Child%20Developmental%20Theories

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Child Developmental Theories

• Constructivist

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DevelopmentalConstructivist

•  
• Approach very concerned with socialization and
  the lifecycle. (curvilinear) (end point)
• Draws from child psychologists, human development
  researchers.
•  
• Directs attention to the longitudinal career of
  the family rather than focusing on one point in
  time.

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Key Assumptions

• 1. Human conduct is best understood through
  preceding as well as current social milieus.
• 2. Human conduct cannot be understood apart from
  human development 
•  

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Key Assumptions

• 3. The human is both an actor and a reactor 
• 4. Individual and group development is dependant
  upon inherent and developed capacities.
• 5. The individual in a social setting is a basic
  autonomous unit

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The Developmental Approach

•  
• Constructivists approach helps to understand an
  individuals internalization of family from their
  formation to the various stages of the lifecycle.
• i.e.. courtship, engagement, wedding, divorce or
  death
•  

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• Besides these there are theories dealing
  individual rather than the family psychoanalytic,
  cognitive and learning.

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Summary

•  
• Taken independently, these theories describe only
  a portion of the realities of the family.
• They should not be seen as mutually exclusive
  from one another.

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Developmental analysis

• Constructivist/development theories are weak in
  situational analysis.  
• Heavy emphasis on arbitrary stages in theory,
  concept and method. 

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Concept-

• An abstraction used as a building block for the
  development of propositions and theories.

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Freudian Theory or psychoanalytic tradition.

• Freudian theory essential deals with the egos
  attempts to satisfy the desires of the id while
  dealing with opposition from both the superego
  and the real world.

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To Freud

• Children are born with only the primitive element
  of the psychic structure-the id- sexual and
  aggressive drives.

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Psychic energy

• Freuds theory essentially shows that the
  personality functioning was fueled by psychic
  energy that becomes distributed among the id, ego
  and superego.

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ID instincts, drives

• All psychological functioning requires energy,
  and the id was the source of the energy.
• The id is the only psychic structure possessed
  by children for roughly the first year of their
  lives.

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The pleasure principle

• They are driven by the pleasure principle, they
  are hedonistic beings who seek pleasure and avoid
  pain.

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• Young infants are wildly unsocialized creatures
  who seek immediate gratification whenever their
  sexual and aggressive urges are aroused.
•  

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The Ego

• The ego is the rational, reasonable component of
  personality. The ego operates on the reality
  principle -it can plan, delay gratification, and
  block the irrational choices of the id.

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The superego.

• The third aspect of the personality to Frued is
  the superego.
• Freud maintains that it usually develops within
  the child between the ages of 3 and 5

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   Psycho-Sexual Stages.

• Freud was the first to conceptual child
  development in a stage pattern based upon a
  biological foundation

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His stages include

• Oral -year one
• Anal -year two
• Phallic-years three
  to five
• Latency-
  adolescence
• Genital-adolescence

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Healthy vs. Pathology

•  
• Freud believed that in a healthy person, sexual
  energy now becomes focused on a loved person of
  the opposite sex.

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Critique of Fruedian Theory

• The following are the major criticisms
• A.      shortcoming in his methods used to
  validate his hypotheses-Freuds data were the
  verbal reports of neurotic parents who were asked
  to free associate -not reliable indicator of the
  patients real thoughts.an ivory tower approach.

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Freuds concepts-difficult to measure

• B.     Freuds concepts are not defined in ways
  that make them amenable to concrete behavior
  assessment
• How do you measure a childs level of psychic
  energy?
• How do you measure a childs strength of ego?

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Generalizing

• C.      A third criticism is that although
  Freuds theory can explain just about anything,
  it is difficult to use in making predictions.
• It is weak on relational rules if this happens,
  then that will happen

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Nature more than Nurture

• D. Lastly, it places too much emphasis on
  intra-psychic determinants of behaviour, paying
  little attention to environment.

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• For example, although he acknowledges
  parent-child relationships, he believed that
  internal conflicts and defenses are ultimately
  responsible for the childs personality.

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Freuds Legacy

•   There is little direct influence on development
  today, but his concepts have had impact on
  research directions and issues
• On research and theory-Erikson was student of
  Freud.. 

