Introduction to Psychology: Psychosocial Development

Psychosocial Development

  • The process by which a person’s sense of self emerges as the result of interactions between his or her social and personal side

Epigenetic Principle

  • Erik Erikson proposed that the stages of development follow the Epigenetic Principle
  • Biological plan for growth that allows each function to emerge systematically until the fully functioning organism has developed
      * Although one can anticipate challenges that will occur at a later stage, one passes through the stages in an orderly pattern of growth
      * There is no going back to an earlier stage because experience makes retreat impossible
      * One can review and reinterpret previous stages in the light of new insights and experiences
      * Themes of earlier stages may reemerge
  • Do not think of stages as pigeonholes
      * Just because a person is described as being at a given stage does not mean that he or she cannot function at other levels
      * At every successive developmental stage, the individual is also increasingly engaged in the anticipation of tensions that have yet to become focal and in re-experiencing those tensions that were inadequately integrated when they were focal

Preschool Years

  • Infancy
      * Birth to 2 years
      * Maturation of sensory, perpetual, and motor functions
      * Attachment
      * Sensorimotor intelligence and early causal schemes
      * Understanding the nature of objects and creating categories
      * Emotional development
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Trust vs Mistrust
      * Feeding
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: mutuality with caregivers
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: Hope
        * An essential belief that one can attain one’s deep and essential wishes
      * Core Pathology: Withdrawal
        * Social and emotional detachment
      * The infant must …
        * Form a first loving, trusting relationship with the caregiver or develop a sense of mistrust
        * Trust the aspects of their world that are beyond their control
      * The infant will develop a sense of trust if its needs for food and and care are met with comforting regularity and responsiveness from caregivers
      * Infants must trust aspects of their world that are beyond their control
  • Toddlerhood
      * 2 to 3 years
      * Elaboration of locomotion
      * Language development
      * Fantasy play
      * Self-play
      * Psychosocial Crisis: autonomy vs Shame and Doubt
      * Toilet training
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: imitation
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: will
        * Determination to exercise free choice and self-control
      * Core Pathology: compulsion
        * Repetitive behaviors motivated by impulses or restrictions against the expression of impulse
      * The child’s energies are directed toward the development of physical skills, including walking, grasping, controlling the sphincter
      * The child learns control but may develop shame and doubt if not handled well
      * Beginning of self-control and self-confidence
      * Assume important responsibilities for self-care such as feeding, toileting, and dressing
      * Parents need to be protective but not too overprotective
      * If parents do not reinforce the child’s efforts to master basic motor and cognitive skills, children may begin to feel shame
      * They may learn to doubt their abilities to manage the world on their own terms
      * Children who experience too  much doubt at this stage will lack confidence in their own abilities
  • Early School Age
      * 4 to 6 years
      * Gender identification
      * Early moral development
      * Peer play
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Initiative vs Guilt
      * Independence 
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: identification
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: purpose
        * The courage to imagine and pursue valued goals
      * Core Pathology: inhibition
        * A psychological restraint that prevents freedom of thought, expression, and activity
      * The child continues to become more assertive and to take more initiative but may be too forceful, which can lead to guilt feelings
      * The challenge for this period is to maintain a zest for activity and at the same time understand that not every impulse can be acted on
      * Adults need to provide supervision without interference
      * If children are not allowed to do things on their own, a sense of guilt may develop, they may come to believe that what they want to do is always wrong

Elementary Years

  • Middle Childhood
      * 6 to 12 years
      * Friendship
      * Concrete operations
      * Skill learning
      * Self-evaluation
      * Team play
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Industry vs Inferiority
      * School
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis:  education
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: competence
        * The free exercise of skill and intelligence in the completion of tasks
      * Core Pathology: inertia
        * A paralysis of action and thought that prevents productive work
      * Students are beginning to see the relationship between perseverance and the pleasure of a job completed
      * Children’s ability to move between the worlds of home and neighborhood, and school, and to cope with academics, group activities, and friends will lead to a growing sense of competence
      * Difficulty with these challenges can result in feelings of inferiority
        * Have you decided on a career? What alternatives did you consider? Who or what was influential in shaping your decision?

