One part of Jeffrey Arnett's conceptualization of emerging adulthood is that it is a time of life that carries a sense of possibility. Malcolm Gladwell's latest book, Outliers: The Story of Success, suggests that the possibilities open to someone can be greatly enhanced or curtailed by some quite arbitrary factors.
Among other examples, Gladwell discusses the Canadian youth hockey policy of placing players on purportedly uniform-age teams based on how old they are as of January 1. If a player's birthday happens to be January 2, he (or perhaps she) will immediately be older than the rest of the team, especially relative to someone whose birthday is in December. As a result of being older -- and potentially also physically stronger and larger -- than most other players, those players born early in the year will get to play more, develop better skills, get selected for all-star teams that expose them to better coaching and provide more practice opportunity, etc. As Gladwell documents, the apparent upshot of using the arbitrary marker of someone's birth month as an organizing principle for youth hockey is that, across various levels of competitive hockey in Canada, team rosters are comprised disproportionately of players born in January, February, and March.
Likewise, Gladwell suggests that there were optimal historical times (usually in years, not months) and places to grow up if one wanted to be a success at computer software development, corporate takeover law, garment manufacturing and sales, and other endeavors. Tying all of this back to emerging adulthood, Gladwell writes the following:
The sense of possibility so necessary for success comes not just from inside us or from our parents. It comes from our time: from the particular opportunities that our particular place in history presents us with (p. 137).
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Television Programming Trends Regarding Young Adults
Today's Los Angeles Times has an article on how television networks may be moving away from demographic targeting of young adults in their programming, in favor of family-oriented, "big tent" fare that appeals to all ages. In other words, we may see fewer shows inspired by "Friends" and "Seinfeld," and more modeled after "The Cosby Show" and "Everybody Loves Raymond." Though the 18-49 year-old "young adult" demographic that's previously been targeted extends well beyond what we would consider emerging adulthood, many of the points in the article mesh well with the study of EA.
As previously discussed on this blog and elsewhere, characteristics of emerging adulthood include openness to novelty and experimentation. For this reason, television executives, marketers, and advertisers will never lose touch completely with the 18-49 demographic, according to the article:
None of this means, of course, that the 18-to-49 yardstick is about to become as obsolete as rabbit-ear antennas. Young people remain the most important early adopters of new products and cultural trends. Their purchase decisions are vital to marketers in such big categories as consumer technology, movies and cars.
Another oft-cited theory for why young-adult viewers are important, namely that of establishing lifelong brand loyalty, does not appear to have much support in the media/advertising community:
The idea was that "if you bought Crest toothpaste when you were 18 years old, when you turned 50 you would still use Crest toothpaste," [CBS chief Leslie] Moonves said.
Indeed, [media analyst Steve] Sternberg and others said they knew of no reliable studies backing that theory.
One final point that jumped out at me from the article was the discussion of how increasing life-expectancies are changing notions of age-appropriateness:
Also, Moonves adds, "a 50-year-old today is different than a 50-year-old 25 years ago. The life expectancy is longer; the boomers are doing more in their 50s, they're experiencing more. It's a very different generation."
As previously discussed on this blog and elsewhere, characteristics of emerging adulthood include openness to novelty and experimentation. For this reason, television executives, marketers, and advertisers will never lose touch completely with the 18-49 demographic, according to the article:
None of this means, of course, that the 18-to-49 yardstick is about to become as obsolete as rabbit-ear antennas. Young people remain the most important early adopters of new products and cultural trends. Their purchase decisions are vital to marketers in such big categories as consumer technology, movies and cars.
Another oft-cited theory for why young-adult viewers are important, namely that of establishing lifelong brand loyalty, does not appear to have much support in the media/advertising community:
The idea was that "if you bought Crest toothpaste when you were 18 years old, when you turned 50 you would still use Crest toothpaste," [CBS chief Leslie] Moonves said.
Indeed, [media analyst Steve] Sternberg and others said they knew of no reliable studies backing that theory.
One final point that jumped out at me from the article was the discussion of how increasing life-expectancies are changing notions of age-appropriateness:
Also, Moonves adds, "a 50-year-old today is different than a 50-year-old 25 years ago. The life expectancy is longer; the boomers are doing more in their 50s, they're experiencing more. It's a very different generation."
