Legal Socialization across the Life Course
Every developing child goes through a series of stages associated with childhood and adolescence. This is the focus of chapter 3. To some extent development is an invariant progression shaped by cognitive and biological growth, and the capacities and limits that exist at any stage of individual growth. At the same time, the progression reflects the unique experience of each individual over their life course, particularly with nonlegal and legal authority figures. Beyond that, every child grows up during a particular period in history that has particular events such as the war in Vietnam or the 9/11 terror attacks, which create a unique social climate and produce common concerns and outlooks among the members of a particular age cohort. These common elements have been widely discussed in popular writing that has sought to distinguish among the silent generation, baby boomers, generation X, millennials, and generation Z.