makes a contribution during this period, perhaps by raising a family or working toward the betterment of society, a sense of generativity-a sense of productivity and accomplishment-results. In contrast, a person who is self-centered and unable or unwilling to help society move forward develops a feeling of stagnation-a dissatisfaction with the relative lack of productivity.

Central tasks of middle adulthood are to:

• Express love through more than sexual contacts

• Maintain healthy life patterns

• Develop a sense of unity with partner

• Help growing and grown children to be responsible adults

• Relinquish central role in lives of grown children

• Accept children’s mates and friends

• Create a comfortable home

• Be proud of accomplishments of self and mate/spouse

• Reverse roles with aging parents

• Achieve mature, civic and social responsibility

• Adjust to physical changes of middle age

• Use leisure time creatively

Wisdom: Ego Integrity vs. Despair (Maturity, 65-Death) Existential Question: Is it Okay to Have Been Me?

As we grow older and become senior citizens we tend to slow down our productivity and explore life as a retired person. It is during this time that we contemplate our accomplishments and are able to develop integrity if we see ourselves as leading a successful life. If we see our life as unproductive, or feel that we did not accomplish our life goals, we become dissatisfied with life and develop despair, often leading to depression and hopelessness.

The final developmental task is retrospection: people look back on their lives and accomplishments. They develop feelings of contentment and integrity if they believe that they have led a happy, productive life. They may instead develop a sense of despair if they look back on a life of disappointments and unachieved goals. This stage can occur out of the sequence when an individual feels they are near the end of their life (such as when receiving a terminal disease diagnosis).

    Image 8.3  

Ninth Stage

Joan M. Erikson, who married and collaborated with Erik Erikson, added a ninth stage in The Life Cycle Completed: Extended Version (Erikson & Erikson, 1998). Living in the ninth stage, she wrote, “old age in one’s eighties and nineties brings with it new demands, reevaluations, and daily difficulties” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, p. 4). Addressing these new challenges requires “designating a new ninth stage.” Erikson was ninety-three years old when she wrote about the ninth stage (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, p. 105).

Joan Erikson showed that all the eight stages “are relevant and recurring in the ninth stage” (Mooney, 2007, p. 78). In the ninth stage, the psychosocial crises of the eight stages are faced again, but with the quotient order reversed. For example, in the first stage (infancy), the psychosocial crisis was “Trust vs. Mistrust” with Trust being the “syntonic quotient” and Mistrust being the “diatonic” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, p. 106). Joan Erikson applies the earlier psychosocial crises to the ninth stage as follows:

• Basic Mistrust vs. Trust: Hope

In the ninth stage, “elders are forced to mistrust their own capabilities” because one’s “body inevitably weakens.” Yet, Joan Erikson asserts that “while there is light, there is “hope” for a “bright light and revelation” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 106-107).

• Shame and Doubt vs. Autonomy: Will

Ninth stage elders face the “shame of lost control” and doubt “their autonomy over their own bodies.” So it is that “shame and doubt challenge cherished autonomy” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 107-108).

• Inferiority vs. Industry: Competence

Industry as a “driving force” that elders once had is gone in the ninth stage. Being incompetent “because of aging is belittling” and makes elders “like unhappy small children of great age” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, p. 109).

• Identity Confusion vs. Identity: Fidelity

Elders experience confusion about their “existential identity” in the ninth stage and “a real uncertainty about status and role” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 109-110).

• Isolation vs. Intimacy: Love

In the ninth stage, the “years of intimacy and love” are often replaced by “isolation and deprivation.” Relationships become “overshadowed by new incapacities and dependencies” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 110-111).

• Stagnation vs. Generativity: Care

The generativity in the seventh stage of “work and family relationships” if it goes satisfactorily, is “a wonderful time to be alive.” In one’s eighties and nineties, there is less energy for generativity or caretaking. Thus, “a sense of stagnation may well take over” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 111-112).

• Despair and Disgust vs. Integrity: Wisdom

Integrity imposes “a serious demand on the senses of elders.” Wisdom requires capacities that ninth stage elders “do not usually have.” The eighth stage includes retrospection that can evoke a “degree of disgust and despair.” In the ninth stage, introspection is replaced by the attention demanded to one’s “loss of capacities and disintegration” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 112-113).

Living in the ninth stage, Joan Erikson expressed confidence that the psychosocial crisis of the ninth stage can be met as in the first stage with the “basic trust” with which “we are blessed” (Erikson & Erikson, 1998, pp. 112-113). Erikson saw a dynamic at work throughout life, one that did not stop at adolescence. He also viewed the life stages as a cycle: the end of one generation was the beginning of the next. Seen in its social context, the life stages were linear for an individual but circular for societal development (Erikson, 1950). Erik Erikson believed that development continues throughout life. Erikson took the foundation laid by Freud and extended it through adulthood and into late life (Kail & Cavanaugh, 2004).

Criticism of the Psychosocial Theory of Identity Development

Erikson’s theory may be questioned as to whether his stages must be regarded as sequential, and only occurring within the age ranges he suggests. There is debate as to whether people only search for identity during the adolescent years or if one stage needs to happen before other stages can be completed. However, Erikson states that each of these processes occur throughout the lifetime in one form or another, and he emphasizes these “phases” only because it is at these times that the conflicts become most prominent (Erikson, 1956).

Most empirical research into Erikson has related to his views on adolescence and attempts to establish identity. His theoretical approach was studied and supported, particularly regarding adolescence, by James E. Marcia. Marcia’s work (1966) has distinguished different forms of identity, and there is some empirical evidence that those people who form the most coherent self-concept in adolescence are those who are most able to make intimate attachments in early adulthood. This supports Eriksonian theory in that it suggests that those best equipped to resolve the crisis of early adulthood are those who have most successfully resolved the crisis of adolescence.

Educational Implications

Teachers who apply psychosocial development in the classroom create an environment where each child feels appreciated and is comfortable with learning new things and building relationships with peers without fear (Hooser, 2010). Teaching Erikson’s theory at the different grade levels is important to ensure that students will attain mastery of each stage in Erikson’s theory without conflict. There are specific classroom activities that teachers can incorporate into their classroom during the three stages that include school age children. The activities listed below are just a few suggested examples that apply psychosocial development. 

At the preschool level, teachers want to focus on developing a hardy personality.

Classroom examples that can be incorporated at the Preschool Level :

1. Find out what students are interested in and create projects that incorporate their area of interest.

2. Let the children be in charge of the learning process when participating in a classroom project. This will exhibit teacher appreciation for the areas of interest of the students as well as confidence in their ability.

3. Make sure to point out and praise students for good choices.

4. Offer continuous feedback on work that has been completed.

5. Do not ridicule or criticize students openly. Find a private place to talk with a child about a poor choice or behavior. Help students formulate their own alternate choices by guiding them to a positive solution and outcome.

6. When children experiment, they should not be punished for trying something that may turn out differently than the teacher planned.

7. Utilize physical activity to teach fairness and sportsmanship (Bianca, 2010).

Teachers should focus on achievement and peer relationships at the Elementary Level .

Classroom examples that can be incorporated at the Elementary Level:

1. Create a list of classroom duties that need to be completed on a scheduled basis. Ask students for their input when creating the list as well as who will be in charge of what.

2. Discuss and post classroom rules. Make sure to include students in the decision-making process when discussing rules.

3. Encourage students to think outside of their day-to-day routine by role playing different situations.

4. Let students know that striving for perfection is not as important as learning from mistakes. Teach them to hold their head high and move forward.

5. Encourage children to help students who may be having trouble socially and/or academically. Never allow any child to make fun of or bully another child.

6. Build confidence by recognizing success in what children do best.

7. Provide a variety of choices when making an assignment so that students can express themselves with a focus on their strengths.

8. Utilize physical activity to build social development and to help students appreciate their own abilities as well as the abilities of others (Bianca, 2010).

During the middle and high school year s , building identity and self-esteem should be part of a teacher’s focus.

Classroom examples that can be incorporated at the Middle School and High School Level :

1. Treat all students equally. Do not show favoritism to a certain group of students based on gender, race, ability, academic skills, sexual orientation, or socioeconomic status.

2. Incorporate guest speakers and curriculum activities from as many areas as possible so as to expose students to many career choices.

3. Encourage students to focus on their strengths and acknowledge them when they exhibit work that incorporates these strengths.

4. Encourage students to develop confidence by trying different approaches to solving problems.

5. Incorporate life skills into lesson planning to increase confidence and self-sufficiency.

6. Utilize physical activity to help relieve stress, negative feelings and improve moods (Bianca, 2010).

Chapter Discussion Questions:

• Explain the benefits of psychosocial theory of identity development to support student success.
• How would you summarize psychosocial theory of identity development?
• How would you use psychosocial theory of identity development to support your students?
• How is equity related to psychosocial theory of identity development?

ATTRIBUTIONS

Image 8.1: “Friends and Family” by Mike Watson Images Limited is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Image 8.2: “Erik Erikson citáty” by Wikimedia Commons is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

Image 8.3: “Eldre, Karen Beate Nosterud” by Karen Beate Nøsterud is licensed under CC BY 2.5

Video 8.1: “Erikson’s Psychosocial Development” by Shreena Desai , Khan Academy

Video 8.2: “Erik Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development Explained” by Learn My Test  

Allen, E., & Marotz, L. (2003). Developmental profiles pre-Birth through twelve (4th ed.). Albany, NY: Thomson Delmar Learning.

Bee, H., & Boyd, D. (2009, March). The developing child (12th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Bianca, A. (2010, June 4). Psychosocial development in physical activity. Retrieved from http://www.ehow.com/about_6587070_psychosocial-development-physical-activity.htm

Crain, W. (2011). Theories of development: Concepts and applications (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Erik Erikson’s stages of social-emotional development. (n.d.). Retrieved from  https://childdevelopmentinfo.com/child-development/erickson/#ixzz3ZaBI7RQf

Erik Erikson’s 8 stages of psychosocial development. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://web.cortland.edu/andersmd/ERIK/stageint.HTML

Erikson, E. H. (1950). Childhood and society . New York, NY: W.W. Norton.

Erikson, E. H. (1956).  The problem of ego identity. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association , 4, 56-121. doi : 10.1177/000306515600400104.

Erikson, E. H., & Erikson, J. M. (1998). The life cycle completed: Extended version. New York, NY: W.W. Norton.

Gross, F. L. (1987). Introducing Erik Erikson: An invitation to his thinking. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.

Hooser, T. C. V. (2010, November 28). How to apply psychosocial development in the classroom. Retrieved from http://www.ehow.com/how_7566430_apply-psychosocial-development-classroom.html

Kail, R. V., & Cavanaugh, J. C. (2004). Human development: A life-span view (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Thomson/Wadsworth.

Macnow, A. S. (Ed.). (2014). MCATbehavioral science review . New York, NY: Kaplan Publishing.

Marcia, J. E. (1966). Development and validation of ego identity status. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 3, 551-558. doi :10.1037/h0023281

Mooney, J. (2007). Erik Erikson . In Joe L. Kincheloe & Raymond A. Horn (Eds.), The praeger handbook of education and psychology (Vol. 1, p. 78). Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?id=O1ugEIEid6YC&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Praeger+Handbook+of+Education+a nd+Psychology&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjWnfK7i_DWAhWDwiYKHdrjAooQ6AEIJjAA#v=onepage&q=The%20 Praeger%20Handbook%20of%20Education%20and%20Psychology&f=false

Rao, A. (Ed.). (2012, July). Principles and practice of pedodontics (3rd ed.). Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?id=Ynaeb6CC8wAC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=discourage+the+pursuit+of+independe nt+activities+or+dismiss+them+as+silly+and+bothersome,+children+develop+guilt+about+their+needs+and+desires&so urce=bl&ots=R-A9YrkvAH&sig=DNUdrJg ZsnT96jXA8FipC64eDQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjnstb0je_WAhWHQyYKHfkpCXUQ6AEINjAD#v=onepage&q =discourage%20the%20pursuit%20of%20independent%20activities%20or%20dismiss%20them%20as%20silly%20and%20bothersome%2C%20children%20develop%20guilt%20about%20their%20needs%20and%20desires&f=false

Sharkey, W. (1997, May). Erik Erikson. Retrieved from  http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/erikson.htm Stevens, R. (1983). Erik Erikson: An introduction . New York, NY: St. Martin’s Press.

Thomas, R. M. (1997, August 8). Joan Erikson is dead at 95: Shaped thought on life cycles . New York Times . Retrieved from  https://www.nytimes.com/1997/08/08/us/joan-erikson-is-dead-at-95-shaped-thought-on-life-cycles.html.

Wright, J. E. (1982). Erikson: Identity and religion . New York, NY: Seabury Press.

ADDITIONAL READING

Credible Articles on the Internet: 

Davis, D., & Clifton, A. (1999). Psychosocial theory: Erikson. Retrieved from http://www.haverford.edu/psych/ddavis/p109g/erikson.stages.html

Erikson, R. (2010). ULM Classroom Management. Retrieved from https://ulmclassroommanagement.wikispaces.com/Erik+Erikson

Krebs-Carter, M. (2008). Ages in stages: An exploration of the life cycle based on Erik Erikson’s eight stages of human development. Retrieved from http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1980/1/80.01.04.x.html

McLeod. S. (2017). Erik Erikson. Retrieved from https://www.simplypsychology.org/Erik-Erikson.html

Ramkumar, S. (2002). Erik Erikson’s theory of development: A teacher’s observations. Retrieved from http://www.journal.kfionline.org/issue-6/erik-eriksons-theory-of-development-a-teachers-observations

Sharkey, W. (1997). Erik Erikson. Retrieved from  http://www.muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/history/erikson.htm

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles:

Capps, D. (2004). The decades of life: Relocating Erikson’s stages. Pastoral Psychology , 53(1), 3-32.

Christiansen, S. L., & Palkovitz, R. (1998). Exploring Erikson’s psychosocial theory of development: Generativity and its relationship to paternal identity, intimacy, and involvement in childcare. Journal of Men’s Studies , 7(1), 133-156.

Coughlan, F., & Welsh-Breetzke, A. (2002). The circle of courage and Erikson’s psychosocial stages. Reclaiming Children and Youth , 10 (4), 222-226.

Domino, G., & Affonso, D. D. (1990). A personality measure of Erikson’s life stages: The inventory of psychosocial balance. Journal of Personality Assessment , 54, (3&4), 576-588.

Kidwell, J. S., Dunham, R. M., Bacho, R. A., Pastorino, E., & Portes, P. R. (1995). Adolescent identity exploration: A test of Erikson’s theory of transitional crisis. Adolescence , 30(120), 785-793.

Books in Dalton State College Library:

Sheehy, N. (2004). Fifty key thinkers in psychology . New York, NY: Routledge.

Videos and Tutorials:

Khan Academy. (n.d.) Erikson’s psychosocial development. Retrieved from  https://www.khanacademy.org/test-prep/mcat/individuals-and-society/self-identity/v/eriksons-psychosocial-development

Educational Learning Theories Copyright © 2023 by Sam May-Varas, Ed.D.; Jennifer Margolis, PhD; and Tanya Mead, MA is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Fostering Engagement, Reflexivity, and 21st-Century Skills in Middle School: A Pilot Collaborative Action Research on Identity Formation with Adolescent Co-Researchers

Pascale haag.

1 École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), 75006 Paris, France

2 Laboratoire BONHEURS, CY Paris Cergy University, 95011 Cergy-Pontoise, France

Titouan Fantoni

Stéphanie dubal.

3 Institut du Cerveau—Paris Brain Institute—ICM, Sorbonne Université, Inserm, CNRS, 75013 Paris, France

Associated Data

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author, (P.A.) The data are not publicly available due to the fact that only part of the whole dataset was analyzed for this paper.

Identity construction during adolescence constitutes a primary psychosocial developmental task. A growing body of research has addressed the importance of school education in fostering adolescents’ identity formation and the skills they need to thrive. Although several studies aimed at defining the factors contributing to a coherent, stable, and integrated identity formation, none sought to investigate this question from the adolescents’ perspective. This contribution aimed to explore new ways of fostering 21st-century skills among adolescents through action research. Five adolescents aged 13 to 15 participated in the research process, creating a survey to answer a research problem mainly focused on identity construction in adolescence. A reflexive analysis of the co-research process highlighted the interest in involving adolescents as co-researchers to foster their social and emotional skills. The deployment of the resulting survey in a sample of 1210 adolescents from the general population highlighted the importance of gender diversity for constructing various dimensions of identity.

1. Introduction

How education can foster healthy identity development among adolescents and the acquisition of transversal skills—collaborative, social, emotional, and civic skills—to enable them to face the challenges of the 21st century is a challenging question for educators, as well as for parents and researchers. Identity construction during adolescence constitutes a primary psychosocial developmental task ( Branje 2022 ; Erikson 1968 ; Helve 2019 ; Negru-Subtirica et al. 2017 ). This process involves a “complex interplay of intrapsychic processes and interpersonal experiences” ( Abbasi 2016 ). The transition from childhood to adulthood is rendered increasingly difficult in a rapidly changing world, where new challenges, such as globalization, development of technologies, increasing individualism, and climate change are likely to influence the development of adolescents, their social relations, and their mental health ( Patel et al. 2007 ). School interventions are needed to foster adolescents’ identity development, support them in developing a positive and coherent sense of self, and help them acquire the skills they need to thrive ( Lavy 2020 ; Tiwari et al. 2020 ; Verhoeven et al. 2019 ). Following this lead, we conducted a co-research with adolescents (study 1) that resulted in a second research about essential dimensions of identity (study 2).

1.1. Identity Formation during Adolescence

Erikson’s psychosocial development remains an essential theoretical framework for studying identity formation during adolescence ( Erikson 1968 ). He conceives identity as a “fundamental organizing principle which constantly develops throughout the lifespan”. This principle is considered a synthesis of elements from the past (personal history), from the present (needs and personality), and from expectations of the future. This synthesis process is cardinal to adolescent development when one explores various social roles. However, as pointed out by Phillips and Pittman ( 2007 ), Erikson’s theory does not lend itself easily to empirical research methods.

Refining Erikson’s work, the identity status paradigm proposed by Marcia ( 1966 , 1980 ) goes one step further. It is characterized by the adolescent’s levels of identity exploration and commitment to self-chosen goals. Marcia differentiates two processes of identity construction: Exploration—the search for different alternatives for oneself in an area of life—and Commitment—the adhesion to a set of values, aims, and beliefs. Depending on their combinations, four statuses are identified ( Marcia 1966 ; Marcia et al. 1993 ).

Figure 1 represents the four statuses’ main characteristics that can be summarized as follows (cf. Marcia et al. 1993, pp. 7–8 ):

• Identity achievement , or self-constructed identity, qualifies individuals who tend to build “their own [game plans], not their parents”, seeing “the future as something to be shaped, a period of identity creation or realization rather than a time to meet preset standards”;
• Identity foreclosure refers to individuals with conferred identities who tend to “adopt a lifelong ‘game plan’ set out for them by their parents or similar authority figures”;
• Identity moratorium is used in the case of a “transition from no sense of identity or a conferred to a constructed identity”; individuals are compared to “trapeze performers, holding on to the bar of the past while swinging toward that of the future, often with much of the vacillation, fear, intensity, and excitement connoted by the circus image. At some times, all things seem possible to them; at other times, they can be so totally self-preoccupied that their whole phenomenological world is consumed with their present struggle”;
• Identity diffusion or no firm strong identity corresponds to the “lack of a coherent identity”, with little “future sense” or “central sense of self”, mostly feeling “subject to the vicissitudes of fortune”, and “whether optimistically or pessimistically, somewhat out of control of their futures”.

Marcia’s Identity status model (1966).

Many longitudinal studies found these statuses stable ( Meeus 2011 ). Empirical research found that the statuses with higher engagement and exploration levels show a better psychosocial integration in society, as well as higher levels of well-being and self-confidence and fewer depressive symptoms ( Arnold 2017 ; Meeus 2011 ) and that the knowledge and understanding of these statuses have solid implications for therapeutic and educational interventions ( Kroger and Marcia 2011 ).

This psychosocial framework of identity development is coherent with Cuin ’s ( 2011 ) sociological approach to adolescence. For this author, adolescence’s “crisis” would be related to the experimental nature of adolescent behaviors: adolescents tend to move away from previous normative models and test and adopt new ones while privileging those that seem most valuable to them. The adolescents’ ability to manipulate social norms depends on two principles:

• Integration, which requires the ability to identify, appropriate and subscribe to norms in order to benefit from the psychological and social effects of that subscription.
• Strategy, which consists in learning to move away from norms that impede access to other types of benefits—either by transgressing them or by cleverly exploiting them.

These two dynamics embody a subjectivation process, i.e., the construction of a social subject, both agent and actor of social norms. Sociology constructs the theoretical framework of adolescence as a moment of autonomy without independence ( de Singly 2006 ), during which the dynamics of integration and strategy allow this subjectivation process. Autonomy refers to identity criteria, whereas independence refers to statutory requirements ( Galland 2008 ). Thanks to social media and other contemporary changes, today’s adolescents have significant decision-making power over their own lives, especially regarding the constitution of their peer groups: they, therefore, have more control over how they fit into social norms ( Galland 2008 ; Metton-Gayon 2006 ). In this way, sociological and psychological frameworks of identity complement each other, showing how healthy identity development relates to one’s adhesion to social norms.

Finally, Erikson’s psychosocial development theory does not consider that adolescence is the moment identity elaborates as a stable entity for life: identity evolves constantly. This is consistent with Marcia’s model, which considers a person’s identity determination as a process resulting from individual commitments. Such commitments are not made once and for all but can be questioned throughout one’s life.

A healthy process of adolescent formation of identity guarantees a better integration into society. For this, considering well-being and self-confidence in developing identity is essential. Since Erikson’s work, many studies have corroborated that well-being and identity formation are strongly related ( Luyckx et al. 2006 ). The links between well-being and identity styles have also been investigated, indicating a negative association between a diffuse/avoidant style—lack of exploration and commitments, difficulty in setting goals—and various indices of well-being and a positive, hopeful outlook toward the future ( Phillips and Pittman 2007 ). All these studies indicate a positive association between social and emotional skills on the one hand and healthy identity development and well-being on the other.

1.2. Fostering 21st-Century Skills among Adolescents

Since the beginning of the millennium, there has been an increased interest in the question of social and emotional skills. They are variously referred to as 21st-century skills, psycho-social skills, non-academic skills, character strengths, soft skills, life skills, or transversal skills ( Borghans et al. 2008 ; Heckman and Kautz 2012 ). There is no single exhaustive list since different authors worked with other lists. The World Health Organization defines them as “abilities for adaptive and positive behavior that enable humans to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of life” ( WHO 1994 ). It recognizes ten skills grouped into five pairs (problem-solving, decision making, creative thinking, critical thinking, self-awareness, empathy, interpersonal relationship, good communication, management of stress, and management of emotions.)

Several studies have elaborated on this definition and have come to consider these skills as a coherent and interrelated set of psychological abilities involving specific knowledge, intra-psychological processes, and attitudes, which make it possible to increase individuals’ autonomy and empowerment, to maintain a state of psychological well-being, to promote optimal individual functioning and to develop constructive interactions ( Kankaras and Suarez-Alvarez 2019 ; Lamboy et al. 2022 ; Schoon 2021 ). In a synthesis compiled for Santé publique France, Lamboy et al. ( 2022 ) propose a taxonomy of 22 skills classified under three broad categories—cognitive skills (e.g., awareness, self-control, thinking critically, ability to achieve goals, to make responsible choices or to solve problems creatively); emotional skills (e.g., identifying and understanding emotions and stress, ability to regulate emotions and to manage stress in everyday life, coping skills); social skills (e.g., pro-social attitudes, assertiveness, and constructive conflicts resolution).

A growing body of studies shows their decisive role in the development of mental health, physical health, work performance, and social relations ( Mikolajczak et al. 2020 ). The development of these skills thus represents a significant issue in public health, education, and social action today ( Lamboy et al. 2022 ). School climate and pedagogical practices contribute to the development of a wide variety of skills among pupils and students, such as self-efficacy ( Dweck 2016 ; Usher and Pajares 2008 ), problem-solving ( Baraké et al. 2015 ), cognitive flexibility, divergent thinking, and creativity ( de Vries and Lubart 2019 ; Scheibling-Sève et al. 2017 ), social and emotional skills ( Oberle and Schonert-Reichl 2017 ; Osher and Berg 2017 ). School climate and pedagogical practices can also favor intrinsic or self-determined motivation ( Deci and Ryan 2000 ) as well as prosocial behaviors and civic engagement ( Denney 2022 ).

1.3. Fostering Identity Formation: Lack of Interventions

As Schwartz and Petrova ( 2018 ) pointed out, the field of identity interventions is still relatively young, and etiological work suggests that interventions may facilitate identity consolidation. Connecting schoolwork with “real-world outcomes” is one of their recommendations to foster adolescent identity development. Incorporating identity development into prevention programs is another avenue of intervention. Moreover, the inherent limitations of interventions designed solely by adults being widely established, relying on peers, promoting adult-youth partnerships to conceive interventions, and placing young people in positions of leadership are likely to help young people develop a healthy and consolidated sense of identity, supported by advocacy and empowerment and leadership ( Schwartz and Petrova 2018 ).