Sunday, December 28, 2008
New Book "Guyland" Looks at Young Males' Development
I recently finished reading the book Guyland, by sociologist Michael Kimmel (hat tip to Janis Henderson, my Teaching Assistant, for bringing the book to my attention). The subheading of the book's title signifies the developmental nature of the subject matter: "The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men/Understanding the Critical Years Between 16 and 26."
Kimmel charges Jeff Arnett's and others' writings on emerging adulthood with saying "nary a word about gender" (p. 41), setting the stage for Kimmel to articulate his own theory of the male experience. Guyland does not apply to all young men, however. Quoting from the above-linked website for the book:
Kimmel’s study shows that the guys who live in “Guyland” are mostly white, middle-class, totally confused and cannot commit to their relationships, work or lives. Although they seem baffled by the riddles of manhood and responsibility, they submit to the “Guy Code,” where locker-room behaviors, sexual conquests, bullying, violence and assuming a cocky jock pose can rule over the sacrifice and conformity of marriage and family. Obsessed with never wanting to grow up, this demographic, which is 22 million strong, craves video games, sports and depersonalized sexual relationships.
The heart of the Guy Code seems to be rank-and-file young males' strong desire to win the approval and avoid the scorn of the "cool" guys. For that reason, guys in the crowd will remain silent at what are often cruel and violent acts perpetrated by the leaders of the group (e.g., fraternity hazing, group sexual assaults).
Through this lens of social approval, other stereotypically male behaviors such as sports fanaticism and binge-drinking, can be seen as efforts for guys to impress other guys. According to Kimmel, this lens can also explain at least some guys' relationship (or non-relationship) choices. Regarding sexual "hookups," Kimmel writes:
...it's a bit more complicated than simple pleasure-seeking on the part of guys, because as it turns out pleasure isn't the first item on the hookup agenda... If sex were the goal, a guy would have a much better chance of having more (and better) sex if he had a steady girlfriend. Instead, guys hook up to prove something to other guys (p. 206).
In the latter parts of the book, Kimmel also explores the implications of Guyland for the psychosocial development of young women who come into contact with this male subculture.
In the end, Kimmel expresses the hope that developing young men can avoid the darker impulses of Guyland and become ethical, humane, and responsible men. Throughout the book, Kimmel shares positive examples of men who stood up to others who wanted to commit antisocial acts (or who at least owned up to their actions and expressed remorse after the fact).
Guyland, Kimmel reminds us at the end, is both a life stage and a symbolic place, only the latter of which he feels needs to be trimmed back or abolished: "There are positive reasons for delaying marriage, exploring different career paths, playing the field, traveling, hanging out, exploring oneself and who one wants to be, and become, in this lifetime... ...our task, as a society, is to decouple the stage of life from that social space..." (pp. 287-288).
On the whole, I found the book well-researched and documented; however, there are a few areas I would quibble with. Kimmel claims that, among other behavioral difficulties, "...boys are more prone to depression..." (p. 54). This claim is contrary to research showing that, in the words of Nolen-Hoeksema and Girgus, "There are no gender differences in depression rates in prepubescent children, but, after the age of 15, girls and women are about twice as likely to be depressed as boys and men." For a more recent examination of gender differences in the development of depression, see this abstract from Janet Shibley Hyde and colleagues.
Kimmel's writing is lively, and the ideas are thought-provoking. I would recommend Guyland to anyone interested in emerging adulthood or gender-role development.
Kimmel charges Jeff Arnett's and others' writings on emerging adulthood with saying "nary a word about gender" (p. 41), setting the stage for Kimmel to articulate his own theory of the male experience. Guyland does not apply to all young men, however. Quoting from the above-linked website for the book:
Kimmel’s study shows that the guys who live in “Guyland” are mostly white, middle-class, totally confused and cannot commit to their relationships, work or lives. Although they seem baffled by the riddles of manhood and responsibility, they submit to the “Guy Code,” where locker-room behaviors, sexual conquests, bullying, violence and assuming a cocky jock pose can rule over the sacrifice and conformity of marriage and family. Obsessed with never wanting to grow up, this demographic, which is 22 million strong, craves video games, sports and depersonalized sexual relationships.
The heart of the Guy Code seems to be rank-and-file young males' strong desire to win the approval and avoid the scorn of the "cool" guys. For that reason, guys in the crowd will remain silent at what are often cruel and violent acts perpetrated by the leaders of the group (e.g., fraternity hazing, group sexual assaults).
