Schaie's cross sequential research on intellectual development demonstrated that

CHAPTER 11 Physical and Cognitive Development in Young Adulthood

Garrett, a 19-year-old, is a 2nd-year college student. He enjoys many privileges that could be construed as “adult.” He drives a car, votes in elections, and owns a credit card. He shares an apartment near his college campus with two other undergraduates. He drinks alcohol with his friends at parties (albeit illegally) and has regular sexual relations with his girlfriend of 10 months. The couple split up once and subsequently reunited. During the separation, Garrett dated another young woman. At this point, Garrett and his girlfriend have no plans to marry. He wanted to get a job immediately after high school, but job opportunities in the trade he aspired to went to more experienced workers. He decided to give higher education a try. Garrett has little idea of what his ultimate career path will be. Garrett’s father, who is divorced from Garrett’s mother, pays for his tuition and housing costs. He has taken out loans to help finance his son’s education. Garrett’s mother provides him with an allowance for food. He works part-time for low wages at a clothing store in a local mall, which helps him pay for clothes and entertainment. Garrett is very responsible at work, but he is an unenthusiastic college student. His study habits lean toward procrastinating and then trying to make up for lost time by staying up all night to finish assignments by their deadlines. When Garrett broke his wrist playing sports, his mother had to take a few days off from her job to accompany him to doctor’s visits. Her health insurance covered most of the bills. Yet, despite their financial support, Garrett’s parents have no legal right to see Garrett’s college grades. Is Garrett an adult? Scholars are likely to disagree about the answer to this question. Most would agree that the onset of adolescence is marked by the changes of puberty. But there are no easily observed physical changes that signal entry into adulthood. Instead, adulthood is a social construction. One or more culturally determined criteria usually must be met before one’s maturity is established (Hogan & Astone, 1986), and the criteria vary depending on the observer and the culture. In the past, sociologists have emphasized the achievement and timing of marker events as criteria for adulthood. These have included completing formal education, entering the adult workforce, leaving the family home, getting married, and becoming a parent. Around the middle of the last century, a large proportion of the American population achieved these marker events between the ages of 18 and 24 (Rindfuss, 1991). However, if we evaluate our hypothetical student, Garrett, according to these traditional marker events, he would not be an adult despite being in the right age range. From a sociological perspective, it seems to take longer to grow up today than it did at earlier points in history for many reasons. Some of these include the demand for a highly educated workforce and the increased cost of this education (Jacobs & Stoner-Eby, 1998), the difficulties inherent in earning enough to support children and in achieving stable employment (Halperin, 1998b), and the frequency of early, nonmarital sexual activity and the availability of contraception (Warner et al., 1998). All have had profound effects on the timing of life events. On one hand then, some markers of adulthood are considerably delayed. For example, the median age for marriage in 1976 was about 22 or 23. By 2006, the median age for marriage had risen to about 27, a difference of more than 4 years in only 30 years (Arnett, 2010). On the other hand, other indicators of adulthood, such as the onset of sexual activity, occur much earlier than they did in the past. Such shifts in the timing of marker events appear to have delayed the onset of adulthood, especially in Western societies, where these shifts have most often occurred. However, even in more traditional, nonindustrialized cultures, the transition to adulthood can be a slow process. For example, after completing the puberty rites that induct boys into the adult ranks of some societies, young males in about 25% of cultures pass through a period of youth (Schlegel & Barry, 1991). In these societies, males are seen as needing a period of time to prepare for marriage. Serving as warriors during the transition period, for example, allows boys an opportunity to develop skills and to accumulate the material goods needed to afford a family. Girls enjoy a similar period of youth in 20% of cultures. Thus, even in many non-Western, traditional societies, the movement to full adult status takes time. In cultures such as that of the United States, the pathways to adulthood are remarkable in their variability, so that specifying when adulthood has been achieved is difficult. Arnett (2000, 2004, 2007; Arnett & Taber, 1994) has explored a new way of conceptualizing adulthood. In addition to examining the timing of marker events, he considered individuals’ own conceptions about what makes them adults. The reasoning goes like this: If one’s own judgment of adult status were based on criteria other than marker events, we might find more consistency in criteria across cultures or even within the same culture over a certain period. Arnett (2000) asked young people in the United States to rate the importance of criteria in several areas (such as cognitive, behavioral, emotional, biological, and legal criteria, role transitions, and responsibilities) as definitions of