The Importance of Ethnicity in the Development of Identity of Black Adolescents
- 1 August 1989
- journal article
- research article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Psychological Reports
- Vol. 65 (1), 75-82
- https://doi.org/10.2466/pr0.1989.65.1.75
Abstract
Ego-identity status was examined in 20 male and 20 female black junior and senior high school students. Ego-identity was assessed by a semistructured interview measuring questioning and commitment in the traditional areas of occupation, ideology (religion and politics), sexual-interpersonal attitudes and behavior, and the newly added area of ethnicity. The greatest questioning and commitment occurred in the area of ethnicity. Ethnicity was most predictive of over-all identity-status and was seen as most important to self-definition. The other area of central importance was occupation. While the ideological and sexual-interpersonal areas have been found in previous research to have central importance for white adolescents, they were found in this sample of black adolescents to show the lowest concordance with overall identity and to be cited as having least importance in self-definition. The lowest amount of questioning and commitment occurred in these areas.Keywords
This publication has 8 references indexed in Scilit:
- Sex differences in identity statusSex Roles, 1988
- How Minorities Continue to Be Excluded from Equal Employment Opportunities: Research on Labor Market and Institutional BarriersJournal of Social Issues, 1987
- Woman's Place in Man's Life CycleHarvard Educational Review, 1979
- Toward the development of an objective assessment of ego-identity statusJournal of Youth and Adolescence, 1979
- The Thomas and Cross Models of Psychological NigrescenceJournal of Black Psychology, 1978
- Relationship among ego identity status, field-independence, and traditional femininityJournal of Youth and Adolescence, 1975
- Attitudes toward premarital intercourse in determining ego identity status in college women1Journal of Personality, 1972
- Development and validation of ego-identity status.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1966