Adolescent Narratives and Identity
Unit objectives
Understand the concept of multiple selves.
Understand why adolescence is a time for changing narratives.
Explain factors that influence an adolescent’s narrative.
Describe attributes of a healthy narrative.
Delineate the primary implicit motives that affect narratives.
Understand risk factors for an unhealthy narrative.
Adolescence and Multiple Selves
The founder of American psychology, William James, noted that we all have “multiple selves(Dennis, 1946).” He did not mean that we all have multiple personalities or dissociative states. That belief is primarily for movies and fiction. Instead, he noted that we are slightly different from every person we interact with. According to James, our personalities are so flexible that they are not always as consistent as we think.
As much as we want to believe that we always are guided by our true selves, many researchers believe this is not the case. Most researchers recognize that we behave based on our past learning, our traits, and aspects of the situation at hand. Part of the situation is the behavior of other people. Our ongoing interaction with others often determines how we may behave with them (Lester, 2015).
James believed that we are so influenced by our social group that we are inevitably shaped by them. James knew that this inconsistency became particularly important during the adolescent years. Partly this was because adolescents have more social and other opportunities away from more restrictive groups. Partly this was due to maturation and the tendencies of adolescents to be very creative. Compared to a child, the teenager is free to question and take on more roles. Society also allows the adolescent to have more freedom and hence more possibilities for diverse social interaction.
These opportunities create situations where behavior may be very inconsistent in one social situation as compared to another. We all have known people who, especially during their teenage years, act one way among parents and another way among friends. Moreover, they may have subgroups of friends where they talk, act, or work entirely differently. For example, they may act differently among religious friends compared to others. They may act more mature around certain groups and much less mature around others. This may cause outsiders or perplexed relatives to say that “That just doesn’t seem like it could be the same person.”
In James’s theory, although the person is the same, the self is flexible and potentially changing. It is exceptionally flexible during the adolescent years. The self is, in essence, experimenting with different aspects of the personality, trying on what fits, choosing what works for particular situations. It is almost like a person approaching a new and unknown wardrobe closet full of exciting clothes. Some of these new items fit. Other items do not work so well and are not retained. Some clothes in the wardrobe seem to fit for a while but not for very long. Only experience and the reaction of others determine what should be kept and what should not.
James also noted that adolescents are often drawn to extreme views. James believes that one reason is that they look for a solution to their fragmented self-identities. For example, suppose a person finds one set of beliefs that can unite various parts of the self. In that case, they can have a unifying principle that allows consistent behaviors. Eventually, these new beliefs afford a person a set of purposes. For some young people, James believed this unification could occur through a sudden religious conversion. For others, options included identifying with radical, unusual, or other peer groups or political causes. Other adolescents find unification by identifying with more traditional religious affiliations or forging strong feels towards their schools or sports.
Narrative Approaches to Development
Many people’s adolescent years involve trying out multiple roles and in different friendship groups. However, most young people eventually find their own direction and story as part of their adolescent life. They do not need an extreme ideology or sudden religious conversion. Instead, they settle on a consistent narrative that evolves through time.
Narrative psychology is an approach that emphasizes the stories or narratives that people derive from their memories about their lives that enable them to develop a sense and meaning of the world (Hammack & Toolis, 2019). Many psychologists believe that having a healthy narrative is critical for mental health and successful development.
Adolescence is often a time of shifting narratives. As James and others noted, the stories that adolescents use to define themselves may change through time. This experimentation may not go smoothly. It sometimes is disruptive. This is part of the process of growing up and makes growing up often very painful.
Early adolescence is often characterized by narratives that include exaggerated personal fables or myths (Josselson, 2019). For example, a person might believe that they will become a famous YouTuber or athlete. These accounts are often missing in realizing the hard work involved in these fields and the low probability of success. In the adolescent’s mind, there are no necessary steps. Success just happens. This may be because the cognitive mechanisms for critical thinking may not be sufficiently developed.
By middle adolescence, narratives often include group cohesion stories (Klimstra & van Doeselaar, 2017). The group is often a central part of the story. A person’s narrative may involve their friends, perhaps their faith, and a broader circle of people they may feel close to. There may be less emphasis on family life, especially among males, although everyone is different. Each generation may also be somewhat different.