adult status. He also asked participants whether they felt they had reached adulthood. A majority of respondents in their late teens and early twenties answered both “yes and no.” Perhaps Garrett would say something similar. As you can see in Figure 11.1, the proportion of young people in Arnett’s study who judged themselves to be adults gradually increased with age, with a clear majority of participants in their late 20s and early 30s doing so. FIGURE 11.1 “Do you feel that you have reached adulthood?” SOURCE: Arnett, J. (2000). Emerging adulthood: A theory of development from the late teens through the twenties. American Psychologist, 55, 472. Reprinted by permission of the American Psychological Association. Can this delay in identifying oneself as an adult be attributed to the timing of role transitions? Apparently not. Chronological age and role transitions such as marriage and parenthood, on their own, were not considered significant markers. Arnett’s respondents indicated that the two most important qualifications for adulthood are first, accepting responsibility for the consequences of one’s actions and second, making independent decisions. Becoming financially independent, a traditional marker event, was third. Consequently, the subjective sense of being an adult may be more important than accomplishment and timing of discrete tasks. There is consensus among many researchers that a broad psychological shift toward increasing independence and autonomy characterizes the subjective experience of what it means to be an adult, at least for members of the American majority culture (Greene & Wheatley, 1992; Scheer, Unger, & Brown, 1994). Moreover, achieving a sense of autonomy is among the identity-related tasks described in Chapter 9. Because the shift to feeling autonomous is a lengthy process for many, Arnett (2000, 2004, 2007) advocates that the time period roughly between ages 18 and 25 be considered a distinct stage of life called emerging adulthood. In past decades, adult status was conferred through the achievement of marker events, such as marriage and parenthood. We should note that emerging adulthood is made possible by the kind of economic development that characterizes industrialized, Western cultures. If the labor of young people is not urgently needed for the economic well-being of their families, and if many occupations require extended years of education, then work is postponed, marriage and childbearing are likely to be delayed, and self-exploration can continue. Arnett (e.g., 2002) has argued that increasing globalization is spreading the experience of this new stage from Western societies to other parts of the world. Globalization is “a process by which cultures influence one another and become more alike through trade, immigration, and the exchange of information and ideas” (p. 774), a process that has shifted into high gear with advances in telecommunications and transportation. In developing countries, young people increasingly move from rural communities to urban centers as they pursue expanding economic opportunities. More occupational and lifestyle options are available, and self-development tends to continue well past the teen years. “For young people in developing countries, emerging adulthood exists only for the wealthier segment of society . . . however, as globalization proceeds . . . the emerging adulthood now normative in the middle class is likely to increase as the middle class expands” (p. 781). Whereas Arnett (2000) found that American respondents to his questionnaire emphasized individualistic criteria in defining adulthood, we should note that they also acknowledged the importance of emotional support. As you will see in the next chapter, strong relationships with others are important in and of themselves and can provide a bulwark for the development of personal autonomy. Encouragement and tolerance for independent action and belief, however, may continue to be greater for young people in the American majority culture than for those in non-Western societies, such as China (e.g., Nelson & Chen, 2007), or in some diverse communities in the United States. Even so, several studies suggest that young people in minority samples can be characterized as defining adulthood much the way majority White samples do, and as experiencing the self-exploration or identity development that seems to be the hallmark of emerging adulthood. For example, Black males define manhood individualistically, characterized by personal responsibility and self-determination, much as Whites do (Hunter & Davis, 1992). Yip, Seaton, and Sellers (2006) investigated African American racial identity across the life span, and found that although more young adults had reached identity achievement status than adolescents, identity issues were still front and center for more than half of the college age group. Yip et al. argue that college experiences can “intensify the process of developing a racial and/or ethnic identity” (p. 1515). Deaux and Ethier (1998) make a similar argument, suggesting that college itself tends to serve as a catalyst for ethnic identity development, partly because of opportunities such as access to groups organized around race and college courses on racial or ethnic history. These kinds of experiences may make race and ethnicity more salient. Interestingly, Yip and her colleagues found that the only age group in which an identity status (diffusion) was linked to depression was the college age group, indicating that identity constructions in this age range have critical psychological consequences. Whether