A | B |
identity versus role confusion | Erikson's term for the fifth stage of development in which the person tries to figure out "Who am I?" but is confused as to which of many possible roles to adopt. |
identity | A consistent definition of one's self as a unique individual, in terms of roles, attitudes, beliefs, and aspiratons. |
identity achievement | Erikson's term for the attainment of identity, or the point at which a person understands who he or she is as a unique individual, in accord with past experiences and future plans. |
role confusion | A situation in which an adolescent does not seem to know or care what his or her identity is. |
foreclosure | Erikson's term for premature identity formation, which occurs when an adolescent adopts parents' or society's roles and values wholesale, without questioning or analysis. |
moratorium | An adolescent's choice of a socially acceptable way to postpone making identity-achievement decisions. Going to college is a common example. |
gender identity | A person's acceptance of the roles and behaviors that society associates with the biological categories of male and female. |
sexual orientation | A term that refers to whether a person is sexually and romantically attracted to others of the same sex, the opposite sex, or both sexes. |
bickering | Petty, peevish arguing, usually repeated and ongoing. |
parental monitoring | Parents' ongoing awareness of what their children are doing, where, and with whom. |
clique | A group of adolescents made up of close friends who are loyal to one another while excluding outsiders. |
crowd | A larger group of adolescents who have something in common but who are not necessarily friends. |
peer pressure | Encouragement to conform to one's friends or contemporaries in behavior, dress, and attitude; usually considered a negative force, as when adolescent peers encourage one another to defy adult authority. |
deviancy training | Destructive peer support in which one person shows another how to rebel against authority or social norms. |
clinical depression | Feeling of hopelessness, lethargy, and worthlessness that last two weeks or more. |
rumination | Repeatedly thinking and talking about past experiences; can contribute to depression. |
suicidal ideation | Thinking about suicide, usually with some serious emotional and intelletual or cognitive overtones. |
cluster suicides | Several suicides committed by members of a group within a brief period of time. |
parasuicide | Any potentially lethal action against the self that does not result in death. |
juvenile delinquent | A person under the age of 18 who breaks the law. |
life-course-persistent offender | A person whose criminal activity typically begins in early adolescence and continues through life; a career criminal. |
adolescence-limited offender | A person whose criminal activity stops by age 21. |
generational forgetting | The idea that each new generation forgets what the previous generation learn. As used here, the term refers to knowledge about the harm drugs and do. |