Introduction
Development in life takes stages that are defined by theories of development. The developmental stages of childhood through adolescence contain dynamics based on ages and life experiences that can be explained theoretically. Several development scientists and theorists provide evidence to explain changes in life development. They argue that diverse experiences influence the progression of the life of people from childhood to adulthood in the different stages of life. Broderick and Blewitt provide case studies in their 2014 and 2020 manual that can be analyzed to understand child development. This submission focuses on the effects of variations in individual relationships as demonstrated by Research in Anna’s case.
The Presenting Challenges
Broderick and Blewitt present the case of Anna, who is only nine years old and lives with her parent, who is unfortunately sick. Karen, the mother, has been given an arthritis diagnosis and endured one of the worst marriages of her life. Because of these circumstances, Anna’s life was more difficult than it should have been daily (Broderick & Blewitt, 2020). Anna attends one of the best schooling institutions; however, the case study highlights that she is one grade behind. Intuitively, her education or level of understanding compared to her peers is equally suffering. Anna feels wrong concerning her parent’s situation and is upset that her mother did not tell her the truth about his father’s identity. Since her ailing mother is expected to cover her expenses and support her two other children, Anna’s mother is in a difficult financial situation. Considering Anna’s life events, she manifests empathy, shyness, solitude, and loneliness in her interaction with other children at school.
Theoretical Explanation
There is a relationship between what happens in a child’s life as she develops through childhood to adolescence. The changes impact their brain to inform their cognitive abilities and morality to explain how they relate with others and how they are perceived (Broderick & Blewitt, 2020). The developments also explain the conceptualization of gender and peer interactions. The theories explain why significant changes infer societal conceptualizations (de Graaf & Carmichael, 2019). The cognitive development theory of Piaget explains why Anna lags in her education. The social development theory by Vygotsky helps explain why Anna is shy and shows elements of solitude, loneliness, and empathy. The theory of Sigmund Freud explains personality development by explaining psychosexual stages of development.
The Social Development Theory
Vygotsky developed this theory to provide a sociocultural explanation of development. According to his theory, a person’s learning process is directly influenced by their socialization processes (Erbil, 2020). Anna’s interactions are first influenced by her immediate environment, which affects her psychological approach to life. Theoretically, it is argued that there are developments in the brain that are influenced by the growth environment, which then influences cognition (Taber, 2020).
Vigotsky provides that learning initiates from the inner psychological and the after in the intrapsychological. Anna is exposed to a life of suffering, struggling, and pain. Effectively, this registers in her personality; therefore, she believes that people like her mother must be cared for. In addition, her intrapersonal being believes that people are to be left alone as they lived without her father. Her social environment defined what life should be for her. It is no surprise that she is lonely and practices empathy toward others.
Vygotsky argues that learning occurs from the more knowledgeable other (MKO). The people who are more knowledgeable about Anna are her mother whom she spends the most time. Notably, it is her mother who then is in a position to influence Anna most about knowledge. She may have had much learning from her social interaction at school, except that she is a lone ranger. Unfortunately, the mother does not tell her the truth about his father.
This first knowledge affects the child in line with how she views the world. The interpretation she manifests is solitude since the only person she is supposed to trust does not tell her the truth. Her intrapersonal being registers resistance towards others. As her first teacher, Anna’s mother has influenced how she can learn from others. This explanation shows why she is lagging in her classwork. It is difficult for her to believe information that is told to her because her inner being encodes distrust.
Cognitive Development Theory
Piaget is the author of this development theory, which explains cognitive development as a function of the environment and biological maturation process. He explains that a child’s complex cognitive development process takes a progressive re-systemization of a mental process. Learning is, therefore, for them, defined by the forces of nurturing and their environmental experiences. The nurturing environment of Anna is crowded with issues that are not good for any learning. An environment that encourages learning is one in which the brain focuses on knowledge. Unfortunately, Anna is in an environment where her attention span is divided between a life of struggling and the need to make things better for themselves. As a result, she has a deterioration in her academics which explains the delay in her grading.
