The development of adolescents subjectivity in a digital environment

Author: Dzhanashia A., Mogilev State A.A. Kuleshov University (Russia)

Keywords

adolescent, person, intention, self-education, assistance, speech, will

Abstract

The development of digital technologies and artificial intelligence (AI search chatbots) “offer” a person autonomy in self-development, while at the same time deforming independence. The most important component of self-education and self-development is minimized - communication with another person: a complex, multifaceted process of establishing and developing contacts between people, the perception and understanding of another person, and therefore myself. Speech is a tool for the child to acquisition his own affects, behavior and activities (L.S. Vygotsky). Our own experimental studies showed that the adolescents in 2007 (N=157) and to a greater extent in 2020 (N=315) found it difficult to clearly articulate their intentions, the reasons for successes and failures in self-education. Probably, their growing immersion in the digital environment, which “offers” the simplification of performing routine, but “human” actions: oral and written speech, is affecting. The current trend towards content visualization requires the user to only operate visually, in which speech is used minimally. Fluency and awareness of reading are lost, which entails difficulties in reflecting one's own feelings, desires, intentions. There are problems with volitional self-regulation, which requires reinforcement first by external and then by internal speech; as a result, instead of overcoming obstacles, there is a refusal of activity. The formation of subjectivity in this case is delayed, occurs discretely. In adolescence a real adult loses its significance and exclusivity as a source of knowledge and experience. The problem also lies in the way in which knowledge and experience are transferred from an adult to a teenager, especially in such a complex and, at the same time, typical activity for the latter, as self-education. Cooperation between an adult and a teenager is possible under the following conditions: the independence of the teenager's intention to engage in self-education, the specificity of activities, the specifics of adolescence.

Video