Update on Readings

Tonight I spent the entire evening reading and reviewing. The task was to have a first read, notetaking and highlighting session, going through a bundle of articles about adolescent identity - based on class and ethnicity. This will tie into my first two assignments. I have included notes on two of the readings tonight and plan to add two more tomorrow night.

Some interesting points from 2 of the readings to follow up:

The Development of Stereotypes about the rich and poor: Age, Race, and Family Income differences in beliefs by Woods, Kurtz-Costes and Rowley, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol.34, No.5, October 2005.

• Research about gender has shown that there is a potential role for stereotypes in identity development (e.g. Bornholt et al, 1994 & Tiedemannn, 2000) p.438
  
• Cognitive development view suggest that stereotypes affect 'information processing by determining how information is encoded and interpreted', this can affect beliefs held by individuals about themselves and others (Bigler & Liben, 1992, Hamilton et al, 1994) p.438
• The relationships between 'social class stereotypes and identity development' can be complicated because social class is not as physically obvious (often) as gender or ethnicity. p.438
• Children's sense of self is a product of interactions with others and comparisons of themselves with others (Pajares and Schunk, 2002) So, poor youths, in particular ethnic minority youth and hampered by negative academic stereotypes about the poor. p.443

The Development of Ethnic Identity during adolescece by French, Seidman, LaRue & Lawrence in Developmental Psychology Vol 42, (1), January 2006

• "The identity crisis of adolescence is resolved by reconciling the identities imposed upon oneself by one's family and society with one's need to assert control and seek out an identity that brings one satisfaction, feelings of industry, and competence.'
  
• Social psychologists focus on identity in terms of the feelings of group belonging and the effects of the identification with social groups (Tajfel & Turner, 1979)
• Social psychologists look at the 'negotiation of one's social identity in the broader context of the value society has places on one's group membership". If a person is confronted with negative attitudes or contexts that 'devalue' the social group, an individual will then need to negotiate the meaning of his or her identity

Three Strategies (Tajfel & Turner 1986) if in a devalued group:

• individual mobility - choose toe leave the group and change membership. If it is not easily changeable (e.g. gender, race, ethnicity) the individual can choose to psychologically leave the group by dis identifying with it.
• social creativity - the group as a whole redefines the meaning of their group membership by comparing themselves on a dimension that they are superior OR by changing values assigned to their group from negative to positive
• social competition - group as a whole challenges the current system to change the hierarchy of group membership in the society.

On the basis of Marcia (1980) conceptualisation of Eriksons’ theory of identity development, Phinney (1989) proposed a Model of Ethnic identity development

Unexamined ethnic Identity - Individuals have unexamined positive OR negative views on their ethnic group

Ethnic identity research (or exploration) - Individuals have started to look into what it means to be a member of the group

Achieved Ethnic identity - Individuals have explored their ethnic group membership and are clear about the meaning of this ethnicity to their own lives.

This paper sets out to examine identity not in terms of development stages but rather in terms of continuous growth. This seems to make sense in that there are many factors that would affect the rate of change and the age at which it occurs. This would also take into account any regression in development. There are subtle changes that are not captured by the stages models but they are useful for developing a basic framework. Other factors that need to be considered that I am very interested in would be social class.

Further notes are available through the link at My Work.