The Validity of The Developmental Theories of Freud, Erikson and Essay

The Validity of The Developmental Theories of Freud, Erikson and Piaget based on the personal experiences of Amy - Essay Example In the oral stage, a child gets satisfaction and pleasure through mouth, tongue and lips. Toilet training plays a significant role in delivering pleasure and satisfaction to a child in the anal stage. The third is the phallic stage when sexual organs become a focal point for both the genders. This is also a stage for the development of Oedipus complex in which sexual attraction is developed for the opposite gender. The Latency or Puberty is the fourth stage in which Oedipus complex is resolved through repressing the open expressions of sex; though the dominant area of gratification is still the genital area. The Genital Stage (Puberty onwards) where primary interest turns towards the opposite sex. However, the individual understands the social taboos and try to play within the social norms (see the website). Erikson (29-34) development theory identifies eight stages of human development. In Trust-Mistrust stage, trust is defined as an essential trust on others and one's own self, whi ch is important and has lasting effects throughout the life. Toddlers try to control the environment by doing small things for themselves such as holding feeder in the stage of autonomy-shame and doubt, which brings sense of autonomy if they are successful. During Initiative-guilt stage, children take initiatives and feel guilty if they are discouraged. Comparison with peers becomes important in the Industry-inferiority stage and negative evaluation of one one's own self is damaging. In the Ego Identity-Ego diffusion phase, the adolcence tries to integrate many roles such as sibling, student, athlete, worker into a self-image and leads to dissatisfaciton if develops a feeling that they are not capable to fulfill the role. The next phase is Intimacy-Isolation in which one learns to develop meaningful relationship with others and draw satisfaction and encouragment. The Generativity-Stagnation is phase of adulthood in which one seeks satisfaction in productivity in career, family and s ocietal work. One feels satisfied in the stage of Integrity-Despair if one feels that he has reasonable accomplishments in the past. Jean Piaget (see website) gives four periods of development. The Sensorimotor period has six stages including development of reflexes, habits, coordination between vision and prehension, and beginning of creativity. Pre-Operatory thoughts, Pre-Operational stage, and Sensorimotor are stages of Preoperational period in which a child starts from learning to represent objects by images and words to developing language skills. The Concrete Operational period is the period of cognitive development where a child learns to sort objects in shape and colors, identifies sets of objects, considers multiple aspects to solve a problem, learns complex reversable aspects such as mathmatics, understands and develops ability to arrange unrelated arrangments of numbers, quality and numbers in a meaningful way and leaves egocenterism. In formal operational period, a child develops the ability to think abstractly, reason logically and draw conclusions from the information available. The crux of the theories is that specific developmental conflict becomes critical at a certain stage but that does not mean that attributes of each stage is only related to a specific stage. A passed stage has