How Did Afolabi's Search For Identity

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This confused Afolabi in his search for his identity. Afolabi’s popularity grew during this stage as well as his insecurities. Despite being able to attend a regular high-school, unlike adolescents do during this stage, his strict parents restricted him from going out to visit or hangout with his friends at night due to security reasons and because of the strong Christian foundation he grew up with, they wanted to protect him from anything that went against his family’s beliefs and values. This is another example of how Afolabi missed out on regular experiences because of his commitment to God. This could have caused Afolabi to view himself as a person whose identity included being surrounded by those who shared the same faith that he did, but it however resulted in the lack of normal …show more content…

This impacted on his search for identity because of that he felt that he had no social identity. However he believed that his identity could be changed after he left high-school and can start afresh. Afolabi felt that he had a close relationship with God and exhibited great faith in his beliefs, but felt naïve with his approach to normal social interactions. He faced many challenges while searching for identity, struggling with the challenges an adolescent experiences during this stage, clashing with his beliefs, along with the rise of social media highlighting his inability to get involved in normal adolescent activities. Erikson explains typical adolescent behaviour, such as participation in group activities and falling in love, as part of the search for identity (Meyer, Moore & Viljoen 1994). Despite Afolabi experiencing only a few of the normal adolescent activities he also missed out on most of them and because of all the major social challenges he faced at this stage of development, he found it hard on how to view himself through another person’s perspective creating difficulty in forming a strong occupational