Essay Portion: Psychological Development

Psychological Development

Katherine Freeman

PSY 203

PSY/203

Psychological Development

Erikson’s Stages of Psychological Development

Psychological development refers to the development of individuals’ intellectual, emotional, cognitive, and social functioning and capabilities throughout their lifespan, mainly from childhood to adulthood. Different scholars have come up with different stages that describe the human beings’ psychological development from infancy to adulthood. Such include Eric Erikson, who stated that all human beings experience certain crises which play a major role in their psychological development throughout their lifespan. His theory takes into consideration the effect of eternal factors society and parents on the personality development of an individual (Cherry, 2018). Erikson presented the crises as eight stages of psychological conflicts as discussed below:

Trust Vs. Mistrust – Hope (Infancy-18months)

Here, parents’ capability to nurture and care for the child is emphasized in terms of touch and visual contact. If handled with care, the child develops trust, security, confidence, and optimism. Otherwise, the child develops mistrust to the world, worthlessness, and insecurity.

Autonomy Vs. Shame – Will (18 months-3 years)

The child builds his/her autonomy and self-esteem as he/she learns what is right or wrong. Well-cared-for children believe in themselves and behave with pride. Otherwise, they are likely to develop stubbornness, defiance, tantrums, and temper. Most kids tend to be at risk during this stage, with varying feelings of low self-esteem and shame when they fail to master certain skills.

Initiative Vs. Guilt – Purpose (3-5 years)

Erikson states that children develop the desire to copy adults around them. They develop control and power over the world by taking the initiative of creating and directing the play as well as other social interactions. Children who become successful at this stage develop the capability to lead others. On the other hand, those who fail to gain these skills develop a sense of self-doubt, guilt, and lack of initiative.

Industry Vs. Inferiority – Competency (6-12 years)

During this stage, human beings are capable of creating, learning, and achieving new skills and knowledge, which help develop a sense of industry. Human beings interact more during this stage, and if they encounter unresolved feelings of inferiority and inadequacy, they tend to develop low self-esteem (Cherry, 2018).

Identity Vs. Confusion – Fidelity (13-21 years)

It is the adolescent age, where the individual struggle with questions that concerns their identity. Such includes, “Who am I?” or “What are my goals in this life?” In an attempt to find questions to such questions, human beings tend to try many distinct selves to identify the one that bests fits them. Individuals who end this stage in success develop a strong sense of identity can remain true to their goals, values, and beliefs, while a problem arises. Otherwise, individuals develop weak self-sense and experience confusion. They are confused about their future and identity (Cherry, 2018).

Intimacy Vs. Isolation – Love (22-40 years)

During this stage, human beings either experience intimacy or isolation. Those have experienced a sense of self and are willing to share their life with other individuals. Otherwise, individual experience isolation.

Generativity Vs. Stagnation – Care (40-65 years)

The most important things during this stage are career and work. People work to establish stability and try to contribute as much to society. This involves activity such as volunteering, mentoring and bringing up children, which contribute to the development of others. Individuals who fail to adopt this duty experience stagnation and feel as if they are not contributing to the wellbeing of society (Cherry, 2018).

Integrity Vs. Despair – Wisdom (65 years-death)

According to Erikson, this stage involves much reflection. Individuals that led a meaningful life have a feeling of integrity. Otherwise, a person has a feeling of despair – whereby they fear death and wonder what their point of living was.

Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

Cognitive development refers to the development of the thought process, which includes the capability to learn, read, remember, and solve a problem. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development focuses on understanding the nature of intelligence, along with how children acquire it (Barrouillet, 2015). He states that people go through four main stages of mental development, as discussed below:

Sensorimotor Stage (Birth-2 years)

In this stage, infants build an understanding of themselves by interacting with the environment. Infants can, therefore, differentiate between themselves and other objects. In this stage, infants learn through assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation involves organizing information and absorbing it into a schema, while accommodation involves the modification of schemata to include the object when it cannot be assimilated.

Preoperational Stage (2-7 years)

During this stage, children are in a point to think about a thing symbolically. This means that that they can make a thing stand for something other than themselves. The children learn through pretend play but still encounter struggle with logic and taking other people’s point of view, meaning their thinking is still egocentric.

Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 years)

According to Piaget, children begin to develop logic and operational thought in this stage. This means that the child is capable of thinking internally in their head rather than physically. They are less egocentric and care about the feeling and thoughts of others (Barrouillet, 2015).

Formal Operational Stage (12 years + )

This is the last and stage lasts to adulthood. Here, individuals develop the ability to think about abstract concepts and test hypothesis in a more logical manner.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

 Abraham Maslow introduced a hierarchy of needs that proposes that individuals motivated to fulfill their basic needs before moving on to meet higher level growth needs. It is usually represented as a pyramid that has five levels of needs (Datta, 2014). The lower-order needs are regarded as physiological needs, with the top level in the pyramid regarded as a growth need.

Self-actualization

This is the need to feel fulfilled or to feel that one is living up to his/her potential. Self-actualization includes creativity morality and problems solving, among others.

Esteem

Individual’s esteem needs involve the desire to feel good about oneself. Maslow states that esteem needs involve two components; self-confidence and the feeling of being valued by others. People need to feel respected and appreciated, which enhance their confidence and self-esteem.

Love and Belonging

According to Maslow, people need acceptance, belonging, and love in their lives. The needs for love, belonging, and acceptance is often satisfied by such things as a family, friendships, community groups, churches, social groups, and romantic attachments.

Safety and Security Need

At this level, people look for control and order in their lives. Some of the most common security and safety people want at this level include financial security, safety against injuries and accidents, and health and wellness. For instance, getting a job, getting health insurance, saving money, and living in a secure neighborhood are some of the examples of actions that uphold security.

Physiological

Includes things that are vital for an individual’s survival. Such needs include air, food, water, and homeostasis. Also, shelter and clothing are considered to be psychological needs. According to Maslow, sexual reproduction is also a physiological need since it is essential to the propagation and survival of various species.

Theories of Emotions

There are several theories of emotion, including James-Land Theory, Schachter-Singer Theory, Schachter-Singer’s Two Factor Theory, and Cannon-Bard Theory. The two main theories are James-Land Theory and Cannon-Bard Theory, however. The first theory states that the sensation or reaction of the body happens before the feeling of emotions. For instance, if I cry, I will be sad or happy. The latter proposes that the emotional feelings and reaction of a person happen at the same time. This means that an individual’s emotions will go with their body’s reaction (Nevid, 2015).

Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

The motivation that reflects the need or wishes for outside rewards, like prestige and money, is called extrinsic motivation. On the other hand, the motivation that reflects an individual’s fulfillment for accomplishing certain objectives is called intrinsic motivation (Cerasoli, Nicklin & Ford, 2014). An employer is required to know the difference between these two types of motivations is because it helps them identify the employee that works for his/her fulfillment or those that works for the pay. This, in turn, helps differentiate between the loyal employees and the disloyal ones.

Emotional Intelligence

Emotions involve feelings and include the state of being sad, angry, or happy. Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to recognize, express, and control one’s emotions and those of the others. A customer service interacts with people daily, either through the phone or face to face (Collins & Cooper, 2014). Possessing emotional intelligence would be essential to customer service stuff since it helps them gauge how other people are feeling and change accordingly. This would help ensure that things remain smooth between the two parties. Also, emotional intelligence helps them determine the course of action to take when presented with any situation.

References

Barrouillet, P. (2015). Theories of cognitive development: From Piaget to today.

Cerasoli, C. P., Nicklin, J. M., & Ford, M. T. (2014). Intrinsic motivation and extrinsic incentives jointly predict performance: A 40-year meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin, 140(4), 980.

Cherry, K. (2018). Erik Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development. Retrieved June 5, 2018.

Collins, C. S., & Cooper, J. E. (2014). Emotional intelligence and the qualitative researcher. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 13(1), 88-103.

Datta, Y. (2014). Maslow’s hierarchy of basic needs: An ecological view. Oxford Journal: An international Journal of Business & Economics, 8(1).

Nevid, J. S. (2015). Motivation and Emotion. In Essentials of Psychology: Concepts and Applications(Fourth ed., p. 282). St. John’s University.