Blog Post #5: Identity Development among Youth

The first reading we have from Bracher (2006) introduces educators to a variety of issues that can impact students across the education spectrum. The issue of concern throughout this reading relates to identity formation and the strong human need to defend and maintain one’s identity. As I read this latest article, I kept thinking about adolescent students, particularly those who are in junior high and early high school when identity is being shaped largely by peers and other social influences. These years of adolescence and puberty can be very difficult for youth and for their families as they work to navigate through tumultuous times. It can also mean significant challenges for classroom teachers to work within hormonal and chaotic environments where young people are learning so much about themselves while also trying to learn academically. I also couldn’t help but think about my own teenage children, especially my son who recently turned 18.

Early in the reading, I was captivated by the statement “...people are often more willing to risk biological death than ideological death, the death of their identity or sense of self” (Bracher, 2006, p. 5). As I said, I was already thinking about my own children and how their identity has been shaped and how challenging it is for parents and educators to reach and influence young people who are often so strongly impacted by their social worlds. I remember being the center of my children’s universe and being able to kiss them in public or advise them on what to wear. Then suddenly, all that seemed to change during adolescence when I no longer had much influence on my children because I was no longer “cool” in their eyes. I saw both my son and daughter sacrifice logic in order to maintain the identity of being cool in their friend’s eyes, even if that meant not zippering their jacket or wearing a hat on a very cold day.

As I continued to read, I was really interested in the ways identity and the need for recognition and acceptance are associated with learning. As people develop their sense of self, there is a strong need for their identity to matter in the world and for people to have a sense of purpose. The learning we achieve is also strongly connected to identity formation and our learning must provide support for our identity if it is to be effective and reinforcing. This means that what we learn will either support or negate what we believe to be true about ourselves and our world. The “motivation to learn can be lacking when students are able to get all the support they need from sources other than education with less effort or with fewer threats to identity” (Bracher, 2006, p. 5). This point applied to my son particularly as I watched him begin to resist learning as he was gaining more recognition and attention from peers for acting out and being a class clown in school. His identity as a “cool guy” was threatened in the classroom context when he was confronted by teachers and was reinforced among his peers. Getting attention from peers began to shape his identity and motivate his behavior because it was easy to get the laughs and powerful reinforcement.

My son entered junior high a strong, academic student with good behavior and a shy personality. It wasn’t long before I noted significant changes in his behavior and appearance. Without rehashing all of the details during that period of our lives, it will suffice to say that he was dealing with exposure to drugs, fights, and bullying. He described junior high as “survival of the fittest and a dog-eat-dog” world. Regardless of the support I or teachers offered, he had to choose how to deal with his new environment and determine his own identity. Despite my love, support or words of encouragement, my son was developing his sense of self and determining who he wanted to be through the lens of peers and social pressures. Bracher (2006) points out that when students encounter knowledge that threatens their sense of identity, they will often vigorously resist the information in order to preserve their sense of self and defend their beliefs.

I once got a call from his math teacher to tell me about the high score my son achieved on his recent math test. Just as I was about to say how great the news was, he informed me that when he returned the test to my son and congratulated him on a job well done, my son got very angry. When the teacher waited to talk to him about this behavior after class, my son told the teacher that he had been embarrassed and did not want others knowing his grades. I, too, tried to talk to him, on several occasions, about this issue and other issues related to choices he was making (ie/ choice of friends, habits, etc). However, after the test score incident, we saw a marked decline in my son’s efforts and consequently his grades. It appears that his reputation and social position among his friends was of primary importance compared to academic achievement.

The evidence from this reading suggests that some students will lower the academic standards they set for themselves and reduce their efforts in order to associate with a certain peer group. This concept is referred to as downward social comparisons which are tactics people use to “support their identity by comparing themselves to others who are inferior to them in a significant way” (p.22). Students who do this are comparing their academic abilities to those with inferior performances and thereby lowering their own standards and undermining their own motivation to achieve. Essentially, they are abandoning their own “pursuit of excellence in order to maintain relationships...” (p.22). Once again, we can see from this point how youth may choose recognition from friends over academic achievement.

Another central idea that I found interesting is that the sex of the parent can impact the learning of the child. “Where the mother is the more intelligent parent, learning may seem to be feminine and may result in conflict in the boy. This conflict may be heightened if there are bright sisters or female cousins, or bright classmates. Excelling in school is then often regarded as a sign of being a sissy.... Proof of one’s masculinity demands a certain amount of defiance or behavior disorder” (p.19). After reading this, I wondered if being a single mother and working so hard toward my own academic achievement could have negatively affected my son’s learning. It occurred to me that he was the only “man” in the house and was surrounded by strong women--mother, grandmother, sister, etc-- and his newly developing identity seemed to be resisting the dominant female influences he had. It is possible that the negative behaviors he was displaying were a rejection of these feminine influences and an immersion of his new “bad boy” identity.

Both Katz and Erikson (Bracher, 2006) have discussed the negative behaviors that are displayed as a way to preserve an identity that is associated with being “bad ass”. Erikson referred to this as “negative identity” while Katz pointed out the hypermasculine signifiers boys/men will showcase to make themselves appear hard or tough. Some of the behaviors displayed can lead to social problems such as violence and crime as men [boys] feel the “need to enact or defend their identity as a “man” (p. 23). I can believe that my son’s actions may very well have been a cry for recognition as a man and a rejection of feminized education and influence. Although this seems extraordinary, the initial point made in this article is that humans will often choose death in defense of their identity before the surrender who they believe themselves to be.

These points are certainly food for thought for anyone working with youth as we struggle to recognize and validate the path they are on when developing their identity. Furthermore, as Bracher suggested, we need to have a full understanding of the nature of identity and its needs so that we can understand how these needs motivate both learning and the failure to learn and also how they contribute to our social problems (2006).