Studies show that a feeling of consistency and coherence within one’s sense of identity is associated with higher levels of well-being and lower levels of depression or anxiety ( Meca et al. 2015 ). By contrast, lack of family and community support, and struggle to integrate various aspects of identity (gender, sexual, religious, cultural, etc.) relate to higher risks of health-compromising behaviors ( Schwartz and Petrova 2018 ). In addition, short-term intervention efforts fail to produce long-term gains ( Kroger and Marcia 2011 ). School support for students’ exploration of their identity is related to civic engagement and positive psychosocial development in adolescence ( Crocetti et al. 2014 ; Kaplan et al. 2014 ). Finding efficient ways to promote healthy identity development in adolescents is therefore essential.

1.4. Children as Co-Researchers

Since the early 2000s, the inclusion of children or young people themselves as co-researchers to better understand their perspective has been the subject of much deliberation, both about the benefits of these new approaches and about their limitations ( Bradbury-Jones and Taylor 2015 ; Camponovo et al. 2021 ; Lundy et al. 2011 ; Smith et al. 2002 ). For young people, participating in a project as co-researchers, thus being involved in the elaboration of a research question, the collection of data and its analysis can contribute to building their self-confidence, improving their critical thinking, autonomy, engagement, and sense of competence ( Kellett 2010 ; Suleiman 2021 ). In terms of research outcomes, their participation provides more direct access to knowledge derived from children’s own understanding of their environment and subcultures. It, therefore, provides new insights that complement other approaches and enrich the knowledge gained as a result of the research ( Bradbury-Jones and Taylor 2015 )—having the opportunity to actively contribute to an authentic research project, whether as co-researchers or as joint authors, alongside experienced researchers, also affects adult-adolescent relationships and allows them to make their voices heard rather than being incorporated as a ‘data source’ ( Groundwater-Smith and Mockler 2016 ).

There are, however, also practical and ethical limitations to this approach: on the one hand, children are not trained in research, and it is, therefore, necessary to provide them with some knowledge and skills to participate fully in the project; on the other hand, it is essential to take into account the asymmetric nature of the child- or adolescent-adult relationship, to be aware of the power relationships involved, and to ensure that children’s participation is safe, with their consent, by the ethics of research, and with the possibility of withdrawing from participation at any time ( Bradbury-Jones and Taylor 2015 ; Camponovo et al. 2021 ; Fielding 2011 ).

One additional premise of this research was that by involving adolescents in a project which directly resonates with their concerns and by letting them take part in the decision-making, they would gain a deeper understanding of scientific research methods and requirements and establish meaningful relationships with significant others (peers and adults) while sharpening their critical thinking and problem-solving skills ( Jacquez et al. 2020 ; Suleiman 2021 ). Such practices—i.e., integrating research on topics that are meaningful to the students in the classroom—improve learning-related attitudes, self-efficacy, autonomy, communication skills, teamwork, and collaboration and ultimately lead to increased social support and community transformations ( Jacquez et al. 2020 ).

2. Theoretical Framework and Research Question

This paper presents a research process comprising two interconnected studies—the first embedding the second. It aims to explore new ways of fostering 21st-century skills such as critical thinking, collaboration, and sociability among adolescents through a collaborative research project involving up to five adolescent co-researchers (study 1). They have been actively involved at all stages of the co-research process, and the initial discussions led to the design of a questionnaire assessing some cardinal dimensions of identity development from the point of view of adolescents themselves, with an emphasis on gender identity. This questionnaire was used to conduct a survey, the results of which are presented in study 2.

In the framework of collaborative research involving co-researchers of different ages and statuses, the interplay and dynamics emerging at the same time as the work is carried out make it difficult to detect and objectively assess any transformation among the participants who are immersed in the process and are thus not necessarily able to take a step back. Since this project is intended as a pilot study focusing on the effects of being involved in a research project on adolescents’ psychosocial skills, it was necessary to find an appropriate way of assessing the transformations induced by the research setting among its participants.

This led us to resort to Engeström’s Activity theory . According to Engeström ( 1987 ), one of the limitations of traditional psychological and sociological research lies in the difficulty of understanding change in numerous everyday situations within complex contexts. This observation led him to propose the use of the concept of an Activity System as a unit of analysis ( Engeström 2000 ) and “to understand individual action and support individual and system development, we must study action in the context of the broader activity in which it is taking place” ( Daniels and Cole 2002, p. 311 ). This cross-disciplinary approach is widely recognized as a valuable approach for studying human practices in various fields involving human activity, such as psychology, education, management, culture, and information systems—where individual and social levels are interconnected ( Monaghan 2016 ; Vandebrouck 2018 ).

We propose to study the implemented procedure by analyzing it as a “system of activity” instead of focusing on each factor taken in isolation. In the Activity theory framework, an activity or set of activities is considered as mediated by different contextual elements: subject, object, artifacts, etc. The object, sometimes also called the goal, is what motivates the activity. According to Vandebrouck ( 2018, p. 679 ), the object is “a characteristic that distinguishes one activity from another”—in our case, “ordinary” classroom activity vs. intentional and systematic attempt to nurture 21st-century skills. The rather heterogeneous category of artifacts also mediates the activity, sometimes also called tools, instruments, or technologies. Artifacts refer to all the resources—already available or created by the subjects—to reach the object; they can be concrete (e.g., digital tools, surveys) or immaterial (e.g., thoughts, decisions, researchers’ skills, feelings). The object leads to an outcome—adolescents’ ability to use such skills. Throughout the process, subjects and objects “form a dialectic unit: subjects transform objects, and at the same time, subjects are transformed” ( Vandebrouck 2018, p. 679 ). For this study, the system is analyzed from the point of view of the adolescent co-researchers. Our activity system can thus be broken down into its component parts and represented as in Figure 2 .

Theoretical framework using Engeström’s Activity theory to analyze the transformation of subjects in this research.

The scientific angle chosen for the current project falls within a trend of reflection on the researchers’ posture regarding their research objects and on the place of all the actors involved in a scientific investigation ( Camponovo et al. 2020 ; Lyet 2017 ). In this context, the usual division of labor between researchers who are “producers of knowledge” and respondents who only possess knowledge of experience and action, excluded from the field of “legitimate knowledge”, is not an option: participants in this project adhere to what some researchers call a new ‘science-society contract,’ which recognizes the role of all actors in the production of knowledge, and for which the key words are ‘participation’ and ‘reflexivity’ ( Barré 2017 ; Bonny 2017 ). Our approach seeks to overcome the hierarchy of powers and knowledge in line with critical epistemologies. It falls into the broad category of collaborative and partenarial research, which refers to a reflexive partnership aiming at the co-production of ‘actionable’ knowledge, i.e., knowledge built in and for the sake of action ( Juan 2021 ).

More specifically, the authors are entirely in line with the approach known as transformative action research, promulgated by Bilorusky ( 2021 ), where research, inquiry, and action are brought together in transformative ways to make a difference. Transformative action research is an organic, evolving process in which action and research affect, influence, and transform each other, acknowledging the use of improvised strategies as part of the process by actively involved actors in the social reality being studied.

This project owes a great deal to that of Camponovo et al. ( 2020 ) in the sense that we aim to bring together the points of view of adolescents with those of a research team on a given topic to obtain the most nuanced, comprehensive, and integrated possible perspectives on the knowledge thus produced.

3. Study 1: New Ways of Fostering 21st-Century Skills by Involving Adolescents as Co-Researchers

3.1. context and participants.

Lab School Paris is the first French school inspired by the North American model of laboratory schools, pioneered by John Dewey in Chicago at the end of the 19th century. Founded in 2017, it started with 27 pupils aged 8–11. In 2021–2022, around one hundred students from 6 to 15 years old (elementary and middle school levels in the French educational system) were enrolled. Since its opening, Lab School Paris has maintained regular collaborations with a network of researchers linked to various institutions. In particular, since 2019, it has been participating in a European Erasmus+ project entitled LabSchoolsEurope: Participatory Research for Democratic Education that aims to develop and share democratic practices for teaching in heterogeneous classroom settings ( Haag 2021 ).

At the beginning of the school year 2021–2022, some middle school students started discussing gender and sexual orientation issues. For some, these issues caused such discomfort and anxiety that they hindered their learning at school. This was a situation without precedent: since its opening as an elementary school in 2017, the school has been growing along with its students, opening new levels every year. The enrolment of middle school students gave rise to further questions and challenges, such as welcoming adolescents’ concerns or fostering their intellectual and emotional development. In the absence of a predefined framework within the school to enable these questions to be voiced in a safe environment, the founder of the school and first author of this article—a trained psychologist and assistant professor at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales (EHESS, Paris)—proposed to create an ad hoc group for students wishing to participate. This group would be facilitated by an intern from Lab School Paris holding a Master’s degree in philosophy. The idea was to co-construct a framework with the students to express themselves freely without fear of being judged.

Initially, four 8th and 9th grade students, aged 13–15, joined the discussion group named “Gender and Society” for weekly meetings. The initial goal of the meetings was to create a safe space to explore and reflect upon questions related to gender and sexual orientation (this specific topic will be covered in Section 4 ). The four students involved knew they were welcome to share their thoughts and ideas with their teachers and classmates during weekly student councils. They could also offer suggestions to ensure that all students in the class felt welcome regardless of their gender identity or sexual orientation. The “Gender and Society” group presented their work to the rest of the class 1 .

Neither the direction team nor the teachers participated in these meetings. The fact that the intern was a philosophy graduate with a good knowledge of gender issues may have contributed to creating such a safe space. The second author of this paper, appointed research assistant at the beginning of the action research, is a Master’s student in Gender studies, working on the sociology of gender and education.

In early 2022, the group’s discussions became less active, as if the initial goal had, at least to some extent, been reached—all the students feeling comfortable enough to share their concerns and thoughts with their peers and teachers. The school’s founder then proposed holding a debriefing meeting to reflect upon what they had learned. At this stage, one of the primary outcomes was the students’ realization that (1) gender is one facet of identity but not the only one, and (2) that it is possible to explore these questions without necessarily opting for definitive labels. This could have been the last session. However, a question eventually arose about what could be done to extend this experience to other schools. Informed about research projects involving children or teenagers as co-researchers, the group participants enthusiastically agreed to launch a study. This decision instilled a new dynamic in the working group and marked a significant turning point in the project.

3.2. Procedure

The new research group was composed of the four students of the working group, the intern who had facilitated it, a new pupil (age 14) who had joined the school in the meantime, and the first and second author of this paper. During weekly meetings of approximately one hour, the research project was elaborated: definition of a research topic, design, and methodology. Initially, the adolescents were mostly thinking about conducting interviews with other adolescents outside of school to question their perceptions of identity. The main principles of qualitative analysis were briefly explained to them. Once they realized that this approach implied a transcription and analysis of the interviews, they opted for conducting an online survey which was more realistic from a practical point of view, as the end of the school year was nearing.

New questions arose: How do you design a questionnaire? How do you frame the questions? In what order? To what extent can you ask personal questions without risking the participants leaving the survey without completing it (e.g., about gender or sexuality)? All those questions mostly came from the adolescents themselves. During the weekly meetings, they thought about how they would structure the survey and formulate the questions and wondered what would be interesting to ask to collect interesting and relevant data.

Once the questionnaire was ready, we tested a pilot version on a few adolescents outside school. We requested the co-researchers to ask someone they knew to fill in the questionnaire and to give feedback, especially in case something was unclear so that we could make changes to the survey before its dissemination. The corrected questionnaire version was tested among the 26 middle school students at Lab School Paris. After some minor formal changes, the co-researchers decided to conduct a survey using a snowball sampling method: all the co-researchers sent the survey link to as many people as possible; we also sent the survey link to middle schools and high schools found in the French national education Ministry website.

At the end of the school year (June 2022), two meetings were held with the third author of this paper to explain to the co-researchers how to analyze the survey data with statistics; debriefing sessions were also organized so that the students could share their impressions and feedback about the whole research process: what they had learned throughout the process, whether it had changed them and in which way, etc.

Qualitative data –from recordings of the meetings and interviews, as well as notes from the sessions—was analyzed to determine whether participating in this research project had served the purpose of fostering adolescents’ 21st-century skills. The research assistant conducted the interviews during the summer of 2022 in individual zoom meetings or phone calls. The questions followed an interview guide constructed by the first author of this paper. The interviews were relatively short (10–15 min), and we discussed at the end of the interviews which information could be shared publicly in the case that some information was confidential.

Quantitative data from the online survey conducted by the co-researchers in study 1 is presented in Section 4 (study 2).

3.3. Results

The qualitative data was examined using the Activity Theory framework: a content analysis was performed on the relevant sections of the interviews and focus groups on understanding how they felt, what they learned, and the kind of change the project had brought up from their point of view. In this section, we only consider the adolescents’ voices, although the whole process has included regular formal and informal sharing of reflections among adults throughout the project.

3.3.1. Artifacts and Division of Labor: Learning and Contributing According to Each One’s Expertise

The students shared their thoughts about what they had learned, which aspects of the project most interested them, and in which ways they had contributed:

[I] feel like I participated in a little bit of everything too, which is pretty nice; it allows me to have a little bit of experience, see a little bit of the whole process.

Through the research process, they discovered how to build a survey, participated in its dissemination, and began to get some insight into statistical analysis of the data thus produced:

I participated in finding out what we were going to do; I also participated in a radio show to disseminate the survey. And I also helped to find the questions for the survey […].

[I have acquired] the skills to form a survey and the skills of research work.

I think [what I participated in the most] was the questions when we wrote them because that’s what we mostly did […] because we weren’t going to do the statistics, obviously, and writing the article is more complicated. We couldn’t do it ourselves, so that’s what we could do the easiest.

They also recognize how their personal experience would benefit the whole group:

I think [I contributed with my] perspectives because we all have different views, my experiences from living in New York, I could contribute with that experience, and so by, like, those questions in the survey, I felt like I could contribute with. And also, by being able to share this survey with people I knew all around the world.

3.3.2. Rules and Social Relationships within the Community

All the participants showed appreciation for the quality of the relationships among the students who participated in the research and in the broader community: they highlighted how much they felt accepted, regardless of their different identities, and how free they felt to express their points of view.

I felt like I was with people who kind of understood my vision of things. And they didn’t impose their opinion on me, so we had civic conversations about it, which was pretty cool. It’s not just about gender issues; it’s about listening to each other’s opinions instead of saying, “no, you’re wrong, and I’m right”. There was an atmosphere of caring in the group that was quite nice.

I experienced an openness to express my own opinions […]. It’s a friendly atmosphere where there can be conflicting views, yet it’s scarce in life in general! There are a lot of opinions, pros, and cons, there are too many opinions, and it messes up everything, everywhere.

This feedback points out that they felt it was possible to express opinions without being judged. The space of discussion provided by the explicit rules within the research group—confidentiality and absence of judgment—made them feel comfortable. That feeling allowed them to elaborate their thoughts and to gain from others’ perspectives:

It was a very good environment; it was a very open environment. I feel like we could all really express our positive and negative thoughts. I also felt like I could build my thoughts onto others, and others could build their thoughts onto mine, so we were just helping each other and supporting each other.

They also felt supported by the adult community in this endeavor:

I found them [the adults] very open-minded about all these issues […] they were just there to help us put the thing together, because we were kind of the ones formulating the thing, doing the thing, and they were there to guide us, to prevent us from getting overwhelmed. I thought it was pretty cool.

I also felt it was nice to have adults in the group to like, guide us and show us how to have a formal survey and guide us into those conversations.

Not only did the co-researchers benefit from the project, but also, at various stages, we communicated with the rest of the school ecosystem—students, teachers, and parents –whether through discussions with the whole class or the presentation of the first results. This allowed conversations about identity and gender identity within the school with adolescents who were not part of the research group, although some participants expressed their regrets about not having more diversity among the students participating in the research project:

I would hear other people talking about their relationships with their parents in terms of their sexuality or gender, and I would see how things were going in other families, and that would allow me to see a little bit how I could react to them too. […] Because my parents didn’t talk about it either, until very recently.

I think it would have been nice if we had tried not to include but like engage other students more so we could have gotten more into their perspectives. I think it would have been interesting to understand how the project would have affected them, but yeah, it just pushed me to have discussions with other people in the school. […] We were all already pretty close friends, we were all LGBTQ, and I think it would have been beneficial if we’ve had at least like cishet teenagers or just get their perspective, or a person of color as well because we’re all white so, yeah, yeah.

3.3.3. Reaching the Object: The Point of View of the Subjects

During the final discussions, we explained to the student co-researchers that a critical feature of this project was also to create different relations and collaborations between young people and adults inside the school, to explore new approaches to teaching and learning, and to foster skills and abilities that we considered necessary more than ever in the current context, trusting them with responsibilities and giving them autonomy. We asked them for feedback and how we could improve the process in the future.

Actually […] you weren’t directing anyone; you were showing paths. […] What I find cool in life is that you can take a word, a text, and there can be thousands of paths […]. And the goal of adults in life, I think, is to support selecting paths and to guide as much as possible.

You were super open, super ok to talk about this kind of subject, you listened and everything, you didn’t try to distort, it was cool to talk, we felt that there was no judgment and that we could speak freely and say what we thought and everything. […] There were no questions that implied the answer or were biased. […] I didn’t feel guided or influenced to say answers that weren’t my own.

Reflexivity and critical thinking emerged while talking about how the setting could be improved:

Maybe to have a bigger group of adolescents, a slightly more varied group, because we were all very similar in many ways […] and it would have been nice to get a few other teenagers that could add their perspectives, I guess.

I think it would be interesting to ask others in the class like what parts of their identities are important ‘cause every single one of us in the group is LGBTQ… [Laughs] Yeah, we need an opinion from a straight person!

Maybe not do it at the end of the year, because at the end we were too much in a hurry […] do it at a time when we can help work on it.

Some of the feedback also indicated that the project allowed the participant to gain more perspective and understanding of who they were:

It was like, it’s not scary to talk about it, and people are, in fact, nice. Wow. I didn’t know that was possible in school […] And also, I’ve always been super interested in psychology and stuff. And also like social justice, activism, and kind of putting those together, and into a study. I don’t know, it felt like […]. I’ve always had this question What is me? What makes me me? Is it my brain, my consciousness, is it my body, is it … I don’t know … […] I have all those questions. This has begun to answer a few things, organized a few things in my head, and kind of made a start somewhere of what makes us us, what makes us an individual.

3.3.4. Outcomes: Lessons Learned

The adolescent co-researchers acknowledged that this project helped them to become more aware of their social environment, more reflexive, and more open to others.

(student) Identities are also a pretty vast subject; it doesn’t stop where we defined it; there’s still a lot more to talk about. […] I always knew that it [identity] was much more than my gender and what I look like, identity; identity is much more than that.

(adult researcher) Did it change during this process?

(student) Yeah, it kind of expanded.

They felt that they could share their views on identity more freely, both with their parents/friends and themselves and even publicly, at a conference or in the media. One of them mentioned at the end of the academic year that talking openly within the group allowed him to better identify his feelings as an LGBTQ+ adolescent.

Until I was 12, I knew the words LGBTQ+, but I didn’t know what they meant. So I couldn’t put what I was feeling into words, so obviously, it was a bit complicated for me, with my parents, and with regard to myself.

The data they collected helped them learn about themselves through others and had positive effects on their social well-being:

Something I realized, reasonably major, is that I am not alone. People often say to me, yeah, you’re not the only adolescent asking yourself this kind of question, there are millions of teenagers asking themselves this question, but it’s all very well to talk about it. Still, when you realize that all the people took part in the survey, you say to yourself, “well, yeah, I’m not the only human being on Earth asking myself these kinds of questions”, you feel less alone. There it was concrete; you see the answers of the people.

Gaining self-confidence through the research project seems partly related to the fact that this study enforced the co-researcher’s ability to pay attention to themselves and others at the same time, without depreciating any of them through comparisons:

I think [what I learned the most is] diversity. The different stages of development we’re at, just how we all navigate our identities completely differently, even if we are at the exact same age. So just like, looking at the responses, it was just really interesting to see that some people had part of their identities that were way more developed than mine, but other parts that were less developed. It was really interesting to see what parts were the most important.

Acknowledging individual differences also fostered empathy towards their peers:

[The aim of such co-research] is not just getting to know ourselves better but to understand others better, to see others’ perspectives. I think that’s really what I gained out of this, other people’s perspectives, and just trying to understand how people do that because I know myself. I know how I do things, and I think it’s really beneficial to gain empathy and compassion to understand someone differently.

Participating in this project was considered stimulating and made the students proud, as the number of participants in the survey exceeded their expectations:

Look at that, I made that, all those people, most of them I don’t even know!

Finally, concrete propositions for new rules inside the school community arose beyond exchanging ideas during the project. Although democratic participation and openness to differences are already part of the Lab School Paris’ culture, the students contributed to making the school more inclusive by officially acknowledging and welcoming gender diversity by asking all their classmates by which pronoun(s) and the name they wished to be addressed:

Introducing yourself with your pronouns, yes, I think it’s very important! […] It would be nice to do an introduction sheet with your name, the name you’d like to be called by, it’s safe to be called in class, with your parents … The pronouns you’d like to be used in class… (…) Yeah, it’s starting to become the norm. [Laughing at people from “old generations” identifying as girls or boys.]

This practice will be introduced at the beginning of each year among middle school students at Lab School Paris.

These results will be discussed along with study 2 results.

4. Study 2: Construction of Identity in Adolescence

As mentioned previously, this research was initiated when students started meeting in school to discuss gender and sexual orientation issues that they were confronted with, and that caused discomfort to some of them. With time, the discussion topic enlarged to identity formation, and the research group designed a survey that questioned dimensions of identity that the adolescents perceived as most important. This section presents the results of these questions from the survey.

The survey also included questions that go beyond the scope of the present paper and will be presented in a subsequent article, such as the Consciousness of one’s responsibility scale ( Hagège et al. 2021 ) and an adapted version of the Cantril ladder of satisfaction with life ( Levin and Currie 2014 ).

All co-researcher students identified as LGBTQ+ and were most interested in the topic of gender identity and diversity, although such an interest is growing in society and research ( Perry et al. 2019 ; Rubin et al. 2020 ).

Gaining a better knowledge of gender identity is particularly important in the case of adolescents who identify as non-binary, a-gender, or genderqueer, as little is known about them ( Jones et al. 2016 ), or their experiences of schooling ( Paechter et al. 2021 ). Most studies about non-binary adolescents focus on social background and mental health and indicate that they are particularly vulnerable, with high rates of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation, and risk of experiencing more abuse and victimization than cisgender people ( Chew et al. 2020 ; Jackson et al. 2022 ; Van der Vaart et al. 2022 ; Pullen Sansfaçon et al. 2020 ; Richards et al. 2016 ). On the other hand, gender self-acceptance (i.e., being satisfied with one’s self-defined gender identity) is negatively associated with stress and positively associated with life satisfaction and perceived academic achievement, which confirms the importance of the recognition of gender diversity and of cultivating gender-identity safe school environments ( Day et al. 2018 ; Watson et al. 2021 ).

4.1. Participants

The participants included 1210 middle school and high school pupils, aged 11 to 18 (M = 15.54, SD = 1.71). Participants’ self-identified gender was female (60.2%), male (32%), non-binary (5.1%), and subjects indecisive about their gender (2.3%). Individuals were described as non-binary when they did not self-categorize as exclusively female or male but as either the combination of the two or as something else, following Galupo et al. ( 2017 ) and Hyde et al. ( 2019 ). Five subjects chose not to answer the question relative to gender identity and were excluded from further analyses, including the gender identity variable.

4.2. Measures

The online survey assessed several sets of information:

Social and demographic information: The participants indicated their age, living environment (small to medium city/large city), school grade, parents’ occupation, nationality, and religion. The coders defined family socioeconomic status (SES) based on the participants’ description of their parent’s occupations. Then they assigned values to the rank of the occupation type resulting in lower, middle, and upper SES, following the 2020 INSEE categories and through a procedure similar to Lignier and Pagis ( 2017 ).

Dimensions important to identity were measured from six questions about how important the following dimensions were about their identity: (1) leisure activities, (2) religion, (3) politics/activism, (4) cultural origin, (5) gender, and (6) sexual orientation. The questions were rated on a 7-point Likert scale from unimportant to very important.

4.3. Procedure

The survey was administered online. The first author contacted middle and high schools across France. All the co-researchers also disseminated information using e-mails, newsletters, and social media. Respondents were informed about the research aims and data confidentiality and provided informed consent.

Ethical approval procedures are not yet systematically required in educational science in France for non-interventional studies such as surveys ( Claudot et al. 2009 ). New approval procedures are gradually implemented, but not all institutions have the adequate infrastructure to apply for formal approval before any research ( Carvallo 2019 ). We, therefore, submitted the present research project to two researchers from Swiss institutions (the Haute École pédagogique du Valais and the Centre interfacultaire en Droits de l’enfant, université de Genève) as well as a deontologist/ethic officer from the French Agence de biomédecine, who gave their approval for the study.

4.4. Data Analysis

Here we report the analysis of the six dimensions important for identity. How important leisure activities, politics, religion, cultural origin, sexual orientation, and gender are important to identity formation was analyzed as a function of gender, age, living environment, and SES.

