ABSTRACT
People have multiple identities, participate in diverse role-relationships,
and circulate among several different contexts daily. Identifying arenas of
comfort, as well as those contexts that mainly yield feelings of discomfort,
presumes a degree of complexity in individual lives. Simmons and Blyth
(1987) contended that, in most cases, the more contexts and role-rela-
tionships the adolescent is invested in, the more favorable are the conse-
quences for mental health and adjustment. According to their reasoning,
the person’s sense of personal worth and importance increases with the
number of arenas of participation, especially when the person finds sup-
portive others in those contexts. Simmons (in press) qualified this by not-
ing that it is better to have distinct role-partners in different setting, and
she acknowledged the potential for role strain.