Piaget regarded Anna as being at the operational stage at her age. Piaget emphasizes the sensorimotor stage, pre-operational stage, concrete operational stage, and formal operational stage, which are the four cognitive development phases (Jiang et al., 2022). The first stage exists between ages 0 and 2 years, while the second stage exists between the second and the seventh ages of development. The third stage of development exists between 7 and 11 years, where Anna falls, whereas the other years above 11 define the formal operation stage. Piaget explains that children’s cognitive development is better developed in this stage. With this evidence, Anna can fathom when the mother lies to her about her father’s true identity. The only reason she is in a position to separate truth from falsehood is that she has a better-developed brain, according to the theory of cognitive development.
Sigmund Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of Development
Sigmund Freud discusses the stages of psychosexual development and explains that they affect the behavioral outcome of individuals. Development in the psychosexual domain is progressive from one stage to another stage. Parents’ involvement is pertinent in the development of their children as they spend the most time with them in their initial stages of life. They inform whether their children pass through either pleasure or tension, two factors that inform the sexual development of a child. While Anna is only nine years old, a lot has happened in her life that has left her frustrated and fixed emotionally. Therefore, she finds it difficult to interact with people around her. This analogy explains the limited number of friends Anna has in school. If care is not taken, she is also at risk of developing gender stigma because of the separated status of her mother, who still has to labor to provide for her and her siblings.
Anna has a personality best defined by the interactions of what Sigmund calls the Super Ego, the Ego, and the Id. According to Freud Sigmund, a person’s Super Ego is the consciousness present when they engage with other individuals (Niaz et al., 2019). Anna is well aware of the people around her, so she shows empathy. Freud defines The Ego as social interaction based on rational thought. This argument is in line with the solitary actions of Anna. People in the same age bracket as herself are one class ahead. It is not easy to relate positively with those she is in the same class. It is defined as the social interactions defined by impulses and desires. All these three fundamental definitions of the psychosexual process define Anna’s experiences and behaviors.
Conclusion
Development from childhood to adulthood takes shape in various domains as defined by several factors well explained by developmental theories. Anna, who grows up in a family that battles separation, financial challenges, and sickness, poses Anna to an environment that shapes her character. The theories of cognitive development, social development theory, and psychosexual development help explain Anna’s eventualities in life. The social development theory helps explain why Anna is mostly lonely and has few friends in school. Her loneliness is an attribute of intrapersonal development as an experience of her immediate social environment. The cognitive theory of development helps to explain why Anna delays by one grade in school. Her learning environment influenced her to provide a partial understanding of concepts due to mistrust. The psychosexual development theory explains why Anna’s interaction is limited with her peers.
References
Broderick, P. C., & Blewitt, P. (2020). The life span: Human development for helping professionals 5th ed.). Pearson Education.
de Graaf, N. M., & Carmichael, P. (2019). Reflections on emerging trends in clinical work with gender-diverse children and adolescents. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 24(2), 353–364.
Erbil, D. G. (2020). A review of the flipped classroom and cooperative learning method within the context of Vygotsky theory. Frontiers in Psychology, p. 11, 1157.
Jiang, Y., Xu, N., Xu, S., & Wang, S. (2022). The Enlightenment of Piaget’s Theory to Chinese Primary School Education. In 2022 3rd International Conference on Mental Health, Education and Human Development (MHEHD 2022) (pp. 878–882). Atlantis Press.
Niaz, A., Stanikzai, S. M., & Sahibzada, J. (2019). Review of Freud’s psychoanalysis approach to literary studies. American International Journal of Social Science Research, 4(2), 35-44.
Taber, K. S. (2020). Mediated learning leading development—the social development theory of Lev Vygotsky. In Science education in theory and practice (pp. 277–291). Springer, Cham.