Final Overview: Growth and Human Development

Question 1

The application of human growth and development theories to
the practice of counseling became popular in the 1980s. In 1981
CACREP included this as a core content area. In 1983 APGA (now
ACA) changed its name to American Association for Counseling and
Development to help emphasize the developmental aspects of our
profession. Development is ongoing, systematic, orderly, sequential,
and is said to build upon itself. The term continual implies that development
occurs throughout the life span.

Answer 1

There is speculation as to whether individuals are active or passive
in terms of infl uencing their development. Another issue centers
on the nature or nurture debate. Is behavior the result of inborn tendencies/
heredity (i.e., nature) or the environment (i.e., upbringing,
nurture, and learning)? Current theorists insist it is both, but disagree
on the amount of impact exerted.

Question 2

Changes can be:

Answer 2

quantitative (measured) or qualitative (change

in organization or structure).

Question 3

Behaviorism

Answer 3

Behaviorism was outlined by John B. Watson, Ivan Pavlov, Joseph Wolpe, and B. F. Skinner. Initially the mind is a blank slate and the child learns to behave in a certain manner. This is basically a passive theory. The mind is like a computer that is fed information. This model relies on empiricism—John Locke’s view that knowledge is acquired
by experience. All behavior is the result of learning.

Question 4

Erik Erikson’s Eight Psychosocial Stages

Answer 4

Erikson’s stages are delineated in his classic 1963 work Childhood and
Society. The stages are based on ego psychology and the epigenetic principle that states that growth is orderly, universal, and systematic.

The stages are:
Trust versus mistrust (birth to age 1½ years);

autonomy versus shame and doubt (1½ to 3 years);

initiative versus guilt (3 to 6 years);

industry versus inferiority (6 to 11 years):

identity versus role confusion (12 to 18 years);

intimacy versus isolation (18 to 35 years);

generativity versus stagnation (35 to 60
years); and

integrity versus despair (age 65 and beyond).

Question 5

Jean Piaget’s Qualitative Four Stages of Cognitive

Development (Genetic Epistemology)

Answer 5

Theory:

Sensorimotor (birth to 2 years);

Preoperational (2 to 7 years);

Concrete Operations (7 to 12 years); and

Formal Operations
(11/12 to 16).

Question 6

Jean Piaget’s Theory

Answer 6

Patterns of thought and behavior are called schema or the
plural, schemata.

Adaptation occurs qualitatively when the individual fi ts
information into existing ideas (also known as assimilation) and
modifies cognitive schemata to incorporate new information
(this is called accommodation).

Assimilation and accommodation are said to be complementary
processes. The ages in the Piagetian stages can vary, the order is static.

Object permanence occurs in the sensorimotor stage (an
object the child can’t see still exists).

Centration is the act of focusing on one aspect of something. It
is a key factor in the preoperational stage.

Conservation takes place in the concrete operations stage.
The child knows that volume and quantity do not change, just
because the appearance of an object changes (e.g., pouring a
short glass of water into a tall skinny glass, does not alter the
amount of the liquid). The child comprehends that a change in
shape does not mean a change in volume.

Abstract scientific thinking takes place in the formal operations
stage.

Question 7

Keagan’s Constructive Developmental Model

Answer 7

Keagan’s model emphasizes the impact of interpersonal interaction and our perception of reality.

Question 8

Lawrence Kohlberg’s Three Levels of Moral Development

Answer 8

Each level has two stages: preconventional level—behavior governed
by consequences;

conventional level—a desire to conform to socially acceptable rules;

postconventional level—self-accepted moral principles guide behavior.

Question 9

Carol Gilligan’s Theory of Moral Development for Women

Answer 9

Gilligan’s 1982 book In a Different Voice illuminated the fact that Kohlberg’s research was conducted on males. Women have a sense of
caring and compassion.

Question 10

Daniel Levinson Four Major Eras/Transitions Theory

Answer 10

In a 1978 classic book titled The Seasons of a Man’s Life Levinson
depicted the changes in men’s lives throughout the lifespan. The four
key eras include: childhood and adolescence, early adulthood, middle
adulthood, and later adulthood.

Question 11

Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934)

Answer 11

Vygotsky proposed that cognitive development is not the result of innate factors, but is produced by activities that take place in one’s culture. His zone of proximal development refers to the difference in the child’s ability to solve problems on his own and his capacity to solve them with some help from others.

Question 12

Freud’s Psychoanalytic/Psychodynamic Five

Psychosexual Stages

Answer 12

Freud’s stages are:
oral (birth to one year),

anal (1 to 3 years),

phallic/
Oedipal Electra complex (3 to 7 years),

latency (3 to 5 until age
12), and

genital (adolescence and adulthood).

Question 13

Libido

Answer 13

The drive to live and the sexual instinct that is present
even at birth. It is said to be sublimated in the latency stage as the
individual has little interest in sex. This ends when puberty begins.

Question 14

Regression

Answer 14

The return to an earlier stage caused by stress

Question 15

Fixation

Answer 15

implies that the person is unable to move to the next

stage.

Question 16

Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Answer 16

Maslow interviewed self-actualized people. Lower-order physiological
and safety needs must be fulfilled before self-actualization can occur.

Question 17

William Perry’s Three Stage Theory of Intellectual

and Ethical Development in Adults/College Students

Answer 17

Dualism in which students view the truth as either right or wrong.

Relativism is the notion that a perfect answer may not exist. There is a desire to know various opinions.

Commitment to relativism—in
this fi nal stage the individual is willing to change his or opinion based
on novel facts and new points of view.

Question 18

James W. Fowler’s Prestage Plus Six Stage Theory of Faith

and Spiritual Development

Answer 18

Fowler conducted 350 structured interviews and drew on the work of
Piaget, Kohlberg, and Erikson.

Stage 0 undifferentiated (primal)
faith (infancy, birth to 4 years);

Stage 1 intuitive-projective faith
(2 to 7 years, early childhood);

mythic-literal faith (childhood and
beyond);

synthetic-conventional faith (adolescence and beyond) a
stage of conformity);

individuative-reflective faith (young adulthood and beyond);

conjunctive faith (midthirties and beyond) openness to other points of view, paradox, and appreciation of symbols and
metaphors; 

and universalizing faith (midlife and beyond) few reach
this stage of enlightenment.

According to Fowler faith is not identical with one’s belief in
religion. “Faith can be religious faith, but it can also be centered
on a career, a country, an institution, a family, money, success,
or even oneself.” Faith grows and changes throughout the
lifespan.