THE MEANING AND MEASUREMENT OF EGO DEVELOPMENT1

JANE LOB:VINGER

Social Science Institute, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri

THE research worker in clinical psychologyis beset on two sides. On the one handthere are those, often biochemists, who as-

sure us that nothing we can do in our field canachieve the status of true science. On the otherhand there are those, often psychoanalysts, whoassure us that new insights are vouchsafed only tothose actively engaged in depth psychotherapy.The intent of this essay is to stake out a territoryagainst both assaults.

The area of ego development has been recognizedas a meeting place of clinical and research interest,of psychologist and psychoanalyst, but the con-struct urgently needs crystallization. The con-tinuum referred to in the present essay as egodevelopment resembles what has been describedelsewhere in terms of moral development (Kohl-berg, 1964), character development (Peck & Havig-hurst, 1960), interpersonal integration (Sullivan,Grant, & Grant, 1957), relatability (Isaacs, 1956),conceptual systems (Harvey, Hunt, & Schroder,1961), intraception (Murray, 1938), and so on.At times, however, the term ego development hasbeen used to cover a wider range, particularly thedevelopment of all ego functions, and at other timesa narrower range, particularly the conflict-free egosphere, or, by other authors, the earliest stage ofego formation. In proposing a program for thedefinition of this construct we will be led to reap-praise some topics for personality and psychometricresearch currently much invested. In present con-text much current work on response bias and onconformity appears not only bootless but potentiallymisleading. The same is true for applications offactor analysis to personality measures. Thusin discussing a fundamental concept of person-ality theory, the present essay aims to provoke areassessment of many areas of research.

1 Preparation of this paper was supported by ResearchGrant No. MH-OSllS from the National Institute ofMental Health, United States Public Health Service. It isa revision of an Invited Address presented at AmericanPsychological Association, Los Angeles, September, 1964.

MEASUREMENT OF DEVELOPMENT

Human development can be divided into fourmain streams or channels: physical, psychosexual,ego, and intellectual development. (As a firstapproximation, psychosexual development can betranslated as development of drives and drivederivatives.) That division is not a particularlylogical one: Cognitive elements enter ego as wellas intellectual development, and both ego develop-ment and psychosexual development determinemotivation. The division into four streams hasbeen arrived at in trying to follow the principlethat Egon Brunswik (1951) adapted from Spinoza:Let the order of ideas be the same as the orderof things.

Measurement of general intellectual level is oneof the great achievements of psychology. Thereare four aspects relevant here. First, Binct brokewith his predecessors by noting that some functionsthat require intelligence for their exercise still donot provide useful measures of intellectual develop-ment. Second, although Binet provided severalpointing definitions of intelligence, he relied mainlyon the meaning in the common domain, on tacitunderstanding of what intelligence is. Thus, in-stead of guiding his work by a formal definitionof intelligence, Binet only indicated the kinds ofthings included within its domain, then refined hisselection by successive approximations. Third,Binet used development as touchstone for di-mension, always based on prior inclusions andexclusions of functions in the intellectual realmbased on his tacit understanding. Fourth, bydeveloping an age scale he laid the path for Termanand others, who showed that adult status can bepredicted using current status together with age.

The first three points apply to the notion ofego development advanced here. First, ego devel-opment is not the same as development of all func-tions exercised by the ego, and in particular intel-lectual development is not a fair measure of egodevelopment, even though exercise of intelligenceis an ego function. Confusing ego development

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with (.he development of all ego functions is amistake to which some psychoanalysts are particu-larly prone. The term "conflict-free ego sphere"refers to functions that, however important theymay be, shed little light on the vicissitudes of egodevelopment in an extreme majority of cases.

Second, I propose to make no formal definitionof ego development. Rather, there is a pointingdefinition embodied in Table 1 taken, as wasBinet's definition of intelligence, partly from thecommon domain, partly from other writers. Thisdefinition, like Binet's, has already been correctedand is further correctable by experience from manysources.

Third, following Binet, development is used astouchstone for dimension, i.e., the term ego develop-ment is reserved for just what is common to acertain developmental sequence and a certain char-acterology that applies almost independently of agelevel. What is common to the developmental se-quence and the characterology is an abstraction.To this abstraction and only to this is the termego development most appropriately applied.

The suggestion that the term ego developmentshould be applied to an abstraction rather thanto the concrete stages of growth observable inaverage children will seem strange at first, eventhough we are used to it in the concept of mentalage. But all aspects of growth are occurring simul-taneously; therefore, some criterion other than thenormal sequence is needed to distinguish physicalgrowth from intellectual, or intellectual from ego,and so on. Most accounts of ego development,those in child psychology texts as well as that ofKrikson, tie the several stages to age-specificproblems such as entry into kindergarten, adoles-cence, courtship, and marriage. Table 1 omits allsuch age-specific references. Only when we havean account free of age-specific contingencies can weask such questions as: What is the typical age fora given ego transition? The optimal age? Theearliest and latest possible ages? What conditionsother than mere age are essential or favorable foreach transition? These are not trivial questions,for gifted observers have located the first appear-ance of true guilt as early as the preschool periodand as late as prepuberty; Erikson and Sullivandiffer markedly in the age to which they assign thecrisis of intimacy; and so on. Such observers areunlikely to be completely wrong; rather, they arelooking at different people or at different aspects

of a phenomenon with a given name. If we are tomeasure, or even to contribute to psychology as ascience, we must be somewhat abstract, and thatentails seeking those aspects not age specific.

