Life span is the time of conception till the day a person takes their last breathe. So many situations take place in a person’s life like reaching other developmental periods within life. A child grows from an infant and becomes of age to go to school for the first time or simply graduating from high school and entering the next phase of life when responsibility becomes everything. Each phase of life means that a person is developing whether they are transitioning from a young adult to being a middle aged adult there are developmental stages that take place until the final transition which is death. In order to better understand human development the process of studying takes place which in turn means moving from one stage to the next within a lifespan. Through the years observation, predictions and evolving technologies have opened up doors to the way individuals develop and reach stages by pinpointing differences and predictions that prove to be inaccurate or simply that have not risen to the occasion over the years of change.
There are considered to be five characteristics of development; multidirectional, multicontextual, multicultural, multidisciplinary and plasticity. Multidirectional is the study of change within human development. Multicontextual is dealing with contexts such as an individual’s surroundings or environment that can affect development. Multicultural is when individuals do not notice cultural differences because they have become so used to their own surroundings. Multidisciplinary which pertains to multiple academic fields which all deliver the same insight as to how data and insight are contributed. Plasticity is when change occurs sometime during the lifespan of an individual. A person could be fine and then experience the lost of a parent and become altered forever. These five characteristics all intertwine with one another in order to explain in detail how people transition and develop through multi stages