Autonomy 9

Independence

  • focuses on external an ability to do things without supervision

    • driving and making money at 16 without legal no

autonomy

  • focuses on inner experiences

    • fundamental psychological need for agency

Autonomy as an adolescent issue

sense of self and autonomy are both very important

slef autonomy means to be self-governing is fundamental to development

capacity ot behave on your own

autonomy is more cohesive and dynamic

  • has emotional, cognitive, and behavioral aspects

  • all are important to feel independent and think healthily for yourself

  • is not the same of rebellion, and does not automatically equate to breaking away from family

  • is gradual, progressive, and relatively undramatic

    • adaptive in nature, does require some distance

      • increases novelty seeking and exploration

        • facilitates reproduction outside of the family, or creating stability for themselves

  • learn to govern their own behavior and in a responsible fashion

    • may feel pressure to grow up quickly and act like adults due to media these days

      • take on adult responsibilities to assist in times of need

  • need to develop psychologically and socially, but in modern world economic autonomy comes much later in life

    • cean lead to incogruencies, conflict, etc. due to rules

    • abilitiy to make own decisions should not have to do with financial independence to them

      • must find new ways to function more for economic support and stability, guidance, and nurturance….and from more sources (may be ground for a new theory on economically challenged minorities and teens…seek these things more often but have poor examples

  • is also about self-reliance and comes when challenged with appropriate challenges

  • find different things necessary for them to do in their own way, improves through time

    • can start with guidance

  • must establish and maintain healthy sense of autonomy

Puberty and Developing autonomy

  • change in emotional relationships at home

    • turn away from parents and towards friends, romantic partners (probs why i struggle to open up now bc i was never allowed to do this when i was younger)

    • naturally driven away from emotional exclusive dependence…but need good examples

cognitive change

  • being able to make independent decisions

  • intellectual abstraction increases

  • foresee future consequences of alternative courses of action all help the adolescent weigh various factors in a decision

  • begin to develop a sense of values and morals, rather than just of parents, and other sources of authroity and law

social roles

  • happens more the more you approach situations and ages when things occur

emotional autonomy

  • transformation of their close relationships

  • expression of affection, distribution of power, patterns of interaction based on competencies, concerns, and social roles

Emotional autonomy: detachment or individuation?

  • rush to parents a lot less when distressed as they get older

  • see their parents less all powerful and all knowing as before

  • emotional energy distributed in other relationships these days

  • see and interact with their parents as people, not just parents

  • bickering is not always an indication of diminishing relationships in fam

    • get closer as they get older, due to distance being correct, meaning it is good and transformation is best

      • should not become distant: be separate without becoming alienated, conflict, or hostility

  • individuation is the gradual, progressive sharpening of one’s sense of self as autonomous, competenet, and spaerate from their original support and environment

    • relinquish childish depdencecies on family in favor of more mature, responsible, and less dependent

      • those who do this accept responsibility of choices and actions rather than rebell

        • will respect parents choices and find solutions together through respect and critical thinking

Research on emotional autonomy

  • de-idealization

    • not putting parents on pedestal too much

    • more likely to happen in early adulthood

    • maintain connection

      • should not feel distant even if they become emotionally autonomous

        • adjust better psychologically

    • can be good or bad

      • bad: parents don’t have skills due to lack of effort and begin going to other sources for support, who have different skills or resources, etc.

  • individuation (370-371)

    • coined by Carl Jung

      • things about themselves that their parents aren’t aware of

      • emotional distancing (a good thing)

      • stimulated by cognitive adjustment

    • become separate and distinct from origin

    • value privacy more, and respect parents privacy more

      • have their own separate life, need trust to do things well

    • parents should have less control over their lives

  • psychological control

    • both de-idealization and individuation lead to children wanting to decide what is best for them

      • maybe parent should ask why they want to do that, and say it is ok to tell them the real reason why to come to an agreement

Parenting and emotional autonomy

  • parenting styles 72

Development of behavioral autonomy

  • hold multiple viewpoints in mind at once (prefrontal correlation)

    • compare them

    • contemplate long-term consequences of possible decisions, and risks and benefits

    • long-term planning and logic

      • separating logic from emotion

    • self-reflection

  • PF is the last area of the brain to develop in adolescence

  • enhance role-taking capabilities

  • can sense why someone has the advice they do, biases, vested interests, and where expertise may be or be lacking