Narratives during middle adolescence often have aspects of romantic attachment. Love is often seen as idealized but also problematic. Sometimes it is portrayed sadly or even tragically, not unlike the themes in music or art. A spiritual or religious quest is also common during this period. Adolescents may see themselves as future religious or spiritual “heroes” who await their calling to do great works or fit into a divine plan (D. P. McAdams, Josselson, & Lieblich, 2001).
The person at this age may often hold multiple narratives. Each one comes into consciousness based on social demands. During middle adolescence, there are often extreme differences in a person’s behavior based on social and immediate influences. This is because the narrative is often not stable and may represent possible selves. A person may have several different narratives to choose from and may select different ones depending on whom they encounter. For example, a person may hold one narrative when they are around religious friends. Later they may shift their narrative almost wholly when they encounter a different group of friends. The person may not experience any tension at this inconsistency and may not even be aware of it.
It is essential to realize there are also tremendous individual differences in narratives. Differences are as vast as life stories. Narratives are ways people try to make sense of their lives. Despite similarities, each one is as unique as the person who believes them. None are right or wrong as long as they help a person navigate through life.
Towards later adolescence, people tend to reduce or rule out competing narratives. There is a drive to develop a more singular story or worldview, much as Adler stated. The adolescent realizes that she cannot and should not have separate narratives for every goal. She begins to realize that being inconsistent is simply not compatible with many purposes and successful life. There is a striving for consistency that did not exist a few years earlier.
The drive for self, as Adler stated, involves the young person finding out who they are(Lerner & Steinberg, 2009a). This usually occurs only after having sufficient experience in social and other situations to realize strengths, weaknesses, talents, and tendencies. At that point, a person can concentrate on the development of stability and consistency in different situations.
Motives in Narrative Research
The study of narrative psychology often discusses implicit motives or internal dispositions that direct behavior towards goals (Denzinger & Brandstätter, 2018). Implicit motives are different from the personality traits covered by the Big Five. They are often outside of our ordinary consciousness. They tend to rise and fall depending on the situation, only to return to an eventual baseline. Overall, they tend to be long-standing, reasonably stable, and show consistent patterns over time (Schultheiss, 2008).
Three implicit motives have received extensive research from psychologists during the last 80 years. One is the Need for Achievement.
People who possess a high Need for Achievement do not necessarily want large rewards or success. Instead, they seek feedback about their behavior and want to improve themselves or their performance. Often, they do not wish to receive large rewards as much as they wish ongoing, smaller rewards closely tied to their behavior.
People low on the Need for Achievement often feel that they do not need to do a good job or cannot do a good job. They may well want achievement and want to achieve great things. They may state what they intend to achieve. They just do not think that what they do can produce results. They often avoid the feedback that allows them to improve. Specifically, they make little effort to obtain feedback about their performances. They do not seem to enjoy incremental increases in achievement but prefer success to come as “all or nothing.” As is the case of the Big Five factors, most of us are in the middle of this motive. Motives appear to follow the well-known bell curve that personality factors displayed. However, motives tend to show much more fluctuation than personality factors.
Somewhat independently is another motive, the motive for the Need for Power. This sounds like a terrible motive that only a movie villain would have, but it is not necessarily bad! People who have a high Power motivation want to influence others, often for good. They may want to be social influencers. They may want to be in charge of people at work. They often believe that they are natural leaders.
Those low in this implicit motivation see few rewards in having social or personal control over others. The idea of being responsible for someone else may even be bothersome for them. However, most people are in the middle of this motive and have a moderate need to influence others. These people are often the most flexible in the many complex situations that they must negotiate. Psychologists are unsure why people differ on this motive, although many events in life may shape this motive.
The final motive that has received extensive research has been labeled the Need for Affiliation or, later, the Need for Intimacy. Initially, this was thought of as a need for wanting to talk to or be with others. It was later reconceptualized as wanting to exchange meaningful thoughts and feelings with others. (This is why it was renamed with the concept of “Intimacy.” It does not imply romantic motivation.) The motive is, despite what it may seem, not associated with Extraversion from the Big Five. A person can be very extroverted and have a low need for affiliation/intimacy. Also, some introverts have high needs for affiliation and intimacy.
