Identity Before Adulthood: The Identity of Upper Secondary School Students in Poland

Abstract

The process of identity formation in late adolescence these days differs significantly from what it was in the previous generations. This is a consequence of the demographic and economic changes that have taken place in recent years, locally as well as globally. The research project whose selected results are presented in this monograph concerned young people’s functioning in the late phase of adolescence. The object of analysis was identity at the threshold of adulthood and its sociocultural correlates (gender, type of upper secondary school, parents’ education) as well as selected psychological correlates: (the cognitive styles involved in identity formation; three self-conscious emotions: pride, shame, and guilt; moratorium and transitive life orientation and the type of social participation). The research was conducted in Poznań, in six vocational school complexes and three general secondary schools, in 2012-2015. The obtained material made it possible to perform cross-sectional (the results of six groups of students from six consecutive stages of the study), time-lag (three consecutive years of first- and second-year students), and longitudinal comparisons (changes during three years of study in the upper secondary school). The analysis of results showed that gender, age, and parents’ education were factors of low significance to identity formation. Among the psychological factors, the style of processing identity problems, transitive life orientation, and the sense of pride had the highest positive significance. The results clearly show that the educational environment of schools with vocational curricula is not conducive to the development of mature forms of identity.