Through this lens of social approval, other stereotypically male behaviors such as sports fanaticism and binge-drinking, can be seen as efforts for guys to impress other guys. According to Kimmel, this lens can also explain at least some guys' relationship (or non-relationship) choices. Regarding sexual "hookups," Kimmel writes:
...it's a bit more complicated than simple pleasure-seeking on the part of guys, because as it turns out pleasure isn't the first item on the hookup agenda... If sex were the goal, a guy would have a much better chance of having more (and better) sex if he had a steady girlfriend. Instead, guys hook up to prove something to other guys (p. 206).
In the latter parts of the book, Kimmel also explores the implications of Guyland for the psychosocial development of young women who come into contact with this male subculture.
In the end, Kimmel expresses the hope that developing young men can avoid the darker impulses of Guyland and become ethical, humane, and responsible men. Throughout the book, Kimmel shares positive examples of men who stood up to others who wanted to commit antisocial acts (or who at least owned up to their actions and expressed remorse after the fact).
Guyland, Kimmel reminds us at the end, is both a life stage and a symbolic place, only the latter of which he feels needs to be trimmed back or abolished: "There are positive reasons for delaying marriage, exploring different career paths, playing the field, traveling, hanging out, exploring oneself and who one wants to be, and become, in this lifetime... ...our task, as a society, is to decouple the stage of life from that social space..." (pp. 287-288).
On the whole, I found the book well-researched and documented; however, there are a few areas I would quibble with. Kimmel claims that, among other behavioral difficulties, "...boys are more prone to depression..." (p. 54). This claim is contrary to research showing that, in the words of Nolen-Hoeksema and Girgus, "There are no gender differences in depression rates in prepubescent children, but, after the age of 15, girls and women are about twice as likely to be depressed as boys and men." For a more recent examination of gender differences in the development of depression, see this abstract from Janet Shibley Hyde and colleagues.
Kimmel's writing is lively, and the ideas are thought-provoking. I would recommend Guyland to anyone interested in emerging adulthood or gender-role development.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Youth Vote in the 2008 Election
Now that Election 2008 has been completed and analysts have had several days to watch exit-poll and other data roll in, some impressions of the youth vote (18-29) are starting to crystallize. First, some basic data, from the organization CIRCLE...
Noting that, "...youth voter turnout is the percentage of eligible 18-29 year olds who voted," CIRCLE estimates that around 52 or 53 percent of eligible 18-29 year olds voted this year. This figure continues the upward trend from 1996 (37%), 2000 (41%), and 2004 (48%).
[The 48% youth participation rate in 2004 can (roughly) be broken down further, by multiplying the following two figures from here: "In 2004, 81.6% of registered 18-29 year olds voted in the Presidential elections. Only 60% of 18-29 year olds were registered to vote in that election."]
However, again according to CIRCLE:
Young people (ages 18-29) represented 18 percent of the voters in Tuesday’s election, according to the National Exit Polls (NEP) conducted by Edison/Mitofsky. This is one point higher than in 1996, 2000 and 2004, when young voters represented 17 percent of voters in each presidential election, according to the NEP.
What this means is that, concurrent with youth voters' ever-increasing participation in recent elections (relative to their same-age counterparts in previous years), there has also been rising voter participation in older age groups. Thus, 18-29 year olds have not increased their share of the overall electorate much, from 17% in the past to 18% this year.
Purely in terms of turnout, it seems fair to say that youth voters participated somewhere in between the visions of the most optimistic and most skeptical observers.
The biggest story of this year's youth vote, therefore, would appear to be the unusually lopsided distribution of candidate preference: Obama 66%, McCain 32%. The full electoral implications of this margin are developed in this document:
In 2008, 18% of the electorate was comprised of 18-29 year-olds. That figure, when multiplied by the 34 percent differential in Obama voting equals 6.1 points, or a majority of Obama's popular vote margin. Had the Democratic 18-29 year-old vote stayed the same as 2004's margin, Obama would have won by about 1 to 2 points, and would not have won 73 electoral votes from Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, or Indiana.
I am based at Texas Tech Univesity in the deeply "red" (Republican) state of Texas. I was amazed, therefore, to see exit-poll data showing that Obama carried the 18-29 vote in the Lone Star State, with 54%. All of the age groups of older Texans went for McCain, most dramatically the 66% of 65-and-older voters who went for the Arizona senator.
As social scientists, we aim not only to document trends, but also to understand why things turned out as they did. As detailed here, "Generation We" writer Eric Greenberg commissioned a major study of the so-called "Millenial" generation (born from 1978-2000).
