Individual Differences Profile 1

Individual Differences Student Profile

Nicholas Rideout

EDUC 205: Developmental/Individual Differences

Fall 2022
Individual Differences Profile 2

Emotions are powerful in many ways, especially at the developmental stage of

adolescence. Ashley is a freshman in a high school undergoing an impactful change in the way

she thinks and feels about herself and her environment. This profile will dissect Ashley’s socio-

emotional, cognitive, and physical development as an adolescent and her emotional struggles. I

will also explain the practices her friends, teachers, and family do to help support Ashley through

this monumental challenge in life.

General Information

Ashley is a 14-year-old who lives in Kimberly, Idaho. For most of her life, she has

known the same people throughout her community and has always generally been surrounded by

familiar faces. Ashley comes from a Hispanic background on her mother's side and a western

European background on her father’s. While her culture isn’t prominent in her day-to-day life,

she finds value in it during social events and how the world around her treats Hispanics. Coming

from a family of four, six including two who have moved out, Ashley is a middle child. She has

always been one to be the life of the party and this plays into her coming from a bigger family.

Both of her parents work most of the day so her siblings work together and look out for one

another. Since she has two older siblings who have moved out, they tend to fill in for her parents

and spend time with her, often letting her visit and stay the night on weekends. Her routine is

consistent on a day-to-day basis going to school at 8 am and typically noting that she falls asleep

at or after midnight. On weekdays she uses time directly after school to study or do homework

before spending time for herself for the rest of the evening. However, this often tends to be

drawn out due to a loss of motivation or personal distraction. Her family has dinner together

every night as well. On weekends she is expected to be up around nine am and doesn’t have a
Individual Differences Profile 3

strict bedtime currently. Ashley works hard on keeping a consistent schedule and is supported by

her family with a to-do list every day.

Physical Development

Ashley is a fairly average teenager with a few differences from students her age. Standing

at around 5’ 1”, she has long black hair, brown eyes, and tan skin. Being shorter than average for

students her age and has a smaller stature. Despite this physical difference, she appears to be as

mature as other students her age. Ashley wears contacts or glasses depending on how she is

feeling and is fairly outgoing. While she is outgoing, it appears to be mainly with her friend

group, and her manner changes in class and in the hallway with other people around. Ashley

feels most secure surrounded by her friends inside and outside of class.

Ashley has good health for her age. Coming from a family with stable finances and on

the higher end of income for the area, she never has to worry about eating right or getting the

food and nutrients she needs for her age. The main shortcoming she has with her health is

exercise and eating enough. Despite eating healthy, Ashley doesn’t have a high enough caloric

intake, explaining her size for her age. Paired with her presence in sports such as basketball and

track, Ashley struggles to eat enough for her body to gain the benefits of exercising properly. She

has expressed a bit of resentment towards basketball at the time, however, enjoys running track

with her friends. Thanks to sports, Ashley has fully developed coordination and motor skills.

Outside of sports Ashley spends her time with her siblings or out in town with her friends.

Cognitive Development

Ashley is a freshman at Kimberly Highschool. Her classes are a mixture of core classes

and electives. One of these electives she has a particular resentment towards as she feels forced

into that class by her parents. Ashley has average grades for most of her classes with a noticeable
Individual Differences Profile 4

struggle in a few areas. One of which being math and the other being her business elective. The

other classes that she is taking are English, agriculture, advisory, physical science, health,

Spanish, and seminary. In every class, Ashley feels test anxiety, even in subjects she is fluent in

such as Spanish. I will go further into this area of struggle in her emotional profile. Despite her

personal struggles, Ashley thinks like anyone her age on average. Ashley is also proficient in

formal operations in Piaget stages of cognitive behavior which is appropriate for her age. Ashely

is capable of complex thinking and can use this to plan ahead, this is thanks in part to her

formulaic schedule at home.

One area that Ashley struggles with on a personal level is information processing and

decision-making. She often finds herself overwhelmed with the thought of making simple

decisions such as what she wants to eat or where to hang out with her friends. This not only

affects her personal life but her education as well as she finds herself torn in multiple paths she

wants to pursue as a career. This extends to her experience in class, due to her struggles, Ashley

isn’t confident in class and has a hard time connecting during discussions led by students. Her

teachers have found ways to help this by seating her in the back of the class. Ashley expresses

that this helps her a bit more as she doesn’t feel like she’s being stared at during class and can

physically see her peers interacting with each other. Group work seems to be another tough area

for her so her teachers are specific about who they pair her with. She is often paired up with

more outgoing students. This is to allow Ashley to open up or not feel isolated from the group as

a whole. Thankfully, Ashley is at an early enough stage for her to work through this struggle

with her support groups for her future.