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-Issues

• -Issues such as Breast feeding can be directly
  attributed to Frued.Rooted in his notions of the
  oral stage of development.
•  
•  

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• Freuds theory is highly criticized by Feminists
  who argue he is sexist, conservative and
  monolithic.
• Responsible for mother blaming

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Unscientific

• Because Freuds theory is so unscientific and
  lead to few clear-cut empirical predictions.
• Many other theories have been developed
  emphasizing childs formative years

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Environment

• Freud does not see the the social environment in
  influencing development.
• The emphasis is upon socialization of the child
  becoming adult
• The Child is placed on the margins 

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Superego

• . During this stage, children develop an
  Oedipal crisis, which they resolve by identifying
  with the same sex parent, thereby developing a
  conscience or an external representation of the
  values and sanctions of society.

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Erik Erikson (1902-1994) A student of Frued

• Psychoanalytic Approach- Eriksons psychosocial
  theory was one of many developed by followers of
  Freud.
• His theory stretched, rearranged and in many ways
  improved on Freuds model.

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Erikson (1902-1994)

• Beginning in 1950 he expanded understanding of
  each stage of Frueds developmental model.
• Eriksons, Childhood and Society (1950)
• Identity, Youth and Crisis (1968)

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Culture Personality Erikson

• Firmly rooted in the psychoanalytic tradition
•  
• Beginning with Freud-hotly debated -still with
  us- ie feminists
•  

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Easy to understand Phases Linear Pattern

• Divide into assumptions re. biological endowment,
  perception, learning and socialization 

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• Proposes a series of stages, specifies adult
  practices associated with each, postulates the
  maturation and timing of the child's capacities
  and proposed some relationships between
  experiences at each stage and the child's
  motivation for learning.

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Eriksons theory

•  
•  
• Eriksons theory goes beyond Freud-more respect
  for the individual and his innate ability to meet
  the challenges of a dynamic society.
•  

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Goes beyond Freud

•  
• -more respect for the individual and his innate
  ability to meet the challenges of a dynamic
  society.

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Erikson

• Erikson believed that each stage does not lead to
  an embattled ego that mediates between the id and
  the superego. (Freud)

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The ego

• The ego is a positive force (Erikson) in
  development. At each stage the ego acquires
  skills and attitudes that allow individuals to
  become positive, functional members of human
  society.

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Three positionsDifferent from Freud

• 1. Emphasized the ego over the id-instincts like
  death wish may have their role but less
  significant than the individuals capacity to
  adjust.
• 2. Goes beyond child-mother-father triad-stress
  family and larger society
• 3. Optimistic view-believes hazards in life and
  crises are conducive to growth
•  

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Basic Assumptions

• 1. Unlike Freud dreams do not provide signals to
  unconscious-play does...if you want to understand
  a child's ego look at play 
• -emphasis on qualitative research, psychoanalysis
  alone won't help-look at history, anthropology 

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• 2. Child unfolds biologically and psychologically
  from birth-child learns to survive and promote
  culture through the culture in him

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Individual not evil (Hobbes, Freud)

• 3. Each individual is bad- potentially good or
  bad must be prevented from being bad by democracy
•  

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• 4. Believes in libido-but man not animal-discards
  Freud notion of dynasty of drives in favor of
  flexible modifyable-gives rise to his notion of
  styles of life
• -One can manage inner and outer forces by
  adaptive skills-play, speech, though and actions.

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Freud/Erikson agree on Libido

•  
• 5. Erikson accepts Freud idea that Libido
  influences all aspects of lifebut Erikson
  believes id, ego and superego can balance through
  play in a child's development
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Play teaches

• Play teaches a. how to organize inner life in
  relations to the outer world. 
• b. How to educate oneself and heal defeats and
  pains 
• c. How to master tasks to deal with inner and
  outer world 

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• Play is particularly important when the child
  does not have language it helps the child
  progress in developmental stages

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Stages End Point

• InfantTrust vs MistrustNeeds maximum comfort
  with minimal uncertaintyto trust
  himself/herself, others, and the
  environmentToddlerAutonomy vs Shame and
  DoubtWorks to master physical environment while
  maintainingself-esteem