or not emerging adults attend college, their social worlds are likely to expand beyond immediate family, friends, and neighbors (Arnett & Brody, 2008, p. 292). For African Americans, this often means moving into a much more ethnically diverse world than the schools and neighborhoods of their childhood. In college, fewer instructors or students are likely to be Black; in work environments, few employers and co-workers will be Black. Minority stress, the experience of prejudice and discrimination due to membership in a stigmatized group (Meyer, 2003) is very likely to increase. Arnett and Brody (2008) argue that dealing with identity issues with these added sources of stress may intensify the process. “We believe that identity issues are especially acute for African American emerging adults due to the injection of discrimination and prejudice, and that this may explain a range of puzzling findings” (p. 292). One is the racial crossover effect. African American adolescents engage in less substance use than White adolescents. But the reverse is true in adulthood, when African Americans use substances more than Whites. Another puzzling finding concerns male suicide rates. Males are much more prone to suicide than females. White males show a steady rise in suicide rates through much of adulthood, with the sharpest rise after age 65. But for Black males the peak suicide rate occurs much earlier, between 25 and 34. Arnett and Brody speculate that “there are uniquely formidable challenges to forming a Black male identity” in the United States and that for some the strain may become intolerable during early adulthood (p. 293). Gary grew up in a Vietnamese American family, who had certain expectations for his future. He describes clearly the stress that arises when need for autonomy and desire to meet family obligations come into conflict in young adulthood. Research on other ethnic minorities in the United States supports the idea that moving into a more ethnically diverse world after adolescence both extends the process of identity formation and increases its complexity. Fuligni (2007) looked at the children of Asian and Latin immigrant families and found, as you would expect, culture-specific concerns among young adults. The children of the immigrant families had a stronger sense of “family obligation” than European American offspring. They expected to support and assist their families in many ways (e.g., caring for siblings, providing financial support, living near or with the family) and believed that they should consider the family’s wishes when making important decisions. Interestingly, the researchers found that these kinds of values, while strongest in the immigrant children, also increased in young adulthood for all ethnic groups, including the European Americans. Apparently, the importance of connection, as well as autonomy, becomes clearer after adolescence. Immigrant children were most likely, as young adults, to experience a much more expanded social world if they went to college than if they did not, and this happened most often for those of East Asian background. With these young people, Fuligni found a trend toward the kind of extended identity development that characterizes emerging adulthood. Their sense of obligation to family did not disappear, but it competed with new aspirations, “to be able to be doing something that I like” and “to be the person you’re supposed to be” (p. 99). Is a stage of emerging adulthood a good or a bad thing? Could it be viewed as a tendency for modern youth to simply avoid taking on adult roles and responsibilities, nurtured by overprotective, indulgent parents? Arnett (e.g., 2007) argues that in fact, there could be a grain of truth here; many young adults seem to “find it burdensome and onerous to pay their own bills and do all the other things their parents (have) always done for them” (p. 71). But he generally sees the ambivalence of young adults as a recognition of the value of an extended period of self-development to help them prepare more adequately for taking on adult roles in a complex society. He points out that few emerging adults fail to “grow up.” By age 30 nearly all are stably employed, and three quarters are married and have a child. There is also evidence that as adolescents move into young adulthood today they are not substantially different from their counterparts in the 1970s. For example, high school seniors now and then report similar levels of loneliness, anti-social behavior, self-esteem, and life satisfaction (Trzesniewski & Donnellan, 2010). But some theorists are not as sanguine about this new stage. Hendry and Kloep (2007), for example, express concern that young people are more often inadequately prepared for adulthood than they are benefiting from an extended transition into adulthood. Modern parents, they suggest, tend to both overindulge their children and to pressure them to excel, rather than assuring that their children are adequately educated in basic life skills. Although these competing views may both have “grains of truth”—only continuing research on this interesting new stage can resolve the issue. In this and the next chapter we will examine some of the key characteristics of life after adolescence, primarily for young people in the United States. We will refer to the period from about 18 to 30 as young adulthood, although we acknowledge Arnett’s (2000, 2010) argument that many 18- to 25-year-olds are better described as “emerging adults.” The early years of young adulthood are often an extended period of transition involving exploration of