Child Development theorists by Mrs. Lauer

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Believed that personality develops through a series of stages.

Believed experiences in childhood profoundly affect adult life.

Emphasized personality and social development.

Said that the unconscious plays a critical role in development.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/Sigmund-Freud.html

Jean Piaget (1896-1980)

The first to study children scientifically.

Focused on how children learned.

Believed that children go through four stages of learning.

Learning occurs through a blend of accommodation and assimilation.

Focus is on cognitive development and conscious activity.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/piaget.html

& http://www.simplypsychology.org/piaget-moral.html

Jean Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934)

Wrote that biological development and cultural experience influence children’s ability to learn.

Social contact is essential to intellectual development.

Early development is especially important.

Social-cognitive development is continuous.

Learning is an active process as the child seeks to learn from others.

Focus is on cognitive & conscious activity.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/vygotsky.html

Lev Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory

Erik Erikson (1902-1994)

Like Freud, Erikson said that personality develops in stages.

Erikson’s research extends on Freudian thoughts by focusing on the adaptive and creative characteristic of the ego & expanding on the notion of the stages of personality development to include the entire lifespan.

Like Freud, Erikson thought that each stage includes a unique psychological crisis. If that crisis is met in a positive way, the individual develops normally.

Individuals respond to live events as they search for their identity.

Emphasized on personality and social development.

Said both the unconscious and conscious play a role in development.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/Erik-Erikson.html

Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development

Erikson proposed a lifespan model of development, taking in five stages up to the age of 18 years and three further stages beyond, well into adulthood.

Erikson suggests that there is still plenty of room for continued growth and development throughout one’s life.

Erikson puts a great deal of emphasis on the adolescent period, feeling it was a crucial stage for developing a person’s identity.

B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)

Argued that when a child’s actions have positive results, they will be repeated.

Negative results will make the actions stop.

Skinner called these principles “reinforcement.”

Created “Operant Conditioning” the learning process in which behavior is sensitive to or controlled by its consequences.

Created the Skinner Box to test his theory.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html

The Skinner Box

Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917-2005)

Outlined layers of environment that affect a child’s development, such as the child’s own biology, family/community environment and society.

Development at all ages is important.

Development is continuous.

Learning is an active process involving continuous interactions with others and the environment.

Focus is on cognitive, social & conscious activity.

Bronfrenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Model

Albert Bandura (1925-present)

Said that children learn from the environment by imitating others through the process of observational learning (aka modeling).

Disagreed with Skinner.

Bandura believed that humans are active information processors that think about the relationship between their behavior and its consequences. Therefore observational learning could not take place unless the cognitive processes were at work.

Pointed out that although the environment shapes behavior, behavior also affects the environment.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/bandura.html

Albert Bandura

Bandura’s main research was with the Bobo Doll Experiment.

Children were pre-tested for how aggressive they were by observing children in a nursery.

Next, children were showed videos of adults either beating the inflatable doll or nurturing it.

Children were then given a doll of their own to play with to see how they would interact with it.

Students typically replicated the behavior they witnessed the adult exhibit with the Bobo Doll.

More info: http://www.simplypsychology.org/bobo-doll.html

Bandura’s Social Learning Theory