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Eight stages of personality development
Personality development
Basis of personality development
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Secure attachment develops when parents are consistently warm, responsive, and sensitive to their infant’s needs. Insecure attachment forms when an infant’s parents are neglectful, inconsistent, or insensitive to the child’s mood or behaviors. The Strange Situation is when an infant and mother are brought into an unfamiliar room and the child plays with toys. A stranger enters the room and the mother leaves shortly after leaving the infant alone with the stranger. The mother returns, leaves again, and then returns again. The securely attached infant will use the mother as a “secure base” always returning to her side. The infant is uneasy when the mother leaves the room. On the other hand, the insecurely attached infant is less likely to explore, …show more content…
Infants gain knowledge through direct experience and manipulation. They discover sensory knowledge such as, how objects look, taste, fell, smell, and sound. They learn how to reach, grasp, push, pull, and pour. Infants in this stage have the “out of sight out of mind” thought process. Towards the end of the sensorimotor stage, children obtain object permanence, the object still exists when not in sight. The preoperational stage continues on until age 7. This stage is crucial to the child’s ability to use words, images, and symbols to represent the world. Children in this stage exhibit egocentrism, not understanding events from other’s perspectives. The child experiences irreversibility, the inability to reverse sequences, and centration, the tendency to focus on only one aspect. A child cannot understand that two equal quantities are the same even if one changes appearance. During the concrete operational stage, children are less egocentric and are capable of logical thought. They understand the principle of conservation, but cannot think beyond tangible objects. The formal operational stage starts at the beginning of adolescence and allows children to be more systematic and logical. It reflects the ability to think logically when dealing with abstracts and hypothetical …show more content…
Parental over control hinders spontaneity and sense of purpose, while promoting guilt and fear of punishment. Middle and late childhood (6 to 12 years) children develop pride and competence in schoolwork and social activities. Negative experiences promote pervasive feelings of inferiority and inadequacy. Adolescence is when kids experiment and develop self-definition and forms commitments to future adult roles. Those that feel pressured in this stage may experience confusion of his or her identity in society. During young adulthood, children develop lasting and meaningful relationships, therefore establishing a sense of connection and intimacy with others. However, fear of rejection causes the inability to form these relationships and become psychologically isolated. When one experiences middle adulthood, unselfish concern for the welfare of the next generation develops through care for other, productive work, and community involvement. Self-indulgence and self-absorption leads to boredom and lack of meaningful
Attachments are formed with parents; this contributes to give a sense of who we are and who we will become in later life. However where these attachments are broken the child needs to have a secure attachment established with an alternative adult care giver,...
A strong attachment provides a sense of security. According to Bowlby 's theory, the secure attachment encourages the child to explore the environment, as the child knows he/she can return to the mother at any time (Stevenson-Hinde, 2007). For instance, if a child experiences a stimulus, which elicits fear, he/she will seek out his/her mother for comfort. Red did not appear to mind the observer being present during his playtime. He played with his mother for a while, but was willing to move around the room and play without her. He appeared reassured when she talked to him during his playtime behind the couch, as they could not see each other. Red did seek his mother’s approval during alone tasks, but was always positively
As previously mentioned, a variety of attachments ensue social relationships; these attachments mold differently to what each age grade needs developmentally, especially young adults. Attachment is defined as “a strong affectional tie that binds a person to an intimate companion” (450). This concept emerges around six to seven months of age, and is directed towards our parents (to mother first more so than father) or direct caregiver (450). At such a young age, an infant shows its attachment towards it’s caregiver by “crying, clinging, approaching, following, doing whatever it takes to maintain closeness to her and expressing displeasure when they cannot” (450). These basic characteristics of attachment are quite similar, but are expressed differently as we grow. Other age groups like, for instance, young adults would differentiate in the way they...
Piaget proposed that cognitive development from infant to young adult occurs in four universal and consecutive stages: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operations, and formal operations (Woolfolk, A., 2004). Between the ages of zero and two years of age, the child is in the sensorimotor stage. It is during this stage the child experiences his or her own world through the senses and through movement. During the latter part of the sensorimotor stage, the child develops object permanence, which is an understanding that an object exists even if it is not within the field of vision (Woolfolk, A., 2004). The child also begins to understand that his or her actions could cause another action, for example, kicking a mobile to make the mobile move. This is an example of goal-directed behavior. Children in the sensorimotor stage can reverse actions, but cannot yet reverse thinking (Woolfolk, A., 2004).
