scholarly journals Stability and change in autobiographical reasoning: A 4‐year longitudinal study of narrative identity development

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate C. McLean ◽  
David Dunlap ◽  
Sarah C. Jennings ◽  
Nicole S. Litvitskiy ◽  
Jennifer P. Lilgendahl
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate C. McLean ◽  
David Dunlap ◽  
Sarah Jennings ◽  
Nicole Litvitskiy ◽  
Jennifer Lilgendahl

Objective. Research on personality development has traditionally focused on rank-order stability and mean-level change in the context of personality traits. The present study expands this approach to the examination of change and stability at another level of personality – narrative identity – by focusing on autobiographical reasoning. Drawing from theory in personality and developmental science, we examine stability and change in exploratory processing and positive and negative self-event connections. Method. We take advantage of a longitudinal study of emerging adult personality and identity development, which includes four waves of data across four years, examining reasoning in two domains of identity, academics and romance (n = 1520 narratives; n = 176 – 638 participants, depending on the analysis). Results. We found moderate rank-order stability in autobiographical reasoning, but more so for exploratory processing than self-event connections. We found mean-level increases for exploratory processing in the context of romance, and stability in the context of academics. For self-event connections, we saw a decrease for positive connections, and for negative connections about romance, with stability for negative connections about academics. Conclusions. Implications include developmental differences in types of reasoning, as well as the sensitivity of narrative identity to revealing the contextual nature of personality development.


2015 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 272-292 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claude-Hélène Mayer

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate insights into the identity construction and development of a selected single male individual in Cape Town, South Africa. It aims at increasing the in-depth understanding of the complexities of identity construction in a transcultural setting and provides emic perspectives on a micro-individual level over a period of ten years. Design/methodology/approach – This research study is based on the post-modernist premise by considering phenomenological and interpretative paradigms most relevant. It is a longitudinal study, conducted with a single individual over a period of ten years by using various research methods as well as triangulation of methods, theories and data. Data were analysed through content analysis. Findings – This research provides in-depth information on the struggle of a single person to construct and re-construct his identity and find answers to the question “Who am I?” in the multifaceted and hypercomplex transcultural environment of Cape Town. It shows the attempts to developing a coherent multiple identity over a period of ten years, reconstructing the past, creating the present and envisioning the future. Practical implications – This research has practical implications for practitioners working with identity (development) in transcultural settings. It provides important in-depth information on “nomadic identities” for coaching, counselling or therapies in transcultural settings. Originality/value – This paper provides new and original insights into long-term identity development of an individual in a transcultural urban space.


1989 ◽  
Vol 154 (4) ◽  
pp. 544-551 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel Maziade ◽  
Jacques Thivierge ◽  
Robert Côté ◽  
Pierrette Boutin ◽  
Hugues Bernier

Few, if any, of children's behavioural or cognitive characteristics assessed in the first years of life demonstrate stability until later childhood; early characteristics have so far failed to show an association with future psychopathology. This longitudinal study, from 4–8 months to 4.7 years old, focused on stability and change of extreme temperamental traits in groups of infants subselected from a large birth cohort. Persistent extreme temperament at four and eight months old did not increase stability of temperament to four years of age, relative to other children in the whole population. Sizeable change occurred, and the environmental parameters associated with negative temperamental change did not seem to be the same as those related to positive change. Boys with extreme scores were more stable, while girls appeared more prone to positive change. It is hypothesised that the direction of temperamental change in the first years could be more meaningful for long-term prediction of disorders than any one assessment of temperament taken at any one year.


2005 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 357-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Lewis ◽  
George B Forsythe ◽  
Patrick Sweeney ◽  
Paul T. Bartone ◽  
Craig Bullis

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document