Developing Identity in Adolescence: African American Youth Navigating Race-Ethnicity

Explores racial/ethnic identity development as a life-long process of negotiating self, context, and others’ perceptions and behaviors from early adolescence to adulthood.

Guided by early foundational and recent compelling theories on race/ethnicity and identity development across the lifespan, Celina Chatman Nelson, Stephen C. Peck, Oksana Malanchuk, and Jacquelynne S. Eccles provide a detailed analysis of their collected research on the Maryland Adolescent Development in Context Study (MADICS) to demonstrate the diversity of racial/ethnic identity profiles and how they change over time. MADICS began with nearly 1500 7th graders and their families in the early 1990s, following many of them into their early 30s at the turn of the millennium. Using mixed-method research involving case studies and interview data, this book demonstrates racial/ethnic identity as multidimensional, contextualized, and idiosyncratic, within a bidirectional, iterative, and nuanced process. Through the presentation of their research findings on Prince George’s County youth, the authors encourage families, schools, and communities to have an open dialogue about race/ethnicity to promote active reflection not only among developing youth, but also within the world we live in today.

Celina Chatman Nelson is associate provost for faculty inclusive excellence and pathways at Columbia University, USA.
Stephen C. Peck, PhD, is an independent scholar of personality psychology.
Oksana Malanchuk is retired research investigator at the Achievement Research Lab in the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, USA.
Jacquelynne S. Eccles is distinguished university professor at the University of California, Irvine and distinguished university professor emeritus at the University of Michigan, USA.