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Examples Of Role Confusion In Catcher In The Rye

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Holden Caulfield's Development
When we are are small we were all raised differently which can affect us in different ways as Erik Erikson states “Personality development takes up an entire lifetime and has eight psychosocial stages.” When we are adolescence (12 to 18) we are on our fifth stage and it is a crucial stage because this stage focus on identity vs. Role confusion and in this time it's when we find out who we are and what we want to be. But establishing an identity within society can lead to what Erik Erikson refers to as role confusion, “ Role confusion involves the individual not being sure about themselves or their place in society.” At the time of role confusion an adolescent may explore and experiment with different cultures …show more content…

Holden had gone through four stages but throughout the book he is having trouble going through his fifth and sixth stage which focuses in his Identity and intimacy confusion due to his “failure” in his past stages. For example when Holden told his little sister Phoebe that he was going to leave and find a job far way, but in reality Holden doesn't have an idea of what he's going to do with his life. Holden planning his future shows his role confusion because he's trying to leave his teenage years behind but he’s still not sure if he's going to do it. Another example is when Holden said “ "Here's my idea. How would you like to get the hell out of here? ... tomorrow morning we could drive up to Massachusetts and Vermont ... We'll stay in these cabin camps... when the dough runs out, I could get a job somewhere... and, later on, we could get married or something... Wuddaya say? C'mon! Wuddaya say? Will you do it with me? Please!” to Sally but she said told him that he was crazy but at the time holden didn't think that because he was determined that he was going to leave and leave his past behind a become a new person. That shows that Holden is running away from

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