potential adult identities. In this chapter, we will begin by examining the physical characteristics of young adults and then move on to consider the cognitive changes that are likely in this period of life. In Chapter 12, we will explore the complexities of forming intimate, enduring adult attachments, maintaining or revamping family relationships, and making vocational commitments. That is, we will look at some of the myriad processes involved in taking one’s place as a contributing member of an adult community. PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT IN YOUNG ADULTHOOD Reaching Peak Physical Status By age 18 to 20, most people have reached their full physical growth. Sometime between 18 and 30, all our biological systems reach peak potential. For example, we can see, hear, taste, and smell as well as we ever will; our skin is as firm and resilient as it can be; the potential strength of muscle and bone is as great as we will ever experience; and our immune systems provide us with the most effective protection we will ever have from diseases ranging from the common cold to cancer. Not all physical capacities reach their peak simultaneously. Visual acuity, for example, reaches a maximum level at about age 20, with little decline for most people until about age 40. But auditory acuity appears to peak before age 20 and may show some declines soon after (Saxon & Etten, 1987; Whitbourne, 1996). There are certainly individual differences among us in the achievement of peak physical status—for example, some people reach their full height by age 15, whereas others may not finish growing until age 18 or 20. There are also substantial differences among different physical skills in the timing of peak performance, which is usually assessed by looking at the records of “super-athletes” (e.g., Tanaka & Seals, 2003; Schulz & Curnow, 1988). Schulz and Curnow examined athletic performance records for superathletes in a wide variety of sports. On one hand, they found that maximal performance for most sports is reached within the young adult period; on the other hand, they found that the average age of greatest skill (e.g., winning an Olympic gold medal in track or achieving a Number 1 world ranking in tennis) is different from one sport to another, and sometimes depends on which particular skill is examined within a given sport. For example, the average age at which Olympic swimmers win gold medals is 19; professional golfers typically do not achieve a Number 1 ranking until they have moved out of the young adult period, at age 34. For a professional baseball player, the average age for “most stolen bases” is 23, but the mean age for “peak batting average” is 28 and for “hitting the most doubles” is 32! The differences in age of peak performance suggest that the relative importance of practice, training, knowledge, experience, and biological capacity varies from one skill to another. Skills that are based on muscle strength, flexibility, and speed of movement and response tend to peak early. Abilities that are heavily dependent on control, arm–hand steadiness, precision, and stamina tend to peak later. Overall, the greater the importance of cognitive factors in performance, factors such as strategy knowledge and use, the later a skill will top out (Schulz & Curnow, 1988). An interesting finding from the research on superathletes is that physical development progresses at different rates for the two sexes. Men reach their peak of performance in many skills approximately 1 year later than women do. No simple explanation is available for the gender differences, but in some instances they appear to be based on earlier skeletal-muscular maturation in women. In other cases, they may depend on the fact that the smaller, more streamlined bodies of young adolescent females confer some speed advantages, as in long-distance swimming. Superathletes are those whose performance of a skill seems to match their full potential. Most of the rest of us are not concerned about achieving maximal skill, but we usually are motivated to maintain our physical capacities at high levels—including not only performance skills, but also sensory abilities, good health, and youthful appearance—during and beyond the early adult period. Clearly, biology plays a role here. For example, regardless of activity level, muscular strength begins to decline somewhat by about age 30. But research supports the importance of lifestyle in this process. There are good habits that help maintain peak or near-peak functioning and appearance, and there are bad habits that can erode functioning (Whitbourne, 1996). For example, regular exercise can help both younger and older adults maintain muscle and bone strength and keeps the cardiovascular and respiratory systems functioning well. Smoking, poor diet, and a sedentary lifestyle accelerate loss of peak cardiovascular and respiratory functioning and loss of muscle and bone. Smoking or any excessive drug or alcohol use can diminish functioning in a variety of physiological systems. For example, smoking contributes to more rapid wrinkling of the skin, and alcohol causes damage to the nervous system, the liver, and the urinary tract. “Eating right” is part of a healthy lifestyle. It means having regularly spaced meals (including breakfast) that are low in fat and that sample a range of food groups, allowing a proper balance of nutrients. Failure to eat right contributes to obesity, to depressed mood, and to many aspects of physical decline. Overweight and obesity are epidemic in the United States (65%) and Canada (59%), and weight