Ruling out age-specific aspects is related toexcluding age-contingent scores. A given responseis scored the same regardless of the respondent'sage. The interpretation of a raw score depends onage, but age is never taken into account in decidingwhether a response is right, or wrong. This rule,adhered to in all intelligence tests, carries over towork on ego level.

In view of recent emphasis on use of base ratesin demographically defined subsamples to improveprediction (Meehl & Rosen, 1955), the injunctionagainst contingent ratings in scoring manuals is nottrivial. Improving prediction by capitalizing onextraneous contingencies rather than by increasingone's understanding is dangerous; where theextraneous contingencies reflect changeable circum-stances, it may even backfire. There is no inten-tion here to belittle the base-rates argument. Baserates remain just that, a base line to measure theachievement of understanding. If one can predicta boy's college performance better by knowing thathis father was a professional man than by givinghim an intelligence test, there is not much under-standing incorporated in the test.

Contrary to what one might think at first glance,the whole idea of an age scale breaks down if oneallows age-specific contingencies to enter. Themental age (MA) scale is a measuring instrumentappropriate to all ages just because it relies onthose indices of mental development whose appear-ance depends on where one is in the sequence ofmental development, independent of chronologicalage (CA). The differences between a 3-year-oldwhose MA is 5 and a 10-year-old whose MA is5 are great, but these differences are just whatMA is not. Before Binet, one could diagnose thedifference between bright and dull 3-year-olds onthe basis of criteria appropriate to their CA, andthe same for older children. The MA scale repre-sented a scientific achievement just because ittranscended such age-specific tests. Piaget in hismicroanalysis of mental development seems alsoto be trying to transcend age-specific aspects, butso knowledgeable and sympathetic an interpreteras Flavell (1963, especially final section) can missthis point. Careful reading will reveal what Amer-ican readers, with their normative bias, often miss,

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that Piaget is not setting norms for different agesbut rather using average age differences as a devicefor tracing developmental sequence. The repre-sentativeness of his samples is not a major concern;he need only have comparable samples at differentages. Binet also used age as a device for tracingdevelopmental sequence, though of course he wasinterested in norms. Where Piaget goes beyondBinet is in reconstruction of the inner logic of thesequence, which is independent of age, a point towhich we will return.

The final characteristic of the Binet-Terman ap-proach, the use of present status and age to predictfinal adult status, is not as yet applicable to egolevel. There is no generally agreed-on age scale,though perhaps one could be evolved; certainlythere is as yet no reason to believe that currentstatus can be corrected by means of CA to providea good estimate of final adult status.

With regard to physical height, one can actuallydo better than an age correction in predicting finalheight. Variance in skeletal age tends to disappearin adult life. Therefore measures of it providean estimate of percentage of adult status achievedthat can improve the correction in terms of CAalone, in principle at least (Bayer & Bayley, 1959).At the other extreme of measurability, psychosexualdevelopment has not yet been conceived in termsof a model that lends itself well to any measure-ment. There is indeed a postulated sequence ofstages, and undoubtedly there is some influence onlater stages of the outcome of early stages, butthere is no clear model for the nature of this influ-ence. Thus if the measurement of psychosexuallevel means anything, it means measurement of awhole series of things, at least one for each postu-lated stage, each to be measured in terms of much-ness, a notoriously difficult kind of judgment tomake (see, e.g., Blum, 1949).

Ego development must be distinguished, then, onthe one side from intellectual development and onthe other from psychosexual development, whatevermay be the correlations between them. But themost difficult distinction to make is that betweenego level and adjustment. In the early days ofpersonality measurement it was assumed, in effectif not consciously, that adjustment is the sameas conformity, and in particular as tendency todescribe oneself in socially acceptable terms. Ina recent version, bolstered by social learning theoiy,Heilbrun (1964) asserts, "Psychopathology repre-

sents a deviation from socially desirable standardsof behavior and . . . the greater the psychopathol-ogy, the greater the deviation [p. 385]." Hence,"the dimensions of psychological health and socialdesirability are in large measure one and the same|'p. 385]." But nothing in Heilbrun's review an-swers or even contends with the observations fromwhich Meehl and Hathaway (1946) began theirstudy of what they called the K factor in the Min-nesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI),namely, that hundreds of normal persons and per-sons hospitalized for psychiatric reasons gave MMPIprofiles in the borderline region, not distinguishablein terms of the keys for psychopathology. The Kscale was evolved to increase the discriminatingpower of the test in this range. That self-reportsof psychopathology have some value was of courseassumed by Meehl and Hathaway; their concernwas to correct some of the errors. The chief sourceof error turned out to be a generalized tendencyto describe oneself in socially desirable terms atone extreme, contrasted with a generalized self-criticism at the other extreme. This continuumthey refer to as the K factor. They emphasized thatthe experimental scales most highly saturated withthe test-taking attitude, K, had little or no valuefor discriminating normals from abnormals exceptwhen used as suppressor variables. Little that hasbeen done in the area since 1946 is as compre-hensive as the series of studies summarized byMeehl and Hathaway in 1946, and nothing contra-dicts their general argument.

