THEORIES OF HUMAN

DEVELOPMENT
 CONTROVERSIES ABOUT HUMAN
DEVELOPMENT
• Inherently Bad Versus Inherently Good.
- inherently bad (doctrine of original sin)
- inherently good (doctrine of innate good)
- either bad or good
( doctrine of tabula rasa)

Positiveness or negativeness of character depends on

the child’s experiences.
• Nature Versus Nurture.
- one of the oldest controversies
- are human beings a product of their
heredity & other biological predispositions, or
are they shaped by the environment in which
they are raised?

It is advisable to think less about nature versus

nurture & more about how these two sets of
influences combine or interact to produce
developmental change.
• Activity Versus Passivity.

- Some children are curious, active creatures

who largely contribute to the agents of society
that treat them.

- Some are passive souls on whom society

fixes its stamp.
• Continuity Versus Discontinuity.
- Continuity theorists view human development
as an additive process that occurs in small steps,
without sudden changes.
(PROCESS THAT UNDERLIE DEVELOPMENTAL
CHANGE)
- In contrast, “discontinuity” or “stage” theorists
believe that the developing skill proceeds through a
series of abrupt changes, each of which elevates the
child to a new & presumably more advanced stage.
( NATURE OR CONTENT OF THESE CHANGES)
• A developmental stage is a
distinct period of the life cycle
characterized by a particular
set of abilities, motives,
behavior, emotion that occur
together & form a coherent
(clear, rational, logical) pattern.
• Developmental psychology
researches show that
different types of
development are important
at different periods in the
life cycle.
• PHYSICAL GROWTH
(infancy & adolescence)
• LANGUAGE (preschool period)
• LOGICAL THINKING
(middle childhood)
• ABSTRACT REASONING
( preadolescence)
 THEORY
• Is a set of concepts & proportions
that helps to describe & explain
observations that one has made.
• Theories are particularly useful if
they are concise & yet applicable
to a wide range of phenomena.
 THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON HUMAN
DEVELOPMENT
• The Psychoanalytic Theory (Sigmund Freud)
• Behavioral Theory (John B. Watson)
• Theories of Social Learning
- Clark Hull ( drive theory)
- B.F. Skinner (operant-learning theory)
- Albert Bandura
(cognitive social-learning theory)
• The Cognitive-Developmental
Theory
(Jean Piaget)
• Lawrence Kohlberg’s Theory of
Moral Development
• Ethological Theory (Ethologists)
• Sociobiological Theory
 PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY

• Formulated his psychoanalytic

theory from OBSERVATIONS &
NOTES that he made about the
life histories of his mentally
disturbed patients.
• He favored nontraditional methods
of interviewing patients:
- hypnosis
- free association
- dream analysis
(dreams were thought of as a
particularly rich source of information
– unconscious motivation)
• Freud assumed that we all dream
about what we really want.
- sex
- power
(unhindered by social prohibitions,
& tend to suppress these desires
when we are awake)
• Freud was able to infer (conclude,
assume, understand) that all of us
experience intense conflicts that
influence our behavior.
• As biological creatures, we have goals or
motives that must be satisfied.
• Yet, society dictates that many of these
basic urges are undesirable & must be
suppressed or controlled.
• Conflicts emerge at several
points during childhood & play
a major role in determining
the course & character of
one’s social & personality
development.
 INSTINCTS, GOALS, & MOTIVES
• All human behavior is energized by
psychodynamic forces.
• Presumably, each individual has a
fixed amount of psychic (mental)
energy that he uses to think, to
learn, & to perform other mental
functions.
• A child needs psychic energy in
order to satisfy his basic urges.
• Freud viewed the newborn as an
inherently (naturally) negative
creature who is relentlessly
“driven” by two kinds of
biological instincts (motives)
• EROS (life instinct)
- helps the child to survive
- it directs life sustaining
activities such as respiration,
eating, sex
- fulfillment of all other bodily
needs
- stronger than thanatos
• THANATOS (death instinct)
- a set of destructive forces
present in all human beings.
- if the psychic energy has
reached the critical point, the
death instinct would be expressed
in some way.
• Destructive acts (outward
expressions) such as
- arson
- fist fights
- murder
- war
- masochism (physical) harm
directed against self
THREE COMPONENTS OF PERSONALITY

• ID
- seeking objects that will satisfy the person
- operates by the pleasure principle
(seeking immediate gratification of instinctual
needs)
- impulsive thinking (primary-process
thinking) is unrealistic
• EGO
- executive of the personality
- it emerges when psychic energy is diverted
from the ID to energize important cognitive
processes such as
- perception
- learning
- logical reasoning
- reality principle ( finds realistic ways of
gratifying the instinct )
• The EGO must at the same time
invest some of its available psychic
energy to block the ID’s irrational
thinking.
• The EGO is both a servant & a
master to the ID.
• The EGO’s mastery is reflected in its
ability to delay gratification until
reality is served.
• SUPEREGO
- judicial branch of the personality
- moral arbiter
-it develops from the EGO, represents
the ideal, & strives for perfection rather
than for pleasure or for reality.
- 3-6 years old gradually internalizing the
moral standards of their parents,
eventually adopting these guidelines as
their own.
PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT