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Preschooler

• PreschoolerInitiative vs GuiltBegins to
  initiate, not imitate, activities
  developsconscience and sexual identity

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School-Age Child

• School-Age ChildIndustry vs InferiorityTries to
  develop a sense of self-worth by refining skills
• AdolescentIdentity vs Role ConfusionTries
  integrating many roles (child, sibling, student,
  athlete,worker) into a self-image under role
  model and peer pressure

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Young Adult

• Young AdultIntimacy vs IsolationLearns to make
  personal commitment to another asspouse, parent
  or partner

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Adult

• Middle-Age AdultGenerativity vs StagnationSeeks
  satisfaction through productivity in career,
  family, andcivic interests
• Older AdultIntegrity vs DespairReviews life
  accomplishments, deals with lossand preparation
  for death

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Summing Up

• 1. Erikson a cultural determinist, ego
  psychologist and an optimist
•  
• 2. Child development must be understood in terms
  of the whole situation involves the child the
  family and his culture.
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Developing personality

• 3. The potential of a developing personality must
  be protected against the hazards of instinctual,
  parental, communal, cultural and environmental
  pressures to allow innate tendencies to develop
  successfully.

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Stages are Ideal typical-

•  
• 4. Explains development within a specific culture
  North America-assumes a monolith bias-ideal
  typical-notions of freedom of expression,
  opportunity, rapid social change and role
  ambiguity-generation gap underlie his thinking

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Piaget's Background

• 1. A Swiss zoologist, interested in philosophy
  -wanted to link God with life

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• 2. . Career began with a zeal to link biology and
  psychology...whereas learning theorist sees
  development as a primary process of learning...

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• Piaget saw them as independent -learning cannot
  explain development, while the stages of
  development can, at least in part, explain
  learning.....

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Development of cognition

• 3. Piaget's primary concern was to understand the
  development of cognition not cognitive
  development...

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Effective socialization

• He explains that effective socialization is the
  product of three elements 
• a. Maturation-differentiation of the nervous
  system
• b. Experience-interaction with the physical world
• c. Equilibrium-self regulation, cognitive
  adaptation

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 Piaget's Concept of the New Born

•  
• A newborn is a biological organism with a
  psychological make-up..

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Newborn Drives-sensory-motor

•  
• He has a drive for hunger, a drive for balance
  and a drive for independence.
•  

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Child development

• The child's development takes place in the
  context of the environment, physical, social and
  ideational. The environment can promote, retard
  or change the order of the succession of the
  individuals growth process. But the sequence of
  the developmental phases must remain the same.

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Linear Course of Development

•  
• Piaget explains development in terms of three
  phases...they are irreversible and denote a
  course of development...'
• Stages-along a continuum

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Piagets Phases of Cognition

• Each phase reveals an organizational pattern,
  potential capacity, probable level of behaviour
  and moves on to the next with a concern for
  balancing.
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Sensory-Motor Stage

• 1. Sensory-Motor (0-24 mos. -with six sub phases)
• Use of reflexes through repetition and
  adaptation... 
• Voluntary movements- coordination- Imitation-
  Play -Affect
• Continuous experimentation, greater mobility,
  cyclical repetition

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Preparation for Conceptual Thought

•  
• 1. Preconceptual2-4 2. Intuitive 4-7
  3.Concrete Operations(7-11)
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Pre-conceptual phase

• During the pre-conceptual phase events are
  explained and experienced in terms of their
  outward appearance without any logic.
•  
• He does not perceive any connections between
  relationships i.e.. quantity and quality.
•  

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Intuitive phase

• During the Intuitive phase, he learns to balance
  between assimilation and accommodation. i.e. he
  does not think in a whole but in parts i.e..
  parts of a house not the whole house.
•  
• Play becomes more social, language helps to
  foster intuition, child reflects on events,
  projects into the future

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Concrete operations

• During the Concrete operations phase, the child
  can consider several points of view
  simultaneously...he can work out solutions, he
  can establish systems of classification, he can
  move from inductive to deductive reasoning.