Among the attitudes and values found to characterize the Millenials, their self-reported openness to innovations and new ideas appears to map onto some of the themes of emerging adulthood, such as trying out new things and learning to think for oneself.
Millennials pride themselves not only on their recognition that the status quo has failed but also on their refusal to be constrained by past conventions. Of all the attributes on which they were asked to compare themselves to earlier generations of Americans, they identified their willingness to "embrace innovation and new ideas" as the variable that most differentiates them from older Americans...
Young persons' "refusal to be constrained by past conventions" was apparent beyond the presidential election. On California's Proposition 8, exit polls revealed 18-29 year olds to be the only age group in which a majority took the pro-same-sex marriage position (61% for "No"). In mirror image, the oldest voters (65 and older) came down 61% in opposition to same-sex marriage (voting "Yes" on the measure).
The source of older voters' conservatism in the 2008 election cannot be determined solely by exit polls from last Tuesday, with longitudinal studies being necessary. Were today's older voters more liberal at earlier points in their lives and then become more conservative with age (known as an aging effect)? Or perhaps was there something about becoming an adult in the years roughly from 1945-1960 that would make today's older voters more conservative (known as a cohort effect)? (See here for an illustration of these effects.)
If the 18-29 year-old voters of today retain their liberal values throughout their adult life spans -- and this is a big if -- then the Democratic Party will be in good shape for a long time. Quoting again from the article about Greenberg's research:
Born between 1978 and 2000, the Millennials currently include 95 million young people up to 30 years of age -- the biggest, most diverse, and best-educated age cohort in the history of the nation. In 2016, they will be 100 million strong and positioned to dominate the American political scene for 30-40 years.
UPDATE: Over at Pollster.com, Kristen Soltis has written an interesting piece entitled "The GOP Faces Long-Term Challenge With Young and Independents." Below, I reproduce two paragraphs that I feel are particularly relevant to the study of emerging adulthood (along with Soltis's bibliographic references):
Scholars have noted that early adulthood plays a key role in the creation of political generations. In 1974, Beck described that young voters are primarily responsible for the birth of electoral realignment.(1) Billingsley and Tucker (1987) follow this analysis with the claim that political generations are often defined by political events occurring during young adulthood. (2) Indeed, the generation of voters in the 18-29 age group for the 2008 election were made up of those whose young adult political life would likely have included the events of September 11th as well as the expansion of political news availability via cable news and the Internet - not to mention the entire Bush Administration. The long term impact on the GOP of this swing will be felt for years to come i[f] young voters are not appealed to with a positive, modern agenda that speaks to their concerns - the environment, energy, the economy, education, and entitlement reform. (Perhaps there's something with the letter "e"?)
...
The Republican Party has two major challenges that jump from these numbers that must be tackled. First, the GOP must win back the youth vote. There's little reason to believe that this year was an aberration - that young voters came out for Obama but will fade away and become apathetic in years to come. However, barring major life events, young voters who leave a pattern of habitual non-voting by voting for the first time will be carried [by] "inertia" to continue voting in future elections. As more and more young voters go to the polls, the norms surrounding voting among that age cohort will change the social costs of voting in a way that provides positive peer reinforcement, contributing to higher turnout. (3) Furthermore, the longer the GOP waits to try to win these voters back, the harder it will be - prior study has already established that as voters age, their partisan identification grows stronger. (4)
...
1) Beck, Paul. (1974). A socialization theory of partisan realignments. In Richard Niemi and associates (eds.), The Politics of Future Citizens. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
2) Billingsley, K., & Tucker, C. (1987). Generations, Status and Party Identification: A Theory of Operant Conditioning. Political Behavior, 9(4), 305-322
3)Plutzer, E. (2002). Becoming a habitual voter: inertia, resources, and growth in young adulthood. American Political Science Review, 96(1), pp 41-56.
4)Claggett, W. (1981). Partisan acquisition versus partisan identity: life-cycle, generation, and period effects, 1952-1976. American Journal of Political Science, 25(2), pp 193-214. and Campbell, A., Converse, P., Miller, W., and Stokes, D. (1960). The American voter. New York; Wiley.
Noting that, "...youth voter turnout is the percentage of eligible 18-29 year olds who voted," CIRCLE estimates that around 52 or 53 percent of eligible 18-29 year olds voted this year. This figure continues the upward trend from 1996 (37%), 2000 (41%), and 2004 (48%).