• ORAL STAGE (first year of life)

- infant’s need for gratification from the
mother
• ANAL STAGE (second to third year of
life)
- toddler’s need for gratification along
the rectal area (toilet training)
• PHALLIC STAGE (fourth to fifth year of life)
- preschooler’s gratification involving the
genitals
- opposite sex parent
- Oedipus Complex (jealous)
- after the legendary Oedipus, the King of
Thebes, who unwittingly killed his father &
married his mother
- Electra Complex (female counterpart of
Oedipus Complex
• LATENCY STAGE (SIXTH YEAR OF LIFE
TO PUBERTY)
- sexual desires are repressed & all
the child’s available libido is
channeled into socially acceptable
outlets such as schoolwork or
vigorous play that consume most of
the child’s physical & psychic energy.
GENITAL STAGE (from puberty onwards)
- characterized by the maturation of the
reproductive system, production of sex hormones,
& the reactivation of the genital zone as an area of
sensual pleasure
- libido is invested in activities such as
- forming friendships
- preparing for a career
- courtship
- marriage
 BEHAVIORAL THEORY
(John B. Watson)
• Psychologists began to study what they
could see – overt behavioral responses.
• Basic premise of “behaviorism” is that
the mind of an infant is a tabula rasa &
that learned associations between
stimuli & responses are the building
blocks of human development.
• Development does not proceed through
a series of stages; it is a continuous
process marked by the gradual
acquisition of new & more sophisticated
behavioral patterns, or habits.
• Only the simplest of human reflexes are
inborn & that all important tendencies,
including traits, talents, values, &
aspirations, are learned.
• Behaviorists of the 1980s are more
moderate in their views.
- heredity & maturation play meaningful
roles in human development
- no amount of prompting or
environment enrichment could transform
severely retarded person into a lawyer or
a brain surgeon.
• These contemporary learning theorists
believe that biological factors merely
place limits on what children are capable
of learning.
• Theorists who favor the learning
approach feel that the most significant
aspects of human behavior – those
habits & qualities that make us “human”
– are learned.
 WHAT IS LEARNING?
• Is a process that produces relatively
permanent changes in behavior or
behavior potential.
• These behavioral changes are the result
of one’s experience or practice, as
opposed to natural causes as
maturation, fatigue, injury or illness.
LEARNED RESPONSES OR HABITS MAY
BE ACQUIRED IN SEVERAL WAYS
• Classical conditioning
• Operant (instrumental)
conditioning
• Observational learning
 THEORIES OF SOCIAL LEARNING
• Drive Theory (Clark Hull)
- instincts played virtually no role
- the term habit for the well-learned
associations (habits – personality)
- development occurs continuously & is not at
all stage like.
- each individual was said to develop a unique
habit structure (personality)
• It is theory that
attempts to define,
analyze, or classify
the psychological
drives.
• A drive is an “excitatory state
produced by a homeostatic
disturbance”, an instinctual
need that has the power of
driving the behavior of an
individual.
• It is based on the principle
that organisms are born with
certain psychological needs &
that a negative state of
tension is created when these
needs are not satisfied.
• When a need is satisfied,
drive is reduced & the
organism returns to a state
of homeostasis &
relaxation.
• DRIVE tends to increase
over time & operates on
a feedback control
system, much like a
thermostat.
•DRIVE THEORY is
also known as
DRIVE REDUCTION
THEORY.
• PRIMARY DRIVES are those
related to basic survival &
procreation.
• SECONDARY DRIVES are related
to social & identity factors which
are less important for survival.
• As we act to satisfy needs we become
conditioned & acquire habits & other
unconscious forms of response or reaction.
• Behavior is changed only if habits no longer
satisfy needs, such drives remain.
• If enacting of drives is frustrated or the
driven action does not satisfy needs, this can
lead to ANXIETY & OTHER NEGATIVE
EMOTIONS.
• EXAMPLE:
- A person in a strange house is
hungry & looks for food. They find
some under the staircase. When
they are in another house &
hungry the first place they look is
under the stairs.
• Skinner’s Operant-Learning Approach
- the majority of habits that children acquire
are freely emitted responses (operants).
- behavior is motivated by external stimuli
reinforcers or primitive events rather than of
internal forces, or drives.
- it focuses exclusively on the external stimuli
(reward & punishment) that influence our
behavior & ignores all cognitive determinants of
social learning.
• If the consequences are bad,
there is a high chance the action
will not be repeated; if the
consequences are good, the
actions that led it being repeated
become more probable –
REINFORCEMENT.
• QUOTATIONS:
1. “It is a mistake to suppose that the whole
issue is how to free man. The issue is to
improve the way in which he is controlled.”
2. “Education is what survives when what has
been learned has been forgotten.”
3. As the senses grow dull, the stimulating
environment becomes less clear. When
reinforcing consequences no longer follow
we are bored, discouraged & depressed.”
• Bandura’s Cognitive Social-Learning Theory
- He believes that children can learn novel
responses by merely observing the behavior of a
model, making mental representation….
- this a form of a cognitive learning, wherein
children need not be reinforced or even respond in
order to learn by observing others.
- All that is required for observational learning is
for the observer to pay close attention to the
model’s behavior & then store this information in
memory so that it can be retrieved for use at a later
date.
• EXAMPLE:
- Students imitating the teacher
- Bobo Doll Experiment
(emphasized how young
individuals are influenced by the
acts of adults) – ethical grounds
 THE COGNITIVE-DEVELOPMENTAL THEORY
(Jean Piaget)
• Children are neither driven by
undesirable instincts nor modeled by
environmental influences.
• View children as constructivists – active
explorers who respond to the
environment according to their
understanding of its essential features.
• He viewed intelligence as a basic life
function that helps the organism
adapt to its environment.
• Intellectual activity is undertaken to
produce a balanced or harmonious
relationship between one’s thought
processes & the environment.
STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPEMENT

