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Adolescent egocentrism


Adolescent egocentrism is a term that David Elkind used to describe the phenomenon of adolescents' inability to distinguish between their perception of what others think about them and what people actually think in reality. David Elkind’s theory on adolescent egocentrism is drawn from Piaget’s theory on cognitive developmental stages, which argues that formal operations enable adolescents to construct imaginary situations and abstract thinking. Accordingly, adolescents are able to conceptualize their own thoughts and conceive of other people’s. However, Elkind pointed out that adolescents tend to focus mostly on their own perceptions – especially on their behaviors and appearance - because of the “physiological metamorphosis” they experience during this period. This leads to adolescents’ belief that other people are as attentive to their behaviors and appearance as they are of themselves. According to Elkind, adolescent egocentrism results in two consequential mental constructions, namely imaginary audience and personal fable.

Imaginary audience is a term that Elkind used to describe the phenomenon that an adolescent anticipates the reactions of other people to him/herself in actual or impending social situations. Elkind argued that this kind of anticipation could be explained by the adolescent’s preoccupation that others are as admiring or as critical of him as he is of himself. As a result, an audience is created, as the adolescent believes that he/she will be the focus of attention.

However, more often than not the audience is imaginary because in actual social situations always being the focus of public attention is not usually the case. Elkind believed that the construction of imaginary audiences would partially account for a wide variety of typical adolescent behaviors and experiences; and imaginary audiences played a role in the self-consciousness that emerges in early adolescence. However, since the audience is usually the adolescent’s own construction, it is privy to his or her own knowledge of him/herself.

According to Elkind, the notion of imaginary audience helps to explain why adolescents usually seek privacy and feel reluctant to reveal themselves – it is a reaction to the feeling that one is constantly under the critical scrutiny of others.

Elkind addressed that adolescents have a complex set of beliefs that their own feelings are unique and they are special and immortal. Personal Fable is the term Elkind created to describe this notion, which is the complement of the construction of imaginary audience. Since an adolescent usually fails to differentiate his focus on his own perceptions and that of others, he tends to believe that he is of importance to so many people (the imaginary audiences) that he comes to regard his feelings as something special and unique. This belief in personal uniqueness and invincibility becomes an illusion that he can be above some of the rules, disciplines and laws that apply to other people; even consequences such as death. Due to the existence of personal fable at some point, an adolescent tends to substitute the roles of an idol, a hero or even a god with his own image.


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