Relationships serve as the communication channels that bond family members together. Attachment theory presents a way of recognizing and assessing the quality of relationships between family members (Landers et al, 2013). John Bowlby (1988) established attachment theory through the study of mammals and humans. He proposed that infants develop their initial relationship with their mother but not always. In addition, he suggested that this relationship serves as the foundation for all subsequent relationships throughout life. This initial relationship creates a subsystem within the family system. The mother’s responsiveness to the infant establishes the quality of attachment the infant will develop (Landers et al, 2013). In most cases, when an infant experiences their mother or primary caretaker as nurturing and responsive, the infant will develop a secure attachment. However, when the infant experiences a primary caretaker as unresponsive or inattentive, an insecure
The child’s development is determined by biological maturation and interaction with the environment. Although all children go through each stage in the same order, there are individual differences in the rate at which children progress through stages, and some may never go through the later steps. Each stage of development reflects an increasing sophistication of children’s thought. The first stage is the Sensorimotor stage. This stage ranges from birth to two years of age and can be broken down to six substages. The main objective of this stage is goal-directed behavior and object permanence. Goal-directed behavior combines several schemes and coordinates them to perform a single act to solve a problem. Object permanence is the realization to form a mental schema of an object that is not present but exists. The Preoperational Stage is the second stage and ranges from age two to seven. During this stage children increase their ability to think symbolically, as well as increase the use of concepts, centration, conservation,and intuitive thought emerge , and thinking remains egocentric. The third stage is the Concrete Operational change. Occurring between ages seven and twelve. Piaget characterized this stage as a major turning point in a child’s cognitive development because it applies operational thought. In this stage, children are
In their own home the child would cling to the caregiver and become in distress. In an unfamiliar environment the child would monitor the caregiver’s whereabouts closely, but would not disrupt the caregiver’s interaction with the baby. Terri and Ablard (1989, as cited by Volling et al., 2014) observed that insecurely attached infants cried and protested more to the mother’s interactions. It was recently found that “insecure-resistant infants stayed in proximity to their mothers longer during a jealously-inducing doll paradigm than secure or insecure avoidant infants (Volling, Yu, Gonzalez, Kennedy, Rosenberg, and Oh, 2014). With the understanding of these different attachment styles it represented how different attachment styles reacted towards their baby siblings and caregiver. For example, if a parent no longer rocks the firstborn to sleep but does for the baby sibling the child would react with crying due to the child being no longer rocked to sleep. Now let’s say when the child cries to the caregiver and ends up being rocked to sleep with no problem it shows how secure the child is attached. If the child still would not be able to be consoled by the caregiver the child would be insecurely attached. So each attachment has its own behavior towards each
Infant attachment is the first relationship a child experiences and is crucial to the child’s survival (BOOK). A mother’s response to her child will yield either a secure bond or insecurity with the infant. Parents who respond “more sensitively and responsively to the child’s distress” establish a secure bond faster than “parents of insecure children”. (Attachment and Emotion, page 475) The quality of the attachment has “profound implications for the child’s feelings of security and capacity to form trusting relationships” (Book). Simply stated, a positive early attachment will likely yield positive physical, socio-emotional, and cognitive development for the child. (BOOK)
This psychologist constructed three different types of attachment that a caregiver and child can exhibit, those being, secure, insecure-avoidant, and insecure-resistant (Anderson, 2015). Secure attachment is defined as the caregiver’s promptness to attend to their child’s needs and to be a dependable “safe base” so that the child can wader about their environment worry-free (Anderson, 2015). When the caregiver is no longer present, the child displays emotions of being upset and condenses their exploration, but they eventually calm down because they are certain of their caregiver’s return (Anderson, 2015). Ainsworth’s insecure-avoidant attachment is when the caregiver does not readily attend to their child, and the child independently explores their environment with no regard to their caregiver (Anderson, 2015). The child is very standoffish and shows little to no emotion when the caregiver departs and returns (Anderson, 2015). Insecure-resistant attachment is when the child experiences a great deal of distress when the caregiver leaves, but refuses interaction with them when they return. Here, the child rarely moves around in their environment because they are in extreme distress upon their caregiver’s departure (Anderson, 2015). “One common misconception about attachment is that there is only one figure that can stand as the caregiver, and the chosen one is the mother” (Anderson, 2015). A child can have multiple attachments, but they are not necessarily equal because one is usually the primary, as others are secondary (Anderson,