These dimensions were analyzed by a 4 × 3 × 4 × 2 repeated measures ANOVA using SPSS statistics (SPSS Inc. Chicago, Illinois, United States of America), with gender identity (male/female/non-binary/indecisive), SES (upper/middle/low), age (11–12/13–14/15–16/17–18) and living environment (small to medium city/large city) as intrasubject factors. Greenhouse-Geisser correction was applied to p values associated with multiple degrees of freedom. Paired t -tests were used for 2 × 2 comparisons.

4.5. Results

Table 1 reports the sociodemographic characteristics of the 1210 participants. Of those who reported their parents’ occupation (97.4%), 47.3% came from upper SES, 32.1% from lower SES, and 18.1% from middle SES. The sample lived in small to medium cities (64.3%) or large cities (35.5%).

Sociodemographic characteristics.

All the dimensions of identity did not receive the same ratings of importance, F(5, 5480) = 18.51, p < .001. As described below, the effect of dimension interacted with gender, age, living environment, and SES.

Gender identity. Dimension of importance interacted with gender identity, F(15, 5480) = 3.66, p < .001. Gender identity had a significant effect on the dimensions of leisure activities (F(3, 1096) = 2.86, p = .03), politics (F(3, 1096) = 5.67, p < .001), sexual orientation (F(3, 1096) = 7.72, p < .001) and gender (F(3, 1096) = 5.67, p < .001), whereas there was no effect of gender identity on the dimensions of religion and cultural origin ( Figure 3 ). Post-hoc comparisons showed that the dimensions of sexual orientation and gender were more important to non-binary than male and female subjects (all p < .001). Sexual orientation was also more important for indecisive than for female ( p = .02).

Mean (± SEM) importance for leisure activities, politics, religion, cultural origin, sexual orientation, and gender as a function of gender identity.

The dimension of politics was more important to non-binary than to male and female (respectively, p < .001 and p = .003) as well as more important to female than male ( p = .016). Leisure activities were more important to male than female and non-binary (respectively, p < .001 and p = .01).

The most important dimensions for indecisive, male and female, were leisure activities (see Table 2 for the associated p values), whereas non-binary rated gender, politics, sexual orientation, and leisure activities as the most important dimensions. Religion was the least important dimension for all groups.

p values associated with paired t -tests resulting from within-dimension comparisons for each gender identity.

Importance interacted significantly with SES (F(10, 5480) = 2.07, p = .023). SES impacted the dimension of religion (F(2, 1096) = 3.30, p = .03) more importance given to religion in lower SES than upper SES ( p = .01). There was no effect of SES on any other dimension.

Age interacted with Dimension, F(15, 5480) = 2.12, p = .01, with a significant effect of age for sexual orientation (F(3, 1096) = 3.13 p = .02) and gender (F(3, 1096) = 3.04, p = .028) dimensions only. The youngest group (aged 11–12) rated both sexual orientation and gender less important than the 13–14 years old (respectively, p = .01 and p = .006), the 15–16 (respectively, p = .003 and p = .006) and the 17–18 years old (respectively, p = .01 and p = .04).

Dimension interacted with living environment F(5, 5480) = 2.74, p = .028, with the effect of living environment significant for religion (F(1, 1096) = 4.26, p = .04) and leisure activities dimensions (F(1, 1096) = 3.93, p = .048) only. Religion was more important in large cities than in small to medium cities. Leisure activities were more important in small to medium cities than in large cities.

5. Discussion

The current study primarily investigated new ways of fostering the development of 21st-century skills among adolescents through collaborative action research focusing on identity formation. In this section, we will discuss the process of action research, the role of school in fostering identity formation, and skills related to a harmonious and prosperous development into adulthood (study 1). In discussing the various dimensions that adolescents considered most important in defining their identity (study 2), we will focus on the sociodemographic factors related to these dimensions and on elements that are directly relevant to the primary object of our study. We will conclude with the limitations and recommendations for further research.

5.1. Looking Back at the Action Research Process

Our research process shared all the characteristic features of action research: immersion of the researchers in the situation; work unfolding in response to a specific situation and not to the researcher’s requirements; questions and problems emerging from the local context; building of descriptions and theoretical frameworks within the context; iteration and tests within the situation; close collaboration between researchers and actors ( Holwell 2004 ). However, it went further than usual action research, classically defined as “a form of self-reflective inquiry undertaken by participants in social situations to improve the rationality and justice of their own practices, their understanding of these practices, and the situations in which the practices are carried out” ( Carr and Kemmis 1986, p. 162 ).

A specific feature of our research is the coexistence of two intertwined levels: the students’ needs that called for intervention and the decision of the educational team to launch a collaborative action research, not only as an answer to those needs but also as a means to reach an even higher target. Indeed, although the project originated from the students’ concerns about gender identity, the implemented setting made it possible to work beyond the initial problem of developing 21st-century skills, as if feeding two birds with one seed.

However, the level of implication differed depending on the stakeholders’ statuses. Resorting to the stakeholders groups model proposed by Stringer and Ortiz Aragon ( 2021 ), it can be said that the primary stakeholders’ goal—the students—was to get a better understanding of their own identities as adolescents, whereas the secondary stakeholders’ goal—the researchers and the educational team—was to explore new ways of fostering 21st-century skills among adolescents through the research process. As represented in Figure 4 , the primary stakeholders’ goal is embedded in the second goal: having a better understanding of adolescents’ identities can indeed help find ways to foster their 21st-century skills.

Level of involvement of the participants in the two studies (based on Stringer and Ortiz Aragon’s stakeholders groups model, 2021).

Action research is a dynamic process involving recurring cycles of activity, sometimes also called self-reflective spiral of cycles—e.g., plan, act, observe, reflect ( Kemmis et al. 1988 , 2014 ; Nazari 2021 ); thinking, planning, doing, and evaluating ( Bilorusky 2021 )—, and characterized by principles of participation, iteration, inventiveness, and emergence ( Burns and McPherson 2017 ). Figure 5 describes the two cycles that made up our journey: the first one, from October 2021 to January 2022, paved the way for the actual action research cycle, from February to July 2022.

Summary of the activity cycles in our action research, inspired by Kemmis and McTaggert’s cycle (2014).

Facilitating identity exploration is one of the roles of the school ( Denney 2022 ; Flum and Kaplan 2012 ; Roeser et al. 2000 ). While all the participants were not equally involved in the discussions, each one expressed their appreciation of the framework provided by the project. However, it sometimes became complicated to distinguish clearly between the inputs arising from the initial “Gender and Society” group and what specifically came up from the research process. However, the discussions and the research design provided opportunities to reflect and learn, find significance in their and others’ contributions, and feel more empowered or more aware than before the beginning of the project. Using accurate data to work on real-world problems that concern them personally has successfully fostered motivation and engagement in young people as co-researchers ( Jacquez et al. 2020 ). Throughout the process, we followed Kaplan and colleagues’ four design-based principles to guide teachers in facilitating student identity exploration (2014): (1) promoting personally relevant topics and issues concerning students’ daily lives; (2) triggering identity exploration through personal reflection; (3) maintaining a safe school environment; (4) scaffolding exploratory activities to facilitate students through their identity’s exploration.

All the adults who took part in the process were also aware that they could, as role models, play a critical role in providing templates for young people to develop their identities ( Harter 2012 ; Schwartz and Petrova 2018 ). Lab School Paris’ pedagogical approach seeks to promote the students’ social and emotional development in various ways ( Haag and Martin 2021 ). This pilot project aimed to support further the students’ self-determined motivation, self-efficacy, and engagement. This is coherent with other studies showing that educational contexts encourage positive civic outcomes, which promote supportive environments for identity exploration while offering critical and analytic awareness of societal issues ( Adams and Fitch 1983 ; Denney 2022 ; Kaplan et al. 2014 ; Manganelli et al. 2015 ). The role of schools as “arenas for exploration and socialization where young people experiment with different roles, values, and relationships” is crucial in the case of “adolescents living in poor and working-class urban communities and deprived of enough opportunities for exploration outside schools” ( Abbasi 2016, p. 106 ).

5.2. Gender Identity and Important Dimensions for Identity

The results of study 2 informed on dimensions important for adolescents’ identity, as defined by the adolescent co-researchers themselves: leisure activities, politics/activism, religion, cultural origin, sexual orientation, and gender. The importance of these dimensions varied according to gender identity, SES, and living environment.

Age had little impact on the importance of identity dimensions. However, the 11–12 years old rated sexual orientation and gender as less critical than older age groups, whereas other dimensions did not vary across age. This can be understood because sexual feelings mostly emerge in adolescence, prompting less interest in sexual orientation in late childhood ( Diamond and Savin-Williams 2009 ).

Religion was more important in lower than upper SES and large cities than in small to medium cities. The interpretation of these results calls for caution. How religion is related to development depends on the cultural context, which also depends on various factors such as sociodemographic status and living environments (urban vs. rural) ( Good and Willoughby 2007 ). In further analyses of some variables from our survey that were not considered in the present paper, religiosity should be regarded given its relationship with SES, living environment, and religion ( Trommsdorff 2012a ). Still, some studies demonstrate considerable variance in adolescents’ religious practices and experiences ( Smith and Lundquist-Denton 2005 ). While religion is assumed to be important in adolescent development, no simple generalizations are possible from the literature results ( Trommsdorff 2012b ).

Leisure activities were important to identity development ( Leverson et al. 2012a ), although leisure activities bring together a vast set of activities, some having beneficial or detrimental effects ( Freire 2013 ; Shaw et al. 1995 ; Stattin et al. 2005 ). Our questionnaire asked how important leisure activities were to identity, with no possibility of explaining which activity was considered. Male participants rated leisure activities more important than non-binary and female respondents. Previous research has demonstrated substantial differences between male and female in leisure activity choices, with some researchers pointing out that the presentation of leisure activities may be gender stereotypical ( Leverson et al. 2012b ). Moreover, non-binary young people report barriers in accessing sports practice, resulting in a lower rate of engagement in sports activity ( Herrick and Duncan 2018 ).

The dimension of politics and activism was more important to non-binary than female and male participants, a well-documented effect in the adult non-binary population. For example, more than three-quarters of non-binary adults U.S. citizens reported being registered to vote in 2014 compared to 65% of the U.S. population ( James et al. 2016 ). According to Arnold-Renicker et al. ( 2020 ), activism is embraced by non-binary communities to establish their rights and protections. Research has also found an increased interest in political issues among young women in the last 20 years ( Briggs 2008 ), decreasing the gap between male and female. Our results follow this trend, with young women aged 11 to 19 more interested in politics than male participants.

Not only did non-binary participants find the politics and activism dimension more important to identity than male and female participants, but sexual orientation and gender dimensions were also more important to non-binary teenagers than the other groups. Being able to put labels or having words to describe their identity constitutes a turning point for non-binary adolescents ( Rankin and Beemyn 2012 ), who then engage in essential processes of self-reflection and self-education ( Bragg et al. 2018 ). This was evidenced in study one, with co-researchers all identifying as LGBTQ+, but also by study 2 showing that identity dimensions of sexual orientation and gender were significantly more important to non-binary adolescents than other gender groups.

A portion of the participants was indecisive about their gender identity (2.3%). This is not an isolated phenomenon: respondents in an extensive survey of more than 2000 participants, primarily LGBTQ from 15 years old, included about 9% of individuals who did not know how to self-characterize their gender ( Richard 2019 ). Not only can self-categorization be an ongoing process, but its stability can also vary across individuals ( Jackson et al. 2022 ). Self-categorization refers to the capacity to state, describe and articulate one’s gender and includes several processes: an internal sense of gendered self, gendered attributes, other people’s perception, and knowledge of gender in the world ( Jackson et al. 2022 ). Gender self-categorization is a dynamic process across the lifespan.

The results of these two studies offer complementary insights into the question of identity formation in adolescence. They show that identity is determined by different factors that are inextricably connected and the product of both individual characteristics and the context in which they evolve ( Lazzeri 2013 ). They also show how, through the whole research process—especially the construction of the survey and the analysis of the results, some of which are presented in study 2—adolescents became more aware of those various dimensions, thereby getting a better understanding of who they were. Moreover, the discussions allowed them to reflect critically on social norms and explicit or implicit expectations of the various groups to which they belong (family, friends, school, etc.), giving them tools to analyze complex social situations and to become more assertive in those around them. Finally, the research setting also allowed both adults and young co-researchers to experiment with new pedagogical models and build more horizontal and collaborative relationships. Research indicates that identity exploration in school has been associated with motivation, engagement, positive coping, openness to change, flexible cognition, and meaningful learning ( Kaplan et al. 2014 ); in our research, the participants’ attitudes were clearly in line with those observations. It is worth noting that our project took place throughout the school year, allowing a progressive integration of new skills for each participant according to their needs and pace. In the long run, whether this experiment will benefit the participants remains to be investigated.

5.3. Limitations

A significant limitation of this study was the limited scope of the research setup: it was prompted by the demand of a group of students with very homogeneous characteristics in the sense that all of them identified as LGBTQ+. They all come from privileged social backgrounds, primarily associated with high levels of cultural capital (e.g., teachers, researchers, company directors); most of them have had the opportunity to live in or visit multiple countries, thus opening up internationally. Three of the five adolescent co-researchers had a natural exposure to scientific research, one of their parents or both working in academia. Likewise, in our sample, parents’ occupations revealed that the upper classes were overrepresented in the collected data. Adapting this setting to a traditional school environment to achieve generalizable results would require substantial adjustments.

Another limitation lies in the short time frame within which the research has been conducted, as pointed out by the participants themselves, which restricted opportunities to work with the adolescent co-researchers on outcomes and dissemination of the project’s result.

5.4. Recommendations for Future Research

One way to strengthen our findings will be to replicate this action research in various school contexts to build surveys that reflect the identity-related concerns of more diverse social backgrounds and reach more diverse participants. Improvements suggested by the co-researchers should be considered, such as integrating the whole process into the curricular activities and starting earlier in the school year.

Contrasting with action research in single situations, Holwell ( 2004 ) insists on the concept of iterability: to address criticisms made to research-action for its lack of generalization, such methodologies should be possible to adapt to different situations. It may not be feasible to replicate this action research on other sites by bringing in several researchers each time. However, a well-planned and rigorous methodology of co-research, with detailed guidelines for the teachers and student co-researchers, could realistically be implemented under the supervision of a research coordinator in the framework of a collaborative project.

Future research should include a valid assessment of the efficiency of action research with adolescent co-researchers in fostering social and emotional skills and engagement and reflexivity, combining both quantitative and qualitative approaches.

Scholars working on identity and adolescence have pointed out since the late 1990s that identity construction is challenging in our society ( Baumeister and Muraven 1996 ) 2 . Adolescents are vulnerable to risk factors, including emotional, relational, and behavioral problems ( Aldam et al. 2019 ). With adolescents representing a significant proportion of the global population (16% in 2022), understanding and describing identity development during adolescence remains an essential objective for research ( Lannegrand-Willems 2012 ). In the current context, which is particularly anxiogenic due to climate change ( Marks et al. 2021 ; Salomon et al. 2017 ), special attention must be paid to interventions that can improve young people’s personal resources and skills and build resilience for coping with life’s adversities and challenges ( Taylor 2020 ). Intervention programs should consider the identity processes of exploration and commitment mobilized by individuals in the investigation of the self, relationships with others, and the social world, to accompany and support the various dimensions of identity construction in adolescence ( Lannegrand-Willems 2017 ), which corresponds to what has been broadly defined earlier as 21st-century skills.

Educational teams must carefully monitor the implementation of interventions. Indeed, there is no such thing as ‘one size fits all’ ( Pressman and Cross 2018 ). Even protocols generally considered the most rigorous—large-scale randomized controlled trials—are not always conclusive ( Lortie-Forgues and Inglis 2019 ). Moreover, interventions’ effects can differ substantially depending on some social and environmental characteristics of their targets. For instance, interventions designed to improve psychological health may not only be ineffective but may even produce detrimental effects in some children, notably the most vulnerable ones, such as deterioration in well-being or increased scores on anxiety or depression scales ( Das et al. 2016 ; Montero-Marin et al. 2022 ). In the specific case of identity, Lannegrand-Willems and Bosma ( 2006 ) point out that in a comparison between three high schools, students’ exploration and commitment were higher in the school with students from higher socioeconomic backgrounds. In contrast, Kroger and Marcia ( 2011 ) note that differential intervention strategies must be targeted at individuals according to their identity statuses to be efficient. Above all, each child should be supported in a way that respects and fosters their needs and opens a range of possibilities, allowing them to explore various facets of their identity in a secure environment and harmoniously develop both their academic and non-academic skills.

6. Conclusions

This school intervention fostered engagement and motivation based on a co-research process with adolescents. It led to more comfort, a better understanding of their identities, and, more generally, identity formation in a group of five adolescents. This action research resulted in a survey administered to 1210 adolescents that informed on dimensions important to identity formation. Mostly gender diversity modulated the relative importance of dimensions to identity formation, pointing out the relevance of educational contexts in promoting a supportive environment for identity exploration.

As our world faces environmental and social problems that current solutions cannot address, there is a growing demand in the field of education to explore new ways to address these increasingly complex challenges. Addressing significant issues for the students and opening up opportunities for them to make their voices heard and take responsibility is beneficial in terms of academic success and the development of their social, emotional, and civic skills. Beyond that, fostering 21st-century skills ultimately aims to enable young people to play their role as active citizens in society fully.

Acknowledgments

We wish to thank the co-researchers who participated in this action research: Zero Arrabal, Ulysse Berra, Raphaël Disdet, Lieve Potters and Clementine Shelsky, as well as Léo Ragazzi, who facilitated the working group “Gender and society” and Margot Le Lepvrier for the design work on some figures. We also wish to thank Ulysse Berra and Aurélien Berra for their comments on earlier versions of this paper and for proofreading.

Funding Statement

This research was partly funded by the Erasmus+ program line for Strategic Partnerships for Higher Education LabSchoolsEurope (grant no. 2019-1-DE01-KA203-005003).

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, P.H.; methodology, P.H. and T.F.; investigation, P.H. and T.F.; data curation, S.D.; writing—original draft preparation, P.H., T.F. and S.D.; writing—review and editing, P.H., T.F. and S.D.; supervision, P.H. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Informed Consent Statement

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Data Availability Statement

Conflicts of interest.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

1 For a short reflexive account of the initial work of the “Gender and society” group, see https://en.labschool.fr/post/philosophical-discussion-as-a-starting-point-for-research (accessed on 15 July 2022).

2 https://www.unfpa.org/data/world-population-dashboard (accessed on 15 July 2022).

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32 Self Awareness and Identity Development

Self-awareness and identity development.

In the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, the ancient Greeks inscribed the words: “Know thy  self  .” For at least 2,500 years, and probably longer, human beings have pondered the meaning of the ancient aphorism. Over the past century, psychological scientists have joined the effort. They have formulated many theories and tested countless hypotheses that speak to the central question of human selfhood:  How does a person know who he or she is? How does this develop from infancy through adolescence?

The ancient Greeks seemed to realize that the self is inherently reflexive—it reflects back on itself. In the disarmingly simple idea made famous by the great psychologist William James (1892/1963), the self is what happens when “I” reflects back upon “Me.” The self is both the “I” and the “Me”—it is the knower, and it is what the knower knows when the knower reflects upon itself. When you look back at yourself, what do you see? When you look inside, what do you find? Moreover, when you try to  change  your self in some way, what is it that you are trying to change? The philosopher Charles Taylor (1989) describes the self as a reflexive project. In modern life, Taylor agues, we often try to manage, discipline, refine, improve, or develop the self.

We work on our selves, as we might work on any other interesting project. But what exactly is it that we work on?

Imagine for a moment that you have decided to improve yourself. You might, say, go on a diet to improve your appearance. Or you might decide to be nicer to your mother, in order to improve that important social role. Or maybe the problem is at work—you need to find a better job or go back to school to prepare for a different career. Perhaps you just need to work harder. Or get organized. Or recommit yourself to religion. Or maybe the key is to begin thinking about your whole life story in a completely different way, in a way that you hope will bring you more happiness, fulfillment, peace, or excitement.

Although there are many different ways you might reflect upon and try to improve the self, it turns out that many, if not most, of them fall roughly into three broad psychological categories (McAdams & Cox, 2010). The “I” may encounter the “Me” as (a) a social actor, (b) a motivated agent, or (c) an autobiographical author.  (68)

The Social Actor

In some ways people are just like actors on stage. We play roles and follow scripts every day.

Shakespeare tapped into a deep truth about human nature when he famously wrote, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” He was wrong about the “merely,” however, for there is nothing more important for human adaptation than the manner in which we perform our roles as actors in the everyday theatre of social life. What Shakespeare may have sensed but could not have fully understood is that human beings evolved to live in social groups. Beginning with Darwin (1872/1965) and running through contemporary conceptions of human evolution, scientists have portrayed human nature as profoundly  social  (Wilson, 2012). For a few million years,  Homo sapiens  and their evolutionary forerunners have survived and flourished by virtue of their ability to live and work together in complex social groups, cooperating with each other to solve problems and overcome threats and competing with each other in the face of limited resources. As social animals, human beings strive to get along and  get ahead  in the presence of each other (Hogan, 1982). Evolution has prepared us to care deeply about social acceptance and social status, for those unfortunate individuals who do not get along well in social groups or who fail to attain a requisite status among their peers have typically been severely compromised when it comes to survival and reproduction.

It makes consummate evolutionary sense, therefore, that the human “I” should apprehend the “Me” first and foremost as a social actor  .

For human beings, the sense of the self as a social actor begins to emerge around the age of 18 months. Numerous studies have shown that by the time they reach their second birthday most toddlers recognize themselves in mirrors and other reflecting devices (Lewis & Brooks-Gunn, 1979; Rochat, 2003). What they see is an embodied actor who moves through space and time. Many children begin to use words such as “me” and “mine” in the second year of life, suggesting that the “I” now has linguistic labels that can be applied reflexively to itself: I call myself “me.” Around the same time, children also begin to express social emotions such as embarrassment, shame, guilt, and pride (Tangney, Stuewig, & Mashek, 2007). These emotions tell the social actor how well he or she is performing in the group. When I do things that win the approval of others, I feel proud of myself. When I fail in the presence of others, I may feel embarrassment or shame. When I violate a social rule, I may experience guilt, which may motivate me to make amends.  (68)

“I” and “Me”

Many of the classic psychological theories of human selfhood point to the second year of life as a key developmental period. For example, Freud (1923/1961) and his followers in the psychoanalytic tradition traced the emergence of an autonomous ego back to the second year. Freud used the term “ego” (in German  das Ich  , which also translates into “the I”) to refer to an executive self in the personality. Erikson (1963) argued that experiences of trust and interpersonal attachment in the first year of life help to consolidate the autonomy of the ego in the second. Coming from a more sociological perspective, Mead (1934) suggested that the “I” comes to know the “Me” through reflection, which may begin quite literally with mirrors but later involves the reflected appraisals of others. I come to know who I am as a social actor, Mead argued, by noting how  other people  in my social world react to my performances. In the development of the self as a social actor, other people function like mirrors—they reflect who I am back to me.

Research has shown that when young children begin to make attributions about themselves, they start simple (Harter, 2006). At age 4, Jessica knows that she has dark hair, knows that she lives in a white house, and describes herself to others in terms of simple behavioral  traits  . She may say that she is “nice,” or “helpful,” or that she is “a good girl most of the time.” By the time, she is in fifth grade (age 10), Jessica sees herself in more complex ways, attributing traits to the self such as “honest,” “moody,” “outgoing,” “shy,” “hard-working,” “smart,” “good at math but not gym class,” or “nice except when I am around my annoying brother.” By late childhood and early adolescence, the personality traits that people attribute to themselves, as well as those attributed to them by others, tend to correlate with each other in ways that conform to a well-established taxonomy of five broad trait domains, repeatedly derived in studies of adult personality and often called the  Big Five  (Roberts, Wood, & Caspi, 2008):

• Extraversion
• Neuroticism
• Agreeableness
• Conscientiousness
• Openness to experience

By late childhood, moreover, self-conceptions will likely also include important social roles: “I am a good student,” “I am the oldest daughter,” or “I am a good friend to Sarah.”  (68)

Traits and roles, and variations on these notions, are the main currency of the self as social actor (McAdams & Cox, 2010). Trait terms capture perceived consistencies in social performance. They convey what I reflexively perceive to be my overall acting style, based in part on how I think others see me as an actor in many different social situations. Roles capture the quality, as I perceive it, of important structured relationships in my life. Taken together, traits and roles make up the main features of my social reputation, as I apprehend it in my own mind (Hogan, 1982).

