Stages
Human being growth and development undergoes through various stages in the life cycle that starts from the conception to the time of death. The other stages include childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and then death (Berk, 2014). The infancy stage is the critical stage as it determines the rest of the human life .During these stages, children undergo different body, behavioral changes that determine the nature of their adulthood. For the purpose of this paper, childhood and adolescent stages will form the basis of discussion.
Childhood period is divided into different stages that are the early childhood, age between 3-6, middle childhood age between 6-8 and late childhood age between 9-11 (Golenia, 2018). During all these stages of youth, the rapid increase in body size averagely 2-3 inches in height and 5 pounds in body weight are observable in the first two years (Findlay, 2006). Physical changes such as sitting, walking, and hand-eye coordination are mastered. As month’s passes, children tend to grow thinner as girls retain body fat while boys become more muscular. At the age of between 3 -6, skeletal growth is evidential as the bones tend to harden as the growth rate slows down and development of inner subjective self, and besides developing a spoken vocabulary of about 300 to 1000 words (Dawes et al., 2015). The stage allows the images from the outer world into the unconscious mind thereby determining the later life of artist, scientist, and writers. At the following stage of childhood, the child develops some technical and social skills that allow them to solve practical problems and attain everyday responsibilities (Sigelman, & Rider, 2008). The adolescent stage ranges from the ages of 12-20 and is mainly characterized by the biological developments such as sexual desires, emotional, spiritual, and cultural passions (Jensen & Chen, 2013). The adolescent stage allows the child to move towards a more mature sense of self and purpose regarding intimacy and healthy relationship, understanding of ideas with moral viewpoints and many others.
Several studies have developed theories to explain human development. Among the theories are the Erikson’s psychological development, Sigmund Freud psychosexual theory, Attachment theory, and many others (Platz & Arellano, 2015).
Erickson theory was developed by Erik Erikson that centered on the psychological development of an individual from the time of birth to the time of death (Dunkel & Harbke, 2017). The theory is made up of 8 series of personality development stages that are; trust vs. mistrust, autonomy vs. shame and doubt, initiative vs. guilt, industry vs. inferiority, identity vs. confusion, intimacy vs. isolation, generativity vs. stagnation, and integrity vs. despair. Each of the stages helps in building the preceding stage, and the experience gained on those stages offer the turning points of the human development (Westen, Burton, & Kowalski, 2006). The experience can either develop or fail to establish the psychological quality of an individual, and either way affects the rest of the life of the individual.
Theories
According to Dr. Feud, he believed that the ways parents were dealing with their children’s primary sexual and aggressive desires shape the future personalities of the children developed Sigmund Freud theory (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2005). According to Freud, children development to adulthood is through sexual development stages known as the Oral, Anal, Phallic, Latency, and Genital.
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Stages |
Theories |
Phase |
Analysis |
|
Childhood stage |
Erikson’s theory and Sigmund Theory |
Trust vs. Mistrust And oral stage |
According to Erikson’s theory, the first stage of psychological development occurs between birth and the age of one year. At this stage, the infant depends on the adults for food, love warmth, safety and nurturing, therefore, trust id developed on the quality of the care given. Consistent providence of those requirements makes the infant gain trust and feel comfortable in the world, and unavailability of those features, the child loses trust and tens to reject the caregivers. The oral stage of the Sigmund theory starts from birth, whereby the oral cavity is the primary focus of libidal energy. The infant finds pleasure in suckling and therefore, like the Erikson, trust is gained on the caregiver that offers adequate oral pleasures. Infants that get frustrated at this stage lack psychological pleasure and this affects their confidence. |
|
Autonomy vs. Shame and doubt And the Anal stage |
According to Erikson’s theory, the child develops personal control to be independent. At this stage, the child performs major necessary actions on their own like toy preferences, food choices hence making them more secure and confident than those that fail to go through this stage. The anal stage is the second stage of the Freud’s theory and takes place between one-half years. At this stage, the child is obsessed with erogenous zones and therefore is the phase of toilet training. At this stage, the child is in dilemma of meeting his/her desires or the parent’s demands; hence those that derive pleasure from the expulsion of feces tend to grow into careless and defiant children who help themselves anywhere. Conversely, those children that don’t have expulsive pleasure may spit on the parents hence the stage needs proper toilet training. |
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Initiative vs. Guilt |
This is the third stage of the Erikson’s theory that allows children to acquire the power to play and interact with others. |
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Industry vs. inferiority |
Is the fourth stage and happens between the ages of 5-11, whereby the child starts to develop a sense of pride in their achievements. At this stage, those children that get encouraged, commended by parents and teachers tend to believe in their skills that eventually affect their psychological development unlike those that don’t receive encouragements that develop inferiority character. |
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Adolescent stage |
Erikson’s theory and Sigmund Freud theory |
Identity vs. confusion and Phallic stage |
Identity vs. confusion is the fifth stage of the Erikson’s theory whereby the children develop a sense of personal identity such as beliefs, ideal and values that guide the behaviors that conform to the societal standards. The phallic stage the child’s erogenous zone is the genital region, thereby the child becomes interested in personal and other children areas. At this stage, the child tends to be more close to the opposite sex parent. Boys tend to have a conflict of the motherly love since most of the libido energy is transferred to the genital region. However, the feeling is suppressed by the availability of the father. As the boy child realize that is unable to possess the mother, he copies the lifestyle of the father to possess the mother. The same happens to the girl child who tends to love the father more than the mother. |
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Intimacy vs. isolation and Latency period |
The intimacy and the is the stage that the child tends to explore personal relationships. Individuals that pass through this stage successfully tend to have secure and enduring relationships. The latency stage is psychosexual whereby the child develops sexual desires. |
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This essay examines personal development in two stages that are the childhood and the adolescent stages. According to the two theories by Erik Erikson and Sigmund Freud theories, myself awareness and listening skills were influenced during those two stages. From the stories told by mother, my breastfeeding period was short since my mother conceived our second born within eight months after my birth; fortunately, I was well nourished that enable me to gain motor skills such as crawling and walking at the early age of 7 months. Having close attachments with my mother, enabled to trust her because she was always there to care for me (Jones et al., 2014). Also, the availability of my cousin who was older than me by eight years enabled me to grab more fine motor skills and cognitive aspects. Apart from my parents, my cousin was very supportive during my early stages of life, who introduced me to a number of his teenager’s friend. The association with a diverse number of older children developed my today’s self-awareness. At the age of 8, I was able to ride a bicycle with the help of my cousin, and this impressed my father who went ahead and bought me a personal bicycle.
