CHAPTER 2 THEORIES OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Learning Objectives

• What are the main issues addressed by developmental theories?

• Where does each major theorist – Freud, Erikson, Skinner, Bandura, Piaget, and Gottlieb – stand on each of these issues?

Theories of Human Development

• Developmental theory

– Ideas proposed to describe/explain phenomena

– Provides means to organize, interpret, explain facts or observations

– Guides collection of new data

Five Key Developmental Issues

• Goodness-badness of human nature– Evidence of biologically-based tendencies

for good and bad

• Nature-nurture issue– Biological forces or environmental forces

• Activity-passivity issue– Are humans active agents in their own

development or passively shaped by forces beyond their control?

Five Key Developmental Issues, continued

• Continuity-discontinuity issue– Are changes over the lifespan gradual or

abrupt (like stair steps)?– Are changes quantitative (a matter of

degree) or qualitative (changes in kind)?

• Universality-context-specificity issue– Are developmental changes common to all

humans or different across cultures, subcultures, contexts, and individuals?

Learning Objectives

• What are the features of Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of personality?

• What are the features of Freud’s psychoanalytic theory of psychosexual development?

• What are the strengths and weaknesses of psychoanalytic theory?

Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory of Personality

• Central notion: humans have instincts that motivate behavior

– Unconscious motivation

• Humans possess psychic energy that is divided among three components of the personality

– Id – impulsive, selfish part of personality

– Ego – rational aspect that seeks to gratify instincts

– Superego – internalized moral standards

Freud’s Theory of Psychosexual Development

• As a child biologically matures, libido seeks to gratify different biological needs

– Libido – psychic energy of the sex instinct

• Child moves through five stages

– Oral – infancy

– Anal – toddlerhood

– Phallic –3 to 6 years of age

– Latent – 6 to 12 years of age

– Genital - adolescence

Concepts in Freud’s Theory of Psychosexual Development

• Fixation – arrested development; the libido is tied to an earlier stage of development

• Oedipus complex – a young boy loves his mother and fears his father will retaliate by castrating him

– Resolves this conflict by identification – taking on or internalizing the attitudes and behaviors of the other person

• Electra complex – a young girl desires her father, views her mother as a rival

– Resolves the conflict by identifying with her mother

Concepts in Freud’s Theory – Defense Mechanisms

• Defense mechanisms – unconscious coping devices that the ego adopts to defend itself against anxiety

– Repression

– Regression

– Projection

– Reaction formation

Strengths and Weaknesses of Freud’s Theory

• Weaknesses

– Theory said to be ambiguous, internally inconsistent, not testable, and therefore not falsifiable

• Strengths

– Many insights have held up and been influential

• Called attention to unconscious processes

• Emphasized importance of early experience

• Emphasized importance of emotions and emotional conflicts

Learning Objectives

• How does Erikson’s psychoanalytic theory compare to Freud’s theory?

• What crisis characterizes each of Erikson’s psychosocial stages?

Erik Erikson

• Most influential neo-Freudian

• Some differences with Freud

– Less emphasis on sexual urges

– More emphasis on rational ego

– More positive, adaptive view of human nature

– Development continues through adulthood

Erikson’s Stages: Approximate Ages

• Trust vs. mistrust: infancy

• Autonomy vs. shame and doubt: toddlerhood

• Initiative vs. guilt: preschool

• Industry vs. inferiority: school-age childhood

• Identity vs. role confusion: adolescence

• Intimacy vs. isolation: young adulthood

• Generativity vs. stagnation: middle age

• Integrity vs. despair: Late life

Strengths and Weaknesses of Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory

• Strengths

– Emphasis on rational and adaptive nature

– Emphasis on interaction of biological and social influences

– Influenced research into adolescence and adulthood

• Weaknesses

– Sometimes vague and difficult to test

– Describes human personality development but does not explain how development occurs

Learning Objectives

• What are the distinct features of the learning theories covered in this chapter: Watson’s classical conditioning, Skinner’s operant conditioning, and Bandura’s social-cognitive theory?

• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the learning theories in our understanding of lifespan development?

Learning Theories: Classical Conditioning

• Behaviorism: conclusions should be based only upon observable behavior

• Principles of classical conditioning and learning by association

– UCS: automatic, unlearned stimulus

– UCR: automatic, unlearned response

– CS: learned stimulus

– CR: learned response

• Caption: The three phases of classical conditioning

Learning Theories: Operant Conditioning

• Learner’s behavior is more/less probable depending upon the consequences it produces

– People tend to repeat behaviors that have desirable consequences and reduce behaviors that have undesirable consequences

– We learn new skills and good and bad habits

Learning Theories: Operant Conditioning

– Reinforcement occurs when a consequence strengthens a response or makes it more likely to occur

– Two forms of reinforcement

• Positive – something pleasant or desirable is added

• Negative – something unpleasant or undesirable is removed, escaped, or avoided

Learning Theories: Operant Conditioning

– Punishment decreases the strength of a behavior or weakens it

– Two forms of punishment

• Positive – occurs when an unpleasant stimulus is applied or added to the situation following the behavior

• Negative – occurs when a desirable stimulus is removed following the behavior

• Caption: Possible consequences of whining behavior. Moosie comes into the TV room and sees his father talking and joking with his sister, Lulu, as the two watch a football game. Soon Moosie begins to whine, louder and louder, that he wants them to turn off the television so he can play Nintendo games. If you were Moosie’s father, how would you react? Above are four possible consequences of Moosie’s behavior. Consider both the type of consequence – whether it is a pleasant or aversive stimulus – and whether it is administered (“added”) or withdrawn. Notice that reinforcement strengthens whining behavior, or makes it more likely in the future, whereas punishment weakens it.