Block (1965), in a closely reasoned case, hasshown that the general factor in the MMPI, essen-tially Meehl and Hathaway's K factor, cannot bereduced to mere acquiescence or mere social desir-ability, as some recent critics would have it. Buthis interpretation in terms of ego resilience doesnot suffice. Should not a measure of ego resiliencedifferentiate normals from hospitalized psychiatricpatients? An explanation for the radically differentinterpretations of the general factor in the MMPIwill be proposed presently.

To bring the Meehl-Hathaway argument intorelation with the present topic one need only addthat the tendency to describe oneself in sociallydesirable terms is a conspicuous aspect of the con-formist stage of ego development. To be at theconformist stage neither precludes nor insures goodadjustment. Our world is a conformist's world, asperhaps any must be, and many conformists are

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happy in it; they are not all, however, immune tothe most serious mental disturbances or to mildermaladjustments.

Recently, probably in part as reaction againstthe earlier equation of conformity with adjustment,there have been a number of writers who havedescribed what they call positive mental health; ingeneral, as seen in the summary by Marie Jahoda(19S8) of many such writings, what they are de-scribing is the highest stage of ego development.Adjustment, at least in the first instance, meanssomething different. Jahoda acknowledges thedifficulty that all the specifics of positive mentalhealth are applicable to adults rather than to chil-dren. Surely there are some well-adjusted children,children with positive mental health. A clear dis-tinction between developmental variables and ad-justment is essential to deepening our understandingof optimal conditions for development. Hence Iquestion not the reality of the syndrome they aredescribing but the appropriateness of calling itpositive mental health, which implies a relation toadjustment and neglects the relation to maturity.The frequent, perhaps careless, use of adjustmentand maturity as synonyms in clinical and quasi-clinical talk is an obstacle to progress and clarity,just as is the equation of adjustment with conform-ity.

To distinguish ego level from intellectual level,from psychosexual level, and from adjustment is toask for a clear conceptual distinction without in anyway prejudicing the question of correlations or ofcomplex triggering or facilitating effects. The lat-ter can be ascertained only after a conceptual dis-tinction has been attained. Consider for compari-son height and weight. Certainly they are not inde-pendently variable; they influence each other in oneway and another; yet conceptually they are entirelydistinct. While an estimate of one may be influ-enced by the other, careful measurement will notbe. This is the kind of conceptual clarificationneeded in the area of ego development.

STAGES OF EGO DEVELOPMENT

Having noted some of the things that ego level isnot, let us turn to what it is. This will be done bypointing to and briefly characterizing the successivestages, as in Table 1. The construct is a collage,pasted together bits from many sources, too manyto mention. Most important have been Sullivan,Grant, and Grant (1957), Peck (in Peck & Havig-

hurst, 1960), and Isaacs (1956; Isaacs & Haggard,1965); all of them have been concerned with theabstract junction of a developmental sequence anda character typology.

In the first stage of the ego the problem is todistinguish self from nonself. This stage can bedivided into the presocial and the symbiotic stages.In the presocial or autistic stage animate and inani-mate parts of the environment are not distinguished.In the symbiotic stage the child has a strong rela-tion to his mother (or surrogate) and is able todistinguish mother from environment, but self isnot clearly distinguished from mother. The egocan hardly be said to exist prior to the end of thisstage. Language is an important, perhaps the cru-cial, factor in bringing this period to an end; thusthe earliest period is hardly accessible to thosestudying the ego by means of verbal tests.

Psychoanalysts sometimes refer to this first pe-riod alone as the period of ego development, mean-ing the period of coming into existence of the ego.That usage contrasts with the present one, whichincludes the later transformations to which the egois subjected or subjects itself. The constructionand investment of a stable world of objects is aprerequisite for all later development in the realmof the ego, of intelligence, and of psychosexuality,as well as for all later adjustment. The lack ofdistinction in this first era between currents later

TAliLE 1

SOME MILESTONES ov EGO DEVELOPMENT

Stage

PresocialSymbiotic

Impulse ridden

Opportunistic

Conformist

Conscientious

Autonomous

Integmtcd

Impulse controland characterdevelopment

Impulse ridden,fear ofretaliation

Kxpedient, fearof being caught

Conformity toexternal rules,shame

Internalizedrules, guilt

Coping withinner conflict,toleration ofdifferences

Reconcilinginner confiicl.srenunciation ofunattainable

IntcrpciHonalstyle

AutisticSymbiotic

Exploitive,dependent

Kxploitive,manipulative,zero-sum game

Reciprocal,superficial

Intensive,responsible

Intensive,concern forautonomy

Ditto,cherishing ofindividuality

Consciouspreoccupation

Self S. P. nonself

Bodily feelings,especially sexualand aggressive

Advantage,control

Things,appearance,reputation

Differentiatedinner feelings,achievements,traits

Ditto, role con-ceptualization,development,Keif-fulfil lment

DUto, identity

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distinguishable is well known. To confine the termego development to this era is to rob it both ofmeaning and of usefulness.

