Module+3+Developmental+Stages%2C+Tasks+and+Challenges+in+Middle+and+Late+Adolescence+2025-2026

Learning Competencies

• Classify assorted developmental tasks according to stage.
• Evaluate one’s own development in comparison with age-mates.
• Explain how actively facing adolescent challenges clarifies and manages the demands of the teen years.
• List concrete ways to become a responsible adolescent who is prepared for adult life.

Human Development: Scope & Definition

• Discipline that studies growth and change across the entire lifespan.
  • Domains: physical, cognitive, social, intellectual, perceptual, emotional, personality.
• Development is commonly broken into stages; stage boundaries differ by theoretical model (e.g., Erikson, Piaget, Kohlberg, Havighurst).

Erikson’s Psychosocial Development (8-Stage Model)

• Central Idea: At each age-linked stage, the individual confronts a normative crisis whose resolution produces a basic virtue; failure yields maladjustment.
• Stage-by-stage details
  • Infancy (Birth–18 mo) — Trust vs Mistrust
    • Influential figures: parents / primary caregivers.
    • Favorable: confidence that basic needs will be met → virtue of Hope.
    • Unfavorable: pervasive uncertainty, wariness of others.
    • Illustrative neonatal cries (practical diagnostic cues):
    – Hunger cry – rhythmic, low-pitched; accompanied by rooting & hand-to-mouth.
    – Pain cry – sudden, sharp, high-pitched with stiff posture, clenched fists.
    – Lonely cry – cooing/whining crescendo that stops when comforted.
    – Tired cry – whiny, nasal, with yawning & eye-rubbing.
    – Discomfort cry – grumbly, fussy, linked to diaper/temperature issues.
  • Early Childhood (18 mo–3 yr) — Autonomy vs Shame & Doubt
    • Favorable: emerging self-control & independence → Will.
    • Unfavorable: self-doubt, excessive restraint, defiance.
  • Play Age (3–6 yr) — Initiative vs Guilt
    • Favorable: purpose, assertiveness.
    • Unfavorable: guilt-ridden perfectionism.
    • Five primary play forms & their developmental pay-offs:
    – Constructive (e.g., LEGOs)→ problem solving, fine-motor skill.
    – Pretend (role play)→ creativity, language, emotion regulation.
    – Physical/Active → motor coordination & health.
    – Symbolic → abstract thought, emergent literacy.
    – Games-with-Rules → fairness, self-regulation, patience.
  • School Age (6–12 yr) — Industry vs Inferiority
    • Favorable: competence, perseverance.
    • Unfavorable: feelings of inadequacy.
  • Adolescence (Puberty–18 yr) — Identity vs Role Confusion
    • Favorable: coherent sense of self → Fidelity.
    • Unf