Studied the relationship between identity status and academic achievement in female adolescents (N=20), based on the theories of Erikson and Marcia. Scoring of interviews suggested that experience and working through crises in beliefs were more closely associated with academic achievement and identity than specific commitments to career or…

Erikson marked adolescence for the prime developmental task of identity achievement. An examination of 31 mothers, aged 25 to 45, revealed that foreclosure of identity development was the norm for this sample in adolescence and that, for those who had achieved identity, the subsequent status change was related to the liberating influences of…