Guiding Questions: DEP 4305, Psychology of Adolescence
We have provided a set of questions for each chapter so you can focus your time reading and
studying the material on concepts and relationships among those concepts. We believe these
concepts are key to understanding how adolescents’ behaviors, feelings, and cognitions change
from entry into puberty through emerging adulthood. These questions are aimed at stimulating a
deeper level of learning than traditional read, memorize, and recite strategies might yield. It is
important that you take a look at the questions for each chapter before you read the chapter. That
way, you will have a structured way to think about the material as you read it. The examinations
will be constructed to focus on the concepts and relationships highlighted in the guiding
questions.
In order to use the questions effectively, you and your colleagues might be well served to tackle
them first individually by thinking about your own responses before you read the text and the
power point slides. Make some notes about your own ideas. Then, as you read the text and the
slides, see where your own ideas overlap with the ideas in the text and where they diverge. Our
own, individual ideas come from our own experiences which are typically encoded in an
uncritical manner. The advantage of using ideas from the text and the power point slides is that
they are informed by a scientific and critical approach and as such typically are more reliable and
valid than our own unique experiences. Your Problem Group might be a good forum for
discussion of the guiding questions and your individual responses.
Class time will be spent focusing on the guiding questions and will largely be focused on your
concerns about the questions and conclusions, and inferences you make as you link concepts
from the text and power point slides with the questions. Specific questions may, of course, be
directed at Elise or me via email or during visits to office hours. We will not spend class time
reading from power point slides or repeating information from the text as you are all literate;
thus, to do so would be an insult to your own intellect.
Guiding Questions: Chapter 1: Introduction
1. How would describe the differences between causal relationships and correlational
relationships and the differences in the conclusions you can draw from each type of
relationship?
2. What are the key differences between an experimental design and a correlational
design and how are differences related to the types of conclusions you can draw from
each design?
3. Two concerns researchers often express are the validity of some measure and the
reliability of that measure. What does each mean regarding a measure and how are they
related to each other?
4. What are the major differences between a longitudinal design and a cross sectional
design and how do those differences relate to conclusions one can draw from each
design?
5. If a researcher investigated the differences in intellectual skills between a group of 10
year old and a group of 15 year old kids, how would you describe the design most likely
used and what would be one limit to the researcher’s conclusions? (HINT: Think about
experimental/correlational and causal/correlational differences.)
Guiding Questions: Chapter 2: Biological Bases of Adolescence
1. How might health practices (e.g. sleep, nutrition, use of alcohol and drugs) during
puberty impact outcomes (social, emotional, intellectual) across adolescence?
2. Many females maturing into puberty experience an increase in fat cells relative to
muscle cells. How might this be related to sexual maturity?
3. How does the endocrine system regulate the onset and process of puberty?
4. During across the course of puberty and into emerging adulthood, several changes occur
within the brain. What are these changes and how do they relate to individuals’
cognitive functioning?
5. As the individual experiences changes during puberty based on the biological
transformations within the body, social changes also occur. How might the adolescent
be impacted by the interactions of timing of onset of puberty interacting with those
social forces (family, peers, school) surrounding the adolescent?
6. How might one’s biological sex be related to outcomes of pubertal timing?
7. There is, in psychology, a history of discussion over the nature-nurture issue. Scarr’s
work (as described in our text) is an attempt to provide a theoretical framework for that
discussion. How might an adolescent’s peer group be the result of the influence of each
of the three levels (passive, evocative, and active) in Scarr’s framework?
Guiding Questions: Chapter3: Cognitive Foundations of Adolescence
1. According to Piaget’s theory of cognitive development, as the individual matures from
childhood into adolescence, the individual moves from predominantly concrete
operational thought to formal operational thought. How is formal operational thought,
according to Piaget’s work, different from concrete operational thought?
2. Many argue that formal operational thought is not universal. What are factors that
might determine the domains in which we might observe evidence for formal
operational thought in any given individual?
3. The work on cognitive development beyond formal operational thought (Post Formal
Thinking) has centered on ways in which, particularly in emerging adulthood,
individuals’ cognitive capabilities continue to change. How does post formal thought
allow the individual to make more informed and more adaptive decisions than one
who is limited to the use of formal operations?
4. When we describe human cognition as a constructive system, what do we mean and how
might that impact how two individuals witnessing the same event describe that event
differently?
5. From an information processing perspective, how might typical 11th graders differ from
typical 5th or 6th graders in their cognitive processes and strategies? HINT: think about
each element—attention, strategies used, executive functioning, and knowledge bases
6. How might we know an individual is engaging in critical thinking as opposed to
automatic and habitual thought?
7. If you were tasked to construct a classroom using Vygotsky’s ideas, what are three
elements you would want to make sure you included? What is the key underlying
concept of Vygotsky’s theory that drives your decision?
8. What might drive adolescents’ decision making outside of knowledge of cognitive
strategies and knowledge?
9. How might cognitive development across adolescence impact their day to day
behaviors toward authority figures?
10. How might the outcomes of imaginary audience and personal fable create risks for the
adolescent?
