The New “Bridge to Adulthood”: Searching for Meaning and Cohesion in the Nexus of “Hook-ups,” Internet Porn, and Instant Messages

Abstract

The transition from adolescence to young adulthood has sometimes been referred to as the “bridge to young adulthood.” This period is critically important for consolidating identity and for developing a deeper capacity for sexual and nonsexual intimacy. However, widening reliance on cyber technology, social media websites, and instant text messaging, in combination with newly emerging patterns of sexual relations and recreational drug and alcohol use, has complicated the navigation of the developmental transition to young adulthood. We review psychoanalytic theory pertaining to the transition from adolescence to adulthood with a focus on Erikson’s theory of psychosexual/psychosocial epigenesis in order to explicate the developmental tasks specific to this transition. This developmental stage will also be examined through the lens of developmental neurobiology. Recent theorizing on Internet-mediated sexuality will be discussed as it relates to the case studies presented. Case material will demonstrate difficulties with the transition to adulthood, manifested in part-object relating, and the use of cyber-mediated and compulsive sexuality to resolve dysphoric self-states.

KEYWORDS:

• cyber sexuality
• developmental neurobiology
• emerging adulthood
• Erikson
• late adolescence

Notes

¹ Some have characterized the “crisis” of each successive developmental epoch as more accurately representing a sort of dialectical tension—reinforcing the notion that trust and mistrust, autonomy and shame and doubt, industry and inferiority, and so forth, are always in a complementary relation to each other.

² Both of the following clinical illustrations have been subject to thorough disguising and alteration of key case elements, including but not limited to such variables as family characteristics, history, and aspects of the clinical process.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jerrold R. Brandell

Jerrold R. Brandell, PhD, BCD, is distinguished professor and coordinator, Doctoral Concentration in Clinical Scholarship, Wayne State University School of Social Work, Detroit, Michigan. He maintains a part-time clinical practice in psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Suzanne Brown

Suzanne Brown, PhD, LMSW, is an assistant professor of social work and lead instructor for the family practice concentration at the Wayne State University School of Social Work, Detroit, Michigan. She has a part-time psychotherapy practice in Ypsilanti, Michigan.