The Affiliation/Intimacy motive involves wanting to listen to others and hear their stories. People who score high on this motive enjoy being around others and affiliating but not in a superficial way. They want social genuineness. People who score low on this may be extroverted but do not enjoy hearing others. They may like social situations, but often interactions are superficial. As with the other two motives, most people are in the middle range.
Motive Differences in Women and Men
The psychologist Carol Gilligan argued that women and men often have different ways that implicit motives are expressed. This is evident even in the adolescent years. The differences may be due to the way that women are socialized. Women tend to be socialized to have more affiliative and intimacy motives and to have less power motivation. Many of our social institutions are constructed to discourage intimacy motives, and power motives are rewarded. This is one facet of society that may hold women back from higher levels of achievement in the broader community.
Motives seem to directly influence our life narratives. Men and women may develop different narratives partly because of their different degrees of implicit motives. Yet other factors are also important.
PREMATURE IDENTITY FORECLOSURE
When people have their narratives defined for them by others, their experience may involve premature identity foreclosure (Hill & Edmonds, 2017). For example, this can occur when someone is told early on in their life what their profession will be or what they will believe. Sometimes, parents are involved in premature identity foreclosure, such as the father deciding that all five of his sons would grow up to be priests. Peers can also be a factor if they exert pressure that stifles a person’s development.
Psychologists believe that, in general, premature identity foreclosure is not psychologically healthy. Most young adults know someone who has been in this position, and often it does not work out well. Most people become resentful and confused since they do not have an actual narrative that they develop for themselves. However, again, there is a variety of individual differences. For some people, it is reassuring to be told what to do. It may also be expected or even demanded. In some cultures, it is appropriate to accept a narrative given by elders or others as part of maturation. In other cultures, deriving a personal narrative is an essential part of personal identity. In the United States, a significant portion of adolescence involves establishing a satisfactory and independent narrative.
Cultural factors are undoubtedly important in how much freedom young people have to develop their narratives. For much of medieval and premodern history, many individuals were apprenticed to the profession of their parents. This was the major source of their narrative. This is still common in many parts of the world. For many women, choices are fewer. If you are a girl, you become a mother and a wife. There are few other options for identity. The possibility of exploring careers or personal fulfillment is a luxury that much of the world can barely dream of, even today.
Data indicates that adolescents have a better life outcome if they are taught not to think but how to think. In the early teenage years, some adolescence may seek to have their identity given to them. They will often identify with peers who like the same music or media or dress similarly (Scalas, Marsh, Vispoel, Morin, & Wen, 2017). Adolescence is a process of crafting the narrative of others, seeing what fits and what parts should be discarded.
The Narrative and the Future
In Western societies, we emphasize the telling of good stories. Being a dreamer, especially during the adolescent years, is encouraged, but only to a point. By the middle adolescent years, most teenagers are also encouraged to look towards the future. Their narratives usually change at about this time. They begin to include a successful future career. Often the job is imaginary, though with fantastic success. A person may believe that they will be a brilliant film director, a famous physician, or an innovative entrepreneur, perhaps with only a rudimentary plan. What is probably essential, though, is not the plan but the development of broader goals and aspirations (D. R. McAdams, 2012).
Adolescents who have many family concerns are often unable to develop a narrative that extends beyond more immediate demands. For example, a teen who has to take care of relatives or work after school long hours to support their siblings has little time to reflect on self-identity. As a result, her narrative may identify with a caregiving role and may have little capacity to develop other skills.
Narratives may contain logical and emotional gaps because of magical thinking. Adolescents who lack maturity may fill in the spaces in their life stories with fantastic prospective accounts. These may leave the person vulnerable to depression or other difficulties a few years later when dreams do not emerge as intended.
One of the problems that adolescents often have is when parents try to renegotiate the child’s narrative. This may occur when parents have different political, cultural, or religious beliefs than the child. Sometimes, the differences are temporary. Other times the schism between parent and child may last.