The second stage is the impulsive one; the childconfirms his separate existence from the mother byexercise of his own will. Control of impulse islacking or at best undependable. Rules are notrecognized as such; an action is bad because it ispunished. Interpersonal relations are exploitive anddependent, but the dependence is not recognized assuch. People are seen as sources of supply. Con-scious concern with sexual and aggressive drives ishigh; at least for women and girls, unsocialized ex-pressions of sexual and aggressive drives are pathog-nomonic for this stage.

Some manifestations of this stage remain remark-ably the same throughout the life span, hence arenot age specific, e.g., temper tantrums. More typi-cally, preoccupation with bodily functions assumesa different form at different ages. The 3-year-oldmakes joking remarks about "going pooh-pooh,"while the adolescent who has not progressed beyondthis stage shows not only that he is preoccupiedwith sex but that for him it is a bodily functionexclusively rather than a social relation. The lat-ter signs are more or less age specific. They arenecessarily used in diagnosis but must not be usedto define the continuum, lest we lose sight of theprobandum, the abstract quality that describes boththe (normally) impulse-ridden small child and the(developmentally retarded) impulse-ridden ado-lescent or adult.

The third stage is the opportunistic one. It isunderstood that there are rules, but they are obeyedin terms of immediate advantage. Thus the moral-ity is purely an expedient one. What is bad is to becaught. Interpersonal relations are manipulativeand exploitive, but there is a marked shift awayfrom dependence. The small child says, "Do it byself," and the adolescent at this stage says, "Whoneeds them." Conscious preoccupation is with con-trol and advantage, domination, deception, gettingthe better of, and so on. Life is a zero-sum game;what you win, I lose.

The fourth stage is the conformist one; morepeople have recognized and described this stagethan any other. At this stage the rules are par-tially internalized. They are obeyed just becausethey are the rules. Chief sanction for transgressionis shame, contrasting with the opportunistic stagepreceding, which is often described by others (but

not by those in it) as shameless. Genuine inter-personal reciprocity is possible now; reciprocity is,after all, the Golden Rule. In many cases, how-ever, the mutual trust is extended only to a nar-rowly conceived ingroup. There may be strongprejudice against various outgroups conceived instereotyped terms. Interpersonal relations are seenprimarily in terms of actions rather than of feel-ings and motives. Conscious preoccupation is withmaterial things, with reputation and status, withappearance, and with adjustment. References toinner feelings are typically stereotyped, banal, andoften moralistic. The transition from the conform-ist to the next level is often if not always markedby an access of introspection and self-consciousness.

The fifth stage we call the conscientious stage.Morality has been internalized. Inner moral im-peratives take precedence over group-sanctionedrules. The sanction for transgression is guilt. In-terpersonal relations are seen in terms of feelingsand traits rather than actions; they become morevivid, intensive, and meaningful than in earlierperiods. Conscious preoccupation is with obliga-tions, ideals, traits, and achievement as measuredby inner standards rather than by recognition alone.Conduct is seen not simply as a series of actions, butas a set of enduring propensities; spontaneous in-terest in the origins of their conduct is often ex-pressed by unsophisticated subjects at this stage.Capacity for self-criticism characterizes this stage,its absence the conformist stage. Self-criticismmay, indeed, mediate the transition, though thattopic is beyond the scope of the present effort atdefinition. Conformists as a group tend to seethemselves in socially acceptable terms, though theymay also report accurately specific symptoms;conscientious persons, or at least some of them,tend to view themselves hypercritically.

The next stage we call the autonomous one.(Unfortunately this term has been used by Erik-son, 1950, for the surge towards independence atthe earlier, opportunistic stage. Dependence-inde-pendence is in fact a dialectical aspect of develop-ment, as Harvey et al., 1961, have shown.) Im-pulse control is no longer a problem at this latestage of maturity. The characteristic moral issue iscoping with inner conflict, conflicting duties, con-flicting needs, conflict between needs and duties,and so on. Such conflicts, although quite evi-dently present at earlier periods, including the con-scientious one, are not squarely and consciously

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coped with earlier. Along with coping with one'sown conflicts comes greater toleration for thosechoosing other solutions than one's own, in con-trast with the moral condemnation frequent in con-scientious and conformist stages. Interpersonalrelations remain intense, they involve a recognitionof inevitable mutual interdependence, and, a crucialaddition, they involve the recognition of other peo-ple's need for autonomy. Thus a typical conscien-tious mother feels obliged to prevent her childrenfrom making mistakes, whereas a typical autono-mous mother recognizes their need to learn fromtheir own mistakes. Characteristic conscious pre-occupations are role differentiation, individuality,and self-fulfillment.

