n (1979), performed a cross-sectional study on 12-24 year old males. It was discovered that just over half of the subjects had reached identity achievement at 24 years. Therefore this shows that identity achievement must go on into adulthood. OConnell (1976), found similar patterns when he carried out retrospective interviews with married women who had school age children. These women described how their identity became more evident to themselves as they progressed though their life, from getting married, to finding a job, to having children. These findings suggest that identity development is not so strongly focused in adolescence as Erikson believes. The work on identity status and its attempt to pin down Eriksons ideas has shown some interesting findings but can be criticised on three counts. Firstly, it is not the case that adolescents experience the moratorium status in different topic areas at the same time. It is evident that at a single point in time, one content area (e.g. religious belief), may be stable while another area of life decision (e.g. sexuality), is in crisis. Secondly, a crisis can occur at any point in time during adult life, but identity development is quite prominent in the early adult years (Cowie and Smith 1996). Finally, it has been discovered that for most young people, most of the time changes in identity are gradual (Cowie and Smith 1996), and are not restricted to individual stage-like experiences. It would therefore appear that the status categories are not such a useful tool for adequately assessing identity as first expected. In conclusion, Eriksons work is a direct descendent of Freudian theory. He does not try to redefine the fundamentals of psychoanalysis but instead enrich, clarify and extend it by taking into account the importance of culture and historical contexts. Erikson was also able to illustrate the nature of their influence on individual identity. However, this is not without criticism, ma...
