Time Perspective and Vocational Identity Statuses of Emerging Adults

Achievement of a vocational identity is an important developmental task for individuals entering adulthood. The present study examined relationships between vocational identity statuses and time perspective in a sample of 165 emerging adults. Results of a canonical correlation analysis identified 2 interpretable variates. The 1st variate indicated that diffuse vocational identity status is associated with negative views of the past and lower orientation toward the future. The 2nd variate indicated that achieved vocational identity is associated with a largely hedonic view of the present, along with being mindful and less inclined to be fatalistic. These results suggest that differing views on time perspective accounts for some of the variation in different vocational identity statuses. Interventions based on time perspective may prove useful in helping individuals attain an achieved vocational identity. Future research should examine how time perspective relates to vocational identity status in individuals at later stages of career development.     

Biography Building To Insure The Future: Women's Negotiation Of Gender Relevancy In Medical School*

In this paper I focus on how women in their first year of medical school build biographies of fitness as a means of negotiating the status of peer in a male-dominated group. Their goal is to negotiate a master status and primary identity as medical student. They do this by making gender, a key characteristic, both irrelevant and relevant. I also discuss the technique of using interview data to provide a particular perspective on the medical students' situation and their use of the interview as a vehicle for identity building. I conclude that women's apparent success in maintaining identities as successful people and in negotiating barriers to the collegia! status stem both from their numbers and from using situationally appropriate vocabularies of motives to build past and future biographies of fitness.     

Prison Gang Members' Tattoos as Identity Work: The Visual Communication of Moral Careers

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate how symbolic self-completion and moral careers are identity work by examining prison gang tattoos. Data were derived from one author's six-year full-member participation as a correctional officer in the California prison system. We examine tattoos specific to members of the Nuestra Familia, a California-based prison gang. Tattoos make an individual's self-definition more complete by visually communicating gang membership, status, rank, and personal accomplishments; they reflect a person's past career accomplishments and possible future career objectives. To analyze the moral careers communicated by these tattoos, we identify and elaborate upon five distinct phases in a prison gang moral career: pre-initiate, initiate, member, veteran, and superior. The article concludes with discussion of the importance of incorporating symbolic self-completion into an identity work perspective and consideration of some implications for future research on gang tattoos in particular and identity construction more generally.     

Stability and Change in Private and Public Ethnic Regard Among African American,Puerto Rican,Dominican, and Chinese American Early Adolescents

Over the past 20 years, researchers have demonstrated that ethnic identity in adolescence is multifaceted and dynamic, encompassing a number of aspects of content and self‐definition. The present study examines private regard (i.e., youths' positive evaluations of their ethnic group) as well as public regard, which refers to their perceptions of others' evaluations of the group. The primary objective of the present study was to examine stability versus change in private and public regard among an ethnically diverse sample of early adolescents as they progressed through middle school. Using data from a longitudinal investigation of 6th graders, we found that private regard was stable over time and quite positive for all groups. In addition, while Chinese American youths' public regard tended to increase over time, African American, Puerto Rican, and Dominican youths' public regard decreased across the middle school years. Implications for ethnic identity theory are discussed.     

A Decade Review of Sex and Partnering in Adolescence and Young Adulthood

The formation and development of romantic relationships continues to be an important area of study among adolescent and young adult populations. Although many adolescents and young adults report having committed romantic relationship experiences, which may or may not include sexual activity, research has grown during the past decade to study a variety of sexual experiences and relationship types. Consistent with identity formation and exploration and the opportunity for experimentation, adolescents and young adults also engage in a variety of casual sexual relationships and experiences. The past decade saw a dramatic growth in the study of casual sex and in particular hooking-up experiences. Furthermore, scholars have begun to examine more fully young adults' attitudes toward and willingness to engage in consensually nonmonogamous relationships; however, little research has examined actual involvement in consensually nonmonogamous relationships among those in young adulthood. As with previous decade reviews, ongoing attention regarding how adolescent experiences serve to inform relationships and sex during the period of young adulthood is warranted. Directions for future research are identified and discussed.     

