First Year Experience

Establishing Identity

Chickering and Reisser report that identity formation depends on the other areas of development mentioned on the student development page: competence, emotional maturity, autonomy, and positive relationships. The development of your identity involves being comfortable with your body, being comfortable with your gender and sexual orientation, having positive self-esteem, personal stability, and a sense of self (1993).

Chickering and Reisser report that college student concern with appearance is obvious. Students continually experiment with dress while trying to keep up with current fads. But by the time students are ready to graduate, most of the early creative variations are given up. Students realize that the package or the phoney personality doesn't make the person but the individual inside is what's important (1993).

Chickering and Reisser add that stablishing identity also includes reflecting on one's family of origin and ethnic heritage, defining self as a apart of a religious or cultural tradition while also seeing self within a social and historical context (1993).

Chickering and Reisser also point out that establishing identity involves finding roles and styles at work, at play, and at home that are genuine expressions of self and that sharpen self-definition (1993). It involves gaining a sense of how you are seen and evaluated by others. Identity establishment leads to clarity and stability and a feeling of capable, familiar, and worthwhile.

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Reference:
Chickering, Arthur, & Reisser, Linda. Education and Identity. Jossey-Bass: San Francisco, CA 1993.