Social participation, identity style and identity dimensions in late adolescence among students of three types of vocational schools

Departing from the model suggested by Luyckx, Schwarz, Berzonsky et al. (2008), the relationships between identity and educational context, social participation, and identity information processing style were investigated. Participants were 972 students from six vocational schools in Poznań. The students, within these six schools, attended Grades I-III of three types of vocational schools: basic vocational schools (n=271), technical upper secondary schools (n=448), and specialized upper secondary schools (n=253). Three questionnaires were used: The Dimensions of Identity Development Scale (DIDS/PL), which measures five identity dimensions according to the concept of Luyckx, Schwarz, Berzonsky et al. (2008), Social Participation Questionnaire, developed by Brzezińska, Rękosiewicz and Hejmanowski (see Rękosiewicz, 2013b), enabling identification of the type of social participation, and the Polish adaptation of M. Berzonsky’s Identity Style Inventory 4 (ISI-4) authored by A. Senejko (2010), to examine identity styles. The results showed that the students from basic vocational schools and technical upper secondary schools were more often characterized by the normative identity style, whereas the students from specialized upper secondary schools manifested a greater tendency to engage themselves in exploration, both adaptive and ruminative.