James Marcia’s Theory of Identity Formation Essay

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Updated: Mar 10th, 2024

Introduction

Each person has to go through identity formation in order to become a full member of a society. In the course of identity, formation adolescences may encounter a lot of problems and obstacles, especially when belonging to minority ethnic groups and trying to fit the society they got into.

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Relying on Erik Erikson’s research on identity and physiological development, James Marcia, a Canadian developmental psychologist, extended some of Erikson’s models making the adolescent physiological development a central idea of his work. According two his theory, a crisis and a commitment are two parts which form the identity of adolescents. Researching the identity, Marcia sorted out four stages of physiological identity development which he called Identity Statuses. The first stage, Identity Diffusion, is a stage at which the adolescent does not yet have any ability to choose, in other words, he cannot make a commitment, thus he is not going through a crisis. At he second stage, named Identity Foreclosure the adolescent seems to be willing and able to make a commitment but without going through a crisis. The following stage is Identity Moratorium. At this stage the adolescent is ready to make a choice but has not made a commitment yet, at this, he is already in crisis. And the final stage is Identity Achievement at which the adolescent makes a commitment to the role or value he has chosen and when he has already gone through an identity crisis. By the way, being in one of this identity statuses, it is possible for the individual to move from one stage to the other.

Main body

Coming through these four stages the adolescents face one of the biggest problems which is achieving the identity. At this stage the individual has to fit the society which judges him by appearances, as well as the goals he has set himself in life and recognition from the other members of society becomes a sore point while going through this stage.

When speaking about fitting a society, a notion of “false-self” has to be discussed. The false self, or as it is also called the ego mind, is used when a person has to correspond to certain rules imposed by the society he lives in and can give false interpretation to the emotion arising in person. There also exist two types of false self which are healthy false self and the unhealthy one. The false self is considered healthy when it remains close to the true self, that is when person, acting in a way the society demands from him, still remembers who he is. Unhealthy false self is when a person is forced to fit in society but does not want it.

Conclusion

As far as the identity formation of minorities is concerned, most of the members of minority groups have dual identities. The members of minority ethnic adolescent groups go through social segregation and this does not depend on the formal law. They are sorted out by their origin, the colour of their skin, sexual orientation, the competence of their family and other factors which can be used to differentiate them from the others. That’s why while forming the identity minority groups face a lot of difficulties and trying to get integrated into a foreign society they always have a fear that they might never be accepted into it. What society can do to ease the process of adaptation for them is to increase the number of psychological organizations which would help the members of minority groups and especially children and adolescents, fit into a new society and get accustomed with a new life more quickly and easily.

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IvyPanda. (2024) 'James Marcia’s Theory of Identity Formation'. 10 March.

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IvyPanda. 2024. "James Marcia’s Theory of Identity Formation." March 10, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/james-marcias-theory-of-identity-formation/.

1. IvyPanda. "James Marcia’s Theory of Identity Formation." March 10, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/james-marcias-theory-of-identity-formation/.


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IvyPanda. "James Marcia’s Theory of Identity Formation." March 10, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/james-marcias-theory-of-identity-formation/.

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