title: Testing reality during adolescence: the contribution of Erikson's concepts of fidelity and developmental actuality.
abstract: The process of reality testing can be thought of as a lifespan developmental line, where adolescence provides a critical developmental advance but not an endpoint. Erikson's concepts of fidelity and developmental actuality provide a frame of reference for considering this. Three means of reality testing are identified--contemplation, action, and conversation--where these modes of approach can be used separately or in concert to clarify the reality status of situations and phenomena. These methods of testing reality are illustrated within four arenas of adolescent functioning-thought, time, parental representations, and the experience of the embodied self.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology at New York University Graduate School of Arts and Science, USA. deborah.browning@nyu.edu
authors.forename: Deborah L
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Browning
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D003142:Communication; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D007207:Individuation; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D016487:Parenting / Q000523:psychology; D011340:Problem Solving; D011574:Psychoanalytic Theory; D000297:Psychology, Adolescent; D011606:Psychosexual Development; D011936:Reality Testing; D012649:Self Concept; D013850:Thinking