If you have ever tried hard to change yourself, you may have taken aim at your social reputation, targeting your central traits or your social roles. Maybe you woke up one day and decided that you must become a more optimistic and emotionally upbeat person. Taking into consideration the reflected appraisals of others, you realized that even your friends seem to avoid you because you bring them down. In addition, it feels bad to feel so bad all the time: Wouldn’t it be better to feel good, to have more energy and hope? In the language of traits, you have decided to “work on” your “neuroticism.” Or maybe instead, your problem is the trait of “conscientiousness”: You are undisciplined and don’t work hard enough, so you resolve to make changes in that area. Self-improvement efforts such as these—aimed at changing one’s traits to become a more effective social actor—are sometimes successful, but they are very hard—kind of like dieting. Research suggests that broad traits tend to be stubborn, resistant to change, even with the aid of psychotherapy. However, people often have more success working directly on their social roles. To become a more effective social actor, you may want to take aim at the important roles you play in life. What can I do to become a better son or daughter? How can I find new and meaningful roles to perform at work, or in my family, or among my friends, or in my church and community? By doing concrete things that enrich your performances in important social roles, you may begin to see yourself in a new light, and others will notice the change, too. Social actors hold the potential to transform their performances across the human life course. Each time you walk out on stage, you have a chance to start anew.  (68)

The Motivated Agent

Whether we are talking literally about the theatrical stage or more figuratively, as I do in this module, about the everyday social environment for human behavior, observers can never fully know what is in the actor’s head, no matter how closely they watch. We can see actors act, but we cannot know for sure what they  want  or what they  value  , unless they tell us straightaway. As a social actor, a person may come across as friendly and compassionate, or cynical and mean-spirited, but in neither case can we infer their motivations from their traits or their roles. What does the friendly person want? What is the cynical father trying to achieve? Many broad psychological theories of the self prioritize the motivational qualities of human behavior—the inner needs, wants, desires, goals, values, plans, programs, fears, and aversions that seem to give behavior its direction and purpose (Bandura, 1989; Deci & Ryan, 1991; Markus & Nurius, 1986). These kinds of theories explicitly conceive of the self as a  motivated agent  .

To be an agent is to act with direction and purpose, to move forward into the future in pursuit of self-chosen and valued goals. In a sense, human beings are agents even as infants, for babies can surely act in goal-directed ways. By age 1 year, moreover, infants show a strong preference for observing and imitating the goal-directed, intentional behavior of others, rather than random behaviors (Woodward, 2009). Still, it is one thing to act in goal-directed ways; it is quite another for the I to know itself (the Me) as an intentional and purposeful force who moves forward in life in pursuit of self-chosen goals, values, and other desired end states. In order to do so, the person must first realize that people indeed have desires and goals in their minds and that these inner desires and goals  motivate  (initiate, energize, put into motion) their behavior. According to a strong line of research in developmental psychology, attaining this kind of understanding means acquiring a theory of mind (Wellman, 1993), which occurs for most children by the age of 4. Once a child understands that other people’s behavior is often motivated by inner desires and goals, it is a small step to apprehend the self in similar terms.  (68)

The Motivated Agent (Continued)

Building on theory of mind and other cognitive and social developments, children begin to construct the self as a motivated agent in the elementary school years, layered over their still-developing sense of themselves as social actors. Theory and research on what developmental psychologists call the age 5-to-7 shift converge to suggest that children become more planful, intentional, and systematic in their pursuit of valued goals during this time (Sameroff & Haith, 1996). Schooling reinforces the shift in that teachers and curricula place increasing demands on students to work hard, adhere to schedules, focus on goals, and achieve success in particular, well-defined task domains. Their relative success in achieving their most cherished goals, furthermore, goes a long way in determining children’s self-esteem (Robins, Tracy, & Trzesniewski, 2008). Motivated agents feel good about themselves to the extent they believe that they are making good progress in achieving their goals and advancing their most important values.

Goals and values become even more important for the self in adolescence, as teenagers begin to confront what Erikson (1963) famously termed the developmental challenge of identity. For adolescents and young adults, establishing a psychologically efficacious identity involves exploring different options with respect to life goals, values, vocations, and intimate relationships and eventually committing to a motivational and ideological agenda for adult life—an integrated and realistic sense of what I want and value in life and how I plan to achieve it (Kroger & Marcia, 2011). Committing oneself to an integrated suite of life goals and values is perhaps the greatest achievement for the self as motivated agent. Establishing an adult identity has implications, as well, for how a person moves through life as a social actor, entailing new role commitments and, perhaps, a changing understanding of one’s basic dispositional traits. According to Erikson, however, identity achievement is always provisional, for adults continue to work on their identities as they move into midlife and beyond, often relinquishing old goals in favor of new ones, investing themselves in new projects and making new plans, exploring new relationships, and shifting their priorities in response to changing life circumstances (Freund & Riediger, 2006; Josselson, 1996).

There is a sense whereby any time you try to change yourself, you are assuming the role of a motivated agent. After all, to strive to change something is inherently what an agent does. However, what particular feature of selfhood you try to change may correspond to your self as actor, agent, or author, or some combination. When you try to change your traits or roles, you take aim at the social actor. By contrast, when you try to change your values or life goals, you are focusing on yourself as a motivated agent. Adolescence and young adulthood are periods in the human life course when many of us focus attention on our values and life goals. Perhaps you grew up as a traditional Catholic, but now in college you believe that the values inculcated in your childhood no longer function so well for you. You no longer believe in the central tenets of the Catholic Church, say, and are now working to replace your old values with new ones. Or maybe you still want to be Catholic, but you feel that your new take on faith requires a different kind of personal ideology. In the realm of the motivated agent, moreover, changing values can influence life goals. If your new value system prioritizes alleviating the suffering of others, you may decide to pursue a degree in social work, or to become a public interest lawyer, or to live a simpler life that prioritizes people over material wealth. A great deal of the identity work we do in adolescence and young adulthood is about values and goals, as we strive to articulate a personal vision or dream for what we hope to accomplish in the future.  (68)

The Autobiographical Author

Even as the “I” continues to develop a sense of the “Me” as both a social actor and a motivated agent, a third standpoint for selfhood gradually emerges in the adolescent and early-adult years. The third perspective is a response to Erikson’s (1963) challenge of identity. According to Erikson, developing an identity involves more than the exploration of and commitment to life goals and values (the self as motivated agent), and more than committing to new roles and re-evaluating old traits (the self as social actor). It also involves achieving a sense of  temporal continuity  in life—a reflexive understanding of how I have come to be the person I am becoming  , or put differently, how my past self has developed into my present self, and how my present self will, in turn, develop into an envisioned future self. In his analysis of identity formation in the life of the 15th-century Protestant reformer Martin Luther, Erikson (1958) describes the culmination of a young adult’s search for identity in this way:

“To be adult means among other things to see one’s own life in continuous perspective, both in retrospect and prospect. By accepting some definition of who he is, usually on the basis of a function in an economy, a place in the sequence of generations, and a status in the structure of society, the adult is able  to selectively reconstruct his past in such a way that, step for step, it seems to have planned him, or better, he seems to have planned it  . In this sense, psychologically we do choose our parents, our family history, and the history of our kings, heroes, and gods. By making them our own, we maneuver ourselves into the inner position of proprietors, of creators.” —(Erickson, 1958, pp. 111-112; emphasis added).

In this rich passage, Erikson intimates that the development of a mature identity in young adulthood involves the “I’s” ability to construct a retrospective and prospective  story  about the “Me” (McAdams, 1985). In their efforts to find a meaningful identity for life, young men and women begin “to selectively reconstruct” their past, as Erikson wrote, and imagine their future to create an integrative life story, or what psychologists today often call a narrative identity. A narrative identity is an internalized and evolving story of the self that reconstructs the past and anticipates the future in such a way as to provide a person’s life with some degree of unity, meaning, and purpose over time (McAdams, 2008; McLean, Pasupathi, & Pals, 2007). The self typically becomes an  autobiographical author  in the early-adult years, a way of being that is layered over the motivated agent, which is layered over the social actor. In order to provide life with the sense of temporal continuity and deep meaning that Erikson believed identity should confer, we must author a personalized life story that integrates our understanding of who we once were, who we are today, and who we may become in the future. The story helps to explain, for the author and for the author’s world, why the social actor does what it does and why the motivated agent wants what it wants, and how the person as a whole has developed over time, from the past’s reconstructed beginning to the future’s imagined ending.  (68)

The Autobiographical Author (Continued)

By the time children are 5 or 6 years of age, they can tell well-formed stories about personal events in their lives (Fivush, 2011). By the end of childhood, they usually have a good sense of what a typical biography contains and how it is sequenced, from birth to death (Thomsen & Bernsten, 2008). But it is not until adolescence, research shows, that human beings express advanced storytelling skills and what psychologists call autobiographical reasoning (Habermas & Bluck, 2000; McLean & Fournier, 2008). In autobiographical reasoning, a narrator is able to derive substantive conclusions about the self from analyzing his or her own personal experiences. Adolescents may develop the ability to string together events into causal chains and inductively derive general themes about life from a sequence of chapters and scenes (Habermas & de Silveira, 2008). For example, a 16-year-old may be able to explain to herself and to others how childhood experiences in her family have shaped her vocation in life. Her parents were divorced when she was 5 years old, the teenager recalls, and this caused a great deal of stress in her family. Her mother often seemed anxious and depressed, but she (the now-teenager when she was a little girl—the story’s protagonist) often tried to cheer her mother up, and her efforts seemed to work. In more recent years, the teenager notes that her friends often come to her with their boyfriend problems. She seems to be very adept at giving advice about love and relationships, which stems, the teenager now believes, from her early experiences with her mother. Carrying this causal narrative forward, the teenager now thinks that she would like to be a marriage counselor when she grows up.

Young people often “try on” many variations of identities to see which best fits their private sense of themselves. Unlike children, then, adolescents can tell a full and convincing story about an entire human life, or at least a prominent line of causation within a full life, explaining continuity and change in the story’s protagonist over time. Once the cognitive skills are in place, young people seek interpersonal opportunities to share and refine their developing sense of themselves as storytellers (the I) who tell stories about themselves (the Me). Adolescents and young adults author a narrative sense of the self by telling stories about their experiences to other people, monitoring the feedback they receive from the stories, editing their stories in light of the feedback, gaining new experiences and telling stories about those, and on and on, as selves create stories that, in turn, create new selves (McLean et al., 2007). Gradually, in fits and starts, through conversation and introspection, the “I” develops a convincing and coherent narrative about the “Me.”  (68)

Child and Adolescent Psychology Copyright © by Lumen Learning is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Learning and Identity Development at Work

• First Online: 11 October 2017

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• Alan Brown 6 &
• Jenny Bimrose 6  

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Brown and Bimrose map changing ideas about the development of identities at work and then outline two models of learning for supporting identity development at work. The most recent model by Brown and Bimrose draws attention to three representations of key factors influencing learning and identity development at work. The first representation views learning as a process of identity development: ‘learning as becoming’. The second way learning and identity development can be represented is as occurring across four domains: relational development; cognitive development; practical development and emotional development. Learning may involve development in one or more domains. The third way that learning and identity development at work can be represented acknowledges that learning takes place in the context of opportunity structures within which individuals operate.

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Brown, A., Bimrose, J. (2018). Learning and Identity Development at Work. In: Milana, M., Webb, S., Holford, J., Waller, R., Jarvis, P. (eds) The Palgrave International Handbook on Adult and Lifelong Education and Learning. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55783-4_14

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Why Identity Matters and How It Shapes Us

Sanjana is a health writer and editor. Her work spans various health-related topics, including mental health, fitness, nutrition, and wellness.

Dr. Sabrina Romanoff, PsyD, is a licensed clinical psychologist and a professor at Yeshiva University’s clinical psychology doctoral program.

Verywell / Zoe Hansen

Defining Identity

• What Makes Up a Person's Identity?

Identity Development Across the Lifespan

The importance of identity, tips for reflecting on your identity.

Your identity is a set of physical, mental, emotional, social, and interpersonal characteristics that are unique to you.

It encapsulates your core personal values and your beliefs about the world, says Asfia Qaadir , DO, a child and adolescent psychiatrist at PrairieCare.

In this article, we explore the concept of identity, its importance, factors that contribute to its development , and some strategies that can help you reflect upon your identity.

Your identity gives you your sense of self. It is a set of traits that distinguishes you from other people, because while you might have some things in common with others, no one else has the exact same combination of traits as you.

Your identity also gives you a sense of continuity, i.e. the feeling that you are the same person you were two years ago and you will be the same person two days from now.

Asfia Qaadir, DO, Psychiatrist

Your identity plays an important role in how you treat others and how you carry yourself in the world.

What Makes Up a Person's Identity?

These are some of the factors that can contribute to your identity:

• Physical appearance
• Physical sensations
• Emotional traits
• Life experiences
• Genetics 
• Health conditions
• Nationality
• Race  
• Social community 
• Peer group 
• Political environment
• Spirituality
• Sexuality 
• Personality
• Beliefs 
• Finances 

We all have layers and dimensions that contribute to who we are and how we express our identity.

All of these factors interact together and influence you in unique and complex ways, shaping who you are. Identity formation is a subjective and deeply personal experience.

Identity development is a lifelong process that begins in childhood, starts to solidify in adolescence, and continues through adulthood.

Childhood is when we first start to develop a self-concept and form an identity.

As children, we are highly dependent on our families for our physical and emotional needs. Our early interactions with family members play a critical role in the formation of our identities.

During this stage, we learn about our families and communities, and what values are important to them, says Dr. Qaadir. 

The information and values we absorb in childhood are like little seeds that are planted years before we can really intentionally reflect upon them as adults, says Dr. Qaadir.

Traumatic or abusive experiences during childhood can disrupt identity formation and have lasting effects on the psyche.

Adolescence

Adolescence is a critical period of identity formation.

As teenagers, we start to intentionally develop a sense of self based on how the values we’re learning show up in our relationships with ourselves, our friends, family members, and in different scenarios that challenge us, Dr. Qaadir explains.

Adolescence is a time of discovering ourselves, learning to express ourselves, figuring out where we fit in socially (and where we don’t), developing relationships, and pursuing interests, says Dr. Qaadir.

This is the period where we start to become independent and form life goals. It can also be a period of storm and stress , as we experience mood disruptions, challenge authority figures, and take risks as we try to work out who we are.

As adults, we begin building our public or professional identities and deepen our personal relationships, says Dr. Qaadir.

These stages are not set in stone, rather they are fluid, and we get the rest of our lives to continue experiencing life and evolving our identities, says Dr. Qaadir.

Having a strong sense of identity is important because it:

• Creates self-awareness: A strong sense of identity can give you a deep sense of awareness of who you are as a person. It can help you understand your likes, dislikes, actions, motivations, and relationships.
• Provides direction and motivation: Having a strong sense of identity can give you a clear understanding of your values and interests, which can help provide clarity, direction, and motivation when it comes to setting goals and working toward them.
• Enables healthy relationships: When you know and accept yourself, you can form meaningful connections with people who appreciate and respect you for who you are. A strong sense of identity also helps you communicate effectively, establish healthy boundaries, and engage in authentic and fulfilling interactions.
• Keeps you grounded: Our identities give us roots when things around us feel chaotic or uncertain, says Dr. Qaadir. “Our roots keep us grounded and help us remember what truly matters at the end of the day.”
• Improves decision-making: Understanding yourself well can help you make choices that are consistent with your values, beliefs, and long-term goals. This clarity reduces confusion, indecision, and the tendency to conform to others' expectations, which may lead to poor decision-making .
• Fosters community participation: Identity is often shaped by cultural, social, political, spiritual, and historical contexts. Having a strong sense of identity allows you to understand, appreciate, and take pride in your cultural heritage. This can empower you to participate actively in society, express your unique perspective, and contribute to positive societal change.

On the other hand, a weak sense of identity can make it more difficult to ground yourself emotionally in times of stress and more confusing when you’re trying to navigate major life decisions, says Dr. Qaadir.

Dr. Qaadir suggests some strategies that can help you reflect on your identity:

• Art: Art is an incredible medium that can help you process and reflect on your identity. It can help you express yourself in creative and unique ways.
• Reading: Reading peoples’ stories through narrative is an excellent way to broaden your horizons, determine how you feel about the world around you, and reflect on your place in it.
• Journaling: Journaling can also be very useful for self-reflection . It can help you understand your feelings and motivations better.
• Conversation: Conversations with people can expose you to diverse perspectives, and help you form and represent your own.
• Nature: Being in nature can give you a chance to reflect undisturbed. Spending time in nature often has a way of putting things in perspective.
• Relationships: You can especially strengthen your sense of identity through the relationships around you. It is valuable to surround yourself with people who reflect your core values but may be different from you in other aspects of identity such as personality styles, cultural backgrounds, passions, professions, or spiritual paths because that provides perspective and learning from others.

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By Sanjana Gupta Sanjana is a health writer and editor. Her work spans various health-related topics, including mental health, fitness, nutrition, and wellness.

29 Stages of Human Development

Learning Objectives

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Describe the stages of prenatal development and recognize the importance of prenatal care
• Discuss physical, cognitive, and emotional development that occurs from infancy through childhood
• Discuss physical, cognitive, and emotional development that occurs during adolescence
• Discuss physical, cognitive, and emotional development that occurs in adulthood

From the moment we are born until the moment we die, we continue to develop.

As discussed at the beginning of this chapter, developmental psychologists often divide our development into three areas: physical development, cognitive development, and psychosocial development. Mirroring Erikson’s stages, lifespan development is divided into different stages that are based on age. We will discuss prenatal, infant, child, adolescent, and adult development.

Prenatal Development

How did you come to be who you are? From beginning as a one-cell structure to your birth, your prenatal development occurred in an orderly and delicate sequence.

There are three stages of prenatal development: germinal, embryonic, and fetal. Let’s take a look at what happens to the developing baby in each of these stages.

Germinal Stage (Weeks 1–2)

In the discussion of biopsychology earlier in the book, you learned about genetics and DNA. A mother and father’s DNA is passed on to the child at the moment of conception. Conception occurs when sperm fertilizes an egg and forms a zygote . A zygote begins as a one-cell structure that is created when a sperm and egg merge . The genetic makeup and sex of the baby are set at this point. During the first week after conception, the zygote divides and multiplies, going from a one-cell structure to two cells, then four cells, then eight cells, and so on. This process of cell division is called mitosis . Mitosis is a fragile process, and fewer than one-half of all zygotes survive beyond the first two weeks (Hall, 2004). After five days of mitosis there are one hundred cells, and after nine months there are billions of cells. As the cells divide, they become more specialized, forming different organs and body parts. In the germinal stage , the mass of cells has yet to attach itself to the lining of the mother’s uterus . Once it does, the next stage begins.

Embryonic Stage (Weeks 3–8)

After the zygote divides for about 7–10 days and has 150 cells, it travels down the fallopian tubes and implants itself in the lining of the uterus. Upon implantation, this multi-cellular organism is called an embryo . Now blood vessels grow, forming the placenta. The placenta is a structure connected to the uterus that provides nourishment and oxygen from the mother to the developing embryo via the umbilical cord . Basic structures of the embryo start to develop into areas that will become the head, chest, and abdomen. During the embryonic stage , the heart begins to beat and organs form and begin to function . The neural tube forms along the back of the embryo, developing into the spinal cord and brain.

Fetal Stage (Weeks 9–40)

When the organism is about 9 weeks old , the embryo is called a fetus . At this stage, the fetus is about the size of a kidney bean and begins to take on the recognizable form of a human being as the “tail” begins to disappear.

From 9–12 weeks, the sex organs begin to differentiate. At about 16 weeks, the fetus is approximately 4.5 inches long. Fingers and toes are fully developed, and fingerprints are visible. By the time the fetus reaches the sixth month of development (24 weeks), it weighs up to 1.4 pounds. Hearing has developed, so the fetus can respond to sounds. The internal organs, such as the lungs, heart, stomach, and intestines, have formed enough that a fetus born prematurely at this point has a chance to survive outside of the mother’s womb. Throughout the fetal stage the brain continues to grow and develop, nearly doubling in size from weeks 16 to 28. Around 36 weeks, the fetus is almost ready for birth. It weighs about 6 pounds and is about 18.5 inches long, and by week 37 all of the fetus’s organ systems are developed enough that it could survive outside the mother’s uterus without many of the risks associated with premature birth. The fetus continues to gain weight and grow in length until approximately 40 weeks. By then, the fetus has very little room to move around and birth becomes imminent.

Prenatal Influences

During each prenatal stage, genetic and environmental factors can affect development. The developing fetus is completely dependent on the mother for life. It is important that the mother takes good care of herself and receives prenatal care , which is medical care during pregnancy that monitors the health of both the mother and the fetus. According to the National Institutes of Health ([NIH], 2013), routine prenatal care is important because it can reduce the risk of complications for the mother and fetus during pregnancy. In fact, women who are trying to become pregnant or who may become pregnant should discuss pregnancy planning with their doctor. They may be advised, for example, to take a vitamin containing folic acid, which helps prevent certain birth defects, or to monitor aspects of their diet or exercise routines.

Recall that when the zygote attaches to the wall of the mother’s uterus, the placenta is formed. The placenta provides nourishment and oxygen to the fetus. Most everything the mother ingests, including food, liquid, and even medication, travels through the placenta to the fetus, hence the common phrase “eating for two.” Anything the mother is exposed to in the environment affects the fetus; if the mother is exposed to something harmful, the child can show life-long effects.

A teratogen is any environmental agent—biological, chemical, or physical—that causes damage to the developing embryo or fetus . There are different types of teratogens. Alcohol and most drugs cross the placenta and affect the fetus. Alcohol is not safe to drink in any amount during pregnancy. Alcohol use during pregnancy has been found to be the leading preventable cause of intellectual disabilities in children in the United States (Maier & West, 2001). Excessive maternal drinking while pregnant can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorders with life-long consequences for the child ranging in severity from minor to major. Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) are a collection of birth defects associated with heavy consumption of alcohol during pregnancy. Physically, children with FASD may have a small head size and abnormal facial features. Cognitively, these children may have poor judgment, poor impulse control, higher rates of ADHD, learning issues, and lower IQ scores. These developmental problems and delays persist into adulthood (Streissguth et al., 2004). Based on studies conducted on animals, it also has been suggested that a mother’s alcohol consumption during pregnancy may predispose her child to like alcohol (Youngentob et al., 2007).

Smoking is also considered a teratogen because nicotine travels through the placenta to the fetus. When the mother smokes, the developing baby experiences a reduction in blood oxygen levels. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2013), smoking while pregnant can result in premature birth, low-birth-weight infants, stillbirth, and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

Heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, almost all prescription medicines, and most over-the-counter medications are also considered teratogens. Babies born with a heroin addiction need heroin just like an adult addict. The child will need to be gradually weaned from the heroin under medical supervision; otherwise, the child could have seizures and die. Other teratogens include radiation, viruses such as HIV and herpes, and rubella (German measles). Women in the United States are much less likely to be afflicted with rubella because most women receive childhood immunizations or vaccinations that protect the body from disease.

Each organ of the fetus develops during a specific period in the pregnancy, called the critical or sensitive period . For example, research with primate models of FASD has demonstrated that the time during which a developing fetus is exposed to alcohol can dramatically affect the appearance of facial characteristics associated with fetal alcohol syndrome. Specifically, this research suggests that alcohol exposure that is limited to day 19 or 20 of gestation can lead to significant facial abnormalities in the offspring (Ashley, Magnuson, Omnell, & Clarren, 1999). Given regions of the brain also show sensitive periods during which they are most susceptible to the teratogenic effects of alcohol (Tran & Kelly, 2003).

Should Women Who Use Drugs During Pregnancy Be Arrested and Jailed?

As you now know, women who use drugs or alcohol during pregnancy can cause serious lifelong harm to their children. Some people have advocated mandatory screenings for women who are pregnant and have a history of drug abuse, and if the women continue using, to arrest, prosecute, and incarcerate them (Figdor & Kaeser, 1998). This policy was tried in Charleston, South Carolina, as recently as 20 years ago. The policy was called the Interagency Policy on Management of Substance Abuse During Pregnancy and had disastrous results.

The Interagency Policy applied to patients attending the obstetrics clinic at MUSC, which primarily serves patients who are indigent or on Medicaid. It did not apply to private obstetrical patients. The policy required patient education about the harmful effects of substance abuse during pregnancy. . . . [A] statement also warned patients that protection of unborn and newborn children from the harms of illegal drug abuse could involve the Charleston police, the Solicitor of the Ninth Judicial Court, and the Protective Services Division of the Department of Social Services (DSS). (Jos, Marshall, & Perlmutter, 1995, pp. 120–121)

This policy seemed to deter women from seeking prenatal care, deterred them from seeking other social services, and was applied solely to low-income women, resulting in lawsuits. The program was canceled after 5 years, during which 42 women were arrested. A federal agency later determined that the program involved human experimentation without the approval and oversight of an institutional review board (IRB). What were the flaws in the program and how would you correct them? What are the ethical implications of charging pregnant women with child abuse?

Test Your Understanding

Infancy through childhood.

The average newborn weighs approximately 7.5 pounds. Although small, a newborn is not completely helpless because his reflexes and sensory capacities help him interact with the environment from the moment of birth. All healthy babies are born with newborn reflexes : inborn automatic responses to particular forms of stimulation. Reflexes help the newborn survive until it is capable of more complex behaviors—these reflexes are crucial to survival. They are present in babies whose brains are developing normally and usually disappear around 4–5 months old. Let’s take a look at some of these newborn reflexes. The rooting reflex is the newborn’s response to anything that touches her cheek: When you stroke a baby’s cheek, she naturally turns her head in that direction and begins to suck. The sucking reflex is the automatic, unlearned sucking motions that infants do with their mouths. Several other interesting newborn reflexes can be observed. For instance, if you put your finger into a newborn’s hand, you will witness the grasping reflex, in which a baby automatically grasps anything that touches his palms. The Moro reflex is the newborn’s response when she feels like she is falling. The baby spreads her arms, pulls them back in, and then (usually) cries. How do you think these reflexes promote survival in the first months of life?

