This is the 3rd lecture of [[Keith Campbell]]'s *[[PA Intro to Psychology]]* from [[Peterson Academy]] Subject: [[Psychology]] > [[Developmental Psychology]] ## Overview Development can be studied in different dimensions: - Social development - Personality development - Psychosexual development - Moral development - Cognitive development Development can be divided into different stages of life: - Infant development - Childhood development - Adolescent development - Advanced old age development aka gerantology --- ## Classic models ### Freud's theory of psychosexual development Frued's idea of development involves *libido*—his version of psychic energy—being focused on different organs at different stages of life. There is the oral stage, anal stage and phallic stage. For example, children suck on things all the time with their mouths because they are in their oral stage. Stunt growth happens when the *libido* that is supposed to be channeled into another organ does not successfully do so, and gets stuck in the previous one. In other words, the *libido* is caught up in a non-age-appropriate organ—he calls this cathexis or fixation. This leads to irregularities in the form of bad habits or addictions like people who are orally fixated might grow addicted to chewing gum. #### [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory]] While Bowlby was a trained in the Freudian models, he discovered much of behavioral irregularities had to do with chidlren not having parents around at all, as he was looking at children who lost their parents during Britain's war against Germany. From there, he developed the idea of attachment styles. ### Jean Piaget's work on cognitive development How do children perceive the natural world on a basic level? ### Lawrence Kohlberg's theory of moral development (1958) Do children deal with morality the same way an older person would? ### Erik Erikson's model of psychosocial development The person's concerns would change throughout their life—a two-year-old would worry about very different things from an eighty-year-old. His model looks at these different stages: 1. Infancy, birth, early stage, 18 months 2. Early childhood, (ages 2-3) 3. Locomotor stage (ages 3-5) 4. Latency stage (ages 6-12) 5. Puberty (Ages 12-18) 6. Adulthood (Ages 19-40) 7. Old age (65-Death) --- ## Stages of Life ### Infancy (18 months) Erikson's infancy stage suggests the main concern for children is to develop a deep sense of trust towards people and the world, or in from the perspective of [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory|attachment theory]] develop a secure base or a secure attachment style. In relation to this is the importance of consistency, predictability, and stability in a household.[^1] This is also Freud's oral stage, which argues that children gain pleasure from oral stimulations like sucking due to libido being focused on the mouth. If it does not move on, and gets fixated on the mouth, these people would end up with a desire for constant oral simulation like gum chewing and smoking. Piaget calls this stage the sensory motor phase, when children are learning to connect their body with their hands and eyes. In terms of Kohlberg's moral developmental model, children at this stage have pre-conventional morality, which consists of basic reward-seeking and punishment-avoiding. ### Early childhood (ages 2-3) Erikson thinks children at this stage are navigating agency and autonomy vs shame and doubt. For Freud, this is the anal stage, which mainly involves toilet training and what the child gets out of it is a sense of control over their own bodies, and by extension control in general. Being fixated on the anal stage means going on to become obsessively clean, controlling and orderly—anal retentive. Another kind of fixation is anal expulsion which involves aggressive elimination and power seeking—flushing the toilet as analogy. From [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory|Bolwlby's theory]], the children, assuming they have built a secure base, turns on their exploration engines and curiously navigates the world. For Piaget, this is the early preoperational stage (2-7), where children begin engaging in conversation, social dynamics, and play. Moral development remains at pre-conventional stage, with only a little bit more agency involved. ### Ages 3-5 Erikson identifies the main conflict of this stage to be initiative vs guilt, which is again about agency. Freud identifies this as the phallic stage where libido is focused on the genitals, and this is when the two sexes start to diverge and differentiate in their development. This is where the [[Oedipal Complex|Oedipal conflict]] comes into play for males, and this pushes them to identify with their fathers in order to marry (somebody just like) their mothers. Jung proposed the [[Electra Complex|Electra complex]] for women, which inverses the sexes on the Oedipal model. Fixation on this stage leads to phallic personality style, or phallic libidinal type, which looks like "cartoonish masculinity" that focuses on power, performance, status, power and not so much about love and kindness—only vertical growth and no horizontal growth. For [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory|Bowlby]] the child transitions to a secondary attachment as they expand their network of attachments. For Piaget, we are still in the preoperational stage. For Kohlberg, on top of rewards and punishments, we enter into conventional morality where the child is mainly concerned with being a "good" kid. ### Ages 6-11 Erikson sees industry vs inferiority as the main conflicts for this stage. Freud calls this the latency period where nothing much happens sexually in waiting for puberty. For [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory|Bowlby]], the focus of this stage is chumships or friendships. Piaget thinks children of this stage are capable of concrete operations, involving basic arithmetics, algebra and all in all better in recognizing predictable patterns in the world. It is classical conventional morality being at play in this stage. ### Adolescents (12-18) Age 12-18 is when Erikson thinks we are conflicted between identity vs role confusion, as we figure out how we fit in with everybody else. This is Freud's genital stage when it is about adult sexuality, which involves forming intimate relationships with people. [[John Bowlby's Attachment Theory|Bowlby]] similarly thinks that we start forming romantic relationships, as a recapitulation of earlier attachments. If earlier attachments weren't secure, this recapitulation or redoing might first involve undoing. Piaget thinks people of this age are capable of formal operations, which involves logical rules, and theoretical thinking. ### Emerging Adulthood (18-28) This probably only exists (not as an Erikson stage) due to our commonly observed delayed development in today's landscape of people taking longer to reach adulthood. Some might find "growing up" to be an adult optional . The potential danger of taking too long to transition into adulthood is the Peter Pan syndrome or the Puer aeturnas, which means the eternal boy. ### Young Adulthood (29-40) Erikson focuses on connection in this stage. It could be connecting with a potential lifelong marriage partner, or a job, but basically something bigger than yourself to not feel cut off. Personality wise, what happens at this stage is maturation. ### Middle Adulthood (41-50) Ages 41-60. Eriksan points out generativity vs stagnation governs them. Jung calls this time of one's life midlife crisis, which consists of the "night sea voyage " involving transition from the regular world to a spiritual self. In contrast, women transition from family to outer worldly pursuits. ### Maturity (65-Death) Erikson thinks this is the stage of integrity vs despair—how we struggle with it depends on how we reflect and made peace with older experiences. For Jung, it felt somewhat like preparing oneself for death. --- Back to: [[PA Intro to Psychology]] Previous lecture: [[Mental Models and Sense Making]] Next lecture: [[Motivation and Maslow]] [^1]: Rob Henderson