Reconciling control and identity development: experiences of South African adolescents

The aim of this study was to explore how a group of South African adolescents experience and react to being controlled during their process of finding a personal identity. Adolescents from the Eastern Cape province in South Africa (n = 120; 58.33% female) participated in focus group discussions regarding their experiences of how control shaped their sense of self. Participants understood identity as a continuous and fluid process of negotiation and adjustment shaped by significant others and embedded in social context. Participants articulated various experiences of control, mostly negative. Through thematic analysis, three pathways were constructed as distinct reactions to control: Conforming and Submitting, Finding Freedom, and Internalising. Each of these reactions contains a unique combination of exploration and commitment, with specific implications for identity development and achievement.

“Whatever You Become, Just Be Proud of It.” Uncovering the Ways Families Influence Black and Latino Adolescent Boys’ Postsecondary Future Selves

As researchers and school stakeholders determine ways to best support Black and Latino adolescent boys from low-income communities in actualizing their postsecondary future ambitions, more attention is needed on the types of futures these boys imagine and how family members influence this process. Guided by future orientations and possible selves frameworks, this school-based ethnographic study investigated the ways families influenced what the author calls the “postsecondary future selves” of Black and Latino (i.e., U.S.-born Salvadoran) 11th-grade boys ( N = 5). Described as what youth conceptualize as possible, likely, and expected for their lives after high school, postsecondary future selves considers three future domains: “college” (postsecondary education), “career” (postcollege employment trajectory), and “condition” (expected financial stability, relational and familial prospects, future living arrangements, happiness, and joy). Findings indicate that families built their boys’ capacities for envisioning and making strides toward ideal futures. Finding “success,” “being somebody,” and “having a future” underscored familial messages that emphasized the salience of college going in obtaining a career and life condition that would lead their boys to finding pride and fulfillment. Implications support stakeholders in building adolescents’ efficacy for threading linkages between college going and college majors, career trajectories, and expected life conditions, thus complementing familial-based supports.

Relationship between Family Functioning and Possible Selves in Adolescents from Argentina

The goal of this study was to analyze the relationship between different family functioning types and the content, valence, and structure of adolescents' possible selves (PSs). Participants were adolescents (n = 392) of both genders (female = 54.9%) from private and catholic high schools in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina (age, M = 14.92, SD = 1.52). We performed a cluster analysis to explore family functioning profiles in terms of communication with parents, promotion of challenges, family cohesion, and flexibility. In order to study family functioning type and PSs content association, we performed a chi-squared test. To study family functioning type differences in PSs valence and structure we conducted a one-way MANOVA. The chi-squared test indicated that there was no significant association between family functioning type and adolescents' PSs spontaneous content. On the other hand, the MANOVA revealed the existence of significant differences in PSs valence between each type of family functioning group. In regard to the structure of PSs, there were no significant differences between family functioning types. In conclusion, adolescents who perceived positive family functioning have more positive PSs. Family functioning type was not related to PSs content and structure.

Perceptions of Undocumented Status and Possible Selves Among Latino/a Youth

Although only a portion of Latina/o adolescents in the United States are undocumented, the social perception of legal status may influence Latina/o youth living in immigrant communities more broadly. This perception has implications not only for how Latina/o youth understand themselves but also for how they construct their aspirations. Qualitative interviews and consensual qualitative research protocols were utilized to understand how perceptions of legal status might change images of possible selves for 14 Latina/o adolescents in an emerging immigrant community. Students described their hopes and worries for themselves as well as the prospects for a “typical” Latina/o peer and an undocumented Latina/o peer. Themes show more hopefulness for students’ own sense of self, a mixed opinion on the possibilities for a “typical” peer, and a hopeless view of the future for an undocumented youth. Implications for promoting hopeful possible selves within the constraints of the social context are offered.