I was,I am,I will be: Identity and time perspective before and during COVID-19

The ways in which youth reach a stable identity, a core developmental task of emerging adulthood, are intertwined with their perceptions of the past, present, and future. Additionally, these dynamics are embedded in and are strongly influenced by the socio-historical context and concurrent events, such as COVID-19. This study examines how different groups of emerging adults (university students and workers) engage in identity processes in educational/vocational and interpersonal domains and frame their perspective of time before (N = 299, M_age = 21.90; 51.4% females) and during the pandemic (N = 497; M_age = 23.11; 68.2% females). Significant differences in identity processes and time perspective emerged between the two cohorts. Moreover, significant associations between identity and time perspective were found to be similar across different identity domains and cohorts.     

When My Mom Was a Little Girl … : Gender Differences in Adolescents' Intergenerational and Personal Stories

Narratives about parents may help adolescents navigate their own experiences. Yet, research has not examined what adolescents know about their intergenerational past. Sixty‐five 14‐ to 16‐year‐old middle‐class, racially diverse adolescents narrated two stories about each parent's childhood, and 2 positive personal stories. Narratives were coded for structure (length, elaboration), theme (affiliation, achievement), and internal states. Mothers' stories were more elaborative, affiliative, and emotionally rich than fathers', which were more achievement focused. Girls' personal narratives were longer, more elaborative, and more emotionally rich than boys' and resembled narratives about mothers but not fathers. Adolescents may be narrating parents' experiences through gendered lens of the parent but personal experiences through their own gendered lens. Implications of intergenerational narratives for adolescent identity are discussed.     

Ethnic Identity and Psychosocial Functioning in Navajo Adolescents

The current study assessed associations among theoretically driven measures of ethnic identity and psychosocial adjustment among 137 Navajo adolescents. For both sexes, measures of students' sense of affirmation and belonging to their ethnic heritage emerged as a strong predictor of positive psychosocial functioning. Less-consistent patterns of association emerged between other measures of ethnic identity and psychosocial adjustment. Students with achieved ethnic identity status, characterized by high levels of exploration of their ethnic heritage and high levels of affirmation or commitment to their Navajo culture, reported the most positive functioning on several measures. Interesting interactions with biological sex suggested that ethnic identity may function differently for male and female Navajo adolescents. Implications of results for educators, parents, and policy makers are discussed.     

Rejection,Humiliation, and Parole: A Study of Parolees' Perspectives

Research on status rejection has developed considerably over the past two decades and is applied in a number of different settings to better understand criminal and deviant behavior. Our research contributes to that body of work by examining the ways in which status rejection may create a potentially humiliating dynamic for individuals on parole. Specifically, we use in‐depth interviews with parolees to illustrate how the parolee identity can promote the experience of status rejection and simultaneously foster conditions for humiliation—an emotional state that may impede one's ability to both (re) construct a conventional identity and reintegrate back into one's community.     

Songwriting and Activism: A Young Singer's Efforts to Write Himself into the Traditions of an Activist Group

This article examines how music functions as a vehicle by which people may place themselves in social movements. Centering questions of culture, the article describes how an environmentalist group based in the northeastern USA used music to: (1) assert a collective identity; (2) project a past, present and future; and (3) forge relationships among group members and between group members and the general public. Against this background, the article considers how a young activist used music to take on and adapt a movement identity and position himself within the movement's traditions and social relations. In a discourse analysis of a song this young activist composed and performed at the group's summer music festival, the article shows how he adapted a range of cultural resources to reimagine and place himself within the group's relations of time and social space.     

Ego Development,Ego Strengths,and Ethnic Identity Among First Nation Adolescents

Three conceptualizations of psychosocial development were investigated among Canadian First Nation adolescents. Loevinger's social cognitive model of ego development reflects the way in which an individual views the self and social reality. From Eriksonian theory, ego strengths refer to the emergent values or outcomes that represent resolution of the eight psychosocial stages of development, and ethnic identity is a domain of personal identity with special relevance for minorities. As expected, age and biological gender differences were found for ego development. Associations between ego development and ego strengths were supported as were age differences in ethnic identity status. Traditional students (strongly identified with indigenous culture) demonstrated greater ego strengths than bicultural (identified with both their own and mainstream cultures) adolescents.     

