Abstract
M.Ed.
A major challenge facing adolescents is the achievement of a stable identity, failure in which would result in being identity confused (Mussen, Conger, Kagan & Huston, 1990:617). According to Perosa et al. (1996:818), identity refers to a person's stable, coherent and integrated sense of self. It is argued that many members of the present generation of adolescents lack this stable, coherent and integrated sense of self. This is partly because of the following reasons cited by Freeman (1993:158): high levels of crime; substance abuse and family breakdown; violence that has become a way of solving
problems; some adolescents that have lost respect for human life; and levels of education that are appallingly low, all of which depict a situation of maladapted adolescents.These manifestations of maladapted adolescents cited in the previous paragraph, warrant adult intervention so that adolescents will develop and achieve stable identities. The intervention can take among other forms, the development of the adolescents' intelligence, in view of the fact that intelligence may be taught (paragraph 1.2), and that it also makes an important contribution to identity. Erikson (1968, cited in Freeman,
1993:164) states that: " For interventions to be effective, people need to feel that they can make an impact on their own lives and on the large society ". A question that can be asked from this assertion is: " what interventional programmes are there to develop the adolescents' intelligence and what role do adolescents play in the development of their own intelligence?" In line with the emphasis made in the latter paragraph about interventional programmes to develop adolescents' intelligence, Hayes (1993:13) argues
that individuals who do not use some well-developed thinking by the end of high school education, are unlikely to develop such thinking in adulthood. Thinking, particularly abstract thinking, is one of the manifestations of intelligence at the adolescent stage. The assertion that Hayes (1993) makes, demands that intelligence be developed during adolescence because if that does not happen, adolescents might develop into adults with
underdeveloped identities. If this situation is not attended to, one might see a range of maladaptations like the ones that have already been mentioned, which poses a problem for society. Hjelle and Ziegler (1992:188) advocate that a person's ego is a basis for
human behaviour and functioning. A person's ego is described by Shestowsky (1983:553) as a psychological component that determines the person's perceptions and relationships with himself or herself as well as with his her social world. The person's ego may thus be viewed as a source of his or her attitude towards life in general.