[The 48% youth participation rate in 2004 can (roughly) be broken down further, by multiplying the following two figures from here: "In 2004, 81.6% of registered 18-29 year olds voted in the Presidential elections. Only 60% of 18-29 year olds were registered to vote in that election."]
However, again according to CIRCLE:
Young people (ages 18-29) represented 18 percent of the voters in Tuesday’s election, according to the National Exit Polls (NEP) conducted by Edison/Mitofsky. This is one point higher than in 1996, 2000 and 2004, when young voters represented 17 percent of voters in each presidential election, according to the NEP.
What this means is that, concurrent with youth voters' ever-increasing participation in recent elections (relative to their same-age counterparts in previous years), there has also been rising voter participation in older age groups. Thus, 18-29 year olds have not increased their share of the overall electorate much, from 17% in the past to 18% this year.
Purely in terms of turnout, it seems fair to say that youth voters participated somewhere in between the visions of the most optimistic and most skeptical observers.
The biggest story of this year's youth vote, therefore, would appear to be the unusually lopsided distribution of candidate preference: Obama 66%, McCain 32%. The full electoral implications of this margin are developed in this document:
In 2008, 18% of the electorate was comprised of 18-29 year-olds. That figure, when multiplied by the 34 percent differential in Obama voting equals 6.1 points, or a majority of Obama's popular vote margin. Had the Democratic 18-29 year-old vote stayed the same as 2004's margin, Obama would have won by about 1 to 2 points, and would not have won 73 electoral votes from Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, or Indiana.
I am based at Texas Tech Univesity in the deeply "red" (Republican) state of Texas. I was amazed, therefore, to see exit-poll data showing that Obama carried the 18-29 vote in the Lone Star State, with 54%. All of the age groups of older Texans went for McCain, most dramatically the 66% of 65-and-older voters who went for the Arizona senator.
As social scientists, we aim not only to document trends, but also to understand why things turned out as they did. As detailed here, "Generation We" writer Eric Greenberg commissioned a major study of the so-called "Millenial" generation (born from 1978-2000).
Among the attitudes and values found to characterize the Millenials, their self-reported openness to innovations and new ideas appears to map onto some of the themes of emerging adulthood, such as trying out new things and learning to think for oneself.
Millennials pride themselves not only on their recognition that the status quo has failed but also on their refusal to be constrained by past conventions. Of all the attributes on which they were asked to compare themselves to earlier generations of Americans, they identified their willingness to "embrace innovation and new ideas" as the variable that most differentiates them from older Americans...
Young persons' "refusal to be constrained by past conventions" was apparent beyond the presidential election. On California's Proposition 8, exit polls revealed 18-29 year olds to be the only age group in which a majority took the pro-same-sex marriage position (61% for "No"). In mirror image, the oldest voters (65 and older) came down 61% in opposition to same-sex marriage (voting "Yes" on the measure).
The source of older voters' conservatism in the 2008 election cannot be determined solely by exit polls from last Tuesday, with longitudinal studies being necessary. Were today's older voters more liberal at earlier points in their lives and then become more conservative with age (known as an aging effect)? Or perhaps was there something about becoming an adult in the years roughly from 1945-1960 that would make today's older voters more conservative (known as a cohort effect)? (See here for an illustration of these effects.)
If the 18-29 year-old voters of today retain their liberal values throughout their adult life spans -- and this is a big if -- then the Democratic Party will be in good shape for a long time. Quoting again from the article about Greenberg's research:
Born between 1978 and 2000, the Millennials currently include 95 million young people up to 30 years of age -- the biggest, most diverse, and best-educated age cohort in the history of the nation. In 2016, they will be 100 million strong and positioned to dominate the American political scene for 30-40 years.
UPDATE: Over at Pollster.com, Kristen Soltis has written an interesting piece entitled "The GOP Faces Long-Term Challenge With Young and Independents." Below, I reproduce two paragraphs that I feel are particularly relevant to the study of emerging adulthood (along with Soltis's bibliographic references):
Scholars have noted that early adulthood plays a key role in the creation of political generations. In 1974, Beck described that young voters are primarily responsible for the birth of electoral realignment.(1) Billingsley and Tucker (1987) follow this analysis with the claim that political generations are often defined by political events occurring during young adulthood. (2) Indeed, the generation of voters in the 18-29 age group for the 2008 election were made up of those whose young adult political life would likely have included the events of September 11th as well as the expansion of political news availability via cable news and the Internet - not to mention the entire Bush Administration. The long term impact on the GOP of this swing will be felt for years to come i[f] young voters are not appealed to with a positive, modern agenda that speaks to their concerns - the environment, energy, the economy, education, and entitlement reform. (Perhaps there's something with the letter "e"?)
