Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud was born in the Austrian town of Freiberg, now known as the Czech
Republic on May 6, 1856.

When he was four years old, Freud’s family moved to Vienna, the town where he would
live and work for most of the remainder of his life. He received his medical degree in 1881. As a
medical student and young researcher, Freud’s research focused on neurobiology, exploring the
biology of brains and nervous tissue of humans and animals.

He fled to Austria to escape from Nazis in 1938 and died in England on September 23,
1939 at the age of 83 by suicide. He requested a lethal dose of morphine from his doctor, following
a long and painful battle with oral cancer.

One of his contributions is the Psychoanalytic Theory. He can be considered as the most
well-known psychologist because of his very interesting theory about the unconscious and also
about sexual development.

Jean Piaget

Jean Piaget was born on August 9, 1896, in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, becoming an expert
on the study of mollusks by his teen years. Over the course of his later career in child psychology,
he identified four stages of mental development that chronicled young people's journeys from basic
object identification to highly abstract thought. The recipient of an array of honors, Jean Piaget
died of unknown causes on September 16, 1980, in Geneva, Switzerland. He was 84 years old. His
body rests at the Cimetière des Plainpalais.

Jean Paiget’s Cognitive Theory of Development is truly a classic in the field of educational
psychology. This theory fueled other researchers and theories of development and learning. It
focus on how individuals construct knowledge.

Jean Piaget pioneered the study of children’s intellectual development. He argued that
children’s understanding of the world progresses through four stages: sensorimotor development
and self-awareness; representational thought, including by means of language; classification of
objects by their similarities and differences and the emergence of elementary logical abilities; and
advanced reasoning, including manipulation of abstract ideas.

Erik Erikson

Erik Erikson was born in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1902. Erikson never knew his own father;
he was raised by his mother and stepfather, who married in 1905. He struggled with his identity
throughout his youth as he felt his stepfather never fully accepted him as he did his own daughters.
Erikson grew up using his stepfather’s surname; he eventually adopted the name Erikson in 1939.

After meeting Anna Freud while working in Vienna, Erikson decided to pursue the field of
psychoanalysis. He studied child development at the Vienna Psychoanalytic Institute through the
Montessori method, which focused on psychosexual and developmental stages. Erikson received
a diploma from the institute, but he never received a formal degree. Instead, his knowledge was
based upon his experiences and extensive reading.

Erikson married Joan Serson, a dancer and artist, in 1930, who helped him to develop his
psychosocial development theory. Erikson, his wife, and young son fled the Nazi uprising for the
Unites States in 1933. The couple raised three children.

Each of Erikson's stages of psychosocial development focus on a central conflict. In Erikson's

theory of development, children don't automatically complete each stage on a predetermined
schedule. Instead, people face generalized challenges throughout life, and the ways in which they
answer these challenges determine whether they develop further or stagnate at a particular stage
of development.

Erik Erikson, 91, the psychoanalyst and author who developed the concept of "identity crisis" and
made the term a part of the common idiom, died May 12 at a nursing home in Harwich, Mass. The
Associated Press reported that he died as the result of an "infection.

Lawrence Kohlberg

Lawrence Kohlberg was born in Bronxville, New York on October 25, 1927. Kohlberg
enrolled in the University of Chicago, and with high examination scores, he was excused from
many required courses and received his bachelor’s degree in just one year. He received his PhD in
psychology from the University of Chicago in 1958. His dissertation was based on his research
into the moral choices of adolescent boys and led to a life devoted to the exploration of moral and
ethical development in young people.

In 1959, Kohlberg joined the staff of Yale University as an assistant professor of

psychology. In 1962, he returned to the University of Chicago as an assistant professor. Over
several years, he worked as an associate professor and director of Child Psychology Training
Program at the university. The remainder of his career was spent as a professor of education and
social psychology at Harvard University between 1968 and 1987.