• Sensorimotor Stage.
- infants are busy discovering the
relationships between sensations & motor
behavior.
- they learn that their hands are part of
themselves, whereas a ball is not.
- child’s mastery of the principle of object
permanence
• Preoperational Stage.
- child’s developing capacity to
employ symbols, particularly
language (ball)
- egocentrism (consider their
own point of view to be the only
possible one)
• Stage of Concrete Operations.
- beginning of rational activity in
children
- children concentrate on only one
aspect at a time
- they come to master various logical
operations, including arithmetic, class &
set relationships, measurement, &
conceptions of hierarchical structures
• Stage of Formal Operations.
- child’s thought remains fixed upon the
visible evidence & concrete properties of objects
& events
- Children acquire a greater ability to deal
with abstractions.
- the adolescent can engage in hypothetical
reasoning based on logic
- the adolescent acquires the capacity for
adult thinking.
 LAWRENCE KOHLBERG’S THEORY OF MORAL
DEVELOPMENT
• Preconventional Morality (up to age 9).
- children do not really understand the conventions or rules of a
society.

Stage One. Punishment-Obedience Orientation

(the physical consequence of an action determines goodness or badness)
Punishment should be avoided by staying out of trouble.

Stage Two. Instrumental Relativist (dependent) Orientation.

(An action is judged to be right if it is instrumental or satisfying one’s own
needs or involve even exchange.)
Obeying rules should bring some sort of benefit in return.
• Conventional Morality (9 to 20 years old).
- conform to the convention of society because
they are rules of a society.

Stage Three. Good Boy-Nice Girl Orientation. The

right action is one that would be carried out by
someone whose behavior is likely to please or
impress others.

Stage Four. Law & Order Orientation. Fixed rules

must be established & obeyed. It is essential to
respect authority.
• Postconventional Morality (after the age of twenty &
by only a small proportion of adults).
- the moral principles that underlie the conventions of
a society are understood.

Stage Five. Social Contract Orientation. Rules are needed

to maintain the social agreement. At the same time, the
rights of the individual should be protected.

Stage Six. Universal Ethical Principle Orientation. Moral

decisions should be made in terms of self-chosen ethical
principles. Once principles are chosen, they should be
applied in a consistent way.
 ETHOLOGICAL THEORY
• Ethology is the study of the biological bases of
behavior, including its evolution, causation, &
development.
• Members of each species are born with a
number of innate responses that are products
of evolution.
• These biologically programmed behaviors are
thought to have evolved as a result of the
Darwinian process of natural selection.
• Only those individuals with the most adaptive
characteristics will survive to pass these
attributes along to their offspring.
(preselected characteristics)
- nest-building behaviors of lovebirds or crying
to communicate discomfort by human infants.

One interesting ethological idea is that infants

are sociable creatures who are quite capable of
promoting & maintaining social encounters from
the day they are born.
• Ethologists clearly acknowledge that
we are largely a product of our
experiences.
• We are inherently biological
creatures who have inborn
characteristics that affect the kinds
of learning experiences we are likely
to have.
 SOCIOBIOLOGICAL THEORY
• Focuses on the biological foundations of social
behavior in species ranging from amoeba colonies to
human societies.
• Sociobiology which views organisms as only the
gene’s way of making more genes.
• Individual organisms may die, but their genes live on
in future generations.
• The key to the entire process is survival (organisms
must be able to function in their habitat – changes
across time.