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Child and Adolescent Development

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Child and Adolescent Development
Child and Adolescent Development
The development of child and adolescents covers a large selection of human efforts that attempts to understand why a person acts the way he or she does, grows the way he, or she grows, and thinks the way he or she thinks. Human development has been studied since the beginning of psychology, in which the work of Sigmund Freud has been predominantly influential. Freud was the father of psychodynamics and the first to study human development and the inner workings of the mind as a result of childhood experiences. Since the time of Freud, child development has become a crucial aspect in virtually every field of psychology because of several influencing factors on childhood growth and experience. The different stage theories are significant tools in understanding the psychology of human development. Each theorist offers logically uncomplicated justifications of human behavior. Unanswered questions are asked about how accurate a theory is based on characterizing human behavior in general can be when applied to one particular person. This paper it will discuss psychoanalytic, learning and cognitive perspectives, and will compare and, contrast the three. Also the interaction of cognitive, physical and emotional development in the development of the child will be discussed.
Psychoanalytical Perspectives
Sigmund Freud is best known for psychoanalytic theory; his exploration of the unconscious is one of his greatest contributions to psychology and has provided significant insight into the realm of human behavior and development. One of Freud’s prominent beliefs was the theory that individuals are primarily motivated by drives that they are unaware of (Heffner, 2001). Freud believed that there are two levels of human cognition, the conscious and, the unconscious. He then went further to suggest that the conscious is also divided into two levels, the conscious proper and, the preconscious. Freud’s work was focused primarily on



References: Atherton, J.S. (2010). Learning and Teaching Piaget’s Developmental Theory [On-Line]. Retrieved January 9, 2011 from http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/piaget.html Boeree, G.C. (2006). Jean Piaget. Webspace.ship.edu. Retrieved January 20, 2011 from http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/piaget.html Braslau-Schneck, S. (1998) An Animal Trainer’s Introduction to Operant and Classical Conditioning. Retrieved January 20, 2011 from http://www.wagntrain.com/OC/#Classical Cherry, K. (2010) Introduction to Classical Conditioning. About.com: Psychology. Retrieved January 20, 2011 from http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/a/classcond.htm Dictionary.com (2010) Cognition. Retrieved May 22, 2010 from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cognition Heffner, C.L. (2001). Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual Development. Psychology 101. Retrieved January 9, 2011, from http://allpsych.com/psychology101/sexual_development.html Kearsley, G. (2010) Operant Conditioning (B.F. Skinner). The Theory Into Practice Database. Retrieved January 20, 2011 from http://tip.psychology.org Papalia, D. E., Olds, Wendkos S., Feldman, Duskin R. (2008). A child’s world: infancy through adolescence (11th ed.)

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