  • make these decisions on their own, rather than while solely taking on the thinking and permission of others

    • have weight and real reason behind their decision

early vs. late adolescence

early

  • rewards and immediate consequences

  • rewards come first, don’t consider risks

    • looking cool vs. falling

    • risks seem much less real

late

changes in decision-making abilities

  • improvements in self-regulation

    • control impulses

    • READ THIS SECTION MORE THOROUGHLY

when do adolescents make decisions as well as adults

by age 16

  • basic information process skills

    • working memory

    • attention

    • logical reasoning abilities

differentially within mid 20s

  • sophisticated cognitive skills

    • planning ahead

    • judging relative costs and benefits of risky situations

    • coordination of cognition and emotion

      • feelings interfere with logical reasoning

        • logic can overcome strong feelings like passion, love, hate, anger, laziness, etc.

changes in susceptibility to influence

  • READ MORE THOROUGHLY

  • peers and parents

    • behavioral autonomy is important in both relationships

  • peer pressure

  • differences

  • parenting and behavioral autonomy

    • READ MORE THOROUGHLY

ethnic and cultural differences in expectations for autonomy

  • READ MORE

  • are not universal in different parts of the world

  • much more independent in Japan

generational changes

  • ways children are raised

    • balance of space and quality time

    • spending time to teach them skills they want and need

  • what children are allowed to do

    • times per week teens go out with friends

      • downturn after 2008 and just continued ot go down

        • may be due to electronic hobbies and changes in what industries are open due to covid and advances

          • less malls to hangout and other places of leisrure

          • less likely to have jobs

          • gas more expensive these days

      • underdevelopment of emotional and behavioral

        • less professional

      • kids more sassy and rude due to being online all the time

        • negative emotional connections with parents

          • underestimate the effect of media

      • new generation of parents more strict at first (70s parents)

      • new generations of parents less strict (80s-2000s)

      • m

one minute note

  • is a teaching strategy

  • stopping and see what the kids have learned so far and taken from this

Jonathan Haidt interview (New York Times) & one minute note

what is a good childhood

  • effective in making you a successful adult

  • what is a functional member of society in this sense

what is a fun childhood?

  • thrive if this overlaps with a good childhood

  • roamed and highly aged diverse with random kids

    • kids are always almost exclusively around kids their age

    • what is a functional member of society in this sense

    • not parents job to socialize kid

      • most important development do not happen around parents

  • schools are like factories

one minute note

  • society freaked out about abduction in the 90s

    • freaking out can lead to helicopterism, but I do think it can also lead to good supervision

    • could’ve had a jump in how much both fathers and mothers spend time with a jump in productivity, but less distance in culture

      • quality time seen as the most important and maybe the only tek of quality time

    • less trust in neighbors (loss of social capital and connection in society)

      • adults a lot more detached these days

The Development of Cognitive Autonomy

  • stimulated by emotional and behavioral autonomy

    • put in situations to where you realize or decide your values and what feels right or wrong

      • clearly can also be good or bad

values, opinions, beliefs

three trends

  • become more and more abstract in how they think about morals, politics, and religion

    • more comp. decisions about how to act when their beliefs clash with those of others

  • beliefs become more rooted in general principles

    • e.g. breaking the law is less important than protesting for the environment

  • beliefs become increasingly founded in their own values, not those passed on from various sources

    • may or may not lead to stubborn challenging

    • why childhood is so important to be loving, explanatory

      • avoid traumatizing them

enhanced reasoning, exploration of different values systems

Moral development during adolescence

affects both reasoning and behavior

  • how they think about moral dilemmas and how they behave in situations that call for moral judgements

  • Moral reasoning and moral behavior

Piaget stages

  • preconventional

    childhood mostly

    • reference to external and physical events

    • not based on society’s standards, rules, or conventions

    • focus on rewards and punishments associated with diffrent courses of action

  • conventional

    late ch. early ado.

    • based on rules of society, institutions and conventions and how they’ll be judged by others

    • special importance given to role people are expected to pay

    • behave properly based on if they have approval of certain people and to maintain social order

      • correctness of rules is not questions

      • duty by upholding and respecting rules they are supposed to dfollow

      • maybe a 9 yr old

    • most common type of rules

      • ok but only insofar as those standards support and serve moral ends.

  • postconventional

  • - ado or early YA

prosocial reasoning, prosocial behavior, and volunteerism

political thinking

religious beliefs

civic engagement