Interruptions to the narrative can occur due to illness, including psychiatric disorders. Disruptions to the family system can also cause disruptions that may affect the formation or development of a narrative (Krestan, 2000). Families that feel threatened may overcompensate and attempt to maintain excessive control. This affects identity formation by depriving the adolescent of the chance to develop skills. It also affects them by interrupting the development of a coherent sense of a life story. The life story essentially becomes the parents or the one the parents wish on the adolescent. This may cause problems later in life.
Execute Function and Narratives
Psychologists now understand that executive function problems can also interrupt a narrative (Atherton, Lawson, & Robins, 2020). For example, the adolescent diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, described later, has more problems behaving consistently in social and other situations. They may also have difficulties with peers, making identity and a life story even harder to maintain. As a result, it may be challenging to engage in ongoing self-reflection.
Similarly, depression or severe anxiety may interrupt the narrative, its formation, development, or resolution. Simply, it is hard to worry about defining oneself when faced with demands to cope with symptoms.
Substance abuse or other addictions deprive a person of the development of social skills. Addictive experiences become a person’s primary focus and may crowd out other motives. The use of substances of abuse such as alcohol or drugs like Xanax may also cause memory gaps(McCrady & Epstein, 1999). In addition, addictive drugs and addictions often increase anxiety. This makes it more challenging to explore narrative formation. Individuals who are actively abusing substances often have narratives that have little future orientation and are preoccupied with drug-taking activities. This is another reason why drugs of abuse are not recommended during adolescent years and beyond.
Spiritual Identity
Adolescent narratives often have a spiritual component. Yet spiritual identity often changes during adolescence, much to the bewilderment and sometimes anger of parents (Good & Willoughby, 2008). Nevertheless, most teenagers eventually decide on a personal spiritual identity. Usually, this identity is compatible with their early beliefs and that of their parents and community. Thus, most parental worry is probably unnecessary.
Despite much research regarding adolescent spiritual development, there is much we do not know. One reason is that the field is simply challenging and very difficult to study. Results are sometimes inconsistent. Studies in one part of the country may not replicate in another. Studies with one denomination may not replicate when applied with the same denomination at a later date. Often this is an area where people have had difficulty being objective for many reasons.
In general, evidence suggests that church attendance correlates with less substance use. However, care needs to be taken because we do not know the direction of causality. Many but not all studies suggest that church attendance is associated with less depression, though not necessarily less anxiety than adults. The narratives of these people are usually more optimistic than their peers. Narratives also include more plans to obtain social support, which we know is associated with reduced depression.
Measuring adolescent spirituality rather than church attendance has been much more complicated since definitions change and are inconsistent across studies. But, in general, evidence suggests that adolescent spirituality has many positive and protective aspects.
Most older research suggests that there is a positive relationship between adolescent spirituality and students’ academic grades. Youth who identify as more spiritual tend to have higher grades. However, like many complex behaviors in psychology, the direction of causation is not clear. Youth who have a higher degree of spirituality also seem to have a narrative that reflects achievement.
Previous research has suggested that several factors influence adolescent spiritual development. One, not surprisingly, is a successful relationship with mentors or spiritual leaders. This is why society reacts so strongly when these people betray adolescents through exploitation. Another is through peer networks. Finally, cultural norms and expectations are also crucial, though perhaps not as essential as peer influence.
Most recent research suggests that spirituality is usually a protective force in adolescents’ lives (Hardy, Nelson, Moore, & King, 2019). Furthermore, personal aspects, such as sincerity and commitment, are the critical components of a protective effect. Church attendance and participation in religious rituals are not as vital. There is some evidence that the relationship is causal and correlational, although more research is needed.
However, there are some situations where people can use religious commitment to avoid developing a narrative. There are also situations where the parent or other figures may use religious beliefs and traditions to stifle adolescents’ natural desire for autonomy and creativity.
Psychologists have paid surprisingly little attention to the spiritual development of adolescents who are not considered part of the dominant culture. We know that for Black adolescents, spirituality is often an essential part of development. It may be much more protective, on average, than for white adolescents of the dominant culture. For people who are raised in deaf communities, spirituality has an entirely different dimension.