At the highest stage, which we call integrated, theperson proceeds beyond coping with conflict toreconciliation of conflicting demands, and, wherenecessary, renunciation of the unattainable, beyondtoleration to the cherishing of individual differences,beyond role differentiation to the achievement of asense of integrated identity. In normal groupssuch persons rarely appear, so new insights are hardto confirm. Maslow (1954, 1962) has sought outand studied a number of such persons, and on thisempirical though not rigidly controlled basis hasdescribed the stage more extensively.

Probably it is a mistake to idealize any stage.Every stage has its weaknesses, its problems, andits paradoxes, which provide both a potential formaladjustment and a potential for growth. Oneproblem of the autonomous stage is how to recon-cile the need for autonomy with dependence needs,on the one hand, and with exercise of authority onthe other. Another paradox is the paradox of re-sponsibility. Piaget (1932) notes that young chil-dren (hence, children at low ego levels) considermore blameworthy breaking IS cups by accidentthan breaking 1 cup while stealing jam. Olderchildren (hence, on the average of higher ego level)assign blame in accord with motives rather thanconsequences; so breaking 1 cup while stealing isthe worse offense. But at the highest ego levels,which Piaget did not study, one acknowledges re-sponsibility not only for one's motives but also forthe consequences of one's actions. Indeed, one isnot completely responsible for one's motives norcompletely absolved of responsibility for the conse-quences of actions taken from good motives. Tosee such unresolved problems is important, lest onerun to the conclusion that the person highest on the

scale of ego maturity is always the best parent orteacher or therapist.

For each stage one can specify the characteristicmode of impulse control and character develop-ment, of interpersonal relations, and of consciouspreoccupation, including self-concept. The as-sertion that these are all aspects of ego develop-ment would seem at first to be clearly testable.One need merely devise separate measures of im-pulse control and character development, of inter-personal relations, and of conscious content, thencorrelate. The more deeply one becomes involvedin this area, the more it appears that impulse con-trol, character development, interpersonal relations,and conscious preoccupations are indeed aspects ofa single thing, so intimately intertwined that onecan hardly define much less measure them sepa-rately. Thus we are driven to the paradox that theassertion that they are all aspects of ego develop-ment is too true to be proved. But this is the con-tent of the proposed construct.

THE STRUCTURAL MODEL

Consider now the structural aspects of the con-struct. There appear to be just two commonlyheld models, which may be called the embryonicand hierarchical models (but cf. Loevinger, inpress). The embryonic model has been propoundedby Erikson (1950, 1959); the hierarchic model isforeshadowed in the writings of H. S. Sullivan(1953), and clearly implied by Clyde Sullivan,Grant, and Grant (1957) and by Isaacs (1956).The clearest exposition of the formal properties ofthe hierarchic model is by Piaget and Inhelder(Tanner & Tnhelder, 1956, 1960). They arrived atit in connection with their work on cognitive devel-opment but have carefully abstracted the generalfeatures that characterize the model apart from thecontent of the intellectual growth sequence.

Erikson's (1950, 1959) model of ego develop-ment is well known. He portrays the successivecrises of normal development—trust versus mis-trust, autonomy versus shame and doubt, etc.—inthe principal diagonal of a matrix. Clearly im-plied by the representation in terms of rows andcolumns, though not explicitly specified, are ante-cedents in each period of problems of later periodsand also consequences of the problems of earlierperiods, but how the outcome of the problem of oneperiod affects the focal problem of the next is notclear. This model of ego development is patterned

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after Erikson's similar model for psychosexual de-velopment. In the latter case rows represent zonesand columns represent modes. The order of thezones is the order of their successive primacy, andthe modes are ordered so that the one most charac-teristic of each zone falls at or near the principaldiagonal, so far as possible. In regard to the influ-ence of one stage on the next, Erikson has statedthat one may cling to the mode of one period onpreceding to the next zone or may cling to the oldzone and express in it the new mode; but what isthe analogue of this in ego development? The dia-gram of psychosexuality is modeled, in turn, afterwhat is known of fetal development, hence the titleembryonic (though Erikson calls it epigenetic). Infetal development different organs are predominantat successive periods, and the greatest distortion orharm to an organ is done when growth disturbance,whatever its origin, occurs in its period of ascend-ancy, not sooner and not later. There is not onecritical period for all organs but a different criticalperiod for each. This fact is what Erikson por-trays in his model. But while the embryonic modelhas some application to psychosexual development,where different organs are indeed involved at dif-ferent periods, it is of questionable application toego development. The ego is, or is like, a singleorgan.

While Erikson assimilates ego to his model ofpsychosexual development, Piaget and Inhelder as-similate ego to cognitive development. The latteris the more curious fact, since Piaget's (1932) earlywork on moral judgment has been grist for the millof subsequent writers on ego development. Invarious books and articles Piaget and Inhelderhave written of personal, social, and affective de-velopment influencing and being influenced bycognitive development; that there are separable andindependently variable sequences is not stated(Flavell, 1963).