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Phase of Formal Operations (11-15)

• It is in this phase that childhood ends, around
  14 and youth is reached, with the maturation of
  cerebral structures.

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Formal Operations

• He moves in a world of ideas The growing youth
  possesses
• 1. Qualitative understanding of objects and
  events
•  
• 2. Knowledge of metrical activities
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Deductive reasoning

• 3. Deductive reasoning develops to a point where
  he is able to establish personal rules and
  values...His personality is crystallizing.....
•  
• His/her interests center around weighing,
  classifying and reevaluating....(this is why
  adolescents are so critical)

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At 15,

• 4. At 15, he/she has the following developmental
  accomplishments
•  
• a. Sees the social world as an organic unit-laws,
  roles social functions
•  
• b. Egocentricity is dissolved by a sense of moral
  solidarity
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Formal Operations complete

•  
• 5. Personality has developed through
  intra-communication
•  
• 6. Submission to adult authority is related by a
  sense of equality
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Summary

• Piaget's developmental framework, provides a
  model for individual potentiality-a frame of
  reference
• Regular patterns of cognitive development bound
  to be experienced by everyone 
• We are able to predict an individuals mode and
  range of comprehension along a developmental
  plane 

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Robert Sears The Learning Theory

• Sears, an empiricist and an experimentalist.
• Taught at Stanford-Social Learning Psych
  Department
•  

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Stimulus/Response

• Explains child development through the S.R.
  (stimulus-response) sequence.
•  
• SR-the effect of an action can be the learned
  cause of future behaviour.

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• Many of his ideas were formed with the help of a
  colleague-Clark Hull who stressed
  reinforcement-secondary drive, motivation and
  frustration and aggression hypothesis advanced by
  Dollard, Miller and others.

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SR and Behaviour

•  
• For example, -hunger (stimulus) activates the
  individual and determines how he/she (will
  respond) thus producing an action sequence and a
  goal.
•  
• Behaviour to Sears, is the cause and effect of
  other behaviour Behaviour is Learned
•  

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Learning Theory

• Behaviour is self motivated towards tension
  reduction 
• Behaviour is reinforced by goal achievement
  producing secondary motivational systems
•  

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Concept of Development in PhasesConstructivist

•  
• For Sears, development is a continuous chain of
  events, some of which replace previous
  acquisitions.
•  
• The development of the child occurs in three
  phases

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Stages of Learning

•  
• 1. Rudimentary behaviour (1-16 months)
•  
• 2. Secondary motivational systems- family
  cantered learning (1.5 years to 5 years)
•  
• 3. Secondary motivational systems- extra familial
  learning (5-)
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Phase One Rudimentary Behaviour

•   Like Freuds Id, and Piagets Sensory Motor
  Phases,
• Sears Rudimentary Stage
• -Phase of gratification of immediate needs
•  

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• -Primary drives the cry
•  
• -Environmental learning -fulfilment of needs
  reduction of tensionrewards, experience (crying
  and the breast)
•  
• -

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• the child learns he/she can manipulate the
  environment-learns that he is not only controlled
  but can control
•  
• -child begins to learn techniques for cooperation
•  
• Child development to Sears occurs in dyadic units
  of behaviour..

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Dyadic relationships

• The prime dyad is between mother and child-the
  mother looks after the biological needs of the
  child, enforcing dependency, regulating
  appropriate behaviour on the part of the child
  seeking gratification

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•  
• This dyadic relationship eventually serves to
  control and modify behaviour because as mothers
  permissiveness becomes more discriminately
  offered it give rise to frustration and
  aggression

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The second dyad

•  
• The second dyad is child-environment-child's sex,
  position in the family structure, mother's
  personality, social status and education
•  
• In brief, it is in the rudimentary phase that the
  child bonds with the mother and is introduced to
  the environment, which leads to ever increasing
  interaction with it...
•  

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Learning Primary

• Sears gives little consideration to the role of
  punishment and more to reward
• The child learns positive roles and relationship
  from primary agents, significant othersmother,
  father, siblings

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Phase II Secondary Motivational System-Family
Centered Learning

