Identity Statuses
Help for teenage identity role confusions.
IDENTITY STATUSES IN CHILDREN
Throughout our lifetime, we can experience life crisis identity moments where we struggle to explain and understand who we really are. The most important development task that adolescents must achieve is forming a stable identity (Erickson 1968). Our identity is how we see ourselves and how we integrate aspects of who we are and form then into a label or schema of who we are. A Canadian developmental psychologist and Emeritus Professor of Psychology at Simon Fraser University named James Marcia developed four identity statuses that focused on adolescent development. Marcia had taken Erickson’s stages of psychosocial development from the 1950’s-1960’s and he created a new model that described the different types of identities that adolescents may have when trying to determine how to choose between commitment and the evaluation of old choices. The four stages are not in chronological order determined by age like Erickson’s, but they are a state of identity that are each independent from one another.
The first stage of Marcia’s four identity statuses is diffusion. Diffusion can be described as when the teen feels overwhelmed by the idea that they have to choose an identity, so as a response to the stress placed on them, they do very little to accomplish reaching a certain identity. An example of this stage would be the following:
Kenny is about to go to graduate school from high school, barely. His grades are borderline, he has few friends, no real interests, and spends most of his time after school staying in his room and listening to music. He seems to have no interest in making plans for the future or even finding a job to support himself after high school.
The second stage of the four identity statuses is foreclosure. When a teenager has been told what to do with their identity and character for as long as they can remember and do not have the change for personal exploration to determine their identity themselves, then this will be foreclosure. The parents are usually the ones who tell the teenager how they should act and who they should be and the teenager will accept this form of identity. An example of foreclosure would be:
Josh has just started college this semester and is positive he wants to go to medical school. He has never considered any other career for himself. His father is a doctor, as was his grandfather. For as long as he can remember, all he has ever wanted to do is follow in his father’s footsteps and become a doctor as well. He is sure it is his calling.
The stage of moratorium occurs when a teenager explores all of their options at this point of their lives, but has not found one that is satisfactory to their solid identity for now. They like to imagine themselves in all of the possibilities and become easily excited in each one. An example of moratorium would be the one below:
Sue seems to change her mind every few weeks about most everything. She cannot seem to settle on what she wants to do after high school. At times she says she wants to go to college, but at other times she says she wants to see the world. One minute she wants to be a doctor, the next she wants to be a writer. She is also continually changing her appearance. One month she was preppy, the next day she dyed her hair and bought a new wardrobe. He parents are not too concerned. They support her ideas about the future and knows she will eventually find her path.
The last stage of achievement is the most solid type of identity that the teenager can achieve in order to lead themselves into a healthy and happy adulthood. The individual has explored all their options and alternatives, and then deliberately chosen a specific identity. The example of an achievement identity stage is:
Cindy has just graduated from college with a B.A. in psychology. It took her almost six years to get her degree because she changed it so many times. First she was an English major, and then it was art, next business. Finally, she took a general psychology class and was hooked. Later, she got a part-time job at a mental health facility and knows this was the field for her. Now she is going to graduate school to earn her Ph.D. in psychology. From her experience working at the mental health facility, she knows she wants to be a psychologist who works with troubled children.
Identity statuses are shaped by many factors in our lives form biological to environmental. We can get our identity characteristics from our genetics, our upbringing, experiences, efforts, goals, and decisions. They label our reactions to different struggles during our developmental stages of life. There have been recent studies regarding adolescent identity categorization about there being a possibility that there can be more than just four identities. The study that was done by Beyers et al. explored the possibility of the formation of new identity statuses when analyzing data from clusters on measures of openness and conscientiousness factors. The Closure identity status was a new one developed from the experiment when taking into account different amounts of trait combinations. This new finding indicates that the four identity statuses that were set by Marcia are not always perfectly exact with every adolescent. Combinations of each of these four statuses are possible when categorizing each teen in their identity. A consideration that would need to be taken into account is understanding that a teen is unique in their own developmental patterns and may need specific attention or a treatment plan from a therapist when struggling through this crisis.
Closure will happen to an adolescent if for some reason a crisis was too problematic or the achieved commitments were no longer workable (yet the individual felt pressure to be committed nonetheless). The individual then retreats and feels unable to cope with the commitments they have already verbally said they were going to do. They feel as if they possibly took on too much and have to cling to faith that everything may work out in the future when they feel ready to venture again with commitments (Valde 1996). This new identity creation will be useful information in therapeutic techniques for helping the adolescent development in our future generations. We can only hope to spread awareness about each life stage crisis in our development in order to alleviate the hardships and emotions that come with them, especially during the most confusing time in our lives-adolescence.
References
Beyers, Wim, et al. "Identity statuses based on 4 rather than 2 identity dimensions: extending and Refining Marcia's paradigm." Journal of Youth and Adolescence 34.6 (2005): 605+. General OneFile. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.
Valde, Gregory A. "Identity closure: a fifth identity status." Journal of Genetic Psychology 157.3 (1996): 245+. General OneFile. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.