Take a few minutes to view this brief video clip illustrating several newborn reflexes: Reflexes in newborn babies .

What can young infants see, hear, and smell? Newborn infants’ sensory abilities are significant, but their senses are not yet fully developed. Many of a newborn’s innate preferences facilitate interaction with caregivers and other humans. Although vision is their least developed sense, newborns already show a preference for faces. Babies who are just a few days old also prefer human voices, they will listen to voices longer than sounds that do not involve speech (Vouloumanos & Werker, 2004), and they seem to prefer their mother’s voice over a stranger’s voice (Mills & Melhuish, 1974). In an interesting experiment, 3-week-old babies were given pacifiers that played a recording of the infant’s mother’s voice and of a stranger’s voice. When the infants heard their mother’s voice, they sucked more strongly at the pacifier (Mills & Melhuish, 1974). Newborns also have a strong sense of smell. For instance, newborn babies can distinguish the smell of their own mother from that of others. In a study by MacFarlane (1978), 1-week-old babies who were being breastfed were placed between two gauze pads. One gauze pad was from the bra of a nursing mother who was a stranger, and the other gauze pad was from the bra of the infant’s own mother. More than two-thirds of the week-old babies turned toward the gauze pad with their mother’s scent.

Physical Development

In infancy, toddlerhood, and early childhood, the body’s physical development is rapid. On average, newborns weigh between 5 and 10 pounds, and a newborn’s weight typically doubles in 6 months and triples in 1 year. By 2 years old the weight will have quadrupled, so we can expect that a 2-year-old should weigh between 20 and 40 pounds. The average length of a newborn is 19.5 inches, increasing to 29.5 inches by 12 months and 34.4 inches by 2 years old (WHO Multicentre Growth Reference Study Group, 2006).

During infancy and childhood, growth does not occur at a steady rate (Carel, Lahlou, Roger, & Chaussain, 2004). Growth slows between 4 and 6 years old: During this time children gain 5–7 pounds and grow about 2–3 inches per year. Once girls reach 8–9 years old, their growth rate outpaces that of boys due to a pubertal growth spurt. This growth spurt continues until around 12 years old, coinciding with the start of the menstrual cycle. By 10 years old, the average girl weighs 88 pounds, and the average boy weighs 85 pounds.

We are born with all of the brain cells that we will ever have—about 100–200 billion neurons (nerve cells) whose function is to store and transmit information (Huttenlocher & Dabholkar, 1997). However, the nervous system continues to grow and develop. Each neural pathway forms thousands of new connections during infancy and toddlerhood. This period of rapid neural growth is called blooming . Neural pathways continue to develop through puberty. The blooming period of neural growth is then followed by a period of pruning, where neural connections are reduced. It is thought that pruning causes the brain to function more efficiently, allowing for mastery of more complex skills (Hutchinson, 2011). Blooming occurs during the first few years of life, and pruning continues through childhood and into adolescence in various areas of the brain.

The size of our brains increases rapidly. For example, the brain of a 2-year-old is 55% of its adult size, and by 6 years old the brain is about 90% of its adult size (Tanner, 1978). During early childhood (ages 3–6), the frontal lobes grow rapidly. Recalling our discussion of the 4 lobes of the brain earlier in this book, the frontal lobes are associated with planning, reasoning, memory, and impulse control. Therefore, by the time children reach school age, they are developmentally capable of controlling their attention and behavior. Through the elementary school years, the frontal, temporal, occipital, and parietal lobes all grow in size. The brain growth spurts experienced in childhood tend to follow Piaget’s sequence of cognitive development so that significant changes in neural functioning account for cognitive advances (Kolb & Whishaw, 2009; Overman, Bachevalier, Turner, & Peuster, 1992).

Motor development occurs in an orderly sequence as infants move from reflexive reactions (e.g., sucking and rooting) to more advanced motor functioning. For instance, babies first learn to hold their heads up, then to sit with assistance, and then to sit unassisted, followed later by crawling and then walking.

Motor skills refer to our ability to move our bodies and manipulate objects . Fine motor skills focus on the muscles in our fingers, toes, and eyes, and enable coordination of small actions (e.g., grasping a toy, writing with a pencil, and using a spoon) . Gross motor skills focus on large muscle groups that control our arms and legs and involve larger movements (e.g., balancing, running, and jumping) .

As motor skills develop, there are certain developmental milestones that young children should achieve. For each milestone there is an average age, as well as a range of ages in which the milestone should be reached. An example of a developmental milestone is sitting. On average, most babies sit alone at 7 months old. Sitting involves both coordination and muscle strength, and 90% of babies achieve this milestone between 5 and 9 months old. In another example, babies on average are able to hold up their head at 6 weeks old, and 90% of babies achieve this between 3 weeks and 4 months old. If a baby is not holding up his head by 4 months old, he is showing a delay. If the child is displaying delays on several milestones, that is reason for concern, and the parent or caregiver should discuss this with the child’s pediatrician. Some developmental delays can be identified and addressed through early intervention.

Cognitive Development

In addition to rapid physical growth, young children also exhibit significant development of their cognitive abilities. Piaget thought that children’s ability to understand objects—such as learning that a rattle makes a noise when shaken—was a cognitive skill that develops slowly as a child matures and interacts with the environment. Today, developmental psychologists think Piaget was incorrect. Researchers have found that even very young children understand objects and how they work long before they have experience with those objects (Baillargeon, 1987; Baillargeon, Li, Gertner, & Wu, 2011). For example, children as young as 3 months old demonstrated knowledge of the properties of objects that they had only viewed and did not have prior experience with them. In one study, 3-month-old infants were shown a truck rolling down a track and behind a screen. The box, which appeared solid but was actually hollow, was placed next to the track. The truck rolled past the box as would be expected. Then the box was placed on the track to block the path of the truck. When the truck was rolled down the track this time, it continued unimpeded. The infants spent significantly more time looking at this impossible event. Baillargeon (1987) concluded that they knew solid objects could not pass through each other. Baillargeon’s findings suggest that very young children have an understanding of objects and how they work, which Piaget (1954) would have said is beyond their cognitive abilities due to their limited experiences in the world.

Just as there are physical milestones that we expect children to reach, there are also cognitive milestones. It is helpful to be aware of these milestones as children gain new abilities to think, problem-solve, and communicate. For example, infants shake their head “no” around 6–9 months, and they respond to verbal requests to do things like “wave bye-bye” or “blow a kiss” around 9–12 months. Remember Piaget’s ideas about object permanence? We can expect children to grasp the concept that objects continue to exist even when they are not in sight by around 8 months old. Because toddlers (i.e., 12–24 months old) have mastered object permanence, they enjoy games like hide and seek, and they realize that when someone leaves the room they will come back (Loop, 2013). Toddlers also point to pictures in books and look in appropriate places when you ask them to find objects.

Preschool-age children (i.e., 3–5 years old) also make steady progress in cognitive development. Not only can they count, name colors, and tell you their name and age, but they can also make some decisions on their own, such as choosing an outfit to wear. Preschool-age children understand basic time concepts and sequencing (e.g., before and after), and they can predict what will happen next in a story. They also begin to enjoy the use of humor in stories. Because they can think symbolically, they enjoy pretend play and inventing elaborate characters and scenarios. One of the most common examples of their cognitive growth is their blossoming curiosity. Preschool-age children love to ask “Why?”

An important cognitive change occurs in children this age. Recall that Piaget described 2-to-3-year-olds as egocentric, meaning that they do not have an awareness of others’ points of view. Between 3 and 5 years old, children come to understand that people have thoughts, feelings, and beliefs that are different from their own. This is known as theory-of-mind (TOM). Children can use this skill to tease others, persuade their parents to purchase a candy bar, or understand why a sibling might be angry. When children develop TOM, they can recognize that others have false beliefs (Dennett, 1987; Callaghan et al., 2005).

False-belief tasks are useful in determining a child’s acquisition of theory-of-mind (TOM). Take a look at this video clip showing a false-belief task involving a box of crayons: The “False Belief” Test: Theory of Mind .

Cognitive skills continue to expand in middle and late childhood (6–11 years old). Thought processes become more logical and organized when dealing with concrete information. Children at this age understand concepts such as the past, present, and future, giving them the ability to plan and work toward goals. Additionally, they can process complex ideas such as addition and subtraction and cause-and-effect relationships. However, children’s attention spans tend to be very limited until they are around 11 years old. After that point, it begins to improve through adulthood.

One well-researched aspect of cognitive development is language acquisition. As mentioned earlier, the order in which children learn language structures is consistent across children and cultures (Hatch, 1983). You’ve also learned that some psychological researchers have proposed that children possess a biological predisposition for language acquisition.

Starting before birth, babies begin to develop language and communication skills. At birth, babies apparently recognize their mother’s voice and can discriminate between the language(s) spoken by their mothers and foreign languages, and they show preferences for faces that are moving in synchrony with audible language (Blossom & Morgan, 2006; Pickens, 1994; Spelke & Cortelyou, 1981).

Children communicate information through gesturing long before they speak, and there is some evidence that gesture usage predicts subsequent language development (Iverson & Goldin-Meadow, 2005). In terms of producing spoken language, babies begin to coo almost immediately. Cooing is a one-syllable combination of a consonant and a vowel sound (e.g., coo or ba). Interestingly, babies replicate sounds from their own languages. A baby whose parents speak French will coo in a different tone than a baby whose parents speak Spanish or Urdu. After cooing, the baby starts to babble. Babbling begins with repeating a syllable, such as ma-ma, da-da, or ba-ba. When a baby is about 12 months old, we expect her to say her first word for meaning and to start combining words for meaning at about 18 months.

At about 2 years old, a toddler uses between 50 and 200 words; by 3 years old they have a vocabulary of up to 1,000 words and can speak in sentences. During the early childhood years, children’s vocabulary increases at a rapid pace. This is sometimes referred to as the “vocabulary spurt” and has been claimed to involve an expansion in vocabulary at a rate of 10–20 new words per week. Recent research may indicate that while some children experience these spurts, it is far from universal (as discussed in Ganger & Brent, 2004). It has been estimated that 5-year-olds understand about 6,000 words, speak 2,000 words, and can define words and question their meanings. They can rhyme and name the days of the week. Seven-year-olds speak fluently and use slang and clichés (Stork & Widdowson, 1974).

What accounts for such dramatic language learning by children? Behaviorist B. F. Skinner thought that we learn language in response to reinforcement or feedback, such as through parental approval or through being understood. For example, when a 2-year-old child asks for juice, he might say, “Me juice,” to which his mother might respond by giving him a cup of apple juice. Noam Chomsky (1957) criticized Skinner’s theory and proposed that we are all born with an innate capacity to learn language. Chomsky called this mechanism a language acquisition device (LAD). Who is correct? Both Chomsky and Skinner are right. Remember that we are a product of both nature and nurture. Researchers now believe that language acquisition is partially inborn and partially learned through our interactions with our linguistic environment (Gleitman & Newport, 1995; Stork & Widdowson, 1974).

Psychosocial development occurs as children form relationships, interact with others, and understand and manage their feelings . In social and emotional development, forming healthy attachments is very important and is the major social milestone of infancy. Attachment is a long-standing connection or bond with others. Developmental psychologists are interested in how infants reach this milestone. They ask such questions as: How do parent and infant attachment bonds form? How does neglect affect these bonds? What accounts for children’s attachment differences?

Researchers Harry Harlow, John Bowlby, and Mary Ainsworth conducted studies designed to answer these questions. In the 1950s, Harlow conducted a series of experiments on monkeys. He separated newborn monkeys from their mothers. Each monkey was presented with two surrogate mothers. One surrogate monkey was made out of wire mesh, and she could dispense milk. The other monkey was softer and made from cloth: This monkey did not dispense milk. Research shows that the monkeys preferred the soft, cuddly cloth monkey, even though she did not provide any nourishment. The baby monkeys spent their time clinging to the cloth monkey and only went to the wire monkey when they needed to be fed. Prior to this study, the medical and scientific communities generally thought that babies become attached to the people who provide their nourishment. However, Harlow (1958) concluded that there was more to the mother-child bond than nourishment. Feelings of comfort and security are the critical components of maternal-infant bonding, which leads to healthy psychosocial development.

Harlow’s studies of monkeys were performed before modern ethics guidelines were in place, and today his experiments are widely considered to be unethical and even cruel. Watch this video to see actual footage of Harlow’s monkey studies: Harlow’s Studies on Dependency in Monkeys .

Building on the work of Harlow and others, John Bowlby developed the concept of attachment theory. He defined attachment as the affectional bond or tie that an infant forms with the mother (Bowlby, 1969). An infant must form this bond with a primary caregiver in order to have normal social and emotional development. In addition, Bowlby proposed that this attachment bond is very powerful and continues throughout life. He used the concept of secure base to define a healthy attachment between parent and child (1988). A secure base is a parental presence that gives the child a sense of safety as he explores his surroundings. Bowlby said that two things are needed for a healthy attachment: The caregiver must be responsive to the child’s physical, social, and emotional needs; and the caregiver and child must engage in mutually enjoyable interactions (Bowlby, 1969).

While Bowlby thought attachment was an all-or-nothing process, Mary Ainsworth’s (1970) research showed otherwise. Ainsworth wanted to know if children differ in the ways they bond, and if so, why. To find the answers, she used the Strange Situation procedure to study attachment between mothers and their infants (1970). In the Strange Situation, the mother (or primary caregiver) and the infant (age 12-18 months) are placed in a room together. There are toys in the room, and the caregiver and child spend some time alone in the room. After the child has had time to explore her surroundings, a stranger enters the room. The mother then leaves her baby with the stranger. After a few minutes, she returns to comfort her child.

Based on how the infants/toddlers responded to the separation and reunion, Ainsworth identified three types of parent-child attachments : secure, avoidant, and resistant (Ainsworth & Bell, 1970). A fourth style, known as disorganized attachment, was later described (Main & Solomon, 1990). The most common type of attachment—also considered the healthiest—is called secure attachment . In this type of attachment, the toddler prefers his parent over a stranger . The attachment figure is used as a secure base to explore the environment and is sought out in times of stress. Securely attached children were distressed when their caregivers left the room in the Strange Situation experiment, but when their caregivers returned, the securely attached children were happy to see them. Securely attached children have caregivers who are sensitive and responsive to their needs.

With avoidant attachment , the child is unresponsive to the parent, does not use the parent as a secure base, and does not care if the parent leaves . The toddler reacts to the parent the same way she reacts to a stranger. When the parent does return, the child is slow to show a positive reaction. Ainsworth theorized that these children were most likely to have a caregiver who was insensitive and inattentive to their needs (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978).

In cases of resistant attachment , children tend to show clingy behavior, but then they reject the attachment figure’s attempts to interact with them (Ainsworth & Bell, 1970). These children do not explore the toys in the room, as they are too fearful. During separation in the Strange Situation, they became extremely disturbed and angry with the parent. When the parent returns, the children are difficult to comfort. Resistant attachment is the result of the caregivers’ inconsistent level of response to their child.

Finally, children with disorganized attachment behaved oddly in the Strange Situation. They freeze, run around the room in an erratic manner, or try to run away when the caregiver returns (Main & Solomon, 1990). This type of attachment is seen most often in kids who have been abused. Research has shown that abuse disrupts a child’s ability to regulate their emotions.

While Ainsworth’s research has found support in subsequent studies, it has also met criticism. Some researchers have pointed out that a child’s temperament may have a strong influence on attachment (Gervai, 2009; Harris, 2009), and others have noted that attachment varies from culture to culture, a factor not accounted for in Ainsworth’s research (Rothbaum, Weisz, Pott, Miyake, & Morelli, 2000; van Ijzendoorn & Sagi-Schwartz, 2008).

Watch this video to view a clip of the Strange Situation. Try to identify which type of attachment baby Lisa exhibits: The Strange Situation – Mary Ainsworth .

Self-Concept

Just as attachment is the main psychosocial milestone of infancy, the primary psychosocial milestone of childhood is the development of a positive sense of self. How does self-awareness develop? Infants don’t have a self-concept, which is an understanding of who they are. If you place a baby in front of a mirror, she will reach out to touch her image, thinking it is another baby. However, by about 18 months a toddler will recognize that the person in the mirror is herself. How do we know this? In a well-known experiment, a researcher placed a red dot of paint on children’s noses before putting them in front of a mirror (Amsterdam, 1972). Commonly known as the mirror test, this behavior is demonstrated by humans and a few other species and is considered evidence of self-recognition (Archer, 1992). At 18 months old they would touch their own noses when they saw the paint, surprised to see a spot on their faces. By 24–36 months old children can name and/or point to themselves in pictures, clearly indicating self-recognition.

Children from 2–4 years old display a great increase in social behavior once they have established a self-concept. They enjoy playing with other children, but they have difficulty sharing their possessions. Also, through play children explore and come to understand their gender roles and can label themselves as a girl or boy (Chick, Heilman-Houser, & Hunter, 2002). By 4 years old, children can cooperate with other children, share when asked, and separate from parents with little anxiety. Children at this age also exhibit autonomy , initiate tasks, and carry out plans . Success in these areas contributes to a positive sense of self . Once children reach 6 years old, they can identify themselves in terms of group memberships: “I’m a first grader!” School-age children compare themselves to their peers and discover that they are competent in some areas and less so in others (recall Erikson’s task of industry versus inferiority). At this age, children recognize their own personality traits as well as some other traits they would like to have. For example, 10-year-old Layla says, “I’m kind of shy. I wish I could be more talkative like my friend Alexa.”

Development of a positive self-concept is important to healthy development. Children with a positive self-concept tend to be more confident, do better in school, act more independently, and are more willing to try new activities (Maccoby, 1980; Ferrer & Fugate, 2003). Formation of a positive self-concept begins in Erikson’s toddlerhood stage, when children establish autonomy and become confident in their abilities. Development of self-concept continues in elementary school, when children compare themselves to others. When the comparison is favorable, children feel a sense of competence and are motivated to work harder and accomplish more. Self-concept is re-evaluated in Erikson’s adolescence stage, as teens form an identity. They internalize the messages they have received regarding their strengths and weaknesses, keeping some messages and rejecting others. Adolescents who have achieved identity formation are capable of contributing positively to society (Erikson, 1968).

What can parents do to nurture a healthy self-concept? Diana Baumrind (1971, 1991) thinks parenting style may be a factor. The way we parent is an important factor in a child’s socioemotional growth. Baumrind developed and refined a theory describing four parenting styles : authoritative, authoritarian, permissive, and uninvolved . With the authoritative style , the parent gives reasonable demands and consistent limits, expresses warmth and affection, and listens to the child’s point of view . Parents set rules and explain the reasons behind them. They are also flexible and willing to make exceptions to the rules in certain cases—for example, temporarily relaxing bedtime rules to allow for a nighttime swim during a family vacation. Of the four parenting styles, the authoritative style is the one that is most encouraged in modern American society. American children raised by authoritative parents tend to have high self-esteem and social skills. However, effective parenting styles vary as a function of culture and, as Small (1999) points out, the authoritative style is not necessarily preferred or appropriate in all cultures.

In authoritarian style , the parent places high value on conformity and obedience. The parents are often strict, tightly monitor their children, and express little warmth . In contrast to the authoritative style, authoritarian parents probably would not relax bedtime rules during a vacation because they consider the rules to be set, and they expect obedience. This style can create anxious, withdrawn, and unhappy kids. However, it is important to point out that authoritarian parenting is as beneficial as the authoritative style in some ethnic groups (Russell, Crockett, & Chao, 2010). For instance, first-generation Chinese American children raised by authoritarian parents did just as well in school as their peers who were raised by authoritative parents (Russell et al., 2010).

For parents who employ the permissive style of parenting , the kids run the show and anything goes. Permissive parents make few demands and rarely use punishment . They tend to be very nurturing and loving and may play the role of friend rather than parent. In terms of our example of vacation bedtimes, permissive parents might not have bedtime rules at all—instead they allow the child to choose his bedtime whether on vacation or not. Not surprisingly, children raised by permissive parents tend to lack self-discipline, and the permissive parenting style is negatively associated with grades (Dornbusch, Ritter, Leiderman, Roberts, & Fraleigh, 1987). The permissive style may also contribute to other risky behaviors such as alcohol abuse (Bahr & Hoffman, 2010), risky sexual behavior especially among female children (Donenberg, Wilson, Emerson, & Bryant, 2002), and increased display of disruptive behaviors by male children (Parent et al., 2011). However, there are some positive outcomes associated with children raised by permissive parents. They tend to have higher self-esteem, better social skills, and report lower levels of depression (Darling, 1999).

With the uninvolved style of parenting , the parents are indifferent, uninvolved, and sometimes referred to as neglectful. They don’t respond to the child’s needs and make relatively few demands . This could be because of severe depression or substance abuse, or other factors such as the parents’ extreme focus on work. These parents may provide for the child’s basic needs, but little else. The children raised in this parenting style are usually emotionally withdrawn, fearful, anxious, perform poorly in school, and are at an increased risk of substance abuse (Darling, 1999).

As you can see, parenting styles influence childhood adjustment, but could a child’s temperament likewise influence parenting? Temperament refers to innate traits that influence how one thinks, behaves, and reacts with their environment. Children with easy temperaments demonstrate positive emotions, adapt well to change, and are capable of regulating their emotions. Conversely, children with difficult temperaments demonstrate negative emotions and have difficulty adapting to change and regulating their emotions. Difficult children are much more likely to challenge parents, teachers, and other caregivers (Thomas, 1984). Therefore, it’s possible that easy children (i.e., social, adaptable, and easy to soothe) tend to elicit warm and responsive parenting, while demanding, irritable, withdrawn children evoke irritation in their parents or cause their parents to withdraw (Sanson & Rothbart, 1995).

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (2007), unstructured play is an integral part of a child’s development. It builds creativity, problem-solving skills, and social relationships. Play also allows children to develop a theory-of-mind as they imaginatively take on the perspective of others.

Outdoor play allows children the opportunity to directly experience and sense the world around them. While doing so, they may collect objects that they come across and develop lifelong interests and hobbies. They also benefit from increased exercise, and engaging in outdoor play can actually increase how much they enjoy physical activity. This helps support the development of a healthy heart and brain. Unfortunately, research suggests that today’s children are engaging in less and less outdoor play (Clements, 2004). Perhaps, it is no surprise to learn that lowered levels of physical activity in conjunction with easy access to calorie-dense foods with little nutritional value are contributing to alarming levels of childhood obesity (Karnik & Kanekar, 2012).

Despite the adverse consequences associated with reduced play, some children are over-scheduled and have little free time to engage in unstructured play. In addition, some schools have taken away recess time for children in a push for students to do better on standardized tests, and many schools commonly use loss of recess as a form of punishment. Do you agree with these practices? Why or why not?

Adolescence

Adolescence is a socially constructed concept. In pre-industrial society, children were considered adults when they reached physical maturity, but today we have an extended time between childhood and adulthood called adolescence. Adolescence is the period of development that begins at puberty and ends at emerging adulthood , which is discussed later. In the United States, adolescence is seen as a time to develop independence from parents while remaining connected to them. The typical age range of adolescence is from 12 to 18 years, and this stage of development also has some predictable physical, cognitive, and psychosocial milestones.

As noted above, adolescence begins with puberty. While the sequence of physical changes in puberty is predictable, the onset and pace of puberty vary widely. Several physical changes occur during puberty, such as adrenarche and gonadarche , the maturing of the adrenal glands and sex glands, respectively . Also during this time, primary and secondary sexual characteristics develop and mature. Primary sexual characteristics are organs specifically needed for reproduction, like the uterus and ovaries in females and testes in males . Secondary sexual characteristics are physical signs of sexual maturation that do not directly involve sex organs, such as development of breasts and hips in girls, and development of facial hair and a deepened voice in boys . Girls experience menarche , the beginning of menstrual periods, usually around 12–13 years old , and boys experience spermarche , the first ejaculation, around 13–14 years old .

During puberty, both sexes experience a rapid increase in height (i.e., growth spurt). For girls this begins between 8 and 13 years old, with adult height reached between 10 and 16 years old. Boys begin their growth spurt slightly later, usually between 10 and 16 years old, and reach their adult height between 13 and 17 years old. Both nature (i.e., genes) and nurture (e.g., nutrition, medications, and medical conditions) can influence height.

Because rates of physical development vary so widely among teenagers, puberty can be a source of pride or embarrassment. Early maturing boys tend to be stronger, taller, and more athletic than their later maturing peers. They are usually more popular, confident, and independent, but they are also at a greater risk for substance abuse and early sexual activity (Flannery, Rowe, & Gulley, 1993; Kaltiala-Heino, Rimpela, Rissanen, & Rantanen, 2001). Early maturing girls may be teased or overtly admired, which can cause them to feel self-conscious about their developing bodies. These girls are at a higher risk for depression, substance abuse, and eating disorders (Ge, Conger, & Elder, 2001; Graber, Lewinsohn, Seeley, & Brooks-Gunn, 1997; Striegel-Moore & Cachelin, 1999). Late-blooming boys and girls (i.e., they develop more slowly than their peers) may feel self-conscious about their lack of physical development. Negative feelings are particularly a problem for late-maturing boys, who are at a higher risk for depression and conflict with parents (Graber et al., 1997) and are more likely to be bullied (Pollack & Shuster, 2000).

