Personal Fable

The personal fable, is a cognitive distortion where adolescents believe that they are the focus of everyone else's attention and concern. It is found during the formal operational stage in Neo-piagetian theory, along with the imaginary audience. Feelings of invulnerability are also common. The term "personal fable" was first coined by the psychologist David Elkind in his 1967 work Egocentrism in Adolescence.

Feelings of uniqueness may stem from fascination with one's own thoughts to the point where an adolescent believes that his or her thoughts or experiences are completely novel and unique when compared to the thoughts or experiences of others. This belief stems from the adolescent's inability to differentiate between the concern(s) of his or her thoughts from the thoughts of others, while simultaneously over-differentiating his or her feelings.Thus, an adolescent is likely to think that everyone else (the imaginary audience) is just as concerned with him as the he himself is; while at the same time, this adolescent might believe that he is the only person who can possibly experience whatever feelings he might be experiencing at that particular time and that these experiences are unique to him. According to David Elkind (1967), an adolescent's intense focus on himself or herself as the center of attention is what ultimately gives rise to the belief that one is completely unique, and in turn, this may give rise to feelings of invulnerability. Ultimately, the two marked characteristics of personal fable are feelings of uniqueness and invulnerability. Or as David Elkind states, "this complex of beliefs in the uniqueness of (the adolescent's) feelings and of his immortality might be called a "personal fable", a story which he tells himself and which is not true."

So often if someone on remajanya so often, like talking to myself of dramatizing an issue happened to him. And if he does not can handle it then would be taken until he ' s strong. People like this probably is very convenient once make up a story that we think are those of ordinary men very ' s so cute.

Santrock, John W., Life Span Development, Texas:mcGRaw-hill companies, 2006