Psychosocial Crises of Rizki in J.S. Khairen’s Kado Terbaik: An Eriksonian Reading

Abstract

This study examines the psychosocial crises of Rizki, the protagonist of J.S. Khairen's novel Kado Terbaik, through Erik Erikson's theory of psychosocial development. Previous studies of the novel have described the protagonist's cognition, needs, personality, and motives, but none has examined how his sense of self is formed and damaged under sustained social pressure. Using a qualitative descriptive design within the psychology of literature approach, the study collected narration, dialogue, and interior monologue through close reading and note-taking, and analyzed them with an interactive model of data condensation, data display, and conclusion drawing. The findings show three interrelated crises. First, abandonment by his mother at fourteen re-activates the crisis of trust versus mistrust and leaves a lasting distrust of adults and institutions. Second, in an illegal orphanage, Rizki faces identity versus role confusion: he commits to a moral identity by refusing to abuse younger children, yet internalizes the negative identity of a vagrant imposed by his environment. Third, after leaving the orphanage at eighteen, he briefly moves toward closeness with his youngest sister and with Rani but he resolves the crisis of intimacy versus isolation negatively by cutting off contact and withdrawing from communal life. The study concludes that only the identity crisis reaches a partial positive resolution, while the crises of trust and intimacy are resolved predominantly negatively, and that the novel portrays the psychosocial cost of institutional child neglect, in which a young person protects others while being unable to receive care himself.