Identity is a foundational element in a person's development and can influence all aspects of a person's life. Although research on adolescent identity development is a growing field, there are opportunities for additional research on this stage of development, with specific focus needed on the role of asynchronous development. This study utilized…

School lunch is a universal experience for students everywhere and yet remains largely understudied by educational researchers. This dissertation explores school lunch through the lens of adolescent identity theory, with the purpose of investigating the unarticulated and overlooked complexities inherent in the lunch block, from issues of the…

The purpose of this study was to better understand the influence of educators' attention to identity construction as tenth grade Emergent Bilinguals and native English-speaking students develop mathematical, social, and epistemological empowerment in a mathematics classroom. I incorporated a framework detailing critical consciousness as a mediator…

Adolescents typically use the self-regulation skills that they develop earlier in childhood to explore their identities. However, some adolescents do not develop self-regulation skills for a variety of reasons. Identity formation and self-regulation could develop concurrently for adolescents with self-regulatory failure as they explore a valued…

These three papers test existing educational and identity development theory regarding the phenomenon of transformative pedagogy and its effectiveness, in order to determine the predictive ability of a class on morals and ethics with transformative goals during eleventh or twelfth grade Social Justice towards transformed individuals later in life.…

Effectively addressing the unique developmental and academic needs of adolescents is a challenge that educators have been grappling with since the mid-1960's when school systems began to convert junior high schools into middle schools. While educators have recognized the need to create developmentally responsive schools that help children to form…

During late childhood and early adolescence, there is a dramatic increase in cognitive skills (Keating, 1980) which influences how young people begin to think about their futures. The construct of possible selves has been used to help understand adolescents' views of their future plans and goals by exploring their social perceptions to gain…