Jean Piaget (1896-1980) and Erik Erickson (1902-1994) were developmental psychologists who developed influential theories that have been used to understand children’s development through the life stages. Piaget used his biological background to develop a theory based on children’s biology and their adaptation to the environment (Feist & Feist 2009). Erickson used psychoanalysis to create an ego theory which was based on the earlier works of Sigmund Freud.
Both theories are similar in that they propose that individuals pass through fixed stages of development which occur at a specific age. In Piaget’s theory, there are 4 stages from birth to about 11 years. The first stage is sensorimotor which is followed by the preoperational stage. The last two stages are concrete operational and the formal operational stages of development. On the other hand, Erickson developed a theory composed of eight stages of development which individuals went through in their lifetime. Erickson theorized that the individual would go through hope, followed by will then purpose. Stage four was competence followed by fidelity and love. The last two stages were car and wisdom which occurred in old age just before death. Both individuals theorize that development occurs chronologically from one stage to the next. It is not possible to skip any of the stages in the chronology.
The two theorists varied in their approach to development. Piaget focused his studies on children’s stages of learning and how their reasoning evolved as they grew (Coon and Mitterer 2008). Piaget used sensory and motor abilities to describe how children explore the world between ages 0-2. On the other hand, Erickson felt that significant development occurred around ages 6-12 when children interacted with others in school and other social arena. The first four stages of development overlap with Piaget’s theories while the last stages refer to adulthood and have no relation to any of Piaget’ theories.
References
Coon, D., Mitterer, J. O., Talbot, S., & Vanchella, C. M. (2010). Introduction to psychology:
Gateways to
mind and behavior. Belmont, Calif: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.
Feist, J. & Feist, G. (2009). Theories of Personality. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
