Exam 1: Childhood and Delinquency

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Erik Erikson stated that youths may experience a life crisis in later adolescence, at around ages 16 to 18.
Erikson labeled this a struggle between identity and role diffusion.
Ego identity is formed when youths develop a full sense of the self, combining how they see themselves and how they fit in with others.
Role diffusion occurs when youth experience personal uncertainty, spread themselves too thin, and look to others to give them a sense of identity they cannot create for themselves.
Psychologists also find that late adolescence is a period dominated by the yearning for independence from parental domination.
The mixture of biological change and desire for autonomy during the teenage years creates a time of rebelliousness and conflict with authority at home, at school, and in the community.
Such feelings can overwhelm young people and lead them to consider suicide as a "solution."
Although most young people do not take their own lives, millions are left troubled, disturbed, and at risk for delinquency, drug use, and other forms of antisocial behavior-acting out or externalized behavior that begins in early adolescence may then persist into adulthood.
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