At early stages of my childhood, I was considered as an easy child, who could not listen to instructions and follow orders hence was unable to perform well in academics. This attributes to the amount of the parental love that was offered by both parents. The trait affected me in my pre-school as many times I was on the wrong side of the law. However, the support from the parents and the teachers from the school enable me to realize other people’s emotions and listening skills that shaped my behavior that eventually enable me to be awarded as the best discipline boy in grade three. The award motivated my self-esteem and realized that I could top the class even if not through academic performance, therefore, I started creating more time for academic work that saw me winning more school fair projects. During my adolescence stage, I developed more opposite-sex friend because they found me social and fun to be around (Wiley et al., 2011). The frequent associations with girls led to the loss of my virginity at the age of 13.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Human behaviors and characters depend mostly on the initial stages of life such as the childhood and adolescent. Therefore, it is upon the parents to ensure that every child receives the best during the initial stages of life. It will help those with the desire to have a good personality in the adulthood stages.
References
Berk, L.E. (2014). Development Through the Lifespan: International Edition, 6th Edition, Pearson Education, USA Recommended reading Textbooks
Capps, D. (2012). Erikson’s Schedule of Human Strengths and the Childhood Origins of the Resourceful Self. Pastoral Psychology, 61(3), 269-283. doi:10.1007/s11089-011-0400-5
Cavanaugh, J. & Blanchard-Fields, F. (2005) Adult Development and Aging, 5th Edition, Cengage Learning, USA
Dawes, P., Cruickshanks, K. J., Moore, D. R., Fortnum, H., Edmondson-Jones, M., McCormack, A., & Munro, K. J. (2015). The Effect of Prenatal and Childhood Development on Hearing, Vision and Cognition in Adulthood. Plos ONE, 10(8), 1-16. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0136590
Dunkel, C., & Harbke, C. (2017). A Review of Measures of Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development: Evidence for a General Factor. Journal Of Adult Development, 24(1), 58-76. doi:10.1007/s10804-016-9247-4
Findlay, B. (2006) How to Write Psychology Research Reports and Essays, 4th Edition, Prentice Hall, Frenchs Forest.
Golenia, L., Schoemaker, M. M., Otten, E., Mouton, L. J., & Bongers, R. M. (2018). Development of reaching during mid-childhood from a Developmental Systems perspective. Plos ONE, 13(2), 1-17. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0193463
Jensen, L. A., & Chen, X. (2013). Adolescent Development in a Diverse and Changing World: Introduction. Journal Of Research On Adolescence (Wiley-Blackwell), 23(2), 197-200. doi:10.1111/jora.12046
Jones, R. M., Vaterlaus, J. M., Jackson, M. A., & Morrill, T. B. (2014). Friendship characteristics, psychosocial development, and adolescent identity formation. Personal Relationships, 21(1), 51-67. doi:10.1111/pere.12017
Platz, D., & Arellano, J. (2011). Time Tested Early Childhood Theories and Practices. Education, 132(1), 54-63.
Sigelman, C.K. & Rider, E.A. (2008). Life-Span Human Development, 6th Edition, Cengage Learning, USA
Steinberg, L. (2007) Adolescence, 8th Edition, McGraw-Hill, New York
Westen, D., Burton, L. & Kowalski, R. (2006). Psychology: Australian and New Zealand Edition, John Wiley & Sons, Australia.
Wiley, R., Berman, S., Marsee, M., Taylor, L., Cannon, M., & Weems, C. (2011). Age Differences and Similarities in Identity Distress Following the Katrina Disaster: Theoretical and Applied Implications of Erikson’s Theory. Journal Of Adult Development, 18(4), 184-191. doi:10.1007/s10804-011-9130-2
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