The adolescent brain also remains under development. Up until puberty, brain cells continue to bloom in the frontal region. Adolescents engage in increased risk-taking behaviors and emotional outbursts possibly because the frontal lobes of their brains are still developing. Recall that this area is responsible for judgment, impulse control, and planning, and it is still maturing into early adulthood (Casey, Tottenham, Liston, & Durston, 2005).

More complex thinking abilities emerge during adolescence. Some researchers suggest this is due to increases in processing speed and efficiency rather than as the result of an increase in mental capacity—in other words, due to improvements in existing skills rather than the development of new ones (Bjorkland, 1987; Case, 1985). During adolescence, teenagers move beyond concrete thinking and become capable of abstract thought. Recall that Piaget refers to this stage as formal operational thought. Teen thinking is also characterized by the ability to consider multiple points of view, imagine hypothetical situations, debate ideas and opinions (e.g., politics, religion, and justice), and form new ideas. In addition, it’s not uncommon for adolescents to question authority or challenge established societal norms.

Cognitive empathy , also known as theory-of-mind (which we discussed earlier with regard to egocentrism), relates to the ability to take the perspective of others and feel concern for others (Shamay-Tsoory, Tomer, & Aharon-Peretz, 2005). Cognitive empathy begins to increase in adolescence and is an important component of social problem-solving and conflict avoidance. According to one longitudinal study, levels of cognitive empathy begin rising in girls around 13 years old and around 15 years old in boys (Van der Graaff et al., 2013). Teens who reported having supportive fathers with whom they could discuss their worries were found to be better able to take the perspective of others (Miklikowska, Duriez, & Soenens, 2011).

Psychosocial Development

Adolescents continue to refine their sense of self as they relate to others. Erikson referred to the task of the adolescent as one of identity versus role confusion. Thus, in Erikson’s view, an adolescent’s main questions are “Who am I?” and “Who do I want to be?” Some adolescents adopt the values and roles that their parents expect from them. Other teens develop identities that are in opposition to their parents but align with a peer group. This is common as peer relationships become a central focus in adolescents’ lives.

As adolescents work to form their identities, they pull away from their parents, and the peer group becomes very important (Shanahan, McHale, Osgood, & Crouter, 2007). Despite spending less time with their parents, most teens report positive feelings toward them (Moore, Guzman, Hair, Lippman, & Garrett, 2004). Warm and healthy parent-child relationships have been associated with positive child outcomes, such as better grades and fewer school behavior problems, in the United States as well as in other countries (Hair et al., 2005).

It appears that most teens don’t experience adolescent storm and stress to the degree once famously suggested by G. Stanley Hall , a pioneer in the study of adolescent development . Only a small number of teens have major conflicts with their parents (Steinberg & Morris, 2001), and most disagreements are minor. For example, in a study of over 1,800 parents of adolescents from various cultural and ethnic groups, Barber (1994) found that conflicts occurred over day-to-day issues such as homework, money, curfews, clothing, chores, and friends. These types of arguments tend to decrease as teens develop (Galambos & Almeida, 1992).

Emerging Adulthood

The next stage of development is emerging adulthood . This is a relatively newly defined period of lifespan development spanning from 18 years old to the mid-20s, characterized as an in-between time where identity exploration is focused on work and love .

When does a person become an adult? There are many ways to answer this question. In the United States, you are legally considered an adult at 18 years old. But other definitions of adulthood vary widely; in sociology, for example, a person may be considered an adult when she becomes self-supporting, chooses a career, gets married, or starts a family. The ages at which we achieve these milestones vary from person to person as well as from culture to culture. For example, in the African country of Malawi, 15-year-old Njemile was married at 14 years old and had her first child at 15 years old. In her culture she is considered an adult. Children in Malawi take on adult responsibilities such as marriage and work (e.g., carrying water, tending babies, and working fields) as early as 10 years old. In stark contrast, independence in Western cultures is taking longer and longer, effectively delaying the onset of adult life.

Why is it taking twentysomethings so long to grow up? It seems that emerging adulthood is a product of both Western culture and our current times (Arnett, 2000). People in developed countries are living longer, allowing the freedom to take an extra decade to start a career and family. Changes in the workforce also play a role. For example, 50 years ago, a young adult with a high school diploma could immediately enter the workforce and climb the corporate ladder. That is no longer the case. Bachelor’s and even graduate degrees are required more and more often—even for entry-level jobs (Arnett, 2000). In addition, many students are taking longer (5 or 6 years) to complete a college degree as a result of working and going to school at the same time. After graduation, many young adults return to the family home because they have difficulty finding a job. Changing cultural expectations may be the most important reason for the delay in entering adult roles. Young people are spending more time exploring their options, so they are delaying marriage and work as they change majors and jobs multiple times, putting them on a much later timetable than their parents (Arnett, 2000).

Adulthood begins around 20 years old and has three distinct stages: early, middle, and late . Each stage brings its own set of rewards and challenges.

By the time we reach early adulthood (20 to early 40s), our physical maturation is complete, although our height and weight may increase slightly. In young adulthood, our physical abilities are at their peak, including muscle strength, reaction time, sensory abilities, and cardiac functioning. Most professional athletes are at the top of their game during this stage. Many women have children in the young adulthood years, so they may see additional weight gain and breast changes.

Middle adulthood extends from the 40s to the 60s . Physical decline is gradual. The skin loses some elasticity, and wrinkles are among the first signs of aging. Visual acuity decreases during this time. Women experience a gradual decline in fertility as they approach the onset of menopause , the end of the menstrual cycle, around 50 years old . Both men and women tend to gain weight: in the abdominal area for men and in the hips and thighs for women. Hair begins to thin and turn gray.

Late adulthood is considered to extend from the 60s on. This is the last stage of physical change. The skin continues to lose elasticity, reaction time slows further, and muscle strength diminishes. Smell, taste, hearing, and vision, so sharp in our 20s, decline significantly. The brain may also no longer function at optimal levels, leading to problems like memory loss, dementia, and Alzheimer’s disease in later years.

Aging doesn’t mean a person can’t explore new pursuits, learn new skills, and continue to grow. Watch this inspiring story about Neal Unger, who is a newbie to the world of skateboarding at 60 years old: NEAL UNGER – 60 YEAR OLD SKATEBOARDER .

Because we spend so many years in adulthood (more than any other stage), cognitive changes are numerous. In fact, research suggests that adult cognitive development is a complex, ever-changing process that may be even more active than cognitive development in infancy and early childhood (Fischer, Yan, & Stewart, 2003).

There is good news for the middle age brain. View this brief video to find out what it is: Middle Age Brains – NJN News Healthwatch Report .

Unlike our physical abilities, which peak in our mid-20s and then begin a slow decline, our cognitive abilities remain steady throughout early and middle adulthood. Our crystallized intelligence ( information, skills, and strategies we have gathered through a lifetime of experience ) tends to hold steady as we age—it may even improve. For example, adults show relatively stable to increasing scores on intelligence tests until their mid-30s to mid-50s (Bayley & Oden, 1955). However, in late adulthood we begin to experience a decline in another area of our cognitive abilities— fluid intelligence ( information processing abilities, reasoning, and memory ). These processes become slower. How can we delay the onset of cognitive decline? Mental and physical activity seem to play a part. Research has found adults who engage in mentally and physically stimulating activities experience less cognitive decline and have a reduced incidence of mild cognitive impairment and dementia (Hertzog, Kramer, Wilson, & Lindenberger, 2009; Larson et al., 2006; Podewils et al., 2005).

There are many theories about the social and emotional aspects of aging. Some aspects of healthy aging include activities, social connectedness, and the role of a person’s culture. According to many theorists, including George Vaillant (2002), who studied and analyzed over 50 years of data, we need to have and continue to find meaning throughout our lives. For those in early and middle adulthood, meaning is found through work (Sterns & Huyck, 2001) and family life (Markus, Ryff, Curan, & Palmersheim, 2004). These areas relate to the tasks that Erikson referred to as generativity and intimacy. As mentioned previously, adults tend to define themselves by what they do—their careers. Earnings peak during this time, yet job satisfaction is more closely tied to work that involves contact with other people, is interesting, provides opportunities for advancement, and allows some independence (Mohr & Zoghi, 2006) than it is to salary (Iyengar, Wells, & Schwartz, 2006). How might being unemployed or being in a dead-end job challenge adult well-being?

Positive relationships with significant others in our adult years have been found to contribute to a state of well-being (Ryff & Singer, 2009). Most adults in the United States identify themselves through their relationships with family—particularly with spouses, children, and parents (Markus et al., 2004). While raising children can be stressful, especially when they are young, research suggests that parents reap the rewards down the road, as adult children tend to have a positive effect on parental well-being (Umberson, Pudrovska, & Reczek, 2010). Having a stable marriage has also been found to contribute to well-being throughout adulthood (Vaillant, 2002).

Another aspect of positive aging is believed to be social connectedness and social support. As we get older, socioemotional selectivity theory suggests that our social support and friendships dwindle in number but remain as close, if not closer, than in our earlier years (Carstensen, 1992).

To learn more, view this video on aging in America: The Many Faces of Aging In America .

At conception, the egg and sperm cell are united to form a zygote, which will begin to divide rapidly. This marks the beginning of the first stage of prenatal development (germinal stage), which lasts about 2 weeks. Then the zygote implants itself into the lining of the woman’s uterus, marking the beginning of the second stage of prenatal development (embryonic stage), which lasts about 6 weeks. The embryo begins to develop body and organ structures, and the neural tube forms, which will later become the brain and spinal cord. The third phase of prenatal development (fetal stage) begins at 9 weeks and lasts until birth. The body, brain, and organs grow rapidly during this stage. During all stages of pregnancy it is important that the mother receive prenatal care to reduce health risks to herself and to her developing baby.

Newborn infants weigh about 7.5 pounds. Doctors assess a newborn’s reflexes, such as the sucking, rooting, and Moro reflexes. Our physical, cognitive, and psychosocial skills grow and change as we move through developmental stages from infancy through late adulthood. Attachment in infancy is a critical component of healthy development. Parenting styles have been found to have an effect on childhood outcomes of well-being. The transition from adolescence to adulthood can be challenging due to the timing of puberty, and due to the extended amount of time spent in emerging adulthood. Although physical decline begins in middle adulthood, cognitive decline does not begin until later. Activities that keep the body and mind active can help maintain good physical and cognitive health as we age. Social supports through family and friends remain important as we age.

Review Questions

Critical thinking questions.

Alcohol is a teratogen. Excessive drinking can cause intellectual disabilities in children. The child can also have a small head and abnormal facial features, which are characteristic of fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS). Another teratogen is nicotine. Smoking while pregnant can lead to low-birth weight, premature birth, stillbirth, and SIDS.

Prenatal care is medical care during pregnancy that monitors the health of both the mother and fetus. It’s important to receive prenatal care because it can reduce complications to the mother and fetus during pregnancy.

In the embryonic stage, basic structures of the embryo start to develop into areas that will become the head, chest, and abdomen. The heart begins to beat and organs form and begin to function. The neural tube forms along the back of the embryo, developing into the spinal cord and brain. In the fetal stage, the brain and body continue to develop. Fingers and toes develop along with hearing, and internal organs form.

The particular quality or trait must be part of an enduring behavior pattern, so that it is a consistent or predictable quality.

The sucking reflex is the automatic, unlearned sucking motions that infants do with their mouths. It may help promote survival because this action helps the baby take in nourishment. The rooting reflex is the newborn’s response to anything that touches her cheek. When you stroke a baby’s cheek, she will naturally turn her head that way and begin to suck. This may aid survival because it helps the newborn locate a source of food.

With the authoritative style, children are given reasonable demands and consistent limits, warmth and affection are expressed, the parent listens to the child’s point of view, and the child initiates positive standards. Children raised by authoritative parents tend to have high self-esteem and social skills. Another parenting style is authoritarian: The parent places a high value on conformity and obedience. The parents are often strict, tightly monitor their children, and express little warmth. This style can create anxious, withdrawn, and unhappy kids. The third parenting style is permissive: Parents make few demands, rarely use punishment, and give their children free rein. Children raised by permissive parents tend to lack self-discipline, which contributes to poor grades and alcohol abuse. However, they have higher self-esteem, better social skills, and lower levels of depression. The fourth style is the uninvolved parent: They are indifferent, uninvolved, and sometimes called neglectful. The children raised in this parenting style are usually emotionally withdrawn, fearful, anxious, perform poorly in school, and are at an increased risk of substance abuse.

Emerging adulthood is a relatively new period of lifespan development from 18 years old to the mid-20s, characterized as a transitional time in which identity exploration focuses on work and love. According to Arnett, changing cultural expectations facilitate the delay to full adulthood. People are spending more time exploring their options, so they are delaying marriage and work as they change majors and jobs multiple times, putting them on a much later timetable than their parents.

Personal Application Questions

• Which parenting style describes how you were raised? Provide an example or two to support your answer.
• Would you describe your experience of puberty as one of pride or embarrassment? Why?
• Your best friend is a smoker who just found out she is pregnant. What would you tell her about smoking and pregnancy?
• Imagine you are a nurse working at a clinic that provides prenatal care for pregnant women. Your patient, Anna, has heard that it’s a good idea to play music for her unborn baby, and she wants to know when her baby’s hearing will develop. What will you tell her?

occurs when sperm fertilizes an egg and forms a zygote

begins as a one-cell structure that is created when a sperm and egg merge

process of cell division

the mass of cells has yet to attach itself to the lining of the mother’s uterus

a structure connected to the uterus that provides nourishment and oxygen from the mother to the developing embryo via the umbilical cord

the heart begins to beat and organs form and begin to function

When the organism is about nine weeks old

any environmental agent—biological, chemical, or physical—that causes damage to the developing embryo or fetus

a collection of birth defects associated with heavy consumption of alcohol during pregnancy. Physically, children with FASD may have a small head size and abnormal facial features. Cognitively, these children may have poor judgment, poor impulse control, higher rates of ADHD, learning issues, and lower IQ scores

period of rapid neural growth

refer to our ability to move our bodies and manipulate objects

focus on the muscles in our fingers, toes, and eyes, and enable coordination of small actions (e.g., grasping a toy, writing with a pencil, and using a spoon)

focus on large muscle groups that control our arms and legs and involve larger movements (e.g., balancing, running, and jumping)

occurs as children form relationships, interact with others, and understand and manage their feelings

the affectional bond or tie that an infant forms with the mother

secure, avoidant, and resistant

the toddler prefers his parent over a stranger

the child is unresponsive to the parent, does not use the parent as a secure base, and does not care if the parent leaves

children tend to show clingy behavior, but then they reject the attachment figure’s attempts to interact with them

initiate tasks, and carry out plans. contributes to a positive sense of self.

authoritative, authoritarian, permissive, and uninvolved

the parent gives reasonable demands and consistent limits, expresses warmth and affection, and listens to the child’s point of view

the parent places high value on conformity and obedience. The parents are often strict, tightly monitor their children, and express little warmth

the kids run the show and anything goes. Permissive parents make few demands and rarely use punishment

the parents are indifferent, uninvolved, and sometimes referred to as neglectful. They don’t respond to the child’s needs and make relatively few demands

refers to innate traits that influence how one thinks, behaves, and reacts with the environment

the period of development that begins at puberty and ends at emerging adulthood

the maturing of the adrenal glands and sex glands, respectively

are organs specifically needed for reproduction, like the uterus and ovaries in females and testes in males

are physical signs of sexual maturation that do not directly involve sex organs, such as development of breasts and hips in girls, and development of facial hair and a deepened voice in boys

the beginning of menstrual periods, usually around 12–13 years old

the first ejaculation, around 13–14 years old

theory-of-mind, relates to the ability to take the perspective of others and feel concern for others

a pioneer in the study of adolescent development

relatively newly defined period of lifespan development spanning from 18 years old to the mid-20s, characterized as an in-between time where identity exploration is focused on work and love

begins around 20 years old and has three distinct stages: early, middle, and late

extends from the 40s to the 60s

the end of the menstrual cycle, around 50 years old

information, skills, and strategies we have gathered through a lifetime of experience

information processing abilities, reasoning, and memory

Stages of Human Development Copyright © 2022 by LOUIS: The Louisiana Library Network is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Identity Development

Identity formation.

Self-Concept

Two main aspects of identity development are self-concept and self-esteem.  S elf-concept  is the idea of self-constructed from opinions and beliefs about one’s self. These concepts are defined confidently, consistently, and with stability. Early in adolescence, cognitive developments result in greater self-awareness, greater awareness of others and their thoughts and judgments, the ability to think about abstract, future possibilities, and the ability to consider multiple possibilities at once. As a result, adolescents experience a significant shift from the simple, concrete, and global self-descriptions typical of young children; as children, they defined themselves by physical traits, whereas adolescents define themselves based on their values, thoughts, and opinions.

Adolescents can conceptualize multiple “possible selves” that they could become and long-term possibilities and consequences of their choices. Exploring these possibilities may result in abrupt changes in self-presentation as the adolescent chooses or rejects qualities and behaviors, trying to guide the actual self toward the ideal self (whom the adolescent wishes to be) and away from the feared self (whom the adolescent does not want to be). For many, these distinctions are uncomfortable, but they also appear to motivate achievement through behavior consistent with the ideal and distinct from the feared possible selves.

Further distinctions in self-concept, called “differentiation,” occur as the adolescent recognizes the contextual influences on their behavior and the perceptions of others, and begin to qualify their traits when asked to describe themselves. Differentiation appears fully developed by mid-adolescence. Peaking in the 7th-9th grades, the personality traits adolescents use to describe themselves refer to specific contexts, and therefore may contradict one another. The recognition of inconsistent content in the self-concept is a common source of distress in these years, but this distress may benefit adolescents by encouraging structural development.

Video 8.2.1.  Self-Concept, Self-Identity, and Social Identity explains the various types of self and the formation of identity.

Cooley’s Looking-Glass Self

Charles Horton Cooley (1964) suggested that our self-concept comes from looking at how others respond to us. This process, known as the looking-glass self involves looking at how others seem to view us and interpreting this as we make judgments about whether we are good or bad, strong or weak, beautiful or ugly, and so on. Of course, we do not always interpret their responses accurately so our self-concept is not simply a mirror reflection of the views of others. After forming an initial self-concept, we may use our existing self-concept as a mental filter screening out those responses that do not seem to fit our ideas of who we are. So compliments may be negated, for example.

Think of times in your life when you felt more self-conscious. The process of the looking-glass self is pronounced when we are preschoolers. Later in life, we also experience this process when we are in a new school, new job, or are taking on a new role in our personal lives and are trying to gauge our own performance. When we feel more sure of who we are we focus less on how we appear to others.

Video 8.2.2.  Charles Cooley–Looking Glass Self explains more about this theory.

Mead’s I and Me

George Herbert Mead (1967) offered an explanation of how we develop a social sense of self by being able to see ourselves through the eyes of others. There are two parts of the self: the “I” which is the part of the self that is spontaneous, creative, innate, and is not concerned with how others view us and the “me” or the social definition of who we are.

When we are born, we are all “I” and act without concern about how others view us. But the socialized self begins when we are able to consider how one important person views us. This initial stage is called “taking the role of the significant other.” For example, a child may pull a cat’s tail and be told by his mother, “No! Don’t do that, that’s bad” while receiving a slight slap on the hand. Later, the child may mimic the same behavior toward the self and say aloud, “No, that’s bad” while patting his own hand. What has happened? The child is able to see himself through the eyes of the mother. As the child grows and is exposed to many situations and rules of culture, he begins to view the self in the eyes of many others through these cultural norms or rules. This is referred to as “taking the role of the generalized other” and results in a sense of self with many dimensions. The child comes to have a sense of self as a student, as a friend, as a son, and so on.

Video 8.2.3.  George Herbert Mead–The I and the Me explains more about this theory.

Exaggerated Sense of Self

One of the ways to gain a clearer sense of self is to exaggerate those qualities that are to be incorporated into the self. Preschoolers often like to exaggerate their own qualities or to seek validation as the biggest or smartest or child who can jump the highest. Much of this may be due to the simple fact that the child does not understand their own limits. Young children may really believe that they can beat their parent to the mailbox, or pick up the refrigerator.

This exaggeration tends to be replaced by a more realistic sense of self in middle childhood as children realize that they do have limitations. Part of this process includes having parents who allow children to explore their capabilities and give the child authentic feedback. Another important part of this process involves the child learning that other people have capabilities, too and that the child’s capabilities may differ from those of other people. Children learn to compare themselves to others to understand what they are “good at” and what they are not as good at.

Self-Efficacy

Imagine two students, Sally and Lucy, who are about to take the same math test. Sally and Lucy have the same exact ability to do well in math, the same level of intelligence, and the same motivation to do well on the test. They also studied together. They even have the same brand of shoes on. The only difference between the two is that Sally is very confident in her mathematical and her test-taking abilities, while Lucy is not. So, who is likely to do better on the test? Sally, of course, because she has the confidence to use her mathematical and test-taking abilities to deal with challenging math problems and to accomplish goals that are important to her—in this case, doing well on the test. This difference between Sally and Lucy—the student who got the A and the student who got the B-, respectively—is self-efficacy. Self-efficacy influences behavior and emotions in particular ways that help people better manage challenges and achieve valued goals.

A concept that was first introduced by Albert Bandura in 1977,  self-efficacy  refers to a person’s belief that he or she is able to effectively perform the tasks needed to attain a valued goal (Bandura, 1977). Since then, self-efficacy has become one of the most thoroughly researched concepts in psychology. Just about every important domain of human behavior has been investigated using self-efficacy theory (Bandura, 1997; Maddux, 1995; Maddux & Gosselin, 2011, 2012). Self-efficacy does not refer to your abilities but rather to your beliefs about what you can do with your abilities. Also, self-efficacy is not a trait—there are not certain types of people with high self-efficacies and others with low self-efficacies (Stajkovic & Luthans, 1998). Rather, people have self-efficacy beliefs about specific goals and life domains. For example, if you believe that you have the skills necessary to do well in school and believe you can use those skills to excel, then you have high academic self-efficacy.

Self-efficacy may sound similar to a concept you may be familiar with already— self-esteem— but these are very different notions. Self-esteem refers to how much you like or “esteem” yourself—to what extent you believe you are a good and worthwhile person. Self-efficacy, however, refers to your self-confidence to perform well and to achieve in specific areas of life such as school, work, and relationships. Self-efficacy does influence self-esteem because how you feel about yourself overall is greatly influenced by your confidence in your ability to perform well in areas that are important to you and to achieve valued goals. For example, if performing well in athletics is very important to you, then your self-efficacy for athletics will greatly influence your self-esteem; however, if performing well in athletics is not at all important to you, then your self-efficacy for athletics will probably have little impact on your self-esteem.

Self-efficacy begins to develop in very young children. Once self-efficacy is developed, it does not remain constant—it can change and grow as an individual has different experiences throughout his or her lifetime. When children are very young, their parents’ self-efficacies are important (Jones & Prinz, 2005). Children of parents who have high parental self-efficacies perceive their parents as more responsive to their needs (Gondoli & Silverberg, 1997). Around the ages of 12 through 16, adolescents’ friends also become an important source of self-efficacy beliefs. Adolescents who associate with peer groups that are not academically motivated tend to experience a decline in academic self-efficacy (Wentzel, Barry, & Caldwell, 2004). Adolescents who watch their peers succeed, however, experience a rise in academic self-efficacy (Schunk & Miller, 2002). This is an example of gaining self-efficacy through vicarious performances, as discussed above. The effects of self-efficacy that develop in adolescence are long-lasting. One study found that greater social and academic self-efficacy measured in people ages 14 to 18 predicted greater life satisfaction five years later (Vecchio, Gerbino, Pastorelli, Del Bove, & Caprara, 2007).

Video 8.2.4.  Self-Esteem, Self-Efficacy, and Locus of Control.

Major Influences on Self-Efficacy

Self-efficacy beliefs are influenced in five different ways (Bandura, 1997), which are summarized in the table below.

These five types of self-efficacy influence can take many real-world forms that almost everyone has experienced. You may have had previous performance experiences affect your academic self-efficacy when you did well on a test and believed that you would do well on the next test. A vicarious performance may have affected your athletic self-efficacy when you saw your best friend skateboard for the first time and thought that you could skateboard well, too. Verbal persuasion could have affected your academic self-efficacy when a teacher that you respect told you that you could get into the college of your choice if you studied hard for the SATs. It’s important to know that not all people are equally likely to influence your self-efficacy though verbal persuasion. People who appear trustworthy or attractive, or who seem to be experts, are more likely to influence your self-efficacy than are people who do not possess these qualities (Petty & Brinol, 2010). That’s why a teacher you respect is more likely to influence your self-efficacy than a teacher you do not respect. Imaginal performances are an effective way to increase your self-efficacy. For example, imagining yourself doing well on a job interview actually leads to more effective interviewing (Knudstrup, Segrest, & Hurley, 2003). Affective states and physical sensations abound when you think about the times you have given presentations in class. For example, you may have felt your heart racing while giving a presentation. If you believe your heart was racing because you had just had a lot of caffeine, it likely would not affect your performance. If you believe your heart was racing because you were doing a poor job, you might believe that you cannot give the presentation well. This is because you associate the feeling of anxiety with failure and expect to fail when you are feeling anxious.

Benefits of High Self-Efficacy

Academic performance.

