Life And Personal Experiences: One Of The Three Life Stages Of Human Development

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Individuals’ life and personal experiences play an important role in one’s development. As a matter of fact, the path from infancy to adulthood can be shaped by many factors that happen during the individual’s life. According to Drewery and Claiborne (2010), human development is an area of study that seeks to analyse and understand how ongoing changes affect people’s life and their development. There are many theories around human development, yet all of them share the notion that there are several universal stages that take place in every individual’s development: childhood, adolescence and adulthood (Drewery & Claiborne, 2010). This current essay aims to explore and analyse one of the three life stages that characterised human development: …show more content…

In example, according to the Euro-Western view, adolescence is characterised by the interaction between the individual’s biological development and the demands requested by the industrial and post-industrial societies. Although adolescence is globally referred to as the period in life that groups individuals from 12 to 18 years, each individual’s development varies within different countries and cultures. According to the Euro-Western world, adolescence is a time in life that is characterised by experimentation, fun as well as personal growth that will later lead the individual to become a full adult. However, not every young individual experiences this positive and fun side of this life stage. In fact, adolescence is characterised by the hormonal changes that occur during puberty, which are argued to influence adolescents’ behaviour. Hall (cited in Drewery and Claiborne, 2010) argued that due to the effects caused by puberty, young individuals often experience tension, conflicts with their parents and peers, as well as critical mood changes. In line with Hall, Freud (cited in Drewery and Claiborne, 2010) argues that adolescence is a life stage in which it is hard to maintain a steady equilibrium. For these reasons, adolescence can still be considered a “problematic” stage in life, yet it is not necessary true that these conflicts are triggered by biological changes (Drewery and Claiborne,

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