Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay

Identifying the stages of development, which an individual passes, is essential for the further analysis of one’s progress and the location of the possible issues that may impede the further evolution, including intellectual, emotional and spiritual ones. Although it is traditionally presumed that the adoption of one of the theories suggested by different scholars, particularly, Erikson, Vaillant, Levinson, and Peck, should be considered as the means of evaluating one’s personal progress, the integration of several approaches should be promoted as the means of diagnosing the existing issues and preventing the possible ones from occurring, as the analysis of an interview with a 27-year-old Anne has shown.Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.  Despite the fact that the interviewee seems to be passing the corresponding developmental stages in the due order, a detailed analysis of the sociocultural concerns in her life indicate that she might need psychological assistance to deal with the process of transgressing from adolescence to adulthood, since the process in question has been made overly complex because of the social prejudice related to her gender. It should be noted that, prior to taking part in the interview, Anne signed an informed consent, therefore, stating that she agrees to participate in an academic study and, therefore, does not mind her responses being used or quoted in research.

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As far as the spiritual development of the person in question is concerned, the respondent is clearly at Stage 3 at the moment, as she is questioning her own beliefs, therefore, allowing an impressive amount of doubt into her life. The specified phenomenon aligns with the concept of personal and spiritual development suggested by Peck (Parker, 2009); according to the latter, the third stage of spiritual development implies criticism of faith and its further testing. It would be wrong to assume that Anne dismisses the basic principles of faith, therefore, rejecting religion and eliminating it from her life. Instead, the stage in question can be viewed as testing oneself and one’s ability to be devoted to specific religious beliefs as well as the related morals and values.Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.  Based on the interviewee’s responses, she is rather uncertain about whether she should commit to the Christian religion or to abstain from creating strong ties with the Christian community.

The above-mentioned tension between the religious values suggested to the respondent by her family and the society that she lives in, and the need to locate her own beliefs, values and moral and ethical standards, can be observed. The conflict observed in the given situation can be interpreted from the perspective of the theory suggested by Levinson as an attempt to locate one’s individual characteristics and define one’s personality, thus, claiming set of unique character traits as one’s own. Indeed, the interviewee herself admitted going through a life phase, which involves redefining the current values and constructing the set of principles that she will be living by in the future. Much like Levinson’s theory suggests, the interviewee’s personality contains both the characteristics of a young person and those of an adult one. As the interview has shown, the participant displays a strong inclination towards getting her priorities in order, which is the type of behavior expected from an adult and responsible person. The respondent, on the other hand, also claimed to have been dodging some of her responsibilities, such as the reconciliation with her family members and the reconnection with her community, for quite a while, which can be defined as a rather childish type of behavior. Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.

It should be borne in mind, though, that the gender issues, which the interviewee has to face at present, make the process of transitioning from adolescence to adulthood. According to Rawana and Morgan (2013), gender stereotyping, which remains an integral part of relationships in the contemporary society, affects women of the age group, which the participant belongs to, to a considerable extent. Particularly, the issues related to appearance affect young women significantly, reducing their self-esteem greatly and triggering a hindrance in their personal development: a recent study found that “elevated body dissatisfaction, dietary restraint, and bulimic symptoms at the entry of the study predicted the onset of subsequent depression” (Rawana & Morgan, 2014, p. 599). The specified phenomenon triggers abandonment issues, which must have led to Anne’s unwillingness to communicate with her peers and become an active member of the society. As the respondent admitted, she has already experienced gender profiling when applying for a job and being rejected. Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay. The issue in question has clearly affected the respondent, as it was expected based on Levinson’s theory:

In Levinson’s theory, one of the key conflicts of the middle age involves coping with the young-old polarity in life. Midlife crises are not as common as believed by many; however, when they occur, negative life events usually are involved. (Santrock, 2013, p. 493)

Although most of the behavioral patterns, which the interviewee displayed, aligned with the foundation of the current developmental theories, some of the patterns, which the participant showed, were not in chord with the standard ones suggested by the theorists mentioned above. Particularly, the fact that the interviewee never considered the issue of intimacy versus isolation deserves to be brought up. Although the issue in question can be viewed as a minor dent in the overall strong canvas of Anne’s psychological portrait, it still seems rather unusual. Indeed, according to Eriksson’s stages of cognitive development, the transfer to adolescence involves managing a conflict related to interpersonal relationships, including both romantic ones and the ones concerning the communication process between an individual and the society (Karkouti, 2014). The fact that Anne is not concerned with the issue in question can be explained by the fact that she has been focusing on her professional development and her career; indeed, as the interview responses indicated, Anne had to work hard to attain the level of success that she wishes to have.

