desde finales de los 90 se habla de una nueva etapa en la vida, adultez emergente (emerging adulthood). Se argumenta que esta etapa es diferente de la adolescencia y de la adultez, y por lo tanto debe ser considerada una etapa distinta de las otras. Me he encontrado con este concepto a partir de mis estudios sobre curiosidad. Son los jovenes de hoy mas curiosos, aventureros e inquietos que los de antes? Es la curiosidad un predictor de la accion emprendedora? esa es la pregunta de uno de los paper que estoy escribiendo (les conte que la semana pasada me aceptaron un nuevo paper?). La adultez emergente parte en los 18-19 llegando hasta los 26-29. Se caracteriza por ser una etapa de búsqueda de identidad, una parcial dependencia económica, y una carrera profesional todavía en formación. O sea si no eres 100% independiente económicamente, todavía estas estudiando, y no sabes bien a que te dedicaras en la vida. Para la ciencia eres un adulto emergente. “Emerging dulthood is distinguished by relative independence from social roles and from normative expectations. Having left the dependency of childhood and adolescence, and having not yet entered the enduring responsibilities that are normative in adulthood, emerging adults often explore a variety of possible life directions in love, work, and worldviews. Emerging adulthood is a time of life when many different directions remain possible, when little about the future has been decided for certain, when the scope of independent exploration of life’s possibilities is greater for most people than it will be at any other period of the life course. As recently as 1970, the median age of marriage in the United tates was about 21 for women and 23 for men; by 1996, it had risen to 25 for women and 27 for men, now is close to 30 (U.S. Bureau f the Census, 1997). Age of first childbirth followed a similar pattern. Also, since midcentury the proportion of young Americans obtaining higher education after high school has risen steeply from 14% in 1940, 60% by the mid-1990s, to over 65% in the 00′s (Arnett & Taber, 1994; Bianchi & Spain, 9961).