Theorists throughout the years have provided us with a framework by which to categorize how individuals progress throughout their lives. One such theorist, Erik Erikson, developed stages based on psychosocial developments inclusive of the individual’s entire lifespan. If the stage was handled with success, the person develops a sense of mastery. However, if the person feels that they fell short of their accomplishments, they have a sense of inadequacy and experiences a delay in advancing to the next stage. Erikson believed that “individuals pass through eight psychological stages and that the purpose of the final stage of life is the achievement of ego integrity rather than despair” (Cook, 1991, pg. 292). The challenge when the individual …show more content…
This evaluation of life, often times referred to as life review, is a time for the person to resolve and understand the outcome of their lives. During this introspective stage of life, the older adult looks backs on life events inclusive of both the positive and negative memories. They look back on accomplishments and downfalls, successful relationships versus those that failed, and completed goals versus those incomplete. Ego integrity is a result of positive resolution of life crisis while despair is a result of negative resolution or the inability to come to terms with their past and disappointments. Erikson describes the integrated person as the one who does not “hide from regrets, nor are they overwhelmed by them. They are neither depressed nor duly self critical…as well as generally content with their experiences and achievements” (S. Hearn et al, 2011, p.2). In other words the person has come to terms with their regrets, the life they have lived, who they have become. In contrast the individual who settles on despair is unable to come to terms with their regrets, their shortcomings and may even feel guilt. These individuals have death anxiety because they are unable to come to terms with their
Claireece Precious Jones is currently experiencing the adolescent stage of her development and is transitioning into adulthood. Her experience as a teenage mother, growing up in poverty, and history of abuse all have implications for the development of her identity, cognitive functioning, and biological factors. We will focus on Erikson’s Psychosocial Stage for Adolescents to gage the evolution of Precious’s growth, while addressing the person in environmental theory that also attributes to the biopsychosocial context in which a young person develops.
The different stages have different challenges and in case of any unsuccessful completion they are likely to reappear in the individual`s future. Erikson explains that the problems faced in one stage are not permanent and can be changed by another stage in the future. This theory well describes the life faced by Allison. In her realization of her present life of denial and lack of friends she realizes that she could still make some change in her future and forget all the hard moments she is going through(Cote,
Everyone is unique and not every person needs to successfully master each level to gain a previous ego skill in a future stage of life. Erik Erikson’s theory is derived from primarily an environmental influence. There is data or analysis conducted that offers insight to biological factors that could alter the stages during psychosocial development. While the environment has a strong influence over human being’s development, I believe our genetic makeup can sometimes be enough to overcome previously failed stages. An example would be a person who was raised in a poor environment, only to rise above the pain and suffering to become successful in all stages of life. I also like to think of myself as a good candidate for somebody that failed earlier stages of psychosocial development, only to gain previously lost ego skills in future stages of
Life Transitions and Life Completion. (n.d.). : Joan Erikson's 9th Stage of Psychosocial Development. Web. 3 December 2014.
The main tenant of the psychosocial development theory throughout the life cycle is that an individual’s personality is held to unfold over the course of their life, with healthy development based on the ability of the individual to master tasks and skills at each level or stage of life (Coady & Lehman, 2008; Hutchison, 2008). Erikson’s original model sectioned the life span into eight levels with each containing its own unique psychosocial challenge or conflict which, depending on the outcome, would help the individual experience positive growth (Coady & Lehman, 2008; (Hooyman & Kiyak, 2005/2011; Hutchison, 2008). The eighth stage encompasses late adulthood, where the conflict experienced is that of integrity versus despair. If an individual has experienced successful o...
...through 8 different psychosocial stages of life. Each step has to be completed in order to have gained knowledge and to be able to be successful in the next stage of development. Researching this topic has taught me that we can’t skip over skills and expect to have success or live happily ever after. I now realize how important learning from my mistakes can be. Childhood becomes the remembered past and adulthood the anticipated future (McAdams, 2001).
