[1] Across development, future orientation is particularly important during periods of major changes, for example during the transition from adolescence to adulthood, when youth must make choices about social groups, academic paths, as well as risky behaviors like drug and alcohol use, and sexual activity.
While different in definition, all of these constructs are thought to tap into and impact how people think and plan for the future.
[4][5][6] The collection of self-representations or self-knowledge that someone has about their self is referred to as their self-concept, and this is formed based on past experiences and expectations about the future.
[citation needed] Optimism is thought to be a broader form of hope, that describes more generally positive expectations for the future.
Time orientation refers to the direction (i.e., past, present, or future) that most commonly motivates a person's behavior and thinking.
[1] How well someone performs on this task has been linked to development of brain regions, specifically the pre-frontal lobe, that are responsible for a person's reactions to rewards and punishments, and resistance to impulses.
Delay discounting is used as a measure of future orientation because people need to be able to be motivated to work and plan in the present to receive the reward or reach their goal.
Traditionally, this would be measured by asking people to list their hopes and fears for the future through open-ended questions or questionnaires, which are then grouped into life domains (e.g., education, work and career, etc.).
Despite different physical conditions, cultural orientations, and beliefs about adult roles, people growing up in different socio-cultural settings relate to a common core of four prospective life domains: education, work and career, marriage and family, and self concerns.
Nurmi's[4][5] model focuses primarily on the cognitive representation of anticipated events, can be applied generally to all domains (e.g., education, work and career goals).
Three variables have been suggested to impact this motivation: 1) the value of the considered life domain, the importance and relevance the individual gives to a domain (i.e., higher education, family life); 2) expectancy/confidence of hopes, goals and plans occurring and optimism towards these outcomes; 3) internal control is the extent to which the individual believes they have the power to control what happens to them.
Behavioral component: Exploration of future options by seeking advice, gathering information, and evaluating their suitability for this goal based on personality and life circumstances.
[citation needed] A third framework proposed was intended to take on an all encompassing approach to describing future orientation, specifically including developmental and environmental factors.
Specifically, the model includes a horizontal axis, illustrating that future orientation develops across the lifespan (time) and is influenced by early experiences.
[6] Even if children can correctly use time-related terms associated to the past and the future (such as yesterday and tomorrow), they may still have difficulties distinguishing these periods.
[6] By the time they reach middle childhood, children develop the ability to evaluate themselves in relation to both to specific aspects of their functioning like their schooling, sports performance, or relationships with family and peers and to their global worth.
Future orientation and healthy self-esteem may both serve as protective factors against engaging in risky behavior.
High levels of hope have been associated with academic achievement, social acceptance, feelings of self-worth, and global psychological well-being.
Teens that come from a poorer background and whose families receive public assistance tend to have greater fatalistic attitudes about the future.
In addition, higher levels of future orientation are associated with less violent behaviors in teenage years.
The way parental acceptance and autonomy granting is perceived by adolescents is associated with their motivation to participate in future thoughts and behaviors.
[6] In a retrospective study,[29] emerging adults' optimism about the future was related to the memory of time spent together with parents and their upbringing.
[6] Relationships with siblings is associated to future orientation through self-agency that represents the interpersonal aspect of the self, as indicated by self-reliance, independence, and personal strength.
Also, the value-expectancy proposition suggests that one's positive self-evaluation has a direct effect on the value of a task and one's expectation in relation to task-specific success.
[citation needed] Evolutionary psychology and gender role theory predict that in developing their future orientation adolescent girls will devote more time to relational areas like marriage and family, and adolescent boys will invest more in instrumental domains such as work and career.
In the late 1950s in the United States, studies confirmed the gender differences hypothesis, since girls often viewed future life as depending on the man they would marry.
However, since the 1980s in the United States, Europe (Belgium, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, and Poland), Australia, Singapore and Israel, studies only partly replicated those earlier findings.
Another study[33] looked at future orientation and academic achievement in low-income rural and urban African American adolescents in grades 7 to 12.
[35] Another study[28] looked at the impact of positive future orientation over a span of 10 years in African American youth.
Overall, research suggests that thinking about, planning for and valuing future goals can decrease the chances that youth will participate in risky and dangerous behaviours.