gain is especially likely between the ages of 20 and 40 (Tjepkema, 2005; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2005). Longitudinal studies that have followed participants for 40 to 50 years have made clear that people who fail to follow healthy lifestyles in their young adult years suffer from poorer health later and that they are less satisfied with their lives in late adulthood when compared to people who do adopt healthy habits in young adulthood (e.g., Belloc & Breslow, 1972; Mussen, Honzik, & Eichorn, 1982). None of this information is likely to be new to you. Many Americans, including young adults, are aware of the benefits of a healthy lifestyle and of the liabilities that bad living habits pose. Do they heed what they know? We learned in Chapter 10 that adolescents often act in reckless ways that compromise their health and wellness. Often young adults are not much better. Consider their alcohol use. As we have seen, nearly half of college students report that they drink heavily, often binge drinking (i.e., having at least five drinks in a row), and many indicate that their drinking has caused them problems, such as having unplanned or unprotected sex, getting hurt, or causing property damage (e.g., Fromme, Corbin, & Kruse, 2008; Hingson, 2010). Studies of adolescents and young adults indicate that the ongoing development of memory and learning abilities may be inhibited in binge drinkers (Ballie, 2001). In a longitudinal study of 33,000 people, problem drinking and drug use shifted during the young adult period (Bachman, 1997; Johnston, O’Malley, Bachman, & Schulenberg, 2009). These problems began to decline as participants reached their mid-20s and as their reasons for drinking began to change. “To have a good time with my friends” was the most common reason given by younger participants, but it gradually declined after age 20 and was surpassed by the desire “to relax or relieve tension” as participants approached age 30 (see Figure 11.2; Patrick & Schulenberg, 2011). This study also indicated that being in college is a contributing factor to substance abuse in the United States, because college students drink more alcohol and smoke more marijuana than same-age peers who have never attended college. Although the reasons for substance use in emerging adulthood do not seem to vary across demographic groups in the United States, the extent of substance use does. Alcohol consumption is greater for males than females, and it is greater for Caucasians than for other ethnic or racial groups, although Hispanics run a close second to Caucasians (e.g., Johnston et al., 2009; LaBrie, Atkins, Neighbors, Mirza, & Larimer, 2012; Smith et al., 2006). Sexual minority individuals appear to be at particular risk. Another large longitudinal study of adolescents and young adults found that even as teens, lesbian, gay and bisexual youth, especially girls, were at higher risk of alcohol abuse than heterosexuals (Dermody et al., 2013). And the risk disparity between sexual minorities and heterosexuals increased in young adulthood. It appears that the stresses of dealing with sexual identity issues, along with discrimination and victimization, may be important drivers of these differences in susceptibility to hazardous drinking (e.g., Hatzenbuehler, Corbin, & Fromm, 2011). FIGURE 11.2 Frequency of endorsement of five reasons for drinking in the young adult years. SOURCE: Patrick, M. E., & Schulenberg, J. E. (2010). How trajectories of reasons for alcohol use relate to trajectories of binge drinking: National panel data spanning late adolescence to early adulthood. Developmental Psychology, 47, 314. Reprinted by permission of the American Psychological Association. In addition to substance use problems, attending college appears to have negative health effects in general. In another survey, over 20,000 college students completed a questionnaire in the fall of their 1st year of college and again 1 year later (Keup & Stolzenberg, 2004). Over the course of that year, they reported substantial declines in their emotional well-being, in their physical health, and in their health habits (e.g., reduced levels of exercise). Fromme et al. (2008) also found substantial increases in alcohol and marijuana use, as well as sex with multiple partners, between high school and the end of freshman year of college in a sample of 2,000 young people. There was some variability depending on whether students lived at home (less increase) or not, and whether they came from rural, urban (less increase), or suburban high schools, but in all cases there was an increase. The unhealthy, underregulated lifestyles of many young adults are probably an outgrowth of multiple factors: poor application of problem-solving skills to practical problems (see the next section on cognitive development); perhaps a continuing sense of invulnerability that began in the adolescent years,

HN501 Unit 8 DBP: Young Adulthood

After you have completed the Reading, post your initial response to the following statements.

1. Explore some of the changes regarding cognitive development in young adulthood as they relate to the woman.

2. Determine which aspects of socioemotional development in young adulthood were discussed in the video. Assess whether there were positive and/or negative components of this type of development that were emphasized.

3. Identify some of the challenges related to vocational development that were discussed in the video. Integrate into your answer information that determines whether the challenges that were discussed are typical in young adulthood.