Research Paper on:
Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer and Freedom

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
nice kid would choose the lifestyle he had chosen. For years McCandless had trekked from one coast to the other in search of something. What that something was, no one  would ever know for certain. His trip to Alaska would be his last. His death left many, including his family, to wonder what Chris was looking for. To that end,  Jon Krkauer went on a personal odyssey and discovered that part of Chris journey was a quest for freedom on a social, economic, and spiritual level. As a group, teens  and young adults seem to continually place themselves at genuine risk. This is one indicator that social participation is driving self-image. Consider that for the first time in their lives  they are truly able to make independent choices for themselves. As a result, many engage in highly risky behaviors such as unprotected sex, drugs, theft, driving too fast, and thrill  seeking. The ability to take risks has been linked to the development of self-esteem. Most experts believe that challenge and risk are the primary tools adolescents use to find out  who they are and determine who they will become. This testing of boundaries is a natural and normal part of the growth process, unfortunately for some teens, the envelope is  pushed too far. Eric Erikson, one of the first pioneers of human growth and development, agreed that each person must go through a set of stages and with the accomplishment  of each stage forward progression and maturity is gained. For teens, participation in socially generated tests is inevitable. Eriksson believed that a person was presented with a certain set of  crises during his or her life and it was the dealing and adapting to these crises, which shaped the personality and identity of the individual. One can see that this