Although not clearly recognizing ego develop-ment as an example, Piaget and Inhelder (Tanner& Inhelder, 1956, I960) have abstracted the prop-erties of the hierarchic model somewhat as follows:There is an invariable order to the stages of devel-opment; no stage can be skipped; each stage is morecomplex than the preceding one; each stage is basedon the preceding one and prepares for the succeed-ing one. One can speak of stages of development,they assert, to the extent that these conditions aremet. There is an inner logic that determines the

sequence. In determining a person's current be-havior, Piaget says, this inner logic of develop-ment is as important as his history or his heredityor his current environment.

The inner logic of ego development becomes acompelling conviction to those working in the area.Because there is an inner logic—one not yet fullyverbalized—experienced, intuitive clinicians usuallygrasp the schema quickly. The logic of hierarchicevolution, of the necessary sequence of stages, hasbeen well enough verbalized for separate aspects,i.e., interpersonal maturity (Sullivan et al., 1957),or, what is essentially the same thing, relatability(Isaacs, 1956); conceptual systems (Harvey et al.,1961); and moral judgment (Piaget, 1932; Kohl-berg, 1964). Most such expositions have also rec-ognized the wide diversity of manifestations ofeach stage, e.g., a particular stage of interpersonaldevelopment will be manifest also in a coordinatedlevel of impulse control and character and of con-ceptual system. What has not been captured fullyin any exposition is that these diverse manifesta-tions at once constitute a single organic unity anddevelop through organically related steps. More-over, although both Isaacs (1956) and Sullivan,Grant, and Grant (1957) have given convincingverbal renditions of the hierarchic evolution ofcapacity for interpersonal relations, their renditionsare by no means identical. Neither captures every-thing reflected in the other. Conscious preoccupa-tions are not only clues to moral development andinterpersonal relatability; all are part of a singlething. That pervasive thing cannot reasonably becalled less than ego development; what the organiz-ing principle is remains to be clarified, But isthere any guarantee that mind can render its ownintimate nature as coherently and intelligibly as itcan other aspects of the universe?

The hierarchic model, as opposed to the embry-onic one, states that there is one characteristic levelfor each person. Therefore, any evidence that hischaracteristic level is at one point is evidenceagainst his most characteristic level being elsewhere.To the extent that a person can be called oppor-tunistic, he is not conscientious. Note that psycho-sexual matters are different. Evidence that onehas a strong oral fixation is not evidence that onedoes not have a strong anal fixation. Obviouslyone senses a difference here that concerns the struc-tural model, not the content of the stages. Everymodel is a simplification; the simplification of the

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hierarchic model is necessary for there to be effec-tive measurement of ego level.

Having said this, one must immediately admitthat most samples of behavior, e.g., test protocols,contain evidence of functioning on diverse levels.Piaget has a name for such diversity in the cog-nitive realm, horizontal decalage (Flavell, 1963).Heinz Werner (1957) has observed that behavioris both unilinear and multilinear, i.e., it follows boththe hierarchic and the embryonic models. Thisaffords another way of describing the diversity ofego level within the behavior of a single person ina brief period. Nonetheless, the first step in bring-ing the concept within scientific compass is meas-urement. A probabilistic modification of the hier-archic model both accommodates the complexitiesand assimilates them to the requirements of meas-urement.

Isaacs (1956) advocates an alternative solutionto the problem of measurement. He characterizesevery individual in terms of the highest level shownanywhere in his protocol. When this rule is fol-lowed, probabilistic cues cannot be used. Onlythose items or clues can be rated that indicate withcertainty achievement of the given level. Thisrule for measurement does full justice to the hier-archic model, but it exaggerates the univocality ofthe relation between particular behavioral acts andbehavioral propensities (Hammond, 1955).

Other attempts to measure ego level have in-volved rating or somehow scoring the degree ofpresence of each stage. This schema contradictsthe hierarchic model. Its unsatisfactory naturecan also be expressed in another way, as is done inthe following section.

While considering the probabilistic nature of themanifestations of ego level, we can note sometechnical problems in drawing up Table 1. It aimsto incorporate only the defining aspects of eachstage, those that are always present. But no be-havior sample dependably exhibits which of thesecharacteristics are present and predominant in theindividual. There are other, often more accessible,manifestations that indicate the several levels withfair or high probability (age-specific signs are in-cluded here) and that are usable in individual diag-nosis. The distinction between probabilistic mani-festations of defining aspects and manifestations ofprobabilistic aspects is surely beyond the scope ofclinical intuition. Indeed, it challenges the bestefforts of psychometrically trained psychologists.

MILESTONES AMD POLAR ASPECTS

Ego development has two quite different types ofmanifestations, milestone sequences and polar as-pects. The distinction is a crucial one for measure-ment (Loevinger, 1965). The milestone sequencesare the ones used in Table 1 for the brief charac-terizations of levels. These are observable behav-iors that tend to rise and then fall off in promi-nence as one ascends the scale of ego maturity.For example, conformity to generally accepted so-cial standards becomes increasingly characteristicof behavior up to a point, but beyond that pointwith increasing maturity becomes progressivelyless compelling, though not necessarily turning intononconformity. Tendency to stereotypy, on theother hand, is a polar aspect; it constantly decreaseswith increasing ego level. Tendency to stereotypyis a more abstract and inferential trait, harder tojudge than conformity to specific standards.