Consider academic self-efficacy in your own life and recall the earlier example of Sally and Lucy. Are you more like Sally, who has high academic self-efficacy and believes that she can use her abilities to do well in school, or are you more like Lucy, who does not believe that she can effectively use her academic abilities to excel in school? Do you think your own self-efficacy has ever affected your academic ability? Do you think you have ever studied more or less intensely because you did or did not believe in your abilities to do well? Many researchers have considered how self-efficacy works in academic settings, and the short answer is that academic self-efficacy affects every possible area of academic achievement (Pajares, 1996).

Students who believe in their ability to do well academically tend to be more motivated in school (Schunk, 1991). When self-efficacious students attain their goals, they continue to set even more challenging goals (Schunk, 1990). This can all lead to better performance in school in terms of higher grades and taking more challenging classes (Multon, Brown, & Lent, 1991). For example, students with high academic self-efficacies might study harder because they believe that they are able to use their abilities to study effectively. Because they studied hard, they receive an A on their next test. Teachers’ self-efficacies also can affect how well a student performs in school. Self-efficacious teachers encourage parents to take a more active role in their children’s learning, leading to better academic performance (Hoover-Dempsey, Bassler, & Brissie, 1987).

Although there is a lot of research about how self-efficacy is beneficial to school-aged children, college students can also benefit from self-efficacy. Freshmen with higher self-efficacies about their ability to do well in college tend to adapt to their first year in college better than those with lower self-efficacies (Chemers, Hu, & Garcia, 2001). The benefits of self-efficacy continue beyond the school years: people with strong self-efficacy beliefs toward performing well in school tend to perceive a wider range of career options (Lent, Brown, & Larkin, 1986). In addition, people who have stronger beliefs of self-efficacy toward their professional work tend to have more successful careers (Stajkovic & Luthans, 1998).

One question you might have about self-efficacy and academic performance is how a student’s actual academic ability interacts with self-efficacy to influence academic performance. The answer is that a student’s actual ability does play a role, but it is also influenced by self-efficacy. Students with greater ability perform better than those with lesser ability. But, among a group of students with the same exact level of academic ability, those with stronger academic self-efficacies outperform those with weaker self-efficacies. One study (Collins, 1984) compared performance on difficult math problems among groups of students with different levels of math ability and different levels of math self-efficacy. Among a group of students with average levels of math ability, the students with weak math self-efficacies got about 25% of the math problems correct. The students with average levels of math ability and strong math self-efficacies got about 45% of the questions correct. This means that by just having stronger math self-efficacy, a student of average math ability will perform 20% better than a student with similar math ability but weaker math self-efficacy. You might also wonder if self-efficacy makes a difference only for people with average or below-average abilities. Self-efficacy is important even for above-average students. In this study, those with above-average math abilities and low math self-efficacies answered only about 65% of the questions correctly; those with above-average math abilities and high math self-efficacies answered about 75% of the questions correctly.

Healthy Behaviors

Think about a time when you tried to improve your health, whether through dieting, exercising, sleeping more, or any other way. Would you be more likely to follow through on these plans if you believed that you could effectively use your skills to accomplish your health goals? Many researchers agree that people with stronger self-efficacies for doing healthy things (e.g., exercise self-efficacy, dieting self-efficacy) engage in more behaviors that prevent health problems and improve overall health (Strecher, DeVellis, Becker, & Rosenstock, 1986). People who have strong self-efficacy beliefs about quitting smoking are able to quit smoking more easily (DiClemente, Prochaska, & Gibertini, 1985). People who have strong self-efficacy beliefs about being able to reduce their alcohol consumption are more successful when treated for drinking problems (Maisto, Connors, & Zywiak, 2000). People who have stronger self-efficacy beliefs about their ability to recover from heart attacks do so more quickly than those who do not have such beliefs (Ewart, Taylor, Reese, & DeBusk, 1983).

One group of researchers (Roach Yadrick, Johnson, Boudreaux, Forsythe, & Billon, 2003) conducted an experiment with people trying to lose weight. All people in the study participated in a weight loss program that was designed for the U.S. Air Force. This program had already been found to be very effective, but the researchers wanted to know if increasing people’s self-efficacies could make the program even more effective. So, they divided the participants into two groups: one group received an intervention that was designed to increase weight loss self-efficacy along with the diet program, and the other group received only the diet program. The researchers tried several different ways to increase self-efficacy, such as having participants read a copy of  Oh, The Places You’ll Go!  by Dr. Seuss (1990), and having them talk to someone who had successfully lost weight. The people who received the diet program and an intervention to increase self-efficacy lost an average of 8.2 pounds over the 12 weeks of the study; those participants who had only the diet program lost only 5.8 pounds. Thus, just by increasing weight loss self-efficacy, participants were able to lose over 50% more weight.

Studies have found that increasing a person’s nutritional self-efficacy can lead them to eat more fruits and vegetables (Luszczynska, Tryburcy, & Schwarzer, 2006). Self-efficacy plays a large role in successful physical exercise (Maddux & Dawson, 2014). People with stronger self-efficacies for exercising are more likely to plan on beginning an exercise program, actually beginning that program (DuCharme & Brawley, 1995), and continuing it (Marcus, Selby, Niaura, & Rossi, 1992). Self-efficacy is especially important when it comes to safe sex. People with greater self-efficacies about condom usage are more likely to engage in safe sex (Kaneko, 2007), making them more likely to avoid sexually transmitted diseases, such as HIV (Forsyth & Carey, 1998).

Athletic Performance

If you are an athlete, self-efficacy is especially important in your life. Professional and amateur athletes with stronger self-efficacy beliefs about their athletic abilities perform better than athletes with weaker levels of self-efficacy (Wurtele, 1986). This holds true for athletes in all types of sports, including track and field (Gernigon & Delloye, 2003), tennis (Sheldon & Eccles, 2005), and golf (Bruton, Mellalieu, Shearer, Roderique-Davies, & Hall, 2013). One group of researchers found that basketball players with strong athletic self-efficacy beliefs hit more foul shots than did basketball players with weak self-efficacy beliefs (Haney & Long, 1995). These researchers also found that the players who hit more foul shots had greater increases in self-efficacy after they hit the foul shots compared to those who hit fewer foul shots and did not experience increases in self-efficacy. This is an example of how we gain self-efficacy through performance experiences.

Self-Regulation

One of the major reasons that higher self-efficacy usually leads to better performance and greater success is that self-efficacy is an important component of self-regulation. Self-regulation is the complex process through which you control your thoughts, emotions, and actions (Gross, 1998). It is crucial to success and well-being in almost every area of your life. Every day, you are exposed to situations where you might want to act or feel a certain way that would be socially inappropriate or that might be unhealthy for you in the long run. For example, when sitting in a boring class, you might want to take out your phone and text your friends, take off your shoes and take a nap, or perhaps scream because you are so bored. Self-regulation is the process that you use to avoid such behaviors and instead sit quietly through class. Self-regulation takes a lot of effort, and it is often compared to a muscle that can be exhausted (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Muraven, & Tice, 1998). For example, a child might be able to resist eating a pile of delicious cookies if he or she is in the room with the cookies for only a few minutes, but if that child were forced to spend hours with the cookies, his or her ability to regulate the desire to eat the cookies would wear down. Eventually, his or her self-regulatory abilities would be exhausted, and the child would eat the cookies. A person with strong self-efficacy beliefs might become less distressed in the face of failure than might someone with weak self-efficacy. Because self-efficacious people are less likely to become distressed, they draw less on their self-regulation reserves; thus, self-efficacious people persist longer in the face of a challenge.

Self-efficacy influences self-regulation in many ways to produce better performance and greater success (Maddux & Volkmann, 2010). First, people with stronger self-efficacies have greater  motivation to perform  in the area for which they have stronger self-efficacies (Bandura & Locke, 2003). This means that people are motivated to work harder in those areas where they believe they can effectively perform. Second, people with stronger self-efficacies are more likely to  persevere through challenges  in attaining goals (Vancouver, More, & Yoder, 2008). For example, people with high academic self-efficacies are better able to motivate themselves to persevere through such challenges as taking a difficult class and completing their degrees because they believe that their efforts will pay off. Third, self-efficacious people believe that  they have more control over a situation . Having more control over a situation means that self-efficacious people might be more likely to engage in the behaviors that will allow them to achieve their desired goal. Finally, self-efficacious people  have more confidence  in their problem-solving abilities and, thus, are able to better use their cognitive resources and make better decisions, especially in the face of challenges and setbacks (Cervone, Jiwani, & Wood, 1991).

Self-regulation is the capacity to alter one’s responses. It is broadly related to the term “self-control”. The term “regulate” means to change something—but not just any change, rather change to bring it into agreement with some idea, such as a rule, a goal, a plan, or a moral principle. To illustrate, when the government regulates how houses are built, that means the government inspects the buildings to check that everything is done “up to code” or according to the rules about good building. In a similar fashion, when you regulate yourself, you watch and change yourself to bring your responses into line with some ideas about how they should be.

People regulate four broad categories of responses. They control their thinking, such as in trying to concentrate or to shut some annoying earworm tune out of their mind. They control their emotions, as in trying to cheer themselves up or to calm down when angry (or to stay angry, if that’s helpful). They control their impulses, as in trying not to eat fattening food, trying to hold one’s tongue, or trying to quit smoking. Last, they try to control their task performances, such as in pushing themselves to keep working when tired and discouraged, or deciding whether to speed up (to get more done) or slow down (to make sure to get it right).

Benefits of Self-Control

People who are good at self-regulation do better than others in life. Follow-up studies with Mischel’s samples found that the children who resisted temptation and delayed gratification effectively grew into adults who were better than others in school and work, more popular with other people, and who were rated as nicer, better people by teachers and others (Mischel, Shoda, & Peake, 1988; Shoda, Mischel, & Peake, 1990). College students with high self-control get better grades, have better close relationships, manage their emotions better, have fewer problems with drugs and alcohol, are less prone to eating disorders, are better adjusted, have higher self-esteem, and get along better with other people, as compared to people with low self-control (Tangney, Baumeister, & Boone, 2004). They are happier and have less stress and conflict (Hofmann, Vohs, Fisher, Luhmann, & Baumeister, 2013). Longitudinal studies have found that children with good self-control go through life with fewer problems, are more successful, are less likely to be arrested or have a child out of wedlock, and enjoy other benefits (Moffitt et al., 2011). Criminologists have concluded that low self-control is a—if not the—key trait for understanding the criminal personality (Gottfredson & Hirschi, 1990; Pratt & Cullen, 2000).

Some researchers have searched for evidence that too much self-control can be bad (Tangney et al., 2004)—but without success. There is such a thing as being highly inhibited or clinically “over-controlled,” which can impair initiative and reduce happiness, but that does not appear to be an excess of self-regulation. Rather, it may stem from having been punished excessively as a child and, therefore, adopting a fearful, inhibited approach to life. In general, self-control resembles intelligence in that the more one has, the better off one is, and the benefits are found through a broad range of life activities.

Three Ingredients of Effective Self-Regulation

For self-regulation to be effective, three parts or ingredients are involved. The first is standards, which are ideas about how things should (or should not) be. The second is monitoring, which means keeping track of the target behavior that is to be regulated. The third is the capacity to change.

Standards are an indispensable foundation for self-regulation. We already saw that self-regulation means a change in relation to some idea; without such guiding ideas, the change would largely be random and lacking direction. Standards include goals, laws, moral principles, personal rules, other people’s expectations, and social norms. Dieters, for example, typically have a goal in terms of how much weight they wish to lose. They help their self-regulation further by developing standards for how much or how little to eat and what kinds of foods they will eat.

The second ingredient is monitoring. It is hard to regulate something without being aware of it. For example, dieters count their calories. That is, they keep track of how much they eat and how fattening it is. In fact, some evidence suggests that dieters stop keeping track of how much they eat when they break their diet or go on an eating binge, and the failure of monitoring contributes to eating more (Polivy, 1976). Alcohol has been found to impair all sorts of self-regulation, partly because intoxicated persons fail to keep track of their behavior and compare it to their standards.

The combination of standards and monitoring was featured in an influential theory about self-regulation by Carver and Scheier (1981, 1982, 1998). Those researchers started their careers studying self-awareness, which is a key human trait. The study of self-awareness recognized early on that people do not simply notice themselves the way they might notice a tree or car. Rather, self-awareness always seemed to involve comparing oneself to a standard. For example, when a man looks in a mirror, he does not just think, “Oh, there I am,” but more likely thinks, “Is my hair a mess? Do my clothes look good?” Carver and Scheier proposed that the reason for this comparison to standards is that it enables people to regulate themselves, such as by changing things that do not measure up to their standards. In the mirror example, the man might comb his hair to bring it into line with his standards for personal appearance. Good students keep track of their grades, credits, and progress toward their degree and other goals. Athletes keep track of their times, scores, and achievements, as a way to monitor improvement.

The process of monitoring oneself can be compared to how a thermostat operates. The thermostat checks the temperature in the room compares it to a standard (the setting for the desired temperature), and if those do not match, it turns on the heat or air conditioner to change the temperature. It checks again and again, and when the room temperature matches the desired setting, the thermostat turns off the climate control. In the same way, people compare themselves to their personal standards, make changes as needed, and stop working on change once they have met their goals. People feel good not just when they reach their goals but even when they deem they are making good progress (Carver & Scheier, 1990). They feel bad when they are not making sufficient progress.

That brings up the third ingredient, which is the capacity to change oneself. In effective self-regulation, people operate on themselves to bring about these changes. The popular term for this is “willpower,” which suggests some kind of energy is expended in the process. Psychologists hesitate to adopt terms associated with folk wisdom because there are many potential implications. Here, the term is used to refer specifically to some energy that is involved in the capacity to change oneself.

Consistent with the popular notion of willpower, people do seem to expend some energy during self-regulation. Many studies have found that after people exert self-regulation to change some response, they perform worse on the next unrelated task if it too requires self-regulation (Hagger, Wood, Stiff, & Chatzisarantis, 2010). That pattern suggests that some energy such as willpower was used up during the first task, leaving less available for the second task. The term for this state of reduced energy available for self-regulation is ego depletion (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Muraven, & Tice, 1998). Current research provides mixed results on ego depletion, and we need further study to better understand when and how it occurs. It may be that as people go about their daily lives, they gradually become ego-depleted because they are exerting self-control and resisting temptations. Some research suggests that during the state of ego depletion people become less helpful and more aggressive, prone to overeat, misbehave sexually, and express more prejudice (Hofmann, Vohs, & Baumeister, 2012).

Thus, a person’s capacity for self-regulation is not constant, but rather it fluctuates. To be sure, some people are generally better than others at controlling themselves (Tangney et al., 2004). But even someone with excellent self-control may occasionally find that control breaks down under ego depletion. In general, self-regulation can be improved by getting enough sleep and healthy food, and by minimizing other demands on one’s willpower.

There is some evidence that regular exercise of self-control can build up one’s willpower, like strengthening a muscle (Baumeister & Tierney, 2011; Oaten & Cheng, 2006). Even in early adulthood, one’s self-control can be strengthened. Furthermore, research has shown that disadvantaged, minority children who take part in preschool programs such as Head Start (often based on the Perry program) end up doing better in life even as adults. This was thought for a while to be due to increases in intelligence quotient (IQ), but changes in IQ from such programs are at best temporary. Instead, recent work indicates that improvement in self-control and related traits may be what produce the benefits (Heckman, Pinto, & Savelyev, in press). It’s not doing math problems or learning to spell at age 3 that increases subsequent adult success—but rather the benefit comes from having some early practice at planning, getting organized, and following rules.

Self-Esteem

Another aspect of identity formation is self-esteem.  Self-esteem  is defined as one’s thoughts and feelings about one’s self-concept and identity. Most theories on self-esteem state that there is a grand desire, across all genders and ages, to maintain, protect, and enhance their self-esteem. Contrary to popular belief, there is no empirical evidence for a significant drop in self-esteem throughout adolescence. “Barometric self-esteem” fluctuates rapidly and can cause severe distress and anxiety, but baseline self-esteem remains highly stable across adolescence. The validity of global self-esteem scales has been questioned, and many suggest that more specific scales might reveal more about the adolescent experience.

There are several self-concepts and situational factors that tend to impact an adolescent’s self-esteem. Teens that are close to their parents and their parents are authoritative tend to have higher self-esteem. Further, when adolescents are recognized for their successes, have set high vocational aspirations, are athletic, or feel attractive, they have higher self-esteem. Teens tend to have lower self-esteem when entering middle school, feel peer rejection, and experience academic failure. Also, adolescents that have authoritarian or permissive parents, need to relocate, or have low socioeconomic status, are more likely to experience lower self-esteem.

Girls are most likely to enjoy high self-esteem when engaged in supportive relationships with friends; the most important function of friendship to them is having someone who can provide social and moral support. When they fail to win friends’ approval or cannot find someone with whom to share common activities and interests, in these cases, girls suffer from low self-esteem.

In contrast, boys are more concerned with establishing and asserting their independence and defining their relation to authority. As such, they are more likely to derive high self-esteem from their ability to influence their friends. On the other hand, the lack of romantic competence, for example, failure to win or maintain the affection of a romantic interest is the major contributor to low self-esteem in adolescent boys.

Self Esteem Types

According to Mruk (2003), self-esteem is based on two factors: competence and worthiness. The relationship between competence and worthiness defines one’s self-esteem type. As these factors are a spectrum, we can even further differentiate self-esteem types and potential issues associated with each (Figure 8.1).

Figure 8.2.1. Self-Esteem meaning matrix with basic types and levels. Adapted from Mruk, 2003.

Those with high levels of competence and those that feel highly worthy will have high self-esteem. This self-esteem type tends to be stable and characterized by openness to new experiences and a tendency towards optimism. Those at the medium-high self-esteem type feel adequately competent and worthy. At the authentic level, individuals are realistic about their competence and feel worthy. They will actively pursue a life of positive, intrinsic values.

Individuals with low levels of competence and worthiness will have low self-esteem. At the negativistic level, people tend to be cautious and are protective of what little self-esteem that they do possess. Those at the classic low self-esteem level experienced impaired function due to their low feelings of competence and worth and are at risk for depression and giving up.

It is also possible to have high levels of competence but feel unworthy. This combination is a defensive or fragile self-esteem type, called competence-based self-esteem, where the person tends to compensate for their low levels of worthiness by focusing on their competence. At the success-seeking level, these individuals’ self-esteem is contingent on their achievements, and they are often anxious about failure. The Antisocial level includes an exaggerated need for success and power, even as to the point of acting out aggressively to achieve it.

The combination of low competence and high worthiness is worthiness-based self-esteem. This type is another defensive or fragile self-esteem where the individual has a low level of competence and compensates by focusing instead on their worthiness. At the approval-seeking level, these individuals are sensitive to criticism and rejection and base their self-esteem on the approval of others. At the narcissistic level, people will have an exaggerated sense of self-worth regardless of the lack of competencies. They also tend to be highly reactive to criticism and are very defensive.

• Identity Formation. Authored by : Nicole Arduini-Van Hoose. Provided by : Hudson Valley Community College. Located at : https://courses.lumenlearning.com/adolescent/chapter/identity-formation/ . License : CC BY-NC-SA: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
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• Identity Formation. Authored by : Tera Jones. Provided by : Lumen Learning. Located at : https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-lifespandevelopment/chapter/identity-formation/ . License : CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
• Introduction to Emotional and Social Development in Early Childhood. Authored by : Stephanie Loalada. Provided by : Lumen Learning. Located at : https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wmopen-lifespandevelopment/chapter/emotional-and-social-development-in-early-childhood/ . License : CC BY: Attribution
• Self-Efficacy. Authored by : James E Maddux and Evan Kleiman. Provided by : NOBA. Located at : https://nobaproject.com/textbooks/introduction-to-psychology-the-full-noba-collection/modules/self-efficacy . License : CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike
• Self-Esteem, Self-Efficacy, and Locus of Control. Provided by : Khan Academy. Located at : https://youtu.be/xcLKlPTG97k . License : CC BY: Attribution
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• Self-Concept, Self-Identity, and Social Identity. Authored by : Shreena Desai. Provided by : Khan Academy. Located at : https://youtu.be/PaA0mLVQd3k . License : All Rights Reserved
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Supporting Individual and Community Identity Development in Infant-Toddler Classrooms

• April 11, 2020

Anneliese W. Johnson and Samantha Peterson, The Ohio State University

How do very young children develop a sense of identity and belonging culturally, and how can this sense be supported by early care and education teachers and programs? This article examines literature associated with identity and belonging in early childhood and how those who work closely with children and families can incorporate best practices into daily routines and procedures. The authors share several practices from the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning at The Ohio State University, a high-quality program serving children and families who are economically and culturally diverse.

Elizabeth is a 19-month-old toddler who attends our early care and education program full-day, full-year while her parents work. Her family, including siblings, primarily speak Spanish at home, as do several other of the schools’ students. As such, the school has made a concentrated effort to employ teachers who are native Spanish speakers or otherwise fluent in Spanish. When Elizabeth arrives for the day, she is greeted enthusiastically with phrases in Spanish and English from her peers and teachers. Spanish phrases and words make up the environmental print throughout the room. Laminated notecards are displayed prominently for all children and teachers to access; the cards contain phrases supplied by Elizabeth’s parents for commonly used routines and classroom rituals such as “Do you want to use the bathroom now or in 5 minutes?  ¿Quieres usar el baño ahora o en cinco minutos? ” and “We wash our hands before we eat.  Nos lavamos las manos antes de comer. ” Children frequently carry these card packs around the room to “read,” and teachers read them in English and Spanish and point to the words when providing one of the directives. Photos of all the children’s families, and of the teachers and their families, are displayed on the walls and in small frames throughout the classroom. Similarly, each child has a small photo album with photos supplied by families and/or taken by teachers at school of children’s families, friends, and pets. Children carry and use the photo albums throughout the day, often taking them from their display in a basket in the reading area to their cubbies and other personal spaces to review.

At this morning’s drop off, Elizabeth is feeling sad as her mother leaves for her workday. The teacher says “We will miss Mommy when she is at work. Let’s get her picture to look at and we can write her a note.  Esta bien que extrañes a Mamá cuando ella esta en el trabajo. Vamos a ver su foto y podemos escribirle una nota. ” The other children in the classroom notice Elizabeth is sad, and the other teacher says, “ Una nota.  Elizabeth is writing her mommy  una nota ” and shows the other children the writing area where children can write small notes to parents and vice versa, interspersing Spanish and English, and reads the card aloud that has been transcribed to the teacher.

Identity Development Begins at Birth

Parents and caregivers may not give much thought to their baby’s developing sense of identity while they are overwhelmed with the daily tasks of infant–toddler care and support. Much of the research focused on child identity and the developing sense of self is centered on middle childhood and adolescence, which is when most people expect children to individualize and become their own person (Bennett, 2011). In fact, as soon as they are born, babies are undergoing this process and making sense of the world around them using social relationships to guide their learning. In an increasingly diverse population, this process may place children in the care of educators whose culture, values, and norms are vastly different from those experienced at home. At the same time, early childhood programs, especially those which serve children at-risk and are subsidized by state or federal funds, are experiencing increasing regulation and accountability which often results in standardization. How can early childhood teachers and administrators support and celebrate the diversity of the children within classrooms while also developing a cohesive classroom and infant–toddler community of learners?

The Importance of Relationships

Erikson was among the first to examine how children’s sense of identity and character developed, and he proposed a stage theory to explain how young children and later adolescents and adults progress in life span development (McLeod, 2008). For children less than 36 months old, there are two stages identified by Erikson: Trust vs. Mistrust, which encompasses the first 18 months of life, followed by Autonomy vs. Doubt, which includes ages 18 to 36 months. Both stages are influenced heavily by the types of environments and support a very young child receives. During the Trust vs. Mistrust stage, infants learn whether they can trust that their needs will be met by caring and competent adults and caregivers; those whose needs are not consistently or adequately met will be insecurely attached and suffer later in developing secure and stable relationships. Similarly, in the Autonomy vs. Doubt stage, children begin to test their abilities and competencies; those who are supported and provided an opportunity to explore will grow to be industrious and independent. Children with overly controlling or anxious caregivers will not develop the fortitude to persevere and learn autonomously.

Explicit in both of Erikson’s stages during infant–toddler development of self is the tremendous role of caregivers and parents in how the child’s identity is formed. One of the most fundamental goals that we have for the infants and toddlers in our program is that each establish a strong, secure relationship with a teacher in his or her classroom. This development of trust is a critical foundation for a child’s later understanding of who she is and how she fits into the social world around her. One of the ways we help infants and toddlers develop a sense of trust is by establishing primary caregivers for each infant and toddler in our school. One teacher from the staff of three in each classroom will be partnered with a child upon enrollment and is responsible for the child’s daily routines, family updates, and screenings and assessments. Although any teacher will appropriately meet the needs of each child throughout the day, the primary caregiver is the acknowledged “expert” on a particular child and makes a concerted effort to bond and have special time with their primary care group each day. The primary caregiving teacher takes the lead on supporting developmental milestones such as transitioning to solid foods, walking, and toilet training and is a primary point of contact for families for conferencing and communication purposes.