Firstly, there is the secure attachment style. According to Feldman (2013), infants who exhibit this style in strange situation experiments were securely attached to their mother and feel comfortable around her. They occasionally explore the room but tend to return to their mother often and feel distressed in the absence of her. When she returns, the infants seek comfort and close bodily contact with her (Prior and Glaser, 2006). The next attachment style is the insecure-avoidant attachment. Insecure-avoidant infants explore more frequently than securely attached infants in strange situation experiments. Also, they tend to show minimal response when separated from their mother and even show avoidant behaviour towards her such as averting her gaze. When picked up, the infants are not clingy and do not resist release (ibid.). Moreover, there is the ambivalent attachment style where infants who exhibit this style display immediate distress and anxiety when separation from their mother occurs. However, they show ambivalent behaviour, meaning both contact-resisting and contact-seeking behaviour towards their mother when she returns (ibid.). For example, they might combine kicking and hitting while clinging on to her. Then, there is the disorganized attachment style. According to D. Shemmings and Y. Shemmings (2011), infants who acted strangely and oddly during strange situation experiments were categorized under this attachment style. Some of these infants would move towards their mother then suddenly stop moving for a few seconds. There were also infants in this category who would move towards their mother while holding their hands up in front of their faces as if they were shielding themselves from something (ibid.). These infants showed inconsistent behaviour which contradicts the behaviour of other infants
This stage of development was described by Piaget as the preoperational stage. Children are often in this stage from ages two to seven. Children in this stage begin using symbolic thinking. Their reasoning skills begin to develop as well. Cognitive development is also very important in this stage of a child’s life (Feldman, 2011). Their thinking is partially logical, however they are limited (Fleming, 2004). They can only look at things from their perspective, which is called egocentrism. They cannot yet understand steps for transformations. They also do not comprehend that appearances can be deceiving. They do, however, develop their use of symbolic function. This is their ability to use symbols to describe something. Vygotsky also said that cognitive development is the result of social interactions. Children are guided and supported in solving problems (Feldman,
Erik Erikson introduced us to eight stages of development that happens over a person’s lifespan. At each stage, there is a developmental task with a crisis that will need to be resolved to successfully go through that stage development. During these tasks, vulnerability is increased and there is enhanced potential. If the task is handled successfully, then we can see healthy development occurring. This idea of people going through different stages helps to explain why people develop differently and how one develops during childhood can directly affect how they will be and/or act during later years in life. This paper will examine my personal
The child feels more desire to explore when the caregiver is around, and he or she is discontented when the caretaker goes away. This pattern of attachment is characterized by high discriminative aspects where the child highly sensitive to the presence of strangers (Newton, 2008). A child becomes happy where the caregiver is present and dull when the caregiver goes away. Secure attachment level and intensity is determined by the caregiver sensitivity to the needs of a child. Consistent response to a child needs by the caregiver or parents will create a relatively strong secure attachment pattern. Care and attention are the major determinants of secure attachment and a child who revives a lot of attention and care from his or her parent are much prone to develop secure attachment, and it is an indication that the parent is responsive to the child
The preoperational stage last from two to seven years. In this stage it becomes possible to carry on a conversation with a child and they also learn to count and use the concept of numbers. This stage is divided into the preoperational phase and the intuitive phase. Children in the preoperational phase are preoccupied with verbal skills and try to make sense of the world but have a much less sophisticated mode of thought than adults. In the intuitive phase the child moves away from drawing conclusions based upon concrete experiences with objects. One problem, which identifies children in this stage, is the inability to cognitively conserve relevant spatial
Jean Piaget’s cognitive theory states that a child goes through many set stages in his or her cognitive development. It is through these stages that the child is able to develop into an adult. The first of these stages is called the sensorimotor period in which the child’s age ranges from 0-2 years old. During this sensorimotor period of a child’s development, the child’s main objective is to master the mechanics of his or her own body. Towards the end of this period, the child begins to recognize himself as a separate individual, and that people and objects around him or her have their own existence. The child, however, does not have a sense of object permanence meaning that when an object is taken away, the child no longer believes that that object actually exists. As the child nears the end of this period of development, he may seek an item that has been hidden in the location where he or she last saw it, but does not look elsewhere (Smith). During the preoperational period, which lasts from age 2-7, the child has come a long way in his or her cognitive development since his or her birth. In this period, the child has a very basic understanding of the inner workings of his or her mind and is ready to interact with their environment in a more symbolic way. A limitation during this period is known as egocentrism. The child has a hard time realizing that though there are many other people and things in their world, none of them are more important that the child himself. The child believes that his point of view is the only point of view of the world. This is caused by his inability to put himself in someone’s else’s shoes (Smith). The concrete operational period, spanning between the ages of 7 and 11, is marked by the onset of logic to the young mind. The child is able to mentally manipulate objects and events. In other words, he or she can imagine squashing a clay ball ...