Some people having trouble in choosing their career path whereas their peers have already made their decisions before or some people also having anxieties being in a crowd and public places where they prefer to be alone. These conflicts and problems arise as human develop their psychological construct. According to Ryckman (2008), psychological construct includes individual genetic background, learning history and the way these issues influence their responses to different environments or situation. Psychologists are people who work in the field of personality psychology. There are a lot of theories have been design by them to explains the varieties of human behavior. One of the theories is human psychosocial stages according to Eric Erikson. Adolescence is the period of transition from childhood to adulthood which occurs from the ages 13 to 19. During this stage, puberty begins where a rapid physical growth and sexual maturations take place (Berger, 2001). According to Feist & Feist (2009), psychosocial development during this stage can be simply described as the quest for self-understanding to find their own identity which they will experience identity versus identity confusion crisis. Identity can be defined as the uniqueness of an individual in terms of roles, attitudes, beliefs and aspirations. Adolescents set their own identities by considering the goals and values set by their parents, culture then accepting or rejecting others (Berger, 2001). “Identity confusion is a syndrome of problems that includes a divided self-image, an inability to establish intimacy, a sense of time urgency, a lack of concentration on required tasks, and a rejection of family or community standards” (Feist & Feist, 2009). To develop a stable identity, adolescents must confront some doubt and confusion about who they are. For instance, they may run away from home, having experiments with drugs and sex or joining religious group in search for their own identity. As adolescents successfully finding their identity they will evolve a sense of fidelity, which Erikson defined as the ability to sustain loyalties freely (as cited in Ryckman, 2008). While, for Adulthood consists of three phases of human life which are young, middle and late adulthood. Every human life will continue their journey of life in young adulthood. The range of the age of young adulthood is from 19 to 40 years old. During this period of time they will faced with love as their main event other than planning for their future life or get a stable position in an organization. According to Erikson as cited in Erik Erikson’s 8 stages of Psychosocial Development, young adulthood must develop their intimate relationships or suffer feelings of isolation. Adults try to find someone with whom to share their lives with, in an enduring and self-sacrificing (Berger, 2001). Young adulthood tend to harm their own personality when the relationships with family, friends or the loved one does not went well. Middle adulthood is a person from the range age of 40 to 65 years. At this range, adults work hard to stable their position and preparing for retirement. They also involve in generativity versus stagnation crisis (Jeong & Cooney, 2006). According to Pratt (2008) (as cited in Santrock), they tend to guide the next generation by parenting, teaching, leading and doing things that will give advantages to the community or the organization as well. Stagnation develops when individuals sense that they have done little contribution to the family, community or to the next generation. They also faced with health problem during
Adulthood is the time in life when a person has reached maturity and is aware of the responsibilities that they have to take on. People’s lives are centered on their careers and relationships, leaving less time for much of anything else. Adulthood has three different stages; there is young adulthood (18-40), middle adulthood (41-65), and late adulthood (65-to death), according to Levinson’s Seasons of Life (Levinson, 2010). Individuals experience so many changes to their physical body, cognitive abilities and social development throughout different stages of life. Looking at all the differences that are experienced during these stages of development in early, middle and late adulthood. As an individual we may experience many changes in the body and the mind but the changes in
Thus, all infants at this particular stage get involved or attempt to involve themselves with learning all about the new environment around them. This preliminary stage has a solid bond with environmental stimuli. The various situations/things that infants experience during this time has a powerful influence on his/her growth, both mental and physical, which carries out throughout his/her entire life.
This period is marked by physical, social, moral and emotional development (Davies, Hartdegen, Haxell, Le Geyt & Mercier, 2012). It is a time when the adolescent’s sense of self or identity is becoming much more clear and they are beginning to understand their role in society, starting to question the morals of others and contemplating their own moral and ethical beliefs (Davies et al., 2012). During this time Erik Erikson believed that adolescents are faced with the psychosocial stage of identity versus role confusion (Berk, 2008). Adolescents explore their values and role in society, overcoming this conflict to better understand their own identity, however if they do not fully overcome this conflict, Erikson believed that the adolescent would be confused about their values and future adult roles (Berk, 2008). This conflict was clearly demonstrated in my own development during the late teenage years when I experienced both the results of failing to overcome and then overcoming Erikson’s fifth psychosocial stage. At age eighteen I finished secondary school and began my tertiary studies, I had been accepted into the degree I had wanted to study since middle childhood, however I quickly learnt that I was enjoying neither my studies nor my experience of life in halls of residence. I discontinued my studies after only
Biological influences combined with societal and social expectations contribute to how well people learn to adapt to their environments (2013). According to Erikson, there are eight stages of development. Within these states, there are different psychological, emotional and cognitive tasks. In order to adjust, individuals must learn to develop these tasks. During adolescence, Erikson states that each person needs to navigate through the development task of ‘‘Identity vs. Identity confusion ’’ (2013). He defined this task by stating that adolescent children must learn to develop a sense of self and establish independence. Prior to this stage of development, a person’s parents largely influence their identity. In this stage the adolescent children begin to explore and develop their identity outside of their parents’ influence (Hill, Bromell, Tyson, & Flint, 2007). Adolescents are generally more egocentric at this stage and have an increased sense of self-consciousness. They also have a strong desire to conform to peer influence and develop concerns regarding their appearance. They develop concern about their level of competence in relation to their peer group as well. As peer influence increases, during this stage, parental influence decreases (Ashford & LeCroy, 2013; Hill et. al, 2007). Conflict generally increases between parent and child at this stage of development (2007).
An example when an adult was scaffolding an infant during the time I was observing Lab 1 would be when George of 1 year and 3 months was wobbly walking and exploring his surroundings and worryingly one of the instructors said “no, no” and instead he walked towards another designated play era and uncertain he looked back and made eye contact with the same instructor. She reassured him that he could go play into the area by gesturing and saying “that’s okay ” so he proceeded to play in that area.
