Theories of human development
After reading about the different theories, reflect on whether any particular theory appealed to you or if you disliked it.
What is the most interesting or useful thing that you have learned?
What you have learned about diversity and how all the components of diversity (culture, ethnicity, race, class, gender, sexual orientation and identity, religion, etc.) help to influence and impact our behavior and growth and development.
ANSWER
Theories of human development comprise a framework of human growth, development and learning. I was intrigued to learn about these theories because I have always wondered what is entailed in human behaviour and thought. Similarly, the theories provide an understanding of society and individuals.
The most interesting theory I learnt was Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual Development. It describes how personality develops during childhood. I found the theory both intriguing and controversial. Freud had the belief that personality is developed during childhood where the pleasure-seeking energy becomes focused on various erogenous areas which becomes the driving force of human behaviour. That early experiences play a vital role in the development of personality and continue to influence it throughout individual life. It also suggested that by age five, personality has already been established where if all the psychosexual stages are fulfilled, a healthy personality is acquired. If not, a fixation occurs and persists where the person could remain in this stage indefinitely. It is this fixation that could bring up problems later in life such as an over-dependence and addiction to drugs.
A good example is an oral stage where Feud considered the erogenous zone to be the mouth. From birth, suckling happens by use of the mouth. If fixation occurs on this stage the person, according to Feud could have problems with dependency or aggression. These early stages of positive enable a person to become productive, competent and creative. The controversy of this stage is what in interested me mostly because psychologists and theorists such as Karen Horney disputed Feud’s work calling him a sexist and claiming that some aspects of this theory are inaccurate and demeaning to women.