•  
• During this phase the child's primary needs
  continue to motivate, but these are incorporated
  into social learning and secondary drives
•  
• ie. before child would cry because the stomach
  contracts, now cry might occur because of the
  sight of the bottle or the refrigerator

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Learning and Affection

•  
• Learning occurs and depends upon affection and
  learned dependency- mere permissiveness
  reinforced the status quo so direction teaches
  the child and serves to protect him/her

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Second year

• In the second year the child shows successful
  partial withdrawl from the care of mother.
•  
• The child begins to see there is a larger world
  around him/her gratification, affection, esteem
  can come from other sources-father, siblings and
  family friends and relatives
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Weaning-

• Sears places a great deal of interest in factors
  such as weaning-weaning has four aspects
• 1. new food intake
• 2. solid food
• 3. learning to handle food orally
• 4. to eat without being held

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Toilet Training-

• All of these must occur within 20 months to avoid
  setbacks-can start as early as six months
•  
• Another developmental phenomenon is toilet
  training. For Sears, it is vital to behavioural
  learning-associated with reward and punishment
  and maternal rejection

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Sexual modesty

• A third vital aspect of development is sexual
  modesty -to Sears parental attitudes shape the
  conscience of children
•  
• If parents are too restrictive may lead to the
  feminization of boys, sex anxieties,
  aggressiveness.
•  

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 Social aggression

• A less restrictive attitude will lead to the
  encouragement of masculine qualities in both boys
  and girls.
•  
• Social aggression, for Sears is not learned by
  accident-it is learned in the family-can be
  avoided by careful balance of permissiveness and
  restraint.

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Third year

• In the third year identification and role playing
  are significant characteristics of development...
  a child remembers gratifying experiences in
  infancy and in the absence of mother, begins to
  reproduce mother's caring activities.
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A childs upbringing

• To Sears involves five clusters of dependency 
• 1. negative attention seeking-defiance,
  disruption, aggressiveness
• 2. reassurance- seeking protection, apologizing
  because of high demands 
• 3. positive attention- seeking praise,  
• 4. touching- holding and clutching others 
• 5. being near-

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Summary Phase Two

• Thus, Sears hold that this second phase is vital
  for the child's social development.
•  
• The progression from parental control to partial
  self control affects the child's ability to give
  affection, identify with adults, deal with
  criticism and cope with adult role and
  sex-appropriate behaviour.
•  

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Phase Three (extra-familial learning)

• At age 5 the child's dependency on parents of
  both sexes begins to give way because of
  participation in the outside world.
• Teachers, peers and other adults reinforce
  operate dependency behaviour. 
• The child's ability to identify with extra
  familial role models is rooted in the previous
  stage of his/her development.

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Learning through phases

•  
• As the child matures permissiveness grows
  narrower and controlled areas become expanded,
  defined and reinforced by various adults...
•  
• Thus, for Sears, the learning theorist, a child's
  development is the product of his interaction
  with the social world...
•  His behaviour is the product of environmental
  experiences and child rearing practices...

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Sears The Learning Theorist

• The most open-ended of the developmental
  theorists
• A constructivist-he adopt the phase concept of
  socialization and development
• Sears places the most emphasis on social
  environment compared to Piaget, the Cognitive
  Theory, and the Psychoanalytic theorists, Freud
  and Erikson.

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Innate Aggression

• Aggression is an innate drive that may be aroused
  when an individual encounters frustration or
  threat.
• The individual is automatically directed towards
  the goal of injuring or destroying the source of
  irritation. Furthermore, when the aggressive
  drive is aroused energy is

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Ecological Systems Theory

•  
• -Developed by Urie Bronfrenbenner, is a classical
  psycholical model emphasizing how certain
  biological dispositions combine with
  environmental forces to mould development.
•  

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Systems micro meso, exo

• His theory looks at the micro system, mesosystem,
  and mesosystem.
•  
• The microsystem-refers to the child's immediate
  environment
•  

108

• The mesosystem -encompasses broader agents of
  socialization such as home, neighbourhood,
  daycare center.
•  
• The exosystem- involves social settings beyond
  the childs environment that effect the child in
  some way. These might include work schedules,
  maternity leaves, sick pay etc.
•