Part 1 Essay

Describe the similarities and differences in the way identity is conceptualised by the psychosocial theory of identity and social identity theory.

I will start this essay by explaining both theories, Psychosocial theory and Social Identity Theory mentioning what is understood by identity and answering my essay question describing their similarities and differences.

Identity is a major area of study for Psychology. Over the decades many psychologists in the field tried to explain what identity was, and are still to explain how it is formed. Identity is what defines us as human beings, what we do on our day-to-day life, and our interactions within society.

Psychosocial Theory

Erickson viewed identity as a psychosocial process. A psychological assessment of ‘me’ and a social assessment of ‘me’.

For Erikson, society where children and adolescents grow up would have an impact to their identity, therefore his theory was from point of view that identity was a psychosocial process. Erickson argued that we created our identity from a balanced, constant and reliable sense of who we are and what we are to our society, our group community (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.53).

He developed the sense core identity where an individual would base all his identity building up from our past towards the future.

Erikson believed an individual would take their identity for granted if life was good but to the minimal problem this identity would be questioned (e.g. illness or impairment).

For Erikson it was normal to be in conflict during teen years with our identity (identity crisis). Identity was in constant change hence the conflicts with selves, to what he called ‘normative crisis’ (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.53).

Erikson developed 8 stages of identity development. Stage 5, adolescence, where adolescents had the chance to experiment various identities to safely chose one they could see themselves in the future. There was a standing by period where adolescents could postpone the change from adolescence to adulthood where responsibilities and life changing decisions had to be made (ego identity). To this period Erikson called the ‘Psychosocial Moratorium’ where adolescents were excused from taking responsibilities without experiencing it first (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.55).

Erikson identify as an identity crisis where adolescents had problems in accepting their growing and the lack of not knowing who they were. Individuals were at war with themselves trying to find their role in society (role dysfunction) and secure their ego identity – ‘secure felling of who and what one is’ (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.55).

In adolescence, adolescents turn to bulling to disguise their fear of losing their identity, and being cruel is a defence mechanism, hence their link to groups ideals not to lose this identity, which easily could identify the outsiders from the insiders (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.56).

Marcia (1966, 1980, 1994) used a method that could measure Erikson’s theory in a form of a semi-structured interview. This method allowed a conversation between the interviewer and the interviewee, as questions could be asked in different order and it was open questions rather that questioner type.

The researcher would tape the conversation so it could be used the interviewee own words. This method was time consuming as samples had to be transcript and analysed, but the benefit was that quantitative and qualitative data could be extracted.

Marcia developed the stages created by Erikson where stage 5 was subdivided in other 4 stages:

Identity diffusion – adolescents are not committed to any young adulthood transition/responsibilities or exploring different roles in society/groups.

Identity foreclosure – adolescents assume an identity to ‘copy’ a parent or have an authoritarian personality, strict views of what is right or wrong and do not explore other roles in society.

Moratorium – Adolescents that would explore every stage of its adolescence, every role possible, without commit to any in particular, even though they knew what a commitment is.

Marcia argues that moratorium is a pre-requisite for identity achievement (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.60).

Identity achievement – The stage that successful adolescents achieve after the moratorium process. Adolescents explore their various options in life without committing to any without knowing for sure what they want in life.

Social Identity theory

Tajfel contrasting Erikson’s and Marcia’s theory of identity, developed that instead of our identity derived from individuality it would grow from social interactivity and group integration (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.62).

Tajfel’s students named this theory as Social Identity Theory (SIT). He divided identity into 2 sub-classes, one personal identity (relationships) and the other as a social identity (individual place in society e.g. woman, Portuguese).

For Tajfel a social group was when two or more individuals shared a common identification or who saw themselves as members of the same social group.

A category was only a category when in comparison to another category or categories, e.g. White/black, man/woman (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.62).

Tajfel believed that an individual would labelled himself according to a certain attitude and behaviours that he believed in and could identify with.

For SIT the importance of an individual to feel compelled to belong to a certain group was high valued rather than when an individual only shared some characteristics or similarities with someone within the group (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.64).

Experimental methods were used by Tajfel where experiments were elaborated and manipulated to create what he called ‘minimal groups’.

