ADOLESCENT MASCULINITIES
3.2. Adolescence and identity
A common conception of adolescence in developmental psychology is that it is a time of turmoil, a period of confusion, changing bodies, 'raging hormones', intense interest in the opposite sex and sexual experimentation (Epstein & Johnson, 1998; Head, 1999).
Adolescence is also considered an optimal time for the formation of an 'identity' - a sense of self, incorporating one's history and what else is necessary for psychological health in adulthood (Sprinthall & Collins, 1988). The traditional view of adolescence in developmental theory will be discussed and critiqued from the perspective of discursive psychology.
Traditionally, adolescence is considered from a theory of development based on the idea of ages and stages (Epstein & Johnson, 1998). Three factors are commonly included in the developmental 'phase' of adolescence. First, the biological changes following puberty increase the possibility of sexual activity, which may create fears, anxieties and a sense of changes beyond one's control (Head, 1999). Second, adolescents are positioned as being at 'the age between' and may experience conflicting expectations especially now that the family as a primary transmitter of social values is undergoing major changes. The
increasing prevalence of isolated nuclear family structures, single parent and dual earning families have made it more difficult for adolescents to cope with the unsettled role
expectations of this developmental phase (Wilson, 1985). Third, the adolescent has to go through what has been called the second individuation (Bios, 1962, cited in Head, 1999).
In the transition from the play age to the school age, the child has to accomplish a first individuation in order to have sufficient confidence to leave the immediate protection of the family and venture into the school and peer-group activities (Erikson, 1985; Head,
1999). While the first individuation is a period of'hatching' from the mother's
protective boundary, the second individuation of adolescence may be called a 'shedding' of family dependencies, detachment of self from parental ties and immersion in the peer- group (Bios, 1979, cited in Lerner, 1987). At a psychodynamic level, the individuation process of adolescence involves tolerating the distress of parental object loss and seeking more mature object relations (Manaster, 1977). In order to accrue impetus towards the second individuation, adolescents may polarise the world and experience others as idealised or devalued - this may take the form of cult heroes or sports celebrities (Lerner, 1987). Behaviours which may have been strictly forbidden in childhood become available to adolescents with a consequent need to modify the super-ego and establish an ego ideal, that is a sense of who s/he is and who s/he would like to be (Manaster, 1977).
Erik Erikson's well-known theory of ego identity elaborates upon these traditional views of adolescence. For Erikson (1985), the critical issue during adolescence was the crisis of personal identity, that is a stable definition of oneself and how one is perceived by others, a crisis that unresolved, leads to identity diffusion. Erikson argued that the resolution of this is made all the more difficult by the over-extended period of dependency which exists in western society (Sprinthall & Collins, 1988). Erikson suggested that adolescents may occupy one of four positions in relation to the identity crisis -pre-crisis, these adolescents may be in a protective environment or less mature; identity foreclosure, in order to avoid the effort and discomfort of thinking about life's options, some adolescents may rush to a prematurely 'resolved' identity status (this can also be a temporary haven for some); psychosocial moratorium, a period in which society allows the adolescent to explore options until ready to enter the adult world; identity resolution, where the adolescent attains a higher level capacity to trust others, oneself and be committed to a cause (Sprinthall & Collins, 1988). The psychosocial moratorium may be functional to
society as a 'bridge' to adult commitment but in dislocated societies may lead to a negative identities premised on nihilism and escapism (Baumrind, 1975).
With regard to the traditional stance on adolescence in developmental psychology, Epstein and Johnson (1998) call to question the several assumptions of this view from the perspective of discursive psychology. The apparent 'storm and stress' of adolescence, they suggest may not exist apart from the social practices and discourses which mark as significant a 'stage' in a person's development towards 'maturity', they argue.
Furthermore, in western society and at the same time as the emergence of schools as state-sanctioned social institutions, the categories 'adolescent' followed by 'teenager' emerge along with theories that posit universal experiences of adolescent being (Epstein
& Johnson, 1998). The spurious notions of'ages and stages' may simply decontextualise experience from the discursive practices that are embedded in cultures, including the cultural sense of how experiences are embodied (Epstein & Johnson, 1998). From a discourse perspective, Erikson's theory may simply represent dominant discourses of adolescence within western culture, such as the truism that these years in a person's life are de facto a 'phase' of upheaval and separation (Epstein & Johnson, 1998). The
expectation that the identity resolution is preferable over a prolonged identity moratorium may be ideological in that well-adjusted individuals with resolved 'identities' fit easily into the capitalist status quo whereas disaffected students, political activists and others with unresolved 'identities' do not. The same may be true of those whose choices in sexuality may lead away from the heteronormativity of the 'intimacy versus isolation' stage that Erikson suggests is the primary crisis of early adulthood.
Phoenix (2004b) notes that developmental researchers have begun to move away from the core narrative of development as a natural, unfolding process of sequential
developmental 'tasks' towards the idea of culturally-embedded, teleological self-
transformation. Published in a journal of developmental psychology, a discourse-analytic study by Korobov and Bamberg (2004) takes up this idea of culturally embedded
discursive accomplishment during adolescence. The adolescents in this study constructed meanings of maturity in terms of a 'developmental imperative' to display their
'readiness' in the changing cultural milieu of the peer-group. Here, boys negotiated the challenge of'displayed readiness' through clusters of'problem behaviours' such as risk- taking, displayed toughness and emphasised heterosexuality (Korobov & Bamberg, 2004).
A particularly important aspect of discursive accomplishment is described as 'non- relational sexuality', a cluster of hegemonic norms. These hegemonic norms included perceiving sexuality as 'sport' or lust; an objectification of girls as sexual partners, and tendencies towards trophy ism, voyeurism and emphasised heterosexuality (Korobov &
Bamberg, 2004). Further to this was a marked tendency of boys to emphasise the physical attractiveness of girls in peer-group conversation, a tendency that for the purposes of later discussion shall be termed 'lookism' Managing these hegemonic norms of sexuality in the peer group context becomes an important window towards accomplishing the
developmental imperative and the findings suggest, form a significant area of conflict for adolescent boys as they need to manage an appearance of orientating openly towards emphasised heterosexuality while at the same time not appearing to be naYve, desperate or shallow (Korobov & Bamberg, 2004). These findings have been contested by Coyle and Walton (2004) who claim that they do not reflect a valid participant orientation. Findings of Frosh et al (2002) do however support the view that despite the apparent camaraderie of male peer groups, the need to constantly prove oneself as 'acceptably masculine' is experienced by many boys as anxiety-provoking and alienating. In a related way, Lasser and Thoringer (2003) propose the term 'visibility management' as the means by which sexual minority youth handle perceptions of sexual orientation in peer group contexts.
This refers to a vigilance around appearing heterosexual in the peer group context while being able to come out in relationships where trust has been established.
Despite the resistance of empirical stalwarts such as Archer (2004), the appearance of social constructionism as a status nascendi of developmental psychology has been seen as a welcome and significant move (Coyle & Walton, 2004). Emerging areas of
developmental psychology are turning more to linguistic processes (Phoenix, 2004b) and social constructionism is seen as having a radical potential to shed new light on old
problems in the field of human development (Coyle & Walton, 2004). For example, two useful conclusions from Korobov and Bamberg (2004) are first, that adolescence is a time in which males act on an imperative to reconstitute their identities in visibly heterosexual ways and second, that the improved linguistic skills or 'discursive dexterity' during adolescence allow persons to increase and vary their linguistic positioning strategies to manage self-presentations.