The Purpose of this Paper The purpose of this paper is to apply two developmental concepts, as proposed by Erikson, to the real life experiences of Joe Smith. This paper will emphasize the influence of social structures expressed as risk or protective factors and any traumatic experiences that have shaped their developmental outcomes. Concept #1 will include an exploration of Joe’s psychosocial development during puberty, tied in with Erikson's fifth stage of development: identity versus identity confusion. Concept #2 will include an exploration of Joe’s psychosocial development in middle adulthood, tied in with Erikson's seventh stage of development: generativity versus stagnation.
Erik Erikson was an ego psychologists. He established one of the most widespread and dominant theories of human development. His theory was influenced by Sigmund Freud theory. Erikson 's theory centered on psychosocial development and Freud’s theory centered on psychosexual development. Erik Erikson 's theory of human psychosocial development is the best-known theory of personality. Like Sigmund Freud, Erikson thought that human personality matures in stages. Erikson 's theory outlines the effect of social experience across a person’s whole life.
During this stage, Erikson believes that the individual’s successful identity formation relies on social, cognitive and physical maturation (Pittman, Keiley, Kerpelman, & Vaughn, 2011). The individual tries out different roles for who they see in themselves and who they portray to others, eventually committing to their own personal role and occupational choice. Pittman et al. (2011) describe the identity formation as “consisting of decisions, investments, and commitments tied to current and future roles, goals, and relationships.” Additional considerations for identity formation include the context of the culture which is available to the adolescent during this time. After successful resolution of this stage during adolescence, individuals will typically progress into Erikson’s Intimacy versus Isolation stage during young
According to Erikson’s psychosocial development theory, a major task occurs during adolescence is the resolution of identity crisis. At this stage, adolescents exhibit greater social consciousness and actively seek for a sense of identity. However, the process of identity exploration can be difficult for most teenagers. Some may experience peer pressure and conflicts with friends, while others may suffer from social exclusion (Hoffnung et al., 2016, p. 393). Additionally, teenagers are more inclined to test the social boundaries and often end up in risk-taking behaviours such as smoking, alcohol drinking and sexual activities. The engagement of risk-taking behaviours not only leads to immediate health consequences but could also possibly persist into adulthood (Sales & Irwin Jr,
Psychoanalyst Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development explains how the human identity develops and evolves in eight stages from birth to death. Each one occurs in a predetermined order; the current stage builds upon the previous one and lays the groundwork for future stages (Wikimedia). Each stage has a specific “crisis” or conflict, a turning point in the individual’s life which must be reconciled before moving on to the next. If the conflict is handled well, the individual gains “ego strength” in the form of a corresponding virtue. If the conflict is handled poorly, the individual not only fails to develop that virtue, but his/her ability to complete later stages is hindered resulting in diminished “ego quality” or psychosocial health (Erikson, 188-225).
In conclusion, the growing up or the two stages in life are governed totally by a series of situations, parenting, and events that affect the outcome of how the individuals will handle the changes in life. Using human intellect and determining aspects that are normal, life will be lived and a good balanced person in society will be achieved. Because every person is different and an individual, the outcome in everyone will be different. Mature people may encounter different levels of stressful situations or circumstances than younger adults. They are more practical in coping with stress and have a greater acceptance of some things in life that cannot be altered or improved, and, can easily adapt to changes that will occur in life.
According to Eric Erikson, there are eight different social stages a person must go through as they mature. Each stage has a positive characteristic and a negative characteristic. If positive characteristics are fulfilled then their future will look good. So to what extent can the lack of reinforcement to the positive characteristics of Erikson’s psychosocial stages of development effect you? The effects can be quite horrifying. Especially if all of the stages the only characteristics fulfilled are the negative aspects.
Middle adulthood is the generatively vs. stagnation stages in which an adult must care of others and realize that they need a family or a legacy. During this stage, people will nurture their own family or find ways to nurture others that need to be nurtured outside their immediate family. If an adult does not overcome the crisis during this stage, then they will not grow which will result in them being selfish and
It is the stage where an adolescent re-examines their identity. To be precise, the individual tries to find out exactly who they are. According to Erikson, there are two identities involved in this stage. They are; the occupational and the sexual (McLeod, 2017). The adolescent may be uncomfortable with their looks or body, but with time they adapt to the bodily changes. The experiences of this stage result in the virtue of fidelity. The meaning of fidelity is one’s ability to commit their self to others by accepting other people despite their ideologies being different (McLeod, 2017). In this stage, the person explores the possibilities and starts to form their own identity basing upon the outcomes from their explorations. However, a failure to determine a sense of identity in a society does lead to role confusion (Kroger & Marcia, 2011). The adolescent has not established what they want to be when they grow up. Specifically, role confusion entails a person, not sure about their place in society or even themselves. While responding to the role confusion, the adolescent starts to experiment with various lifestyles such as education, work, and other activities. Notably, pressuring someone with identity crisis can lead to a rebellion that can lead to he or she forming a negative identity. Additionally, the confusion and
Adolescence refers to the transition period experienced by children that occur between childhood and adulthood (Shefer, 2011). Identity is first confronted in adolescence between the ages 12 – 19 years old, because of physical and hormonal changes in the body. It is also due to the introduction of formal operations in cognitive development and societal expectation that this contributes to an individual’s identity to be explored and established (McAdams, 2009). The forces within and outside (family, community) the individual that promote identity development usually create a sense of tension. The basic task is, in Erikson’s terms, “fidelity or truthfulness and consistency to one’s core self or faith in one’s ideology” (Fleming, 2004: 9), in a nutshell: "Who am I and where am I