Developmental Psychology Study

Childhood trauma has significant impact on adult development. According to psychologist Daniel Levinson, adults’ will experience a series of transitional periods as they develop. Levinson explained his theory of adult development in terms of life cycles stating, “Transitions are periods of upheaval because, to continue to develop, one must change the character of one’s life” (Levinson, 1978). Levinson 's four transitions include pre-adulthood, early adulthood, middle adulthood, and late adulthood.

How do we develop or construct our understanding of childhood? This are some of many fundamental question that would help us to truly understand the basic form of our humanity. From Clark’s “The origin of childhood” and Pressler “Construction of childhood” are just few examples the would help us understand some modification of the true importance of the development of a child and its discontents to the contribution of society. I questioned if childhood is a constructive development of my environment, or the embodiment of nature? To truly answer this question, I would need the help of Pressler.

During adolescence major neurological changes occur resulting in a reorganised brain, thus allowing the transition between the period of concrete operational stage of thinking, to a formal operational stage of thinking (Piaget, 1969 as cited in Thies & Travers, 2009). Formal operation thinking allows adolescence to consider all possibilities and reason realistically about the future. To attack a problem, teenager’s gather all information possible and make many variable combinations to solve the problem. This type of thinking can cause teenagers to become argumentative about certain topics (Piaget, 1969 as cited in Thies & Travers, 2009). Piaget’s cognitive development theory ends with formal operational thinking and is continually practiced and developed throughout the adult life stages.

Species has a common ancestor, and as the environment changed either the species adapt or the become extinct-survival of the fittest. His theory help us to understand the biological changed where there is a struggle for existence and how it influence instinct in the animal kingdom, it also applies to human where natural selection has evolved as seen in their social behaviour, reasoning and physical characteristics (Crain,

Historically, human development was seen as taking place in infancy and childhood, thus assuming that further development is not very interesting. Most personality characteristics (e.g., intelligence, social competence) were seen as fully developed by young adulthood without undergoing significant changes thereafter. With more refined empirical studies on human development it became obvious that individual behavior can significantly change until very old age (Baltes, Staudinger, & Lindenberger, 1999). Therefore, an important issue of modern developmental psychology is to study stabilities and change of human development over the life span. Changes in human behavior over the life span include biological processes (e.g., hormonal production in

adhiolescent development involves a complex interplay between genetics, biol- ogy, and social and emotional relationships within multiple contexts of home, school and the broader community. The transition from primary to secondary school, coupled with the onset of puberty, can therefore be a difficult period for young people to negotiate at a critical period of their developmental pathway. Using a social ecological perspective, this article examines the impact of the transition experience on adolescent social and emotional health, both immedi- ately following transition to secondary school and at the end of the first year in this new school environment. This 1-year prospective study involving 1,500 Australian Grade 8 secondary school students found that 31% of students in the sample experienced a ‘difficult’ or ‘somewhat difficult’ transition to their new school. This third of the student sample were consequently more likely to experience poorer social and emotional health, including higher levels of de- pression and anxiety at the end of their first year of secondary school, while controlling for these variables at the time of transition.

The study of psychology evaluates the inner being of an individual. Psychology begins in the early stages of life and is associated with one’s upbringing. Depending on the relationship with parents, to behavior in a social environment, these aspects contribute to help mold a person’s way of thinking. The mental characteristics that are observed has been used overtime to classify individuals as to whether there can be some type of disorder found. The evolution of psychology has created jobs in a variety of different fields such as hospitals, schools, and prisons.

The basis of Identity: Nature or Nurture? Nature versus nurture is a controversial debate in many different educational fields when evaluating the behavior of human beings. When assessing the identity of an individual, some people believe the individual’s behavior is the outcome of their genetics (or nature), while others believe it is due to their environment (or nurture). In Pudd’nhead Wilson, Mark Twain constantly raises the idea of nature versus nurture, and leads the reader to question what determines an individual’s identity.

Piaget Theory Overview- Piaget’s theory of cognitive development in children focuses on the stages and processes that demonstrate growth and eventually lead to adult reasoning. This theory implies that children will progress through the stages of cognitive development in the same particular order, however there will be differences in the rate each child progresses based on the environment and biological differences. Piaget described each stage with developmental norms with named processes (McLeod, 2015).

Question 1: According to Wikipedia, child development refers to the human beings changes in biological, psychological and emotional from birth and to the end of adolescence, and from dependency to increasing autonomy. This is a continuous process in conjunction with a predictable sequence, however it may vary and have a unique progression for every child. It does not develop at the same rate and each stage is influenced by the prior types of development. Social-emotional development being described as the process where children learn to interact with others, communicate, express their feelings, and develop their identity and self-esteem.

In the 1920s, Piaget observed that children 's reasoning and understanding capabilities differed depending on their age. Piaget stated that all youngsters progress through a series of cognitive stages of development, just as they progress through a series of physical stages of development. According to Piaget, the rate at which children pass through these cognitive stages may vary, but boys and girls eventually pass through all the stages, in the same order. For this document the appropriate Piaget’s theory would be the Sensorimotor

Life Course Perspective Sociologist Glen Elder Jr. first wrote about the Life Course Perspective over fifty years ago (Hutchinson, p. 10). In his studies, he first noticed the effects history had on the development of individuals and families. He then looked into developmental theories that looked into how historical events not only effect microsocial groups, individuals and families, but how it affected macrosocial groups, education and work roles (Hutchinson, p. 10) The Life Course Perspective is the understanding of the relationship between human behavior and how it develops over an individuals’ life span.

Developmental Psychology is the study and focus on how an individual will behave or grow up to be (develop). This can can help predict one 's behavior by examining their age,the external influences around them, and way of thinking and matching them to a psychologist assertions to predict how the earliness of their childhood will affect them in the future.

Q1.3 Explain the impact of adolescent development on a young person’s thoughts, feelings and behaviours A1.3 Adolescence is a time of great change for young people when physical changes are happening at an accelerated rate. Puberty is accompanied by physical, psychological and emotional changes adapted to ensure reproductive and parenting success. But adolescence is not just marked by physical changes – young people are also experiencing cognitive, social/emotional and interpersonal changes as well. It marks a transition in risks for depression and other common mental disorders, substance abuse, eating disorders and anti social behaviours. As they grow and develop young people are influenced by outside factors, such as their environment, culture, religion, school and the media.