Developmental Theories There are many theories on how a human develops. Most babies follow a certain pattern of development but the controversy Is which person’s developmental pattern of development is correct? Erik Erickson, Sigmund Freud and Jean Piglet’s developmental theories are similar. Each of the theories goes through a humans development chronologically, giving a guideline to when certain developments happen. For example when a child is supposed to walk or when a child is going to speak. It Is only a guideline and these theories are not supposed to be held too strictly.
Sigmund Fraud’s developmental theory was his psychosocial stages of development. HIS stages were: the oral, the anal, the phallic, the latent and the genital. The oral stage focused on the mouth. It is the reason why all babies like to put everything in their mouth. It Is how they explore the world. This stage Is usually from ages 0-1 . Not completing this stage means that the person will be orally fixated all their life. They might pick up such bad habits as smoking. The anal stage is focused on the anus of the child. During this stage the baby Is trying to conquer such tasks as toilet training.
The consequence of not completing this stage is a person being “Anal Retentive. ” This stage lasts from 1-3 years old. The phallic stage is by far the most controversial stage of Fraud’s developmental stages. This stage states that a child wants the parent of the opposite sex and wants to kill the other parent. This is called the Oedipus complex. If you do not complete this stage then you can become sexually deviant. This stage lasts tort ages 3-6 years old. The latent stage of development means that you want to identify with same sex peers. At this stage you develop defense mechanisms.
This stage lasts from ages 6-12 years old. The last stage of this development is the genital stage. The major task in this stage is to achieve sexual intimacy. This is from 12 years old onward. You cannot get to this stage unless you complete all the other stages. I can give a great example from my life that makes at lest one of the stages true. I have d baby cousin he Is now rears old. Saw him grow up and I have been there as his babysitter since he was born. I was there for his first words and most of his developmental stages. My cousin put everything in his mouth when he was younger.
He date everything from dirt to worms, and sometimes both. This Is an example of Frauds oral stage. My cousin almost died because of it though. My cousin ate a Leg building block. He was choking until I stepped in. I am a lifeguard so I know all the CPRM and first alder techniques. I had my uncle call 911 and I began to perform the Heimlich maneuver. Eventually the Leg came out of his mouth and I swept it from his mouth, but it was not over. My cousin had become unconscious and he was not breathing. I performed CPRM on him until the paramedics got there .
When the paramedics got there we rode to the hospital. When I got to the hospital I Just broke down and cried. I could not believe what had Just happened. The doctor came out of he room where he was the doctor said that my cousin was lucky to have me there because I gave him enough oxygen to survive even though he did not start breathing on his own until he got into the ambulance. Erik Erickson theory on development is based on social development. In Erickson theories he talks about different feelings that a baby has to be secure with before the baby can develop normally.
There are eight stages to his development theory, these stages are: Trust vs.. Mistrust, Autonomy Vs.. Shame or Guilt, Initiative Vs.. Guilt, Industry Vs.. Inferiority, Ego Identity Vs.. Role Confusion, Intimacy Vs.. Isolation, Generatively Vs.. Stagnation and Ego Integrity Vs.. Despair. The first conflict is Trust vs.. Mistrust. This goes from ages 0-2 years old. The baby has to learn to trust their care giver. The baby must trust that the care giver will always be there for its needs. Autonomy vs.. Shame or Doubt is the stage where a baby must learn to have control over their body and their body functions.
This stage last from ages 2-3 years old. This stage corresponds to Fraud’s anal stage. Initiative vs.. Guilt is the stage where a developing child must be active in their environment. The ages of this stage are 3-5 years old. The child needs to have a sense of purpose. Industry vs.. Inferiority is the stage where a child develops competence. The ages for this stage are 6-11 years old. These are the school years of a child’s life. Ego Identity Vs.. Role Confusion is the stage where a child is in their adolescent years. The ages of this stage are 12-18 years old.
The teenager is going through puberty and is noticing members of the opposite sex. Intimacy Vs.. Isolation is the stage where the person is trying to find a mate for themselves. The ages for this stage are 18-24 years old. They want love. Generatively Vs.. Stagnation is the stage where the now adult is working and they want to be a enter for other children. The ages in this stage are 25-64 years old. The last stage of Erickson theory is Ego Integrity Vs.. Despair. In this last stage a person needs to become comfortable with the life that they are living and have lived.
The ages of this last stage are from 65-death. During the summer I work at a summer camp. I am Head Lifeguard, Head Counselor and Director of Sports. It is a fairly large camp with, on average, 140 campers a year. Ages in the camp range from 5-12 years old. Sometimes we have problems with the kids but most of them are good. One year we had one boy who always wanted to play with the girls. This boy was 12 and in the 5th grade. His parents are immigrants from Mexico so he was far behind the other children intellectually. At first we thought it was good and thought nothing of it.
Then we found out that the child was putting on make-up and acting like a girl. We thought this was weird and disturbing. We tried to force the child to play with the boys but all the boys would Just make fun of him. This corresponded to the Ego Identity Vs.. Role confusion. This little boy cannot identify with his same sex peers so he naturally wants to go with the girls and play because he feels that he can identify better with these other children. Jean Piglet’s theory to development touches on the physical aspects to a babies development and the automatic reflexes that the baby and develops as time goes on.
These stages include: the seniority stage, the pre-operational stage, the concrete operations stage and the formal operations stage. The seniority stage in his theory states that infants go from having automatic reflexes to exploring the world in sense and motor abilities that develop naturally. The baby develops the concept of time and space. In the pre-operational stage young children learn to develop the use of words for things that they want. They might use the wrong word for something they want but Just to have the ability is the stage focus.
In the concrete operational stage children can use skills to solve everyday problems but cannot think abstractly. In the formal operational stage the person can think abstractly and logically. The person can use this way of thinking to solve hypothetical problems. The camp that I work at is a summer tutorial camp. I have worked with many different children at many different skill levels. I see children all summer long going through the concrete operational stage. I worked with a child one on one and this child could love a math problem but you ask them why it makes sense and they couldn’t tell you.
This child can not think abstractly. He could tell you that Paul Revere went to Boston and warned everyone that the British were coming, but he couldn’t tell you why that was a good thing. He couldn’t think abstractly, he Just accepted things the way they were. In conclusion I think that all of these stages have good aspects to them and bad aspects to them. For most of them the good outweigh the bad. A parent should not adhere to these guidelines strictly but if a child is far behind any of these stages then the child should get some help to catch up.
