International Teacher Education Conference 2014 1

International Teacher Education Conference 2014
INTRODUCTION
It is a debated topic whether forming healthy relationships is primarily dependent on fulfilling one’s
own identity among developmental psychologists. For instance, according to Erikson (1968) people could form
close relationships only after solving their own crisis. Intimacy is a relationship between trust based on
acceptance of uniqueness and differences and emotions (Kan and Cares, 2006, cited in., Eryılmaz and Ercan,
2011).
Erikson’s developmental theory is the first place to see this phenomenon. According to Erikson, there
are eight critical period in a person’s life. In each period, there is a crisis and conflict to be solved. Erikson stated
that conflicts faced during developmental periods are not a disaster. Instead, it is a critical turning point to fulfill
one’s potential. People could develop healthy personality to the extend s/he cope with these conflicts. In this
way, a person could be equipped with tools to coper with the conflict s/he will face during the later
developmental periods (Özdemir, Özdemir, Kadak, and Nasıroğlu, 2012). Young people that is the focus of the
current study should have a steady identity sense in order to feel that s/he is ready to adulthood period. Hence, it
is a important problem for a young people not to have sense of steady identity especially just before passing to
the adulthood period and disrupt their harmony at some circumstances (Dereboy and Dereboy,1997 cited in
Arslan and Arı, 2008).
Marcia added the fact that whether a person have crisis or not as a parameter to Erikson’s theory
proposed identity status concept and defined identity statuses and defined those statuses bade on availability of
the dimensions of commitment and exploration. In other words, for Marcia, exploration of identity is ended with
a status and there could be transitions between statuses. Marcia stated that foreclosure, identity diffusion,
moratorium and identity achievement are the identity statuses (Atak, 2011).
Arnett (2000), like Erikson, studied identity exploration but, unlike Erikson, stated that identity
exploration process is not end up during adolescence period. An adolescent conduct experimentations in the
areas of vocation, love and world views. Those experimentations become intense during emerging adulthood
period (cited in Atak, 2011).
During emerging adulthood period, five basic psychological of identity was proposed (Adams and
Marshall, 1996, pp. 433; Serafini and Adams, 2002): (i) to present a structure enabling a person to understand
who s/he is: Identity enable person to be aware of his/her autonomy and uniqueness. This awareness further
present a structure enabling a person to be self-confident and having self-respect. (ii) to present meaning and
direction sense with various connections, values and goals: identity is to provide a base where a person could
direct or control his/her behaviors. (iii) to present sense of personal control: identity is to present a sense of an
ability to express yourself independently, free will, and sense autonomy. (iv) to present a sense of consistency,
continuity and harmony between values, beliefs and ideas. Identity is to present harmony ability and ability to
have synthesis about yourself in a period of time. (v) To present an awareness about the probabilities and
alternatives related to the future: Identity provides a future directedness which give opportunity for fulfilling
your own potential (cited in Demir, 2011a).
Studies of identity functions conducted in Turkey is very limited Demir (2011b) conducted a study with
253 graduate students which showed that structure, goal, future, harmony and control sub-dimensions of identity
functions have a predictive power over life satisfaction and explain %28 of it. It was found that there is a
relationship between future relatedness and coping styles of active planning, seeking outside support. Another
relationship was found between personal control and active planning, sheltering to religion and acceptance
(Önen, 2012).
Majority of recent publications generally focused on Marcia’s Kimlik Statuses Årseth, Kroger,
Martinussen and Marcia (2009) conducted a meta-analysis with 550 empirical study published between 1966 and
2005. The findings of the empirical studies conducted in Turkey are as follows;
Atak, Kapçı and Çok (2013) who proposed that studies related to identity should focus on emerging
adulthood instead of adolescence, conducted a study with 700 young people between the ages of 19-26. The
focus of the study was individuation types and identity statuses. In the study, it was found that people in
developmental individuation group had more healthy identity forming in comparison to people in standard
individuation group. On the other hand, Ego statuses were found in close relationship with family attitudes. It
was found that authoritarian and permissive family attitudes, in comparison to neglecting attitudes, were more
related to identity foreclosure (Cakir and Aydin, 2005). Similarly, Eryılmaz and Aypay (2011) found that there is
a strong relationship between subjective well-being and identity achievement and foreclosure identity statuses.
Bacanlı (2011) found that there is a positive relationship identity achievement and rational decision
making style, and negative relationship with dependent and undecided styles. Additionally, he further found that
ego statuses are in close relationship with impulsive and undecided styles.
The problems related to interpersonal relationships which is the other variable in the current study, has
an effect in many field in life. This fact is already proven by many researches. For instance, Durak-Batıgün and
Atay-Kayı (2014) avoidance, anger and manipulative sub-dimensions of “Interpersonal Style Scale” were found
to have predictive power over impatient approach, unplanned approach and evaluative approach sub-dimensions
of “Problem Solving Inventory”.
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