Adolescence

  • Early Adolescence
      * 12 to 18 years
      * Physical maturation
      * Formal operations
      * Emotional development
      * Membership in the peer group
      * Romantic and sexual relationships
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Group Identity vs Alienation
      * Peer relationships
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: peer pressure
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: fidelity to others
        * The ability to freely pledge and sustain loyalty to others
      * Core Pathology: dissociation
        * An inability to connect with others
      * Young adolescents must confront the central issue of constructing an identity that will provide a firm bias for adulthood
      * Answer the question, “Who am I?”
      * Identity: organization of an individual’s drives, abilities, beliefs, and history
      * Involves deliberate choices and decisions, particularly about work, values, ideology, and commitments to people and ideas
      * Identity Statuses
        * Identity Diffusion
          * Do not explore options and made commitments
          * These individuals reach no conclusions about who they are or what they want to do with their lives
          * Apathetic, withdrawn, with little hope for the future, or they may be openly rebellious
        * Identity Foreclosure
          * Commitment without exploration
          * Foreclosed adolescents have not experimented with different identities or explored a range of options, but simply have committed themselves to the goals, values, and lifestyles of others (usually their parents)
          * Foreclosed adolescents tend to be rigid, intolerant, dogmatic, and defensive
        * Moratorium
          * Expiration with a delay in commitment to personal and occupational choices
          * Common and healthy for modern adolescents
          * The period is no longer referred to as a crisis because, for most, the experience is a gradual exploration rather than a traumatic upheaval
        * Identity Achievement
          * Strong sense of commitment to life choices after free consideration of alternatives
          * Few students achieve this status by the end of high school
          * Students who attend college may take a bit longer to decide
          * It is not uncommon for the explorations moratorium to continue until the early 20s
          * Some adults may achieve a firm identity at one period in their lives, only to reject that identity and achieve a new one later
          * Moratorium and identity achieved statuses
      * Adolescent Egocentrism
        * Adolescents become very focused on their own ideas
        * Everyone else shares one’s thoughts, feelings, and concerns
      * Imaginary Audience
        * The feeling that everyone is watching
        * Adolescents believe that others are analyzing them

ADOLESCENT EGOCENTRISM >> IMAGINARY AUDIENCE

  • Personal Fable
      * Self-generated, often romanticized story of one’s own personal identity
      * So unique that you’re misunderstood by others
  • Later Adolescence
      * 18 to 24 years
      * Autonomy from parents
      * Gender identity
      * Internalized morality
      * Career choice
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Individual Identity vs Identity Confusion
      * Peer relationships
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: role experimentation
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: fidelity to values
        * The ability to freely pledge and sustain loyalty to values and ideology
      * Core Pathology: repudiation
        * Rejection of roles and values that are viewed as alien to oneself

Beyond School Years

  • Early Adulthood
      * 24 to 34 years
      * Exploring intimate relationships
      * Childbearing
      * Work
      * Lifestyle
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Intimacy vs Isolation
      * Love relationships
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: Mutuality among peers
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: Love
        * A capacity for mutuality that transcends childhood dependency
      * Core Pathology: Exclusivity
        * An enlist shutting out of others
      * Intimacy refers to a willingness to relate to a person on a deep level, to have a relationship based on more than mutual need
      * Someone who has not achieved a sufficiently strong sense of identity tends to fear being overwhelmed or swallowed up by another person and may retreat into isolation
  • Middle Adulthood
      * 34 to 60 years
      * Managing a career
      * Nurturing intimate relationships
      * Expanding caring relationships
      * Managing the household
      * Psychosocial Crisis:  Generativity vs Stagnation
      * Parenting or mentoring
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: Person-environment fit and creativity
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: care
        * A commitment to concern about what has been generated
      * Core Pathology: rejectivity
        * Unwillingness to include certain others or groups of others in one’s generative concern
      * Generativity extends the ability to care for another person and involves care and guidance for the next and future generations
      * A person’s concern and energies must broaden to include the welfare of others and society as a whole
      * Stagnation happens when an individual is concerned with one’s own needs and comforts
      * Life loses meaning and the person feels better, dreary, and trapped
  • Later Adulthood
      * 60 to 75 years
      * Accepting one’s life
      * Redirecting energy toward new roles and activities
      * Promoting intellectual vigor
      * Developing a point of view about death
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Integrity vs Despair
      * Reflection on and acceptance of one’s life
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis: introspection
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: wisdom
        * A detached yet achieve concern with life itself in the face of death
      * Core Pathology: disdain
        * A feeling of scorn for the weakness and frailty of others
      * Coming to terms with death
      * Achieving integrity means consolidating your sense of self and fully accepting its unique and unalterable history
      * People who have lived richly and responsibly develop a sense of integrity
      * If previous life events are viewed with regret, the elderly person experiences despair (heartache and remorse)
  • Very Old Age
      * 75 years until death
      * Coping with physical changes of aging
      * Developing a psycho-historical perspective
      * Psychosocial Crisis: Immortality vs Extinction
      * Central Process for Resolving Crisis:  social support
      * Virtue Developed if Crisis is Resolved: confidence
        * A conscious trust in oneself and assurance about the meaningfulness of life
      * Core Pathology: diffedence
        * An inability to act because of overwhelming self-doubt

Strengths

  • The theory provides a broad, integrative framework within which to study the lifespan
  • The theory provides insight into the directions of healthy development across the lifespan
  • Many of the basic ideas of the theory have been operationalized using traditional and novel approaches to assessment
  • Longitudinal studies support the general direction of development hypothesized by the theory
  • The concept of psychosocial crisis identifies predictable tensions between socialization and maturation

Weaknesses

  • Explanations for the mechanisms of crisis resolution and process of moving from one stage to the next need to be more fully developed
  • The idea of a specific number of stages of life and their link to a genetic plan for development is disputed
  • The specific ways that culture encourages or inhibits development at each stage of life are not clearly elaborated
  • The theory and much of its supporting research have been dominated by a male, Eurocentric perspective that gives too much emphasis to individuality and not enough attention to connection and social relatedness

Moral Development

  • The mechanism by which children and adolescents learn the difference between right and wrong

Moral Reasoning

  • Their thinking about right and wrong and their active construction of moral judgments