Throughout our lifetime, we can experience life crisis identity moments where we struggle to explain and understand who we really are. The most important development task that adolescents must achieve is forming a stable identity (Erickson 1968). Our identity is how we see ourselves and how we integrate aspects of who we are and form then into a label or schema of who we are. A Canadian developmental psychologist and Emeritus Professor of Psychology at Simon Fraser University named James Marcia developed four identity statuses that focused on adolescent development. Marcia had taken Erickson’s stages of psychosocial development from the 1950’s-1960’s and he created a new model that described the different types of identities that adolescents may have when trying to determine how to choose between commitment and the evaluation of old choices. The four stages are not in chronological order determined by age like Erickson’s, but they are a state of identity that are each independent from one another.
The first stage of Marcia’s four identity statuses is diffusion. Diffusion can be described as when the teen feels overwhelmed by the idea that they have to choose an identity, so as a response to the stress placed on them, they do very little to accomplish reaching a certain identity. An example of this stage would be the following:
Kenny is about to go to graduate school from high school, barely. His grades are borderline, he has few friends, no real interests, and spends most of his time after school staying in his room and listening to music. He seems to have no interest in making plans for the future or even finding a job to support himself after high school.
The second stage of the four identity statuses is foreclosure. When a teenager has been told what to do with their identity and character for as long as they can remember and do not have the change for personal exploration to determine their identity themselves, then this will be foreclosure. The parents are usually the ones who tell the teenager how they should act and who they should be and the teenager will accept this form of identity. An example of foreclosure would be:
Josh has just started college this semester and is positive he wants to go to medical school. He has never considered any other career for himself. His father is a doctor, as was his grandfather. For as long as he can remember, all he has ever wanted to do is follow in his father’s footsteps and become a doctor as well. He is sure it is his calling.
The stage of moratorium occurs when a teenager explores all of their options at this point of their lives, but has not found one that is satisfactory to their solid identity for now. They like to imagine themselves in all of the possibilities and become easily excited in each one. An example of moratorium would be the one below:
Sue seems to change her mind every few weeks about most everything. She cannot seem to settle on what she wants to do after high school. At times she says she wants to go to college, but at other times she says she wants to see the world. One minute she wants to be a doctor, the next she wants to be a writer. She is also continually changing her appearance. One month she was preppy, the next day she dyed her hair and bought a new wardrobe. He parents are not too concerned. They support her ideas about the future and knows she will eventually find her path.
The last stage of achievement is the most solid type of identity that the teenager can achieve in order to lead themselves into a healthy and happy adulthood. The individual has explored all their options and alternatives, and then deliberately chosen a specific identity. The example of an achievement identity stage is:
Cindy has just graduated from college with a B.A. in psychology. It took her almost six years to get her degree because she changed it so many times. First she was an English major, and then it was art, next business. Finally, she took a general psychology class and was hooked. Later, she got a part-time job at a mental health facility and knows this was the field for her. Now she is going to graduate school to earn her Ph.D. in psychology. From her experience working at the mental health facility, she knows she wants to be a psychologist who works with troubled children.
Identity statuses are shaped by many factors in our lives form biological to environmental. We can get our identity characteristics from our genetics, our upbringing, experiences, efforts, goals, and decisions. They label our reactions to different struggles during our developmental stages of life. There have been recent studies regarding adolescent identity categorization about there being a possibility that there can be more than just four identities. The study that was done by Beyers et al. explored the possibility of the formation of new identity statuses when analyzing data from clusters on measures of openness and conscientiousness factors. The Closure identity status was a new one developed from the experiment when taking into account different amounts of trait combinations. This new finding indicates that the four identity statuses that were set by Marcia are not always perfectly exact with every adolescent. Combinations of each of these four statuses are possible when categorizing each teen in their identity. A consideration that would need to be taken into account is understanding that a teen is unique in their own developmental patterns and may need specific attention or a treatment plan from a therapist when struggling through this crisis.
Closure will happen to an adolescent if for some reason a crisis was too problematic or the achieved commitments were no longer workable (yet the individual felt pressure to be committed nonetheless). The individual then retreats and feels unable to cope with the commitments they have already verbally said they were going to do. They feel as if they possibly took on too much and have to cling to faith that everything may work out in the future when they feel ready to venture again with commitments (Valde 1996). This new identity creation will be useful information in therapeutic techniques for helping the adolescent development in our future generations. We can only hope to spread awareness about each life stage crisis in our development in order to alleviate the hardships and emotions that come with them, especially during the most confusing time in our lives-adolescence.
References
Beyers, Wim, et al. "Identity statuses based on 4 rather than 2 identity dimensions: extending and Refining Marcia's paradigm." Journal of Youth and Adolescence 34.6 (2005): 605+. General OneFile. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.
Valde, Gregory A. "Identity closure: a fifth identity status." Journal of Genetic Psychology 157.3 (1996): 245+. General OneFile. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.