Kohlberg married Lucy Stigberg in 1955, and the couple had two sons. Kohlberg died of
an apparent suicide in 1987, after a long battle with depression coupled with painful symptoms
from a tropical parasite he had contracted in Belize in 1971. He parked his car, leaving identifying
documents behind, then walked into the frigidly cold Boston Harbor.

Lev Vygotsky

Lev Vygotsky was born November 17, 1896, in Orsha, a city in the western region of the
Russian Empire. He was married to Rosa Smekhova, and they had two daughters. Lev Vygotsky
died of Tuberculosis on 11 June, 1934, in Moscow, Russia. He was just 37 at the time of his death
 He attended Moscow State University, where he graduated with a degree in law in 1917.
He studied a range of topics while attending university, including sociology, linguistics,
psychology, and philosophy. However, his formal work in psychology did not begin until 1924
when he attended the Institute of Psychology in Moscow.

He completed a dissertation in 1925 on the psychology of art but was awarded his degree
in absentia due to an acute tuberculosis relapse that left him incapacitated for a year. Following
his illness, Vygotsky began researching topics such as language, attention, and memory with the
help of students including Alexei Leontiev and Alexander Luria.

Urie Bronfenbrenner

A Russian American psychologist, Urie Brofenbrenner was born on April 29, 1917 to Dr.
Alexander Brofenbrenner and Kamenetski Brofenbrenner. At the age of his 6, his family relocated
to United States. For a short period of time, they settled Letchworth village in Pittsburgh where
his father worked as a research director and clinical psychologist. Broferbrenner attended Cornell
University after his graduation from Haverstraw High School and by 1938; he completed his
double major in psychology and music. Then he completed his M.A at Harvard University and in
1942, completed his PhD from the University of Michigan. Just shortly after that, he was hired as
a psychologist in the army doing many assignments for the Office of Strategic Services and the
Army Air Corps. In the administration and research, he worked as an assistant chief psychologist
before he accepted the offer from the University of Michigan to work as an assistant professor in
Psychology. In 1948, he accepted an offer from Cornell University as a professor in Human
development, family studies and psychology. He also served as a faculty member in the board of
trustees in the late 1960’s and 1970’s. Urie is admired all over the world to develop the innate
relationship between research and policy on child development. He was of the view that child
development is better applicable when institutional policies motivate studies in a natural
environment and theory is best suited in a practical application when it is relevant.

Urie Bronfenbrenner received many awards for his work and dedication such as The James
McKeen Catell Award from the American Psychological Society and award for lifetime
contribution to Developmental Psychology in the service of science and society. His wife was
Liese Urie Borfenbrenner with whom he had 6 children. At the age of 88, he died on September
25, 2005 in Ithaca, New York at him home due to diabetes.
Erikson’s eight stages and associated challenges include:

Infancy: basic trust vs. basic mistrust. A baby will either develop basic trust in his or her caregiver
or will grow to view the world as a dangerous place, depending upon whether the baby gets
sensitive, nurturing care.
Early childhood: autonomy vs. shame and doubt. Children can either develop a sense of
competence and independence or deep shame. This development is intimately related to toilet
training.
Preschool years: initiative vs. guilt. Children develop a sense of initiative if they are able to explore
their environments and discover they are able to do things on their own. If a child is made to feel
guilty about making his or her own choices, the child will develop a sense of guilt rather than
initiative.
School age: industry vs. inferiority. A child compares self to others during this phase and either
develops a sense of industry and work ethic or feelings of inadequacy.
Adolescence: identity vs. role confusion. During this period, teens may have an identity crisis,
questioning their roles in the world and future goals. If parents allow youth to explore the world,
they'll develop their own identities, but those who are punished for autonomy may develop role
confusion.
Early adulthood: intimacy vs. isolation. The development of strong friendships and healthy
intimate relationships help people develop intimacy, but people who fail at this task may become
isolated.
Middle age: generativity vs. stagnation. People who develop a sense of purpose—from parenting,
hobbies, or a career—excel during this period, but those who find no purpose or value in their
activities may stagnate.
Old age: ego integrity vs. despair. People may look back on their lives fondly or feel an
overpowering sense of regret and despair.