Milestone sequences are peculiarly valuable inthe rating of behavior, of case histories, or of testprotocols for ego level. Clinical research continuesto depend on rating scales for obvious reasons, de-spite their equally obvious deficiencies. Ratings ofthe amount of a trait, which must be used whenone is rating a polar variable, are difficult to apply,are unreliable, require anchoring in some referencegroup, and at best are made effective instrumentsonly for small groups of specially trained raters.By contrast, rating scales with qualitatively differ-ent descriptions of successive points on the scalehave long been known to be specially good. Mile-stone sequences provide exactly such a scale.

Differential psychology has lived under theshadow of E. L. Thorndike's (1914) dictum, that"if a thing exists, it exists in some amount; and. . . it can be measured [p. 141]." The originalcontext was a bit different from the one in which itcurrently serves, for Thorndike did not accreditintervening variables, i.e., traits (Hullfish, 1926).(Remember that he called his ability test CAVDinstead of intelligence.) Rather, it is the productsof behavior that are to be measured. Regardlessof the ultrabehavioristic disavowal of traits thatunderlay Thorndike's dictum it has been inter-preted to mean that every variable can justifiablybe treated as a polar variable. Thus, in regard tovariables such as conformity or opportunism, eachperson can be rated according to how much of sucha variable he has or exhibits. My position is dif-

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ferent. Opportunism and conformity are not prop-erly treated as polar variables; they are rather mile-stones. Rarely will a useful purpose be served byclassing at the nonopportunistic extreme both thosepersons whose impulse control is so slight that theycannot act expediently and those who consider op-portunism morally wrong, though they may beequally low in opportunism treated as a polarvariable. A useful purpose will rarely be served byclassing together in regard to conformity those whohave not yet grown into it, those who are not will-ing to conform, and those who have outgrown thestage, who are able to conform but do not needconformity to insure impulse control. One mightcontrive a few applications where opportunism orconformity appears as a polar variable, but in sci-entific contributions they should appear as mile-stones.

The measurement problem created by the con-fusion between milestones and polar traits is animportant point of difference between personalitymeasurement and measurement of ability. Mostmanifestations of ability are polar aspects, i.e., formost problems the proportion of correct answers isan increasing function of age. Occasionally prob-lems turn up where the right answer can be obtainedby a kind of wrong reasoning that tends to disap-pear with age. In such cases the proportion of rightanswers may be a nonmonotone function of age.Test technology invariably strives to eliminate suchitems from tests of ability. Thus the technologyneed only contend with a single item type, i.e.,polar items, monotone functions of age.

Psychologically, polar traits develop nondialecti-cally, as indeed abilities tend to do. Traits devel-oping dialectically, growing so to say by opposites,are manifest in milestones. Our faith in the non-dialectical development of abilities is expressed inthe Thurstonian requirement of a positive manifoldas a criterion for rotation of axes. What Piagetcalls vertical decalage (Flavell, 1963), however,may refer to a dialectical aspect of cognitive devel-opment; but Piaget has little concern for measure-ment.

There is no Supreme Court to decide for us whatvariables are properly treated as polar ones andwhat are simply milestones along the way of somemore comprehensive trait. I am defending egodevelopment as a construct of central importancefor psychology, one that summarizes and helps toaccount for many diverse phenomena. With re-

spect to ego development seen as a central explana-tory construcl, opportunism, conformity, and manyof the variables that currently engage the attentionof large numbers of psychologists are milestonesbeing improperly treated as polar (i.e., quantitative)variables.

Among the more trivial of the milestones arevarious aspects of stereotypy known as responsebias, such as acquiescence, tendency to choose ex-treme responses, and tendency to describe oneselfin socially desirable terms. Probably few believethat these are major explanatory variables for atheoretical psychology. Those who devote theirlives to the study of such variables often give littleconsideration to whether they are major quanti-tative variables, worthy of the hundreds of researchstudies they have led to. They have become majorareas of study because it is easy to obtain quanti-tative measures, with no questions asked whetherthere is truly an important underlying quantitativevariable or human trait. But surely it would bemost remarkable if the artifacts of naively con-structed personality tests would themselves turn outto be the major dimensions in terms of which toconceive human variability. If the various typesof response bias are rather manifestations of par-ticular stages (i.e., milestones) of ego development,rather poorly measured, then further pursuit ofthem as quantitative variables will not lead to sub-stantive additions to psychology.

