Five Lives at Harvard

Harvard University Press has partnered with De Gruyter to make available for sale worldwide virtually all in-copyright HUP books that had become unavailable since their original publication. The 2,800 titles in the “e-ditions” program can be purchased individually as PDF eBooks or as hardcover reprint (“print-on-demand”) editions via the “Available from De Gruyter” link above. They are also available to institutions in ten separate subject-area packages that reflect the entire spectrum of the Press’s catalog. More about the E-ditions Program »

Case histories of five young men and their experiences “growing up” at Harvard form the basis of this in-depth psychological study. The students were selected as representative of the findings of a longitudinal research project which followed some five hundred Harvard undergraduates through four years. Although the preceding decade has seen dramatic changes in the behavior of adolescents and young adults, Stanley King is convinced that, while the form of major developmental issues may have changed noticeably in this time, the underlying psychological processes remain essentially the same. Dr. King challenges the “crisis” model of growth, suggesting its replacement by one of “adaptive capacity,” the creative interaction of individual and environment.