Erik Erikson developed eight psychosocial stages that occur through life. These stages help parents of younger children understand what the child is thinking and why they are acting the way that they do. For a person to become a well-rounded adult they need to succeed in each level. This essay will discuss the first six stages into young adulthood.
is in Erikson’s last stage of late adulthood, Ego Integrity versus Despair. Erikson believed the problems in adulthood were a result from not accomplishing the earlier stages he developed (Potter & Perry, 2013, p.133). Ego Integrity versus Despair is a challenge for the older adult. They should look back on their life, accept the life they lived and find meaning in their life and accomplishments. Although it is difficult, they should be able to adjust and to cope with the reality of their aging and mortality (Eliopoulos, 2014, p. 18). If they are able to accept their life, find meaning and cope with aging they are said to be in ego integrity. However, they are in despair if they cannot cope, fear death, keep focusing on their failures and what they should have done in life and if they experience “feelings of anger, bitterness, depression, and inadequacy” (Eliopoulos, 2014, p.18). T.H. is in ego integrity. She can look back on her life and overall she knows she had a good life and she is happy with her life. Even though she said if she had to do her life all over she would not but only because of the hardships and pain she overcame. She would just choose not to go through that type of pain again. She knows that aging is a part of her life and she takes care of herself. She only hopes to continue to stay healthy and that maybe her mind and body will stay in
Lifespan development is essential, as it is the changes that happen to us throughout a person’s lifespan. Our development occurs at ages stages where we develop from infancy till death. This essay will contain my life story to display the domains in 5 age stages in my lifespan development. The domains I will be exploring is in this essay is physical, emotional, cognitive, social, cultural and moral domain. The influence of biological and environmental play a significant role in my development. Development is influenced by nature or nurture and its affect will occur throughout lifespan. The changes that occur during development have stage. Each theorists has stages of development where they display the changes. This essay will explore my development that will support theorist such as Erikson, Vygotsky, Berk, Piaget and other theorist. The age stages of prenatal will display physical and emotional domain, Infancy (0-2) will portray social and emotional domain, young children (2-6) will show cognitive and social domain, middle childhood (6-12) will display socio-cultural and moral domain and adolescence will portray nature vs. nurture and cultural domain. Development is crucial for a healthy wellbeing. As a physiotherapist it is significant to understand development in age stages, as it will aid knowing how young children will react compared to an adolescence who is more development mentally, emotionally, physically, socially and culturally.
This assignment’s main focus will be centred on Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development, which consists of eight stages however only the fifth stage ‘identity versus role confusion’ will be discussed. Aspects such as identity crises, exploration of autonomy whilst developing a sense of self, factors that may contribute to identity formation as well as the successful/unsuccessful resolution of this particular stage will be discussed thoroughly. Erikson’s theory was also expanded by James Marcia, who identified certain identity statuses. The discussion will then progress to the psychosocial development of a case study based on Anna Monroe in connection to the difficulties she faced, such as gender, sexuality, peer pressure,
Despair occurs at the age of 65 and older. This is when we are senior citizens, we are slowing down in life, and productivity has declined. This is the time when we start to think about our accomplishments and are able to develop integrity is we think we are going in the direction of a successful life. Erikson believed that if we feel unproductive, or feel that we did not accomplish enough in life, that we develop despair and it can lead to hopelessness. This could also lead to depression because one will think about all the things that they could have done when they were younger, but didn’t and may not be able to do anymore at this age, or time. On the other hand, success in life leads to wisdom. This allows one to look back and have a sense of completeness and one feels good about the past and will “accept death without fear.” One example, is that sometimes we see senior citizens going back to school to “graduate” and say that they graduated college to overcome despair one may have felt knowing they didn’t finish college. Lastly, I will go through this stage, and here I will either realize that I had a successful past or not, which will lead to hopelessness or completeness. So, far I think it will be a sense of completeness, as I feel very successful in life, and making my life the best it can
With perseverance of stage six, I have now entered the seventh stage of life. The seventh stage focuses on generativity vs. stagnation. McAdams (2009) states, “To be generative is to generate a legacy of the self for the good of future generations,” (p. 382). There are four types of genera...
His belief was that each human developed their own personality through a series of stages and these stages developed due to the social experiences that one experienced through life. According to Erikson, there are eight stages and each stage centers around a conflict that has to be resolved. Under Erikson’s theory, if conflict or crisis is not resolved, then the outcome will be more crisis and struggles with that issue later on in life (Domino & Affonso, 2011).
Many identity theorists have put an emphasis on adolescence because it is vital stage in an individual’s life. This stage in life consists of coming out of childhood and on the pathway to adulthood. This is when individuals are more independent and think in terms of their future. They are also actively looking for a society to fit in. Furthermore, during this stage, the identity they had in childhood are examined and transformed into a new identity (Kroger, Martinussen, & Marcia, 2010).
Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development were complex, but simple. It is something everyone will go through and experiences will always be different. The lack of reinforcement to the positive aspects of his stages can lead to quite a disaster. Surprisingly, previous stages are highly influential to the proceeding stage. The lack of reinforcement to the positive aspects of his psychosocial stages can have a very devastating effect on a person. This is because the effects built up rather than taking the place of one another. The effects are quite horrifying, but with the right environment, experiences and beliefs, everything can go well.