Identity Development and Personal Fable
As mentioned, the Personal fable is an important process that every adolescent experiences and it plays an important role in the adolescent's self-perception in all life stages. Research has shown the personal fable to have an impact on identity development specifically. When it comes to identity, adolescent egocentrism is considered an important construct, especially given its relation to self-compassion. Adolescents gradually develop cognitive skills which allow them to understand or speculate what others are thinking. In other words, adolescents develop theory of mind.
Specifically, theory of mind is an individual's ability to understand another's actions, thoughts, desires, and to hypothesize on their intentions. This construct has been found to emerge once a child reaching three to four years of age and continues to develop until adolescence. Müge Artar conducted a study comparing adolescents identified as having higher levels of egocentrism with adolescents exhibiting more emotional inference and looked into their relationships with their parents. An adolescent's ability to infer a family member's thoughts is considered an important developmental stage. Social-emotional questions were based on the adolescents’ understanding of their mother and father’s beliefs. Participants were asked questions such as “When you have problems with your mother/father, what does your mother/father feel? What do you feel? Does your mother/father think what you feel?” Most of the adolescents perceived their relationship with parents relevantly and also accurately perceived images about family network.
It can be inferred then that theory of mind acts as a counter to egocentrism. Where egocentrism revolves around the individual and everything in relation to one's own perspective, theory of mind allows for the inclusion of the fact that other people have differing viewpoints.
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Famous quotes containing the words identity, development, personal and/or fable:
“Growing has no connection with audience. / Audience has no
connection with identity. / Identity has no
connection with a universe. / A universe has no
connection with human nature.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“Dissonance between family and school, therefore, is not only inevitable in a changing society; it also helps to make children more malleable and responsive to a changing world. By the same token, one could say that absolute homogeneity between family and school would reflect a static, authoritarian society and discourage creative, adaptive development in children.”
—Sara Lawrence Lightfoot (20th century)
“I am in no boastful mood. I shall not do more than I can, and I shall do all I can to save the government, which is my sworn duty as well as my personal inclination. I shall do nothing in malice. What I deal with is too vast for malicious dealing.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“In spite of the air of fable ... the public were still not at all disposed to receive it as fable. I thence concluded that the facts of my narrative would prove of such a nature as to carry with them sufficient evidence of their own authenticity.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)