Socio-emotional Development
Individual Differences Profile 5

Ashley has a close group of friends that she is constantly able to rely on. Most of her

friend group consists of girls her age, either Hispanic as well or caucasian. They have a diverse

friend group and are wholly comfortable with each other. Outside of spending time at lunch, they

are often found at the mall or thrifting looking for unique clothes to impress everyone else at

school. Ashley has described spending time with her friends as an escape from her home life, as

she feels suffocated at times by her parents’ expectations. Often she’d try and spend time with

her older siblings and stay weekends there. She has a good relationship with her parents, she has

assured me, she explains that she fears disappointing them and often distances herself. This leads

me to Erikson’s stage of socio-emotional development. It appears that Ashley is stuck at the

identity stage in her life. Often finding comfort in escapism with her friends and having a

difficult time with her self-image. This leads to a lack of motivation and a struggle that Ashley

struggles with every day at school. This struggle is a fear of failure or perhaps a fear of the

unknown. This lack of identity that Ashley has is prevalent during adolescence and this period of

development. A struggle many teens are all too familiar with. This struggle has impacted her

education, leading her to zone out in class and feel uncomfortable outside of her friend group.

Ashley has an incongruent self-concept, which negatively affects her self-esteem and

general confusion about how she portrays herself and others’ views of her. This has been shown

to impact her relationship with peers she is not familiar with, feeling uncomfortable with

socializing with students not already close to her. Her friends have noticed this and often try and

help her through this, this being shown as they often change tables at lunch or hang out with

mutual friends. This helps Ashley become more comfortable with people outside of her circle.

Ashley also has self-conscious emotions, leading her to shut down if she cannot fulfill the

expectations given to her by herself. Although she has struggled with self-esteem, she tries her
Individual Differences Profile 6

hardest to push herself to her limit. This often leads her to disappointment as she doesn’t focus

on her needs first. Ashley has a fairly positive relationship with adults as she looks to them for

guidance. Due to her parents being involved in her life in a very close and strict way, she finds

herself looking for answers in adults and mentor figures in life. This has helped her through her

emotional struggles as she trusts many of her teachers and advisors to help her when she needs

to. However, this has been seen to be a burden at times as she admits to overly relying on the

guidance of adults. This develops a difficulty and being independent and thanks to her having a

hard time making decisions, this extends to a problem of making decisions for herself rather than

the expectations of others. This is shown as she takes classes she says she isn’t exactly interested

in but she hopes to find interest in them to make her parents proud. While her trusting in adults is

helpful at times, it’s been known to hold her back as well.

Major Findings

My findings show that Ashley is a normal adolescent. Having a slightly shorter stature,

but a healthy body. Ashley also appears to be on par with her peers in terms of cognitive

development with the exception of her information processing and decision-making. Her main

struggles appear to be socio-emotional and individuality. These areas that Ashley struggles with

seem to be the greatest burden to her education and development. To review her stages of

development, Erikson’s stage of socio-emotional, I believe Ashley is stuck at the identity stage.

Often finds herself lost and constantly worrying about where she is going in life and what she

truly wants to do. She finds comfort in her friend group and they have shown they have her best

interests at heart. Ashley’s teachers are trying to adapt to her personal needs as an individual to

help her be as successful as possible. One way being special attention to seating charts and group

projects to help her feel more comfortable. Often pairing her up with the same people for
Individual Differences Profile 7

familiarity. For Ashley’s cognitive development, Piaget’s formal operation stage appears to be

appropriate for her at this time. Ashley is very capable of creating schedules and complex

thoughts, she just struggles with voicing her ideas and sharing them with others. Ashley often

seeks guidance from teachers and adults as she has relied on her parents heavily during her

childhood, seeking affirmation from authority figures as she struggles with self-esteem.

Ashley’s childhood impacted her independence as a person. Coming from a rather large

family compared to her peers, she often feels overlooked. With her parents being heavily

involved in her life she finds it difficult to make decisions for herself as she’s used to being given

guidelines and handrails through life.

Ashley’s physical development has not affected her education. She has an average or her

differences make a minimal impact on her educational pursuits. The main issue that might

impact her further in life would be her lack of appetite which is common for her age.

Ashley’s cognitive development has played some part in affecting her education. This is

due to her difficulty in concentrating in class due to her emotional well-being. She is where she

needs to be development-wise for her age, excelling in complex ideas, however, she has personal

areas where she is behind.

Ashley’s socio-emotional development is her biggest hurdle so far. Having a stable and

positive social life with friends, Ashley shows too much reliance on others. This is most

prevalent in her emotional well-being. Ashley is being held back by her self-image and fear of

failure. This often leads to her being scared to take risks or attempt to please her parents instead

of herself.

Ashley has reached a point in her life where identity is the main concern of many people

her age. Teenagers struggle emotionally during this stage in life and social support is a major
Individual Differences Profile 8

positive factor for struggling teens. She has many emotions she doesn’t fully understand and a

reliance that she has built on her parents from her childhood that she has to learn to let go of.

From the few days, I got to work with her I see a determination in her as she sits in class and

faces herself in the metaphorical mirror. Overall, I believe that Ashley has the friend group she

needs to pass this hard time in her life and she can find herself in them as well.
Individual Differences Profile 9

References

Sousa, D. A. (2016). How the special needs brain learns. Thousand Oaks, CA, CA: Corwin.