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The Youth, Frail and Confused: Apt to Identity Crisis

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The Youth, Frail and Confused: Apt to Identity Crisis Thesis Statement: The young, the frail and the confused are likely to experience identity crisis because they are vulnerable, easily discouraged, and they usually find it difficult to establish a personality or goal; and even if they succeeded to establish one, it is even more strenuous for them to commit to a certain identity. Whenever people encounter the word “identity crisis,” it never fails to arouse feelings of mixed curiosity, mirth and discomfort. Some feel curious, because it is either they have not gone through this stage yet, or because they just have an undeniably excessive level of inquisitiveness and interest. Others feel mirth, for they know that have already …show more content…

This will explain the common clothes, styles, attitudes and even their ways rebellion. “Who told you to get a tattoo?” “All my friends have it; it is a sign of the sisterhood of our group.” Above is a simple dialogue between a parent and an adolescent, wherein an evident peer pressure took place. Even an adolescent lacks an interest or desire to do a certain thing or practice, he/she is being forced to conform to the laid required action by his/her peer group due to the fear of “getting left behind.” Therefore, in this sense, the adolescent loses his/her own identity, and has nothing to do but to comply with the groups’ demands. Moreover, the adolescent’s practice of having a specific “idol” also contributes in the identity loss of the adolescent. The excessive admiration of the idol’s attributes results in the defense mechanism called identification, wherein the adolescent identifies an idol that represents his/her ideal self-image, and consequently imitates the idol’s dispositions. In the process, he/she neglects his/her real self and desperately tries to diffuse his/her own insecurities through imitating a more subjective, CORTEZ 4 acceptable behaviour and dispositions. In addition to the factors that were previously mentioned, the natural development of “consciousness,” which arises from the teenager’s encounter with the inexorable features of the adolescence stage (physical growth, sexual

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