Relations Between Rebelliousness, Risk-Taking Behavior, and Identity Status During Emerging Adulthood

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between identity status, rebelliousness, and risk-taking behavior. A hundred and thirty nine young adults responded to (a) the Extended Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status, (b) a multi-faceted rebelliousness measure and (c) a measure of risk-taking behavior. The rebelliousness measure consisted of scales for current levels of telic, hedonistic, fantastic, anarchistic, and defiant rebellion, as well as for level of past rebelliousness. Results indicated that a link exists between identity status, rebelliousness, and risk taking among this sample. The moratorium identity status was positively associated with all levels of current rebelliousness except for anarchistic rebellion. Moratorium was additionally positively associated with risk-taking behavior. The identity achievement status was positively linked to the level of past rebelliousness, but was not associated with any of the current rebelliousness measures except for a negative relation with anarchistic rebellion. Diffusion was positively associated only with the defiance measure, and identity foreclosure was negatively associated with telic rebellion and with past level of rebelliousness. Findings are discussed in terms of the tension faced by maturing individuals between conformity and autonomy with implications for identity development.

Notes

The author would like to thank Moshe Israelashvili, Alan Waterman, and three anonymous reviewers for their comments on earlier drafts of the paper.

¹A copy of the instrument and a report describing its psychometric properties is available from the author on request.

*Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (two-tailed).

**Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (two-tailed).

***Correlation is significant at the 0.001 level (two-tailed).