Learning Theories: Operant ConditioningSpanking: A Form of Punishment

– Best to use more positive approaches before resorting to spanking, but . . .

– Spanking can have short-term effect if it• Is administered immediately after the act• Is administered consistently• Is not overly harsh• Is accompanied by explanation• Is administered by an otherwise affectionate

person• Is used sparingly and combined with efforts

to reinforce desirable behavior

Bandura’s Social-Cognitive Theory

• Formerly called social-learning theory

• Emphasizes the motivating, self-regulating role of cognition in human behavior

• Includes observational learning – the most important mechanism through which human behavior changes

Bandura’s Social-Cognitive Theory

• Observational learning

– Accomplished by observing the behavior of others (models)

– Learners pay attention, construct and remember mental representations, retrieve the representations from memory, and use them to guide behavior

• Famous Bobo doll study

• Includes the processes of latent learning and vicarious reinforcement

Bandura’s Social-Cognitive Theory

• Additional aspects of social-cognitive theory

– Human agency – ways in which people deliberately exercise cognitive control

– Self-efficacy – a high or low sense that one can effectively produce desired outcomes in a particular activity

– Reciprocal determinism – mutual influences among the person, the person’s behavior, and the environment

• Caption: Bandura’s reciprocal determinism involves mutual influences of the person, the person’s behavior, and the environment

Learning Theories: Strengths and Weaknesses

• Strengths

– Theories are precise and testable

– Can test via carefully controlled experiments

– Principles apply across the lifespan

– Practical applications are possible

• Weaknesses

– Inadequate accounts of developmental changes

– Too little consideration of genetic and maturational processes

Learning Objectives

• What is Piaget’s perspective on cognitive development?

• What are the strengths and weaknesses of Piaget’s theory?

Concepts in Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Intelligence: process that helps a person adapt to the environment

• Constructivism: children construct new understandings of the world based on their experiences

• Interaction between biological maturation and experiences is responsible for children’s developmental progress from one stage to the next, qualitatively different, stage

Stages of Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Sensorimotor stage

– Infants deal with the world through their senses and their motor skills

• Properational stage

– Preschoolers can use symbolic thought but cannot yet use logical problem-solving

• Cannot demonstrate conservation

Stages of Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Concrete operations stage

– School-age children are more logical and can use trial-and-error approach to problem-solving

• Formal operations stage

– Adolescents are able to think abstractly and hypothetically

Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Strengths

– Well-accepted by developmentalists

– Well-researched, mostly supported

– Influenced education and parenting

Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Weaknesses– Too little consideration of influences of

motivation and emotion upon thought processes

– Questionable that the stages constitute a coherent, general mode of thinking

– Perhaps underestimated cognitive abilities of young children

– Too little emphasis upon parents and caregivers

– Stages may not be universal

Challenges to Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

• Vygotsky’s sociocultural perspective

– View that cognitive development is shaped by its sociocultural context and children’s interactions with members of their culture

• Information-processing approach

– Examines fundamental processes of attention, memory, decision-making, etc.

Learning Objectives

• How do systems theories conceptualize development?

• What have evolutionary theory and ethology contributed to our understanding of human development?

Systems Theories

• Systems theories attribute changes over the lifespan to ongoing, reciprocal transactions between a changing organism and a changing environment

– Examples

• Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model

• Gottlieb’s epigenetic psychobiological systems perspective

Evolutionary Theory and Ethology

• Evolutionary theory considers how human characteristics and behaviors observed today may have been adaptive for our ancestors and thus become part of human genetics

• Darwin inspired the field of ethology

– Study of evolved behavior of species in their natural environments

– Ethologists suggest that human behaviors are the products of evolution and help humans adapt to their environment

Learning Objectives

• What are the essential elements of Gottlieb’s epigenetic psychobiological systems perspective of development?

• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the systems theories of development?

Gottlieb’s Epigenetic Psychobiological Systems Perspective

• Development is the product of interacting biological and environmental influences that form a larger system

• Evolution endowed humans with genetic makeup

• Genes and environment interact because humans actively change their environments– Occurs at the species level– Biological and cultural evolution contribute

to change over time in the human species

Gottlieb: Epigenesis

• Epigenesis: “over and above” genes– Nature and nurture, genes and

environment, co-act to yield developmental outcomes

• Epigenetic process– Activity of genes– Activity of neurons– Organism’s behavior– Environmental influences

Strengths and Weaknesses of Systems Theories of Development

• Strengths– Call attention to ongoing transactions

between the individual and the environment

• Weaknesses– Only partially formulated and tested– No coherent developmental theory

Learning Objective

• How can we categorize theories of human development?

Categories of Human Development Theories

• Freud, Erikson, and Piaget– Stage theorists– Development guided in universal directions

by biological-maturational forces– Parents are supporters of development

• Watson, Skinner, and Bandura– Learning theorists– Emphasize environment more than biology– Parents are their children’s trainers

Categories of Human Development Theories

• Systems and contextual theorists– View biology and environment as

inseparable components of a larger system– Humans are active contributors to

development, but environment also is an active participant.

– Parents view themselves as partners with their children in the development process