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In response to the paper by Grob and colleagues, three aspects are highlighted. First, when analyzing the influence of history on the lives of different cohorts, it is necessary to differentiate between historical events and gradual historical change in aspects of social structure and norms. Second, the difference between 3rd person and 1st person acounts of lives (life histories vs. life stories) implies different conceptualizations of what a historical trend towards individualization implies. When analyzing life histories, individualization implies an increase in the diversity of life-courses, while when analyzing subjective conceptualizations of one's life, individualization implies a shift of values from traditional public and other-related concerns to self-related hedonistic concerns. This more psychological approach focuses on how self-understanding is influenced by historical context. Finally, an argument is made for undertaking more detailed analyses of life stories in terms of linguistic and formal properties, in terms of age, of hind- versus foresight, and of the pragmatics of the interviewing situation.

The life story is a special cognitive-communicative format which allows understanding persons from a biographical perspective through autobiographical reasoning and life narrating. Reviewing research on the development of the life story from the past 15 years, we clarify the conceptual and developmental specificity of the life story by comparing it to single event stories, and the specificity of autobiographical reasoning by comparing it to other forms of reasoning. To support the claim that the life story emerges only in adolescence, we review the earlier development of self and autobiographical remembering leading up to the life story. We outline the significance of autobiographical reasoning for bridging biographical ruptures, and we discuss the meaning of the cultural context for the development of the life story and its functionality. Finally, we suggest major developmental research questions that remain to be pursued.

Die Studie MainLife – Entwicklung der Lebensgeschichte (quantitativer Teil) wurde von der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main durchgeführt. Im Erhebungszeitraum November 2002 bis Mai 2020 wurden in insgesamt fünf Wellen (I-V) Personen in verschiedenen Alterskohorten in persönlichen Interviews zu ihrer Lebensgeschichte, ihren Motiven und zum Wohlbefinden befragt. Die erste Welle diente der Untersuchung der Entwicklung der Fähigkeit, kohärente Lebensgeschichten zu konstruieren und zu erzählen. In Welle II wurden die neue Alterskohorten hinzugefügt. Welle III diente der Untersuchung der Längsschnittentwicklung der Lebensgeschichte, Welle IV der Untersuchung von Lebensgeschichte und Motiven und Welle V der Untersuchung von Lebensgeschichte und Wohlbefinden.

Der bei GESIS hinterlegte Datensatz enthält quantitative Daten auf der Grundlage von Fragebögen und, in einer späteren Folgeveröffentlichung, auch Codierungen und Bewertungen auf der Grundlage der Erzählungen. Er umfasst fast alle Teilnehmer. Der bei Qualiservice hinterlegte Datensatz (qualitative Daten) enthält die sieben wichtigsten Erinnerungen mit Datumsangaben, Lebenserzählungen, Dauer und Wortanzahl der Lebenserzählungen, zusätzliche Erzählungen aus Welle IV, Alter, Geschlecht, Migrationshintergrund (selbst oder ein Elternteil) und Höhe des höchsten erreichten Bildungsabschlusses.

Scholarship pertinent to the nature of human plasticity and the contemporary theoretical stress on developmental systems theories suggest that the regulation of dynamic person-context relations should be the key focus of inquiry in the study of adolescent development. An exemplar of a theory congruent with this relational conception of adolescent development is the Selection, Optimization, and Compensation (SOC) model offered by Baltes, Baltes, and colleagues. The model may be a value-added contribution to the adolescent literature in several respects: through illustrating the centrality of selection, optimization, and compensation processes in conceptualizing the regulation of the person-context relations that characterize development in adolescence; by integrating key themes within the adolescent development theoretical and empirical literatures; and through suggesting ideas for extending these literatures in new and useful ways, including needed directions for research and applications to policies and programs that are aimed at enhancing adaptive regulation in adolescence. We illustrate these value-added contributions of the SOC model by focusing on theory and research pertinent to arguably the central construct in the study of adolescence, identity. In addition, we discuss the implications of the SOC model for using developmental systems theory to understand the relation between individual development and social constraints or opportunities. The methodological features of research using the SOC model are noted, and its implications for both the development of the person and for the maintenance and perpetuation of civil society are presented.