emotional or truthful. . The self during adolescence carries several contradictions . Thus, adolescents may describe themselves as “I am calm but get easily disturbed” or “I am quiet and also talkative.” .
The adolescent experiences a fluctuating sense of self. As adolescents experience diverse situations and respond to different experiences, their understanding about their own self fluctuates over situations and over time. . The self of the adolescent contains ‘the ideal self’ and ‘the real self’.
The ideal self becomes more prominent now. Each one of us has an idea of what and how one would ideally like to be. This could be called the ideal self, towards which we would like to develop. For example, a girl may want to be tall but is actually quite short.
. Adolescents, more than children, are self-conscious and preoccupied with themselves. This gives them a feeling of always “being on stage” – a feeling that they are always being noticed. This is the reason why most adolescents are over-concerned about their physical appearance.
We now know about the different characteristics of self during certain life stages. But how do we develop a sense of self in the first place? What influences the development of a person’s identity? The next chapter focusses on this aspect.
Key Terms Infancy, Early childhood, Middle childhood, Adolescence, Identity development, Real vs. Ideal self