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Self-Conceptions from
Childhood to Adolescence: A brief experiment Abstract This experiment was designed to confirm previous research on the development of one’s self-conception from childhood through adolescence. Using the results of Montemayor and Eisen’s (1977) study, as well as other research on the developing self-concept, I hypothesized that children in the Preoperational Stage hold more concrete self-conceptions than those in the Concrete Operational stage and Formal Operational stage, whose self-conceptions are more abstract. I used four subjects who were of five, eleven, sixteen, and twenty years of age in order to clearly detect the change of self-conceptions developed throughout Piaget’s Preoperational, Concrete Operational, and Formal Operational stages. Each participant was asked to answer the question "Who am I?" and responses were written verbatim. The study confirms Montemayor and Eisen’s (1977) findings that self-conceptions become more abstract after eight years of age and less focused on physical characteristics, which becomes evident as the child enters adolescence and later adulthood. Introduction Clearly young children’s self-conceptions differ dramatically from those held by older children, adolescents, and adults. Several studies show that this change is a difference between concrete and abstract self-descriptions, which develop through adulthood. Piaget’s research on the cognitive changes one experiences with the physical world between childhood and adolescence (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958) helps support the theory of self-conception development. Piaget suggested that there are four distinct stages that describe children’s cognitive development depending on their age. His preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational stages of cognitive development help explain why an individual’s self-conception becomes more abstract as they become an adult. Piaget classified children between the ages of eighteen months and six years of age as belonging in the preoperational stage of cognitive development. During this stage, children are very focused on the appearance of things and are egocentric (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). This leads to the hypothesis that children in this stage would hold self-conceptions that focus mainly on appearance, as would their conceptions of others. Children between the ages of six and twelve years of age are classified in the concrete operational stage. During this stage, they become less focused on the appearance of things and begin thinking abstractly if there is concrete logic to back it up (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). This implies that children in this stage should be developing more abstract conceptions of themselves and others that are not based primarily on physical appearance. The formal operational stage is Piaget’s final stage in cognitive development, which occurs from twelve years of age into adulthood. During this stage, adolescents begin thinking hypothetically and abstractly and are able to simultaneously take several different perspectives aside from their own (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). This contributes to the hypothesis that adolescents’ and adults’ conceptions of themselves and others should be very abstract and should involve many different people’s perspectives. These hypotheses are also largely based on Montemayor and Eisen’s (1977) study of The Development of Self-Conceptions from Childhood to Adolescence. The results of their study "support the general hypothesis that with increasing age an individual’s self-concept becomes more abstract and less concrete" (Montemayor and Eisen, 1977, p. 317). My experiment is simply a replication of this study. Method Subjects Four subjects were used, aged six, eleven, sixteen, and twenty years of age. All participants were Caucasian, three of which were male. Procedure This experiment was conducted in a natural setting and each participant was asked the question "Who am I?" Their responses were written down verbatim. Results Response from a six-year old female:
Response from an eleven-year old male:
Response from a sixteen-year old adolescent male:
The final response was from a twenty-year old adult male:
Four categories were used to classify each subject’s self-conception, which included behavior descriptions, physical descriptions, psychological descriptions, and ideological and belief descriptions. Each response was placed in one of these categories. Table 1 shows the number of times each participant made a reference to one of the four categories in answering the question "Who am I?" Table 1: The Number of Responses in Each Category by Participants
Discussion The results of this study support the hypothesis that children give more abstract self-conceptions with age, clearly demonstrated by Table 1. There is shift from behavioral and physical descriptions to more psychological, ideological, and belief descriptions as the number of years increases. The first set of responses from a six-year old girl makes several references to physical characteristics, as well as some behavioral characteristics. According to Piaget, this self-description should be expected from a child in the preoperational stage of cognitive development since they tend to be focused on the appearance of things. The next description from an eleven-year old boy included more behavioral descriptions, rather than physical descriptions, as well as some psychological portrayals. This also follows Piaget’s idea that children in the concrete operational stage tend to be less focused on appearance. This description also demonstrates that children at this age are beginning to understand their capabilities. The third and fourth responses from sixteen and twenty-year old males clearly illustrate Piaget’s description of the formal operational stage, which is the final stage of cognitive development. According to Piaget, they are now thinking abstractly without needing concrete logic to back things up and they are also able to think hypothetically and take several people’s perspectives at once. Piaget’s notions of the formal operational stage account for these two individual’s abstract self-concept descriptions. Their responses are based heavily on beliefs and psychological descriptions. Each response supports Montemayor and Eisen’s (1977) finding that "what appears to be the self for the child is only the set of elements from which the adolescent infers a set of personal beliefs and psychic style that uniquely characterize himself" (Montemayor and Eisen, 1977, p. 318).
References Inhelder, B., and Piaget, J. (1958)The Growth of Logical Thinking from Childhood to Adolescence. New York: Basic Books, Inc. Montemayor, R., and Eisen, M. (1977). The Development of Self-Conceptions
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