Ever wondered how growth occurs in human beings or how people get to learn and develop? The human body works in a mysterious way that at times you wonder how it gets to function and adapt to various changes with passage of time. Theories of human development have been established by researchers to offer a structure that allows individuals to figure out how human growth, learning and development occurs (Salkind, 2004). With better understanding of how our bodies grow and develop, we are able to understand ourselves better as well as fellow human beings. This paper will therefore, address the early theories of human development and their concern in relation to gender, race, socioeconomic status and other areas of diversity.
Three researchers Erik Erikson, Jean Piaget and Sigmund Freud came up with theories that explain the human development process. In Freud’s psychosexual theories, he believes that all human beings had a conscious level, preconscious level and lastly, the unconscious level. However, tension often ensued between the conscious and the unconscious level due to the conscious level suppressing what the unconscious level attempted to express.
He further explained the tension using three personality structures known as the id, ego and superego. In his theory, he proposed that the development process took place in five stages that were categorized by the erogenous zone. These stages include the oral stage that took place between birth and twelve months from birth, anal stage between one to three years from birth, phallic stage in children between three to five years, latency stage from five years to adolescence and lastly, genital stage which occurred from adolescence to adulthood (Salkind, 2004).
Erikson expounded on Feud’s theory by adding the social aspect to the theory. He explained his psychosocial theories in eight stages with each stage having two crises involving a positive as well as a negative. These stages include trust against mistrust which took place during infancy, independent vs infamy and uncertainty occurring in early adulthood, ingenuity versus guilt in play age, diligence against inferiority in school age, distinctiveness against identity diffusion in puberty, tenderness against loneliness while in the phase of young adulthood, generativity against self-absorption experienced in adulthood and lastly, scrupulousness versus unscrupulousness which occurs in old age (Salkind, 2004). Failure of completing a stage resulted to challenges in the future while experiencing another stage.
Piaget’s theory of cognitive development explains that children learn by enthusiastically constructing awareness by use of proactive experiences. Adults are supposed to help children acquire knowledge by providing them with materials needed to enable them interrelate and construct knowledge. He outlines four stages the sensorimotor followed by preoperational then concrete operational and lastly, formal operational stage.
Similarities in Feud’s and Erikson’s theories include acknowledgement of the importance associated with the insentient on development. The two theories explain growth as a stepwise process in an individual’s life and occurs in stages and use similar divisions for these outlined developmental stages. Piaget’s theory also outlines a number of stages involved in the development process in an individual’s life (Salkind, 2004). Erikson and Piaget’s theories outline development as a process that takes place throughout an individual’s life and there are also challenges involved.
Despite the similarities, there are differences too. These differences arise as a result of these psychologists unique view of the motivators of growth in people. The names assigned to the developmental stages as well as the developmental issues in each of the stages in all the three theories differs. The number of stages one undergoes in each theory differs with Piaget’s theory having four, Freud five and Erikson eight stages. Compared to Erikson’s and Piaget’s theory, Feud’s theory considers development as a process that ends at early period while the other theories consider development to occur to adulthood.
The development of these theories occurred during the late 19th century. Psychologists who were acquainted with the evolutionary theory developed by Charles Darwin were seeking after the evolutionary developments associated with the psychological factors outlined in the theory. These developments pioneered by Stanley Hall later led to the development of these theories with these researchers taking up the work from their predecessors (Salkind, 2004). The concern related to race, gender, socioeconomic status and other areas of diversity in these theories arise from the experiments conducted to see if these factors had an impact on human development and the effects from infantry to adulthood. They were also related to Darwin’s theory hence proved beneficial to these theories.
In summary, these researchers played a major role in the field of psychology especially in early childhood education. There contributions therefore, should not be neglected despite the gaps in their works. Further research work should be conducted in efforts to create a basis for developments in the future.
Reference
Salkind, N. (2004). An introduction to theories of human development. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications.