Adolescent and family development: Autonomy and identity in the digital age

Adolescence is a time when youth are faced with multiple tasks that intersect and influence one another, e.g., increased desire for autonomy, salience of identity issues, peer orientation, self-focus and self-consciousness, and a continuing need for a safe environment in which to explore autonomy and identity. These all occur in a dynamic ecosystemic environment, which in the past would have mostly included family, peers, and school, but today also includes cyberspace as both a system, and a means to interact with many other systems through the use of multiple forms of information technology (IT). This paper uses the voices and experiences of 128 adolescents, captured in qualitative interviews, to look at autonomy and identity in the digital age as they talk about their parents vis à vis their use of IT. Thematic analysis revealed two major themes: 1) Adolescents spoke of their expertise. In particular they commented on their knowledge to repair equipment, ability to use IT well, their sense of pride in their own ability and their parents' acknowledgement of this ability. 2) Subjects perceived little need for their own supervision, but assessed that other adolescents and younger children needed to be watched closely by their parents. Implications of this work are discussed.     

From Collective Memory to Collective Imagination: Time,Place, and Urban Redevelopment

This article is about a place that does not exist, yet. It is about residents' perceptions of redevelopment plans involving the reconstruction of a defunct neighborhood firehouse. Interviews revealed the residents' “collective imagination” as they actively envisioned potential future outcomes for a firehouse‐turned–community center. When asked about the needs of the community, interviewees discussed the current conditions of their neighborhood (the present), its history (the past), and how they would like to see it change (the future). This corresponds well with George Herbert Mead's ideas about temporality. I argue that connecting the identity of a place to a sociological understanding of time (especially Mead's) is a necessary step for gaining a better understanding of the subjective side of urbanization and ultimately creating a better vernacular knowledge base for urban redevelopment plans.     

Local identity and the reception of refugees: the example of Riace

ABSTRACT

A strong local community identity often goes together with the rejection of refugees and other migrants. However, there is also the possibility that such a local identity actually stimulates the reception of refugees. Based on the social identity perspective and our ethnographic fieldwork we examine this possibility in the context of the small town of Riace in Southern Italy. The analysis demonstrates that there is a local identity of hospitality that is construed as a continuation of the town’s past. This identity of local hospitality is enacted and maintained in various ways in the life of the town in which the mayor as an entrepreneur of the local identity plays a critical role. However, there are also some challenges to the future of the local identity of hospitality that relates to available financial resources and competition over local opportunities.     

A Preliminary Analysis of Associations Among Ethnic–Racial Socialization,Ethnic Discrimination,and Ethnic Identity Among Urban Sixth Graders

Drawing from cultural ecological models of adolescent development, the present research investigates how early adolescents received ethnic–racial socialization from parents as well as how experiences of ethnic and racial discrimination are associated with their ethnic identity (i.e., centrality, private regard, and public regard). Data for this study were drawn from a multimethod study of ethnically and socioeconomically diverse early adolescents in three mid‐ to high‐achieving schools in New York City. After accounting for the influences of race/ethnicity, social class, gender, immigrant status, and self‐esteem, parental ethnic–racial socialization was associated with higher levels of ethnic centrality (i.e., the extent to which youth identify themselves in terms of their group), more positive private regard (i.e., feelings about one's own ethnic group), and public regard (i.e., perceptions of other people's perceptions of their ethnic group). Ethnic discrimination from adults at school and from peers was associated with more negative perceptions of one's ethnic group (i.e., public regard). In addition, the association of ethnic–racial parent socialization and ethnic identity beliefs was stronger for those who reported higher levels of adult discrimination. Results highlight key ways in which ethnic identity may be shaped by the social ecologies in which adolescents are embedded.     

