According to Elkind, immaturity of thinking among adolescents manifests itself in six characteristics. Describe these characteristics.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Adolescents' immaturity of thinking, Elkind suggests, manifests itself in at least six characteristic ways. These are as follows:

1. Idealism and criticalness: As adolescents envision an ideal world, they realize how far the real world, for which they hold adults responsible, falls short. They become ultra-conscious of hypocrisy. Convinced they know better than adults how to run the world, they frequently find fault with their parents and other authority figures. 
2. Argumentativeness: Adolescents are constantly looking for opportunities to try out their reasoning abilities. They often become argumentative as they build a case for, say, staying out past their curfew.
3. Indecisiveness: Adolescents can keep many alternatives in mind at the same time yet may lack effective strategies for choosing among them. They may struggle with simple decisions like whether they should go to the mall with a friend or work on a school assignment.
4. Apparent hypocrisy: Young adolescents often do not recognize the difference between expressing an ideal, such as conserving energy, and making the sacrifices necessary to live up to it, such as driving less often.
5. Self-consciousness: Adolescents can think about thinking-their own and other people's. However, in their preoccupation with their own mental state, adolescents often assume everyone else is thinking about the same thing they are thinking about: themselves. Elkind refers to this as the imaginary audience, a conceptualized "observer" who is as concerned with a young person's thoughts and behavior as he or she is. 
6. Specialness and invulnerability: Elkind uses the term personal fable to describe a belief by adolescents that they are special, their experience is unique, and they are not subject to the rules that govern the rest of the world. This belief might encourage adolescents to believe they can drive fast and recklessly and not get into an accident. According to Elkind, this form of egocentrism underlies much risky, self-destructive behavior. Like the imaginary audience, the personal fable continues into adulthood.