11. One area of development is in the area of social cognition. How might development of
social cognition impact adolescents’ interactions with peers and adults in their lives?
Chapter 4: Cultural Beliefs
1. Why is adolescence a time when many cultures begin to cultivate more adult-like roles
for the individual? (HINT: Think about the changes that occur across adolescence which
make the individual more prepared to acquire and adopt adult roles within a culture.)
2. Arnett describes three outcomes of one’s socialization into a culture—self-regulation,
role preparation, and sources of meaning. How might participation in a culture lead
one to these outcomes? (HINT: Think about the forces and institutions in a culture that
teach formally or informally.)
3. How are cultural values of individualism and collectivism related to the distinction
between a broad and narrow socialization process?
4. How are socialization practices in collectivist cultures different from socialization
practices in individualistic cultures?
5. How might an organization such as the Boy or Girl Scouts be similar to an organization
such as a national gang (Crips/Bloods) in their socialization processes? (HINT: Think
about collectivist/individualist cultures and narrow/broad socialization practices.)
6. How might the variations of custom complexes among the various cultures in a
multicultural society, present challenges for adolescents from minority cultures that
experience custom complexes different from those in the majority culture?
7. How might adolescents whose families engage in religious rituals and practices be
socialized differently from those whose families do not engage in those rituals and
practices? (HINT: Think about broad/narrow and collectivist/individualistic socialization
and self-regulation, role preparation, and sources of meaning.)
8. Kohlberg and Jensen both proposed perspectives on moral reasoning. How would you
describe the differences?
9. How might culture influence our moral reasoning and moral decision-making?
10. Across adolescence into emerging adulthood, what do changes moral reasoning,
religious beliefs, and political ideology have in common?
Chapter 5: Gender
1. How are gender and sex different?
2. How are the differences between broad and narrow socialization processes across
cultures related differences in gender roles for males and females?
3. Arnett presents work by Gilmore (1990) that defines three abilities males must
demonstrate in traditional cultures—provide, protect, & procreate—in order to move
into manhood. How are these abilities socialized in cultures that foster a narrow
socialization process?
4. How do you see traditional male roles manifested in contemporary culture of the
USA? Provide examples to support your assertions. (HINT: You might refer to the
section on Gender in American History for some ideas)
5. How might the culture of the USA contribute to the changes in gender intensification
across adolescence?
6. How might the presentation of gender roles in the media of the USA culture relate to
problems (e.g. body image, aggression) associated with gender socialization?
7. In Arnett’s description of Cognition and Gender, how might self socialization and
development of gender identity and gender schema be related to gender intensification
and distinctions between narrow and broad socialization processes?
8. What might be the forces that hold attributes typically assigned to masculinity being
more desirable than attributes assigned to femininity?
9. What rationale could be used to assert that being androgynous is more adaptive than
being either feminine or masculine?
Guiding Questions: Chapter 6: The Self
1. How might changes in adolescents’ cognitive capabilities across the years be related to
their ability to manage variations on their definition of self? (HINT: Think about the
differences among actual, possible, ideal, feared, and false selves and what sorts of
cognitive processing must be available to form the various selves.)
2. Considering Harter’s findings that self perceptions about physical appearance assume
greater importance during adolescence and gender differences in rates of depression,
how might cultural and ethnic or racial differences in these phenomena be explained?
3. Arnett described the interplay of biological, cognitive, and environmental factors in
adolescents’ interpretations of their own and others’ emotional states. How might
these factors be related to the decline in adolescents’ emotional states as depicted in
Figure 6.3 (pg. 156 in your text)?
4. Given that many female adolescents experience a narrower socialization pattern that
many adolescent males, how might you use the broad versus narrow socialization
patterns to explain Harter’s findings that more feminine adolescent females report losing
their voices than males or androgynous females?
5. Erikson described a theory of psychosocial development that focused on the
development of one’s identity. Marcia further elaborated this theory using the concepts
of commitment and exploration and identified four identity status classifications. Using
the model of broad and narrow socialization practices provide a rationale for which status
you would predict an adolescent with a narrow socialization might experience and which
status an adolescent with a broad socialization experience might experience.
6. On page 164, Arnett stated “…scholars now agree that independence and connectedness
are often balanced differently in males’ and females’ sense of identity…” You will note
that he used the terms “…males’...” and “…females.” Given our understanding of the
concepts of sex and gender, would it have been more appropriate for Arnett to use the
terms masculine and feminine or androgynous instead of the terms associated with
biological sex? Provide a rationale for your answer.
7. Phinney’s work on ethnic identity is described in some detail by Arnett. In the online
notes, Cross’s stage theory of ethnic minority identity development is described as
well. How might Cross’s work correspond with Marcia’s identity statuses?
8. How are bicultural identities and hybrid identities different and how might those
differences be related to how individuals integrate into a foreign culture?
9. Consider the concepts of social loneliness and emotional loneliness. Which do you think
would be the most difficult for a first semester student living away from home for the
first time at UWF? Provide a rationale for your answer.