Article published in:
Narrative Inquiry
Vol. 26:1 (2016) ► pp. 130–149

Parents have lives, too!

Adolescents’ and early adults’ narratives about their parents

| University of Warsaw, Poland
The ability to tell one’s own, culturally valid life story emerges in adolescence — the process that has been metaphorically termed “getting a life”. Between early adolescence and the verge of adulthood, autobiographical stories gain broader temporal perspectives and show greater complexity. But do adolescents use the same narrative story structure when talking about their close ones, such as their parents? We analysed 348 texts written by adolescents and early adults concerning their parents. We demonstrated that, with age, communication changes from a descriptive, present tense format to complex life stories. We used specific indicators of narrative form: text structure, intentionality, temporal perspective, and point of view. Results indicate that early adults are more likely than are younger individuals to use narrative structure and content in their communication. We conclude that, by the end of adolescence, parents are increasingly given their own life stories in the voices of their children.
Keywords: parents, adolescents, narrative development, life story
Published online: 20 December 2016
https://doi.org/10.1075/ni.26.1.07bud
References
Andersen, S.M., & Chen, S.
(2002) The relational self: An interpersonal social-cognitive theory. Psychological Review, 109(4), 619–645. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bokus, B.
(2004) Inter-mind phenomena in child narrative discourse. Pragmatics, 14(4), 391–408. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bruner, J.
(1987) Life as narrative. Social Research, 54, 11–32.Google Scholar
Budziszewska, M., & Dryll, E.
(2013) Narratives about relationships with parents from the perspective of middle-aged and older adults. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 30(3), 217–236. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Budziszewska, M.
(2015) Opowieść „moi rodzice” w trzech fazach adolescencji i w dorosłości. Analiza narracji tożsamościowych. [The “My parents” story in three phases of adolescence and in adulthood. An analysis of identity narratives]. Warszawa: Liberi Libri.Google Scholar
Bronfenbrenner, U.
(1986) Ecology of the family as a context for human development: Research perspectives. Developmental psychology, 22(6), 723–742. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Doležel, L.
(1976) Narrative semantics. PTL, 1, 129–151.Google Scholar
Fitzgerald, D.P., & White, K.J.
(2003) Linking children’s social worlds: Perspective-taking in parent-child and peer contexts. Social Behavior and Personality, 31(5), 509–522. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Fivush, R., Bohanek, J.G., & Duke, M.
(2005) The intergenerational self: Subjective perspective and family history. In F. Sani (Ed.), Individual and collective self-continuity (pp. 131–144). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Fivush, R., Bohanek, J.G., & Zaman, W.
(2011) Personal and intergenerational narratives in relation to adolescents’ well-being. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2011(131), 45–57. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Fludernik, M.
(2000) Genres, text types, or discourse modes? Narrative modalities and generic categorization. Style, 34(2), 274–292.Google Scholar
Habermas, T.
(2011) Autobiographical reasoning: Arguing and narrating from a biographical perspective. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2011(131), 1–17. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Habermas, T., & Bluck, S.
(2000) Getting a life: The emergence of the life story in adolescence. Psychological Bulletin, 126, 748–769. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Habermas, T., & De Silveira, C.
(2008) The development of global coherence in life narratives across adolescence: Temporal, causal, and thematic aspects. Developmental Psychology, 44(3), 707–721. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Habermas, T., & Köber, C.
(2014) Autobiographical reasoning is constitutive for narrative identity: The role of the life story for personal continuity. The Oxford Handbook of Identity Development, October 27, 149.Google Scholar
Habermas, T., & Paha, C.
(2001) The development of coherence in adolescents’ life narratives. Narrative Inquiry, 11, 35–54. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Habermas, T., & Reese, E.
(2015) Getting a life takes time: The development of the life story in adolescence, its precursors and consequences. Human Development, 58(3), 172–201. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Herman, D.
(2008) Description, narrative, and explanation: Text-type categories and the cognitive foundations of discourse competence. Poetics Today, 3, 437–472. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Labouvie-Vief, G., Diehl, M., Chiodo, L.M., & Coyle, N.
(1995) Representations of self and parents across the life span. Journal of Adult Development, 2(4), 207–222. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
McAdams, D.P.
(2003) Identity and the life story. In R. Fivush & C.A. Hayden (Eds.), Autobiographical memory and the construction of a narrative self: Developmental and cultural perspectives (pp. 187–207). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
McKeough, A., & Malcolm, J.
(2011) Stories of family, stories of self: Developmental pathways to interpretive thought during adolescence. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2011(131), 59–71. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
McCabe, A., & Peterson, C.
(1991) Developing narrative structure. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
McLean, K.C.
(2015) The co-authored self: Family stories and the construction of personal identity. NY: Oxford University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Nicolopoulou, A.
(2008) The elementary forms of narrative coherence in young children’s storytelling. Narrative Inquiry, 18, 299–325.Google Scholar
Paluchowski, W.J.
(2010) Komputerowa analiza narracyjności. Wybrane problemy metodologiczne [Computer analysis of narrativeness. Selected methodological problems]. In M. Straś-Romanowska, B. Bartosz, & M. Żurko (Eds.), Badania narracyjne w psychologii [Narrative Research in Psychology] (pp. 53–81). Warsaw, Poland: Eneteia.Google Scholar
Piaget, J., & Inhelder, B.
(1969) The psychology of the child. New York, NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Ricoeur, P.
(1984) Time and narrative. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Reese, E., & Brown, N.
(2000) Reminiscing and recounting in the preschool years. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 14(1), 1–17. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Sani, F.
(2010) Self continuity: Individual and collective perspectives. Psychology Press.Google Scholar
Selman R.L.
(1980) The growth of interpersonal understanding: Developmental and clinical analyses. New York, NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Smollar, J., & Youniss, J.
(1989) Transformations in adolescents’ perceptions of parents. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 12, 71–84. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Trzebiński, J.
(Ed.) (2002) Narracja jako sposób rozumienia świata. [Narration as a way of understanding the world]. Gdańsk: GWP.Google Scholar
Wilkoń, A.
(2002) Spójność i struktura tekstu: wstęp do lingwistyki tekstu. [Coherence and text structure: an introduction to text linguistics]. Kraków: Universitas.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 1 other publications

Köber, Christin & Tilmann Habermas
2018. Parents' traces in life: When and how parents are presented in spontaneous life narratives. Journal of Personality 86:4 ► pp. 679 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 07 february 2021. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.