...
The Republican Party has two major challenges that jump from these numbers that must be tackled. First, the GOP must win back the youth vote. There's little reason to believe that this year was an aberration - that young voters came out for Obama but will fade away and become apathetic in years to come. However, barring major life events, young voters who leave a pattern of habitual non-voting by voting for the first time will be carried [by] "inertia" to continue voting in future elections. As more and more young voters go to the polls, the norms surrounding voting among that age cohort will change the social costs of voting in a way that provides positive peer reinforcement, contributing to higher turnout. (3) Furthermore, the longer the GOP waits to try to win these voters back, the harder it will be - prior study has already established that as voters age, their partisan identification grows stronger. (4)
...
1) Beck, Paul. (1974). A socialization theory of partisan realignments. In Richard Niemi and associates (eds.), The Politics of Future Citizens. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
2) Billingsley, K., & Tucker, C. (1987). Generations, Status and Party Identification: A Theory of Operant Conditioning. Political Behavior, 9(4), 305-322
3)Plutzer, E. (2002). Becoming a habitual voter: inertia, resources, and growth in young adulthood. American Political Science Review, 96(1), pp 41-56.
4)Claggett, W. (1981). Partisan acquisition versus partisan identity: life-cycle, generation, and period effects, 1952-1976. American Journal of Political Science, 25(2), pp 193-214. and Campbell, A., Converse, P., Miller, W., and Stokes, D. (1960). The American voter. New York; Wiley.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
"Rock the Vote" Poll of 18-29 Year-Olds
A new "Rock the Vote" poll of 18-29 year-olds has just been released.
Friday, September 5, 2008
How Candidates Obama and Palin Spent Their Youthful Years
Among the things we've learned from the back-to-back Democratic and Republican conventions over the past two weeks, plus the related news coverage and blogger comments, is how the two "youngsters" of the campaign, Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, 47, and GOP vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, 44, spent at least parts of their emerging-adulthood years.
According to the Wikipedia page on Obama:
A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he served as president of the Harvard Law Review, Obama worked as a community organizer and practiced as a civil rights attorney before serving in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004.
Community involvement, as well as other types of volunteerism, are the kinds of things an emerging adult might do en route to solidifying one's identity and world views. But it was precisely Obama's community work that Palin ridiculed during her convention speech, in contrasting her own background with his:
"I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer except that you have actual responsibilities."
In response, a participant at the left-leaning blog Daily Kos provided a pictorial tribute to community organizers throughout history.
One of the hallmarks of emerging adulthood is, of course, exploration amidst a sea of options. Palin, apparently, did more exploring than most as a college student, transferring between institutions five times.
Obama and Palin, each in their own ways, have made it to the political big leagues, though, and the rest is up to the voters.
According to the Wikipedia page on Obama:
A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he served as president of the Harvard Law Review, Obama worked as a community organizer and practiced as a civil rights attorney before serving in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004.
Community involvement, as well as other types of volunteerism, are the kinds of things an emerging adult might do en route to solidifying one's identity and world views. But it was precisely Obama's community work that Palin ridiculed during her convention speech, in contrasting her own background with his:
"I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer except that you have actual responsibilities."
In response, a participant at the left-leaning blog Daily Kos provided a pictorial tribute to community organizers throughout history.
One of the hallmarks of emerging adulthood is, of course, exploration amidst a sea of options. Palin, apparently, did more exploring than most as a college student, transferring between institutions five times.
Obama and Palin, each in their own ways, have made it to the political big leagues, though, and the rest is up to the voters.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Parents Who Follow their Young-Adult Children to College
Thursday's (August 21) New York Times had an article entitled "Following the Kids to College." The article reports on what seems to be the latest phenomenon in college students' relationships to their parents -- namely, having out-of-state parents buy a home in the town of their children's college. I was interviewed a few months ago by the Times writer, and only learned today that the article had been published. The writer did a good job, in my view, of talking to a variety of experts and obtaining different perspectives. A brief quote of mine was used, featuring what perhaps could be a new contribution to the lexicon.
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