Evil as Indexical: The Implicit Objective Status of Guns and Illegal Drugs

We use C.H. Mead's perspective on the meaning of social objects and his theory of the past and Harold Garfinkel's application of indexicality to describe how people respond to social objects as evil. Mead's notion of an implied objective past illuminates how social actors not only connect objects to past evils but also invoke an objective past to index evil in the future. Focusing on guns and illegal drugs, we maintain that responses to each draw on conceptions of the past in ways that attempt to make their connection to evil in the past and future justifiable. Such responses create meaningful categories that actors then use to anticipate future responses to objects. We note that while people appear to be comfortable using pasts and indexical expressions to define Schedule I drugs as evil in themselves, the attempt to make guns into evil objects has met with strong resistance and requires elaborate contextualization.     

Contextual moderators of the link between national and European identity among European youth

Identification with Europe can constitute an important part of psychological citizenship for European citizens. From a self-categorization perspective, higher-order (e.g. with Europe) and lower order subgroup identities (e.g. with the nation) may interfere with each other if they are seen as incompatible. We were interested in contextual moderators at school and country level of youth’ national identity on identification with Europe. We used multi-level regression analyses based on data from the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study, collected from 14-year old students (n?=?71,282) from 22 European countries. Results showed strong positive effects of national identity at the individual, and classroom-level on European identity. However, main effects of national identity at the individual level were qualified by a number of interactions with contextual-level moderators. The relationship between national and European identity was weaker for adolescents attending classrooms or living in countries with lower average levels of trust in EU institutions. Living in countries with higher gender and income inequalities, less friendly immigration policies, and a communist past lessened the association between national and European identity. Results point to the powerful effects of context in shaping the relationship between national and European identity.     

Evaluation of an Intervention to Foster Time Perspective and Career Decidedness in a Group of Italian Adolescents

A structured 10‐didactic unit intervention was devised to foster adolescents’ time perspective and career decidedness. The study was conducted with 50 adolescents who were selected from a group of 624; 25 of the participants were randomly assigned to the control group and 25 were assigned to the experimental group. They were selected according to their level of career indecision and poor propensity to look to the future. A series of repeated measure analyses of variance were carried out to evaluate pre‐ and posttest differences between the experimental and control groups regarding time perspective and career decidedness. At posttest, the experimental group showed higher levels of continuity, hope, and career decidedness than did the control group. Implications for future practice and research are discussed.     

Acculturation and Enculturation Trajectories Among Mexican‐American Adolescent Offenders

This study examines changes over time in ethnic affirmation/belonging and ethnic identity achievement, Spanish language use, English language use, Mexican/Mexican‐American affiliation/identification and Anglo affiliation/identification in a sample of Mexican‐American adolescents participating in a longitudinal study of juvenile offenders. The Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure and the Acculturation Rating Scale for Mexican Americans‐II were completed by the Mexican‐American adolescents 7 times over a 3‐year period. The findings from longitudinal growth modeling analyses and growth mixture modeling analyses indicate that there is heterogeneity in the initial scores and changes over time on these variables that are related to markers for the cultural qualities of the home environment (i.e., generational status and mother's most frequent language use). In contrast to expectations, marginalized or assimilated acculturation trajectories/types were not overrepresented in this sample of adolescent offenders. Implications for our understanding of the nature of acculturation and enculturation processes and the way these processes are studied are discussed.     

The Role of Premigration Status in the Acculturation of Chinese–Vietnamese and Vietnamese Americans

Drawing from fifty in‐depth interviews, this research examines the role of existing parental language knowledge on the ethnic identity negotiation of two ethnically distinct children of immigrant groups—Vietnamese and Chinese–Vietnamese—whose families have emigrated from Vietnam to the Southern California region of the United States. While previous research focused primarily on the influence of premigration status on first‐generation immigrants, this article considers how a central aspect of premigration status (intranational ethnicity) applies specifically to the children of first generation immigrants. By taking the premigration approach of comparing the experiences of different ancestral‐origin groups from a single nation (the intranational ethnicity perspective), this analysis suggests that a family's premigration ethnic status shapes the 1.5 and second‐generation's ethnic self‐identification choices through the mediation of parental language knowledge. Specifically, for the children of immigrants with twice‐minority status (Chinese–Vietnamese Americans), parental language knowledge serves as an easy ethnic identity default during these children's early self‐identification process.