In fact, a closer look at the issue in question will reveal that the problem regarding the integration of an adolescent individual into the society, which is described by Eriksson as one of the key issues in the life of a person aged 20–29, can still be traced in Anne’s life. Particularly, the fact that she has not yet made any endeavor at becoming a member of the society deserves to be mentioned as the key evidence. It could be assumed that, instead of approaching the conflict in question directly, Anne has chosen the path of avoidance, pretending that the conflict has never even existed in the first place. Her attempts at focusing on her career and professional development cannot be viewed as the proof of the lack of conflict between her personal needs and the expectations of the society (Pittig, Schulz, Craske, & Alpers, 2014). Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.

The experience described above shows that the analysis of one’s developmental patterns is linked directly to the inherent and acquired characteristics of an individual. As well as the external factors, which one is exposed to once integrating into the society. Particularly, the characteristics such as the introversion and extraversion rates that a person displays, the inclination to either an analytical approach to the changes in one’s life or the preference of an intuition-based strategy, and other unique traits of one’s personality must be taken into account when analyzing the changes, which an individual may be undergoing. At this point, the significance of Myers-Briggts Type Indicator (MBTI) deserves to be mentioned. Although the tests suggested by Erikson, Vaillant, Levinson, and Peck are essential to identifying the process of one’s personal development, the location of the outcomes thereof, which MBTI allows for, is also crucial to the correctness and objectivity of the analysis (Ahmed, Campbell, Jaffar, Alkobaisi, & Campbell, 2010). It can be suggested, therefore, that Anne’s issues can be helped in a much more efficient manner once the MBTI approach is adopted. The identification of the personal factors, which she has been exposed to throughout her entire life, is just as important as the evaluation of the external ones, which her environment consists of, to the design of the tools for managing her problem.

Therefore, the interviewee displays rather traditional development patterns, yet some of the changes, which Anne is currently going through, do not comply with the patterns suggested by the theorists; however, the deviations in the personal development, which can be observed in the interviewee, can also be explained from the perspective of the theories under analysis. The changes, which the respondent is undergoing at the specified time slot, can be explained by the transgression from adolescence to adulthood, as well as the need to face the conflicts related to the target stage of development (Irving & Sayre, 2013).

The study in question has shown that the adoption of the theories in question works best once these theories are combined; thus, every single factor in the development of an individual can be taken into account, and the process of one’s personal evolution can be viewed from a range of perspectives, including the cultural, the social, and the economic ones. Consequently, the combination of the theories in question provides an opportunity to identify the developmental issues that could be missed in case of adopting only one approach. Moreover, the combination of the theories suggested by Erikson, Vaillant, Levinson, and Peck creates premises for the creation of a more successful and an entirely adequate approach addressing the problems that an individual may experience in the course of their personal growth.Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay. As the interview carried out with Anne has shown, the theories created by Erikson, Vaillant, Levinson, and Peck do not contradict each other in the slightest; quite on the contrary, they can be viewed as the extension of each other and are perfectly compatible. Helping one locate the dents in the process of personal development, including the analysis of the emotional, intellectual and spiritual growth, the methods in question can be viewed as the tools for carrying out a successful therapy session and addressing the psychological issues that one may be experiencing at a specific developmental stage.

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Reference List

Ahmed, F., Campbell, P., Jaffar, A., Alkobaisi, S., & Campbell, J. (2010). Learning & personality types: A case study of a software design course. Journal of Information Technology Education, 9(16), 237-252. Web.

Irving, P. W., & Sayre, E. C. (2013). Physics identity development: A snapshot of the stages of development of upper-level physics students. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 13(4), 68–84. Web.Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.

Karkouti, I. M. (2014). Examining psychosocial identity development theories: A guideline for professional practice. Education, 135(2), 257-263.

Parker, S. (2009). Faith Development theory as a context for supervision of spiritual and religious issues. Counselor Education & Supervision, 49(1), 39–53. Web.

Pittig, A., Schulz, A. R., Craske, M. G., & Alpers, J. W. (2014). Acquisition of behavioral avoidance: Task-irrelevant conditioned stimuli trigger costly decisions. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 123(2), 314 –329.

Rawana, J. S., & Morgan, A. S. (2014). Trajectories of depressive symptoms from adolescence to young adulthood: The role of self-esteem and body-related predictors. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 43(4), 597–611 Web.

Santrock, J. W. (2013). Life-span development (15th ed.) [Grand Canyon University version]. Web. Transition from Adolescence to Adulthood Essay.