Similarly, people with emotional and physical alternative abilities may take an entirely different path that is poorly understood by traditional psychology. Faith may play a much more prominent role in these people’s lives (Carter & Boehm, 2019). Although the path may be more dictated by family and social institutions, the commitment may be more genuine, inclusive, and protective.
Social media is now crucial in spiritual development. For example, it is often used as a tool for adolescents to talk about their narratives and declare spiritual commitments to their friends. As a result, much of the research regarding adolescents and spirituality that did not include social media may need to reconsider some aspects of previous conclusions.
For those outsides of the Judea-Christian- Muslim tradition, spirituality and the quest for spiritual identity may be quite different than those of more mainstream culture members. For native people of the Americas. Spirituality is intertwined into personal and cultural identity in ways that may be hard for some others outside of these communities to comprehend. Rejecting spirituality for many people would be leaving the culture and rejecting the self.
For people who identify as gay and lesbians, the tension between spirituality, sexuality, and their sense of narrative can be particularly problematic (Roseborough, 2006). This tension is likely to be very strong during the adolescent years. Individuals from these groups already experience stress, depression, and anxiety due to rejection and bullying. Spirituality may offer a way of providing buffering protection. Unfortunately, very little is known about transgender people, narratives, and motives.
What is a Healthy Narrative?
A healthy narrative promotes personal and group wellbeing. It promotes mental health. It optimistically looks to the future and also helps to explain the past. It makes sense of life. Narratives should be metaphors and should serve as guides to life (D. R. McAdams, 2012).
Healthy narratives need to tell a successful story (McLean & Lilgendahl, 2019). Difficulties involved in the narrative need to be resolved. The hero or protagonist typically follows a script involving a struggle, conflict, or quest. They often describe this as a journey. In the successful narrative, unfished business needs to be resolved.
Adolescents frequently expect that 11 to 19 will allow them to resolve and finish their narratives. They look for their narratives to be completed. They are often stymied when they find that the journey is just beginning. One of the developmental tasks of successful adolescences is to lay the foundation for a lifelong narrative. One of the frustrations of this period is to find that the narrative is not resolved. The journey has just begun. Healthy adolescence lays the foundation for a life narrative that changes when, though only when circumstances are necessary.
NARRATIVES and RESILIENCe
To assist in narrative development, adolescents have often turned to supports to help make construct healthy narratives. For years people have trusted peers to give them feedback regarding their life stories. They also have trusted mentors, people outside the home. When fortunate enough to have caring parents, they may trust them as well.
Diaries or journals have been helpful as long as there has been written media. These allow reflection in private. In addition, there is substantial evidence that they help a person establish a sense of personal identity.
Adolescents have also learned what does not work well to facilitate their narrative journey. What is not helpful is an overreliance on social media. It may be difficult to discard parts of the various selves when publicly declared to others or to the world in social media. For example, a devoutly religious person who has a public doubt may have problems living specific statements down after making them on social media.
Narratives have the power to unite people with ideas and turn them into action. As a result, people can influence each other’s histories. Narratives can shape others in powerful ways. Narratives can also help adolescents become resilient. Resilience is defined as the capacity to withstand stress (Allen & Leary, 2010).
Some behavioral scientists thought that this capacity for resilience was essentially biological due to internal or intrinsic factors. However, it is now realized that cognitive factors, or what we believe, are also important. For example, the script that a person follows, their roles, and the narrative that is their life story can help determine whether they respond to stress successfully (Luria & Torjman, 2009).
Resilient narratives need to be optimistic. Yet, they also need a sense of realism. Excessive cheerfulness that obscures reality is called denial. It is often a symptom of problems in thinking. Yet research shows that aspects of a positive attitude may have beneficial results even in the face of catastrophe. Thus, hoping for the best yet acknowledging other possibilities may be the most successful approach for developing a maximally valuable life story.
Critical Thinking
What events influenced your narrative? How would you change them?
What kind of research would be helpful to determine how narratives are formed?
What are some of the potential problems in researching the effects of religion and spirituality on adolescent wellbeing?
What are some challenges that adolescents today face regarding identity that did not exist in past generations? Conversely, what are some ways that present-day adolescents have an easier burden than previous generations?
How might the narratives of people of color differ from more mainstream communities?