Cultural and Societal Influences

Bronfenbrenner later expanded stage theory to include a complex system of cultural and societal influences on child and adult development in his Ecological Models of Human Development (Bronfenbrenner, 1994). Bronfenbrenner’s model examines social systems which influence child development in terms of levels based upon those which the child encounters daily and interpersonally and those which permeate development more indirectly. The role of the parent and/or early childhood educator of a child is critical and inextricably linked in both Erikson’s and Bronfenbrenner’s theories. According to Erikson, a child who is not getting his needs consistently met by a caring adult will suffer greatly during the Trust vs. Mistrust stage. A child whose parents are letting him “cry it out” through the night but is being swaddled and held throughout naptime at child care is receiving inconsistent and confusing messages which makes navigating this stage successfully even more of a challenge. Similarly, in the Autonomy vs. Doubt stage, a child whose parents let her explore and try new things at home but who at child care is kept to a small room with the same materials and rigid schedule day after day would also experience a similar sense of confusion.

Bronfenbrenner’s model also includes parents and teachers at the same Microsystem level; that is, they both have daily and direct influence on how a child interacts and develops socially in the world. In both models, having families and caregivers on the same page and supportive of each other and their child-rearing efforts serves to bolster a child’s development and navigation of these important stages of development of self. One way that our school helps families and teachers to engage in clear and consistent dialogue is ensuring a permanent staff member open and close a classroom daily, rather than “collapsing” classrooms as children and teachers leave or having substitutes end the day. Having a consistent presence in the classroom provides face-to-face communication and opportunities for discussion. Often miscommunications, questions, and assurances are easily sorted out through daily check-ins and concerted efforts by teachers to engage families in conversation each day in the morning and afternoon. Permanent staff who have been with the children for the majority of the day are also more equipped to answer questions about daily routines and experiences throughout the day.

These established theories emphasized the important nature of the relationships infants and toddlers have with those providing primary care and education to them. For children who are cared for outside of the home, typically in group early education and care settings, it is important that there is consistency and routine established between home and school, and that educators and families communicate and have an understanding of family and school culture.

Bridging Home and Classroom Culture

Classroom and group identity form in the school through classroom routines and rituals around arrivals, departures, mealtimes, and toileting. These daily routines help children to understand and predict what is going on around them, support the development of classroom culture, and provide the consistency that is critical in supporting children to feel safe and secure in their environments (Harms, Cryer, & Clifford, 2006; Spagnola & Fiese, 2007). Within a safe group setting, children begin to develop their own classroom or peer culture; this is the language, routines, and rituals that children themselves develop with each other while in group contexts, although these may be heavily influenced by the adults who are a part of the group setting as well (Corsaro, 2009). Peer culture develops in such a way that each school, classroom, and smaller groups of peers within classrooms cultivates its own set of explicit and implicit rules and expectations. For instance, our entire school uses the phrase “make a plan” to initiate and support sharing behaviors between children. However, classrooms may have different routines and expectations around activities such as mealtimes based upon the current make-up of the classroom (e.g., perhaps a classroom with more very young infants has a less autonomous snack time than a classroom with several older toddlers). Even within classrooms, toddlers form their own peer culture routines and rituals that indicate belonging and knowing. Toddlers who want to play rough and tumble ideas will navigate to the mat area of a classroom, and it is implied that those who join in that space are also looking to run, jump, and roll. School culture, classroom culture, and peer culture are all opportunities for children to share in common acts and knowledge with others, contributing and building their sense of identity and belonging. Children are social beings and enjoy shared experiences and learning with peers and caregivers. Positive classroom experiences contribute to the development of an understanding of themselves as competent and significant. The simple act of singing songs and other typical group time activities further strengthen the relationships children develop in school and support their developing sense of belonging and social identity, that is, the sense of themselves in relation to others (Bennet 2011; Niland, 2015).

Classroom and group identity form in the school through classroom routines and rituals around arrivals, departures, mealtimes, and toileting. Photo: Courtesy of the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning

Because those in intimate roles with infants and toddlers impact their sense of identity and belonging so greatly, it is imperative that the classroom and school culture reflect and honor the home cultures of its many students while also developing its own unique culture and practices within the learning community. Cultural and family tradition take on unique meaning when working with infants and toddlers. Very young children can distinguish between male and female faces and different languages and will often show preference for that which is familiar. However, family cultural, religious, and ethnic values, which have more of a verbal transmission, may not yet be internalized by an infant or even experienced by a child (Bennett, 2011).

Oftentimes, early childhood programs attempt diversification by adding images or posters of non-dominant cultures or other tangible artifacts such as ethnic art. These items may be meaningful in a classroom context and encourage language and conversation, however, identifying and supporting family practices and traditions provides meaningful opportunities to enhance the environment and the learning activities which benefit all children in the program (Nieto, 2002). Therefore, it is important that early childhood settings not only add images and celebrate non-dominant holidays, but also take into consideration how families structure their own routines such as eating, sleeping, and speaking with their young child.

Moreover, a well-meaning classroom which focuses on adding artifacts, images, and holidays to its environment may be missing the point of cultural empowerment by creating a “tourist” approach to other cultures and which only serves to emphasize the well-known holidays, dress, or famous individuals of a group (Mangione, 1995). While tangible cultural artifacts and celebrations can be one aspect of cultural sensitivity, it is even more important that an early childhood program create and foster a language of respect, understanding, and welcoming. Although there may be differences in care and routines, establishing a rapport and relationship with families which encourage dialogue and discourse and allow for flexibility is the true key to supporting diverse children and families in the classroom. All families develop systems and rituals around the intimate daily care tasks of infants and toddlers, and, considering the established impact of family and school ecology and relationships on a developing child’s sense identity, it is critical that early childhood educators make every effort to provide pathways for communication and understanding between classrooms and families.

The A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning

Taking the time to build relationships with all families enrolled in diverse schools supports teachers, families, and children. Empirical evidence indicates that children’s development within early childhood classrooms is affected by the skills of their classmates; children who are less skilled due to environmental disadvantage or disability can benefit greatly by being surrounded by highly skilled classmates (Justice, Logan, Lin, & Kaderavek, 2014).

The A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning had previously been located on The Ohio State University’s campus and was viewed as a typical laboratory school where all families paid tuition and were within the same socioeconomic income bracket. The School for Early Learning was purposefully moved to an area historically deemed one in need and located just south of the University, especially to support the large amount of low-income families with young children under 5 years old.

Children are social beings and enjoy shared experiences and learning with peers and caregivers. Photo: Courtesy of the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning

Accessing high-quality early childhood programming is unfortunately out of reach for many families. There is a disproportionate number of minority families living in poverty (Jiang, Granja, & Koball, 2017) and having children all from the same socioeconomic background provides little diversity within the classroom. When the School for Early Learning was on campus, there was much diversity ethnically and racially, being affiliated with the University, but there was not diversity socioeconomically. The move to the Weinland Park neighborhood in Columbus, Ohio, allowed the School to expand its diversity to socioeconomic status as well.

The cost for high-quality early childhood education is often unattainable for many families that live at or below the federal poverty level. Prioritizing a mixed-income model ensures that a diverse population of families are able to come together and receive the same schooling regardless of income level. The use of multiple funding streams ensures a mixed-income model and helps support children and their families by partnering with local and federal agencies. While the requirements to meet local and federal guidelines can take a lot of administrative time, the benefits of having a mixed-income model are crucial to supporting diversity and inclusion of all families. This can be done by leveraging existing local, state, and federal funding to support school operations. But it doesn’t end there; families should feel welcomed and “heard” when enrolling their child in an early childhood school.

Partnering With Families

Prior to enrolling in the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning, families meet with the assistant principal and the classroom teachers. This process allows the parents (or guardians) to share important information regarding their family and their child (see Box 1). Teachers use a guided questionnaire that parents answer in a natural flow, highlighting important points for the family with the teacher. Teachers ask specific questions related to home life such as, who resides in the home or whom the child spends time with, religious and cultural preferences, types of foods eaten, languages spoken in the home, child’s areas of interest, and how involved parents wish to be in the day-to-day experiences of the classroom. All of these can be used to gain a better understanding of a typical day in the life of the child. By sharing this information prior to a child enrolling in school, the teachers can then add or create a classroom environment that has familiar surroundings to the child (Richards, Brown, & Forde, 2007). Teachers intentionally set up their classroom environment to be representative of the children and families that are enrolled; also including their own backgrounds and culture throughout the space. Being purposeful and mindful of the children in the school and having materials and books that are representative of those families is vital to bridging the home–school gap and providing a space where children feel comfortable to freely express themselves (Durden, Escalante, & Blitch, 2015).

Family-centered programs share the following characteristics (Witmer & Petersen, 2010): • supporting the relationship between the child and his or her family • making family members feel welcome through positive attitude and environment • involving families in the programming • establishing a system for daily and thorough information • providing continual support for families to express their feelings, values, and concerns as their child grows and develops

These ideals are critical for high-quality care and education for all children, but in particular for infants and toddlers from a non-dominant culture whose identity and attachment development may be at-risk if careful consideration is not taken to be respectful of home culture (Gonzalez-Mena, 2001). An appealing manner to learn more about infants and toddlers is to invite parents to share transition day(s) with the program. This can be a time where a parent and child attend the classroom prior to being fully enrolled, or when parents are invited to spend several hours alongside the teachers for a day so that the teachers who will assume caregiving for the child can learn from the parent how the child likes to be put to sleep, how she takes a bottle, and how she signals that she needs a diaper change. Transition visits with family members can also be a time when families and teachers discover any potential differences in care routines and provide an opportunity for discussion, understanding, and compromise (Gonzalez-Mena, 2008).

By incorporating images and practices familiar to students, teachers can capitalize on the strengths students bring to school; using the physical environment builds authentic classroom experiences and interactions (Richards et al., 2007). Teachers can show their inclusion of the families by displaying familiar words and phrases throughout the classroom environment in the families’ native languages and incorporating the native language into everyday conversations. The vignette in the beginning of this article gave the example of how the teacher included Elizabeth’s native language of Spanish into the conversation and addressed her feelings to the other children present. This dialogue emphasized the importance of all languages and exposed children, who may not be native Spanish speakers, to the idea that there are many ways in which to communicate with one another.

As young children are playing in the dramatic play area, teachers can place culturally relevant clothing, blankets, and décor in the space and discuss how these materials are being used and their importance (Bredekamp, 1997). Teachers can use developmentally appropriate interactions to explore many different backgrounds and cultures, as well as children with varying needs (e.g., wheelchairs, leg braces, glasses). Materials might include dolls that are representative of all family structures, photos and other materials at the children’s eye level—rather than on a wall or shelf—that “show” diversity within in the classroom, and family photos arranged aesthetically around the room.

Encouraging families to actively participate in their child’s education by inviting them to spend time in the classroom is another way to show the importance of family collaboration and inclusiveness. It is important to communicate with families daily about their child’s interests and also to find out the caregiver’s interests. Ask caregivers to share their knowledge with the classroom. This could be accomplished by having the family bring in a favorite food, create an art project, read stories, sing a song, or simply volunteer in the school office. These efforts show that the school values the family and looks at the family as a partner. Children can begin to see their families are having meaningful interactions within their school and are building relationships with the school and their teachers. Children’s interactions and relationships support their sense of belonging, which in turn supports the development of social identity (Bennett, 2011).

Building Community

The A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning collaborates with the university whenever possible. As the model demonstration site for the College of Education and Human Ecology, undergraduate and graduate students have the opportunity to use the observation deck at the school to watch the children, teachers, and families interact with one another. College students are also placed directly in the classrooms as part of their coursework and work alongside the children and teachers. Members of outside disciplines, including social work interns, marriage and family therapy interns, and speech–language pathologists, are also involved in the school team and aid in supporting all families no matter what their socioeconomic background. These individuals are on-site and work directly with the administration and teachers to support families and bring them together in ways their everyday lives may not have. The principal and assistant principal ask families to complete questionnaires at the beginning of each school year to assist in determining topics for the Parent Education series for the year. This input allows families’ interests to be heard and offers a way for the school community to come together. The school began a Family Storytime with the school librarian and social work intern once a week for parents to network with one another, spend time with their children at the school, and have the opportunity to interact with the social work intern to support their needs. All of this contributes to the families building a sense of community with not only other families but with the school community as well. Even though the families are from varying socioeconomic backgrounds, they are growing and learning together and have the opportunity for their children to learn from other families that may be unlike their own.

Children are increasingly being cared for outside of the home while one or both parents work. At the same time, the diversity of the United States and the ability to communicate instantly using technology has created pathways for progressive communication and insight. Although providers have an understanding about how it feels best to support and engage with diverse families in early childhood programs, there is still a need to support research in responsive care and education in infant–toddler programming specifically, including its impact on identity and self-development and still later academic success. In order to teach diverse student populations, secondary education and teacher training programs must ensure that coursework emphasizes and explicitly teaches cultural sensitivity and responsive education for an impact and appropriate changes to be seen in classroom practice (Goldstein, 2003). Namely, success has been found in professional development which explicitly illustrates the differences in individualism and collectivism in various cultures, and how this may impact a classroom environment or interactions with parents and children (Rothstein-Fisch, Trumbull, & Garcia, 2009). Cultures which value group settings and community may not find it critical that an infant eat independently or sleep alone in a crib, whereas infant programs in the United States may tend to support these outcomes and view them as a success of a child’s autonomy. The individualism vs. collectivism continuum is so prevalent in daily routine and care tasks of infants and toddlers (sleeping, eating, walking, carrying, and speaking) that supporting education and understanding about this cultural difference predictably fosters dialogue and awareness among teachers. In addition to the importance and sensitivity of the pre-service educator’s curriculum and content, the diversity of instructors in early childhood teacher training programs is significant. Diverse instructors are predictive of coursework which was more culturally relevant and sensitive and supported students to think crucially about their role in families’ lives and to continue working with children from different backgrounds (Lim, Maxwell, Able-Boone, & Zimmer, 2009). Attracting diverse candidates and supporting their continued commitment to children and families in the field will positively impact the workforce and classroom in early childhood education. At our early education program, families see their own cultures and languages reflected in the teaching staff and student teachers who work with their children. Evidence of collaboration and communication among diverse teachers is seen through everyday interactions and smooth classroom management as well as classroom documentation. Celebrating diversity and collegiality is evident between the families and teachers, and among the school staff, creating a welcoming and positive environment for everyone associated with the school.

Anneliese W. Johnson, MS , is the principal of A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning in the College of Education and Human Ecology at The Ohio State University. The school is dedicated to a mixed-income, mixed-age-grouping model of education for children birth to 5 years old and is the model demonstration site for the college. In her work, Johnson supervises educators and preservice teachers, and she seeks funding and enrollment pathways to support families living in poverty in attaining high-quality early childhood education. Johnson has presented locally and nationally on early childhood topics such as play, language and literacy, classroom management, the Reggio Emilia Approach, and working with children and families who have experienced trauma. Johnson has a master’s degree in human development and family science from The Ohio State University, and has spent her career in Columbus, Ohio. Although she has been in the field more than 20 years, her 10 years as a preschool teacher in the classroom are the most important in informing her work today with diverse children and families.

Samantha Peterson, MS , is the assistant principal at the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning in the College of Education and Human Ecology at The Ohio State University at the Ohio State University. Peterson supports the delivery of innovative, evidence-based curriculum and systematic documentation and assessment of learning for all infant–toddler and preschool classrooms and serves as the literacy coach for the school. In her role, Peterson provides direct supervision of classroom teaching staff and supports teachers in behavior guidance, problem solving, and development of teaching strategies and supports teachers and families through referral processes. She oversees enrollment of children, parent communication, and compliance paperwork for families. Peterson works with many of the ancillary staff, speech–language pathologists, undergraduate and graduate student placements in marriage and family therapy and in social work, volunteers, and others and coordinates their time at the school and communicating information back to families as needed. She has co-authored a white paper on  Blending Funding Streams in Early Childhood Education: Case Study of the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning in 2015  and a literacy supplement manual specifically for infants and toddlers. Peterson has also presented on various topics at local conferences in Ohio, as well as at the annual conferences of the National Association for the Education of Young Children and ZERO TO THREE.

Peterson holds a master’s degree in human development and family sciences, with a concentration in early childhood development and education, from The Ohio State University. She has also held an early intervention certificate from the state of Ohio and serves as a stakeholder for the ACHIEVE grant through the Health and Rehabilitation Science department at the Ohio State University. She assists with the grant for children with cerebral palsy (CP) regarding dosing in children with CP, participates in panel discussions with the team, performing community outreach, and providing teacher perspective and knowledge of educational needs during infancy, preschool, and kindergarten readiness.

Suggested Citation

Johnson, A. W., & Peterson, S. (2019). Supporting individual and community identity development in infant–toddler classrooms. ZERO TO THREE Journal, 39 (3), 18–24.

Bennett, M. (2011). Children’s social identities.  Infant and Child Development, 20 (4), 353–363.

Bredekamp, S. (1997). NAEYC issues revised position statement on developmentally appropriate practice in early childhood programs.  Young Children, 52 (2), 34–40.

Bronfenbrenner, U. (1994). Ecological models of human development.  International Encyclopedia of Education, 3 (2), 37–43.

Corsaro, W. A. (2009). “Peer culture.”  In The Palgrave handbook of childhood studies  (pp. 301–315). London, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

Durden, T. R., Escalante, E., & Blitch, K. (2015). Start with us! Culturally relevant pedagogy in the preschool classroom.  Early Childhood Education Journal, 43 (3), 223–232.

Goldstein, L. S. (2003). Preservice teachers, caring communities, and parent partnerships: Challenges and possibilities for early childhood teacher education.  Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education, 24 (1), 61–71.

Gonzalez-Mena, J. (2001). Cross-cultural infant care and issues of equity and social justice.  Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 2 (3), 368–371.

Gonzalez-Mena, J. (2008).  Diversity in early care and education: Honoring differences . New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

Harms, T., Cryer, D., & Clifford, R. M. (2006).  Infant/toddler environment rating scale . New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Jiang, Y., Granja, M. R., & Koball, H. (2017).  Basic facts about low-income children children under 6 years, 2015 . New York NY: National Center for Children in Poverty, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Justice, L. M., Logan, J. A., Lin, T. J., & Kaderavek, J. N. (2014). Peer effects in early childhood education: Testing the assumptions of special-education inclusion.  Psychological Science, 25 (9), 1722–1729.

Lim, C. I., Maxwell, K. L., Able-Boone, H., & Zimmer, C. R. (2009). Cultural and linguistic diversity in early childhood teacher preparation: The impact of contextual characteristics on coursework and practica.  Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 24 (1), 64–76.

Mangione, P. L. (1995).  Program for Infant/Toddler Caregivers. Infant/toddler caregiving: A guide to culturally sensitive care.  Sacramento, CA: Bureau of Publications, Sales Unit, California Department of Education.

McLeod, S. A. (2008). Erik Erikson | Psychosocial stages—Simply psychology. Source

Nieto, S. M. (2002). Profoundly multicultural questions.  Educational leadership, 60 (4), 6–10.

Niland, A. (2015). “Row, row, row your boat”: Singing, identity and belonging in a nursery.  International Journal of Early Years Education, 23 (1), 4–16.

Richards, H. V., Brown, A. F., & Forde, T. B. (2007). Addressing diversity in schools: Culturally responsive pedagogy.  Teaching Exceptional Children, 39 (3), 64–68.

Rothstein-Fisch, C., Trumbull, E., & Garcia, S. G. (2009). Making the implicit explicit: Supporting teachers to bridge cultures.  Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 24 (4), 474–486.

Spagnola, M., & Fiese, B. H. (2007). Family routines and rituals: A context for development in the lives of young children.  Infants & Young Children, 20 (4), 284–299.

Witmer, D. S., & Petersen, S. H. (2010).  Infant and toddler development and responsive program planning: A relationship-based approach . New York, NY: Pearson.

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7 Problem-Solving Skills That Can Help You Be a More Successful Manager

Discover what problem-solving is, and why it's important for managers. Understand the steps of the process and learn about seven problem-solving skills.

1Managers oversee the day-to-day operations of a particular department, and sometimes a whole company, using their problem-solving skills regularly. Managers with good problem-solving skills can help ensure companies run smoothly and prosper.

If you're a current manager or are striving to become one, read this guide to discover what problem-solving skills are and why it's important for managers to have them. Learn the steps of the problem-solving process, and explore seven skills that can help make problem-solving easier and more effective.

What is problem-solving?

Problem-solving is both an ability and a process. As an ability, problem-solving can aid in resolving issues faced in different environments like home, school, abroad, and social situations, among others. As a process, problem-solving involves a series of steps for finding solutions to questions or concerns that arise throughout life.

The importance of problem-solving for managers

Managers deal with problems regularly, whether supervising a staff of two or 100. When people solve problems quickly and effectively, workplaces can benefit in a number of ways. These include:

Greater creativity

Higher productivity

Increased job fulfillment

Satisfied clients or customers

Better cooperation and cohesion

Improved environments for employees and customers

7 skills that make problem-solving easier

Companies depend on managers who can solve problems adeptly. Although problem-solving is a skill in its own right, a subset of seven skills can help make the process of problem-solving easier. These include analysis, communication, emotional intelligence, resilience, creativity, adaptability, and teamwork.

1. Analysis

As a manager , you'll solve each problem by assessing the situation first. Then, you’ll use analytical skills to distinguish between ineffective and effective solutions.

2. Communication

Effective communication plays a significant role in problem-solving, particularly when others are involved. Some skills that can help enhance communication at work include active listening, speaking with an even tone and volume, and supporting verbal information with written communication.

3. Emotional intelligence

Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize and manage emotions in any situation. People with emotional intelligence usually solve problems calmly and systematically, which often yields better results.

4. Resilience

Emotional intelligence and resilience are closely related traits. Resiliency is the ability to cope with and bounce back quickly from difficult situations. Those who possess resilience are often capable of accurately interpreting people and situations, which can be incredibly advantageous when difficulties arise.

5. Creativity 

When brainstorming solutions to problems, creativity can help you to think outside the box. Problem-solving strategies can be enhanced with the application of creative techniques. You can use creativity to:

Approach problems from different angles

Improve your problem-solving process

Spark creativity in your employees and peers

6. Adaptability

Adaptability is the capacity to adjust to change. When a particular solution to an issue doesn't work, an adaptable person can revisit the concern to think up another one without getting frustrated.

7. Teamwork

Finding a solution to a problem regularly involves working in a team. Good teamwork requires being comfortable working with others and collaborating with them, which can result in better problem-solving overall.

Steps of the problem-solving process

Effective problem-solving involves five essential steps. One way to remember them is through the IDEAL model created in 1984 by psychology professors John D. Bransford and Barry S. Stein [ 1 ]. The steps to solving problems in this model include: identifying that there is a problem, defining the goals you hope to achieve, exploring potential solutions, choosing a solution and acting on it, and looking at (or evaluating) the outcome.

1. Identify that there is a problem and root out its cause.

To solve a problem, you must first admit that one exists to then find its root cause. Finding the cause of the problem may involve asking questions like:

Can the problem be solved?

How big of a problem is it?

Why do I think the problem is occurring?

What are some things I know about the situation?

What are some things I don't know about the situation?

Are there any people who contributed to the problem?

Are there materials or processes that contributed to the problem?

Are there any patterns I can identify?

2. Define the goals you hope to achieve.

Every problem is different. The goals you hope to achieve when problem-solving depend on the scope of the problem. Some examples of goals you might set include:

Gather as much factual information as possible.

Brainstorm many different strategies to come up with the best one.

Be flexible when considering other viewpoints.

Articulate clearly and encourage questions, so everyone involved is on the same page.

Be open to other strategies if the chosen strategy doesn't work.

Stay positive throughout the process.

3. Explore potential solutions.

Once you've defined the goals you hope to achieve when problem-solving , it's time to start the process. This involves steps that often include fact-finding, brainstorming, prioritizing solutions, and assessing the cost of top solutions in terms of time, labor, and money.

4. Choose a solution and act on it.

Evaluate the pros and cons of each potential solution, and choose the one most likely to solve the problem within your given budget, abilities, and resources. Once you choose a solution, it's important to make a commitment and see it through. Draw up a plan of action for implementation, and share it with all involved parties clearly and effectively, both verbally and in writing. Make sure everyone understands their role for a successful conclusion.

5. Look at (or evaluate) the outcome.

Evaluation offers insights into your current situation and future problem-solving. When evaluating the outcome, ask yourself questions like:

Did the solution work?

Will this solution work for other problems?

Were there any changes you would have made?

Would another solution have worked better?

As a current or future manager looking to build your problem-solving skills, it is often helpful to take a professional course. Consider Improving Communication Skills offered by the University of Pennsylvania on Coursera. You'll learn how to boost your ability to persuade, ask questions, negotiate, apologize, and more. 

You might also consider taking Emotional Intelligence: Cultivating Immensely Human Interactions , offered by the University of Michigan on Coursera. You'll explore the interpersonal and intrapersonal skills common to people with emotional intelligence, and you'll learn how emotional intelligence is connected to team success and leadership.

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Article sources

Tennessee Tech. “ The Ideal Problem Solver (2nd ed.) , https://www.tntech.edu/cat/pdf/useful_links/idealproblemsolver.pdf.” Accessed December 6, 2022.

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This content has been made available for informational purposes only. Learners are advised to conduct additional research to ensure that courses and other credentials pursued meet their personal, professional, and financial goals.