In Tajfel et al (1971) and Billing and Tajfel (1973) experiments the outcome was than even though the groups were chosen randomly and had nothing to gain or lose between them, discrimination against the out-group was existent and favouritism to the in-group presented (as cited in Phoenix, 2007, p.65).

Psychosocial theory argues that personality changes identity. SIT argues that social differences in power affect identity. Using Social Mobility an individual improve his position within the group (e.g. Job promotion), also social change can affect an individual identity in group.

Social change can occur in two ways.

Through social creativity which is promoting a positive point of views to certain characteristics (e.g. black is beautiful slogan in 1960s and 1970s) or through social competition which forces social changes. In social creativity individuals from devalued groups or to devalued groups, promote a positive idea to improve their social identity (of its members), while in social competition groups demand that a change is made.

In conclusion

The psychosocial approach of identity claims that identity development is achieved through the influence of both personal and social factors.

SIT defended that Identity is achievable through social events in our young life which results in gradually building of our identity.

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Part 2 Ethics question

Read the following vignette and then answer the questions below.

A university researcher is interested in exploring whether or not children aged 8–10 make reliable eyewitnesses. To do this, the researcher plans to go into local schools and carry out a simple eyewitness task in the classroom. This involves showing children a video of a petit-theft, and subsequently interviewing them about what they had seen. They plan to gain permission from the school head teachers to play the video during normal lesson time, and then pull the children individually out of class to take part in a structured interview with the researcher. Answers to questions will be recorded and later transcribed (i.e. the questions and answers written down) for them to analyse. Children will be fully debriefed about the purpose of the experiment after they have completed the interview.

The researcher sends their proposal to the university ethics committee.

1. The Ethics Committee does not grant ethical approval for the proposal, citing failure to adequately address the issues involved in consent (as required by the British Psychological Society) as a primary reason. Explain why this might have been the case.

The BPS code explicit says that no children under 16 years old of age, are allowed to be participant in an experiment of any kind without prior consent of parents or legal guardians at the time of experiment. Also a full discloser of purpose of experiment must be explain prior to experiment take place to the children and legal tutors. This at any time can have the right to withdraw or to assist to experiments without any involvement. Any legal acts and legislation must be disclosure and explain to all participants including the legal guardians and parents. All material must be disclose to participants after experiments and in any time the participants can request that their data must be destroyed (as cited in Oates, 2009, p.31-32). As the above experiment fail to follow this proceeding BPS couldn’t permit such experiment.

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2. Explain three of the other ethical problems raised by the proposed study.

The researcher plans to request permission to the head master so the children can see a movie during school time. Not only this will affect their school routine, but the authorization, as mention above must also come from parents and they alone must be informed before an experiment is made.

The extract does not mention how long will the experiment take to end so assuming that this itself is an error I will also assume that children will be exposed to long periods of waiting so every child is interviewed and break times and normal cessation of school day will be prolonged. All this will incur further problems as provide food for children while waiting, toilet breaks, further adult supervision and parents demands and their lack of information about what is happening will not be taken lightly from concerned parents or legal guardians.

The children are being exposed to a video that may or may not have future consequences in their lives as the nature of the video is of a crime being committed even though a ‘petit-theft’. What it might be seen as a mild crime to an adult it might have severe consequences into a child mind. Also children will be separated from the rest of class without knowing what is happening and the researcher will then stop being just a simple observant to be a participant, which itself will invalidate the experiment.

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3. Suggest how you might improve this study and explain the ethical problem(s) this would address.

Explain my experiment to BPS and head master of my intentions and therefore prepare any forms of consent. Made questioners about the video so I could see the extent of its nature and what outcomes could come from seeing it. If possible rearrange school material so it could fit the experiment and minimize exposed time to it so children would not need to ‘suffer’ for long periods of waiting. I would provide entertainment so children could enjoy the process. Some of the implications are, children might not react as they should as they were briefed before. The entertainment could make an impact to children outcome of the experiment.

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References

Dodson, M.; Haslam, A; Reicher, S. and Senior, C (2006, 2009). Code of Human Research Ethics. Leicester: The British Psychological Society. p30-31.

Phoenix, A. (2007). Identities and diversities. In: Miell, D.; Phoenix, A. and Thomas, K. DSE212 Mapping Psychology. 2nd ed. Milton Keynes: The Open University. p41-89.