Since this is an area of high controversy, let ussolidify the argument. Tendency to describe one-self as socially acceptable is an accessible, scorablevariable. It reflects psychologically meaningfultraits having implications outside the testing situa-tion. But it reflects those nontest traits equivocally,in part because the high point is midway in a devel-opmental sequence, i.e., it is a milestone. The non-conformity of low ego levels is confounded with theself-criticism of high stages. On tests designed tomeasure variables such as psychopath ology, theweaknesses and impulsivity of low ego levels areconfounded with the toleration of inner life foundat high levels. Even in a study such as Block's(1965), in which social desirability and acquies-cence as methodological artifacts have been care-fully excluded, the problem remains. In his MMPIscoring key for ego resilience, both the content ofthe items and description of high- and low-scoringsubjects reveal a confounding with conventionality,conformity, and intolerance of inner life. By pres-

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cut. lights, adjustment and ego level are here con-founded to a degree making this scoring key aninstrument of little value.

How can we discover what are the major varia-bles and what are their subsidiary manifestations?What gives us the order of importance? Manypsychologists have become accustomed to thinkingthat there are tools available to help with thesedecisions. In particular, factor analysis is the in-strument advocated by many as the sure way tofind our major variables. It is important to notethat precisely the distinction at issue, that betweenpolar variables and milestone sequences, is one towhich factor analysis is blind. If we begin bytaking as our quantitative variables separate as-pects of several stages of the ego, the milestones,no kind of computational manipulation by howeverhigh speed a machine will sort them out to recon-struct the concept of ego level presented here. Aconsiderable number of people have arrived at someversion of this concept, but no machines. (Orrather, people without computers have discoveredthis concept, but not those using computers.) Ifwe are operating in such studies with a series ofquantitative measures of ego milestones, one wouldexpect a melange of low and curvilinear relations•—precisely what is usually observed.

With respect to ego level, it seems to be the casethat those manifestations observable at a minimalinferential level are just the milestones, while thepolar aspects, properly treated as quantitative, areonly inferable indirectly from patterns of observedbehavior. Thus the ultrabehaviorist is doomed todeal in trivialities in the personality field, for heapproaches the area with a predilection at once forobserving behavior at a minimal inferential leveland for quantitative variables. But this is a con-tradiction; what can be observed most directly arethe milestones rather than the quantitative aspects.This is the behaviorist's dilemma, and a possibleexplanation for much of the frustration and con-fusion that have beset personality measurement.

METHODOLOGICAL SUMMARY

In summary, let us recapitulate those aspects ofthe discussion relating to methodology.

]. Ego development is conceptually distinctfrom intellectual development, from psychoscxualdevelopment, and from adjustment, whatever maybe the relations among these variables.

2. Adult height can be predicted using child-hood height, age, and an independent measure(skeletal age) of percentage of adult heightachieved. Both the 1Q and other indices of intelli-gence in effect use childhood status and age to pre-dict final adult status. Ego development can bemeasured on an ordinal scale, but no method ofpredicting final adult status has been established.Psychosexual development as usually thought ofdoes not constitute an ordinal scale.

3. Ego development is an abstraction, a junc-ture of a developmental sequence and a character-ology. The defining manifestations of any stagemust, therefore, be just those that are not age spe-cific. Although in general predictions can be im-proved by using subpopulations homogeneous withrespect to demographic variables such as age, thisstratagem is inadmissable in defining constructs.Similarly, in constructing scoring manuals con-tingent rules are not allowed.

4. There is an inner logic (to borrow Piaget'sterm) of ego development, an invariable sequence.Each stage builds on, incorporates, and transmutesthe previous one. This inner logic is not created byour definitions or by our reason; it constitutes theclaim of this construct to preempt the term ego de-velopment, in contrast with other usages of theterm in child psychology and psychoanalysis. Noone, however, has succeeded in capturing fully thisinner logic as yet.

5. The attempt to measure ego developmentmust be based on a hierarchic model. Every per-son, protocol, or behavior sample is given just onerating, whatever diversity contained. The alterna-tive embryonic model seems to imply as many rat-ings for every person or protocol as there are stagesof development; evidence for fixation at one stage isnot evidence against fixation at another. The em-bryonic model may have merit for psychosexualdevelopment but seems less good than the hierarchicmodel for ego development.

6. The manifestations of ego development canbe classed as milestone sequences and polar aspects.The milestones tend to be observable at a minimalinferential level, while polar aspects are not them-selves observable but must be inferred from pat-terns of observable behavior. Thus an approach topersonality that is at once behavioristic and quan-titative cannot discover or reconstruct the variableof ego level. In particular, factor analysis couldnot yield this construct.

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7. Either milestones or polar aspects are adapta-ble for measurement, but one must know which iswhich. Polar variables are in their nature quanti-tative or at least ordered continua. A sequence ofmilestones, such as those in Table 1 for ego devel-opment, constitutes an ordering that can itself serveas a rating scale for subjects, protocols, etc. Theequivocality that arises when one stage in a mile-stone sequence is treated like a polar variable canbe observed in the long controversy over the inter-pretation of the first factor in the MMPI. Theequivocality is built into the variable; no experi-mental ingenuity will unconfound the variance.

8. Age has served as an objective anchoragepoint twice in this discussion. The traits describedas constituting positive mental health are all agerelated. That is one crucial reason for assigningthem to the realm of ego development rather thanadjustment, for adjustment is not, in the first in-stance, a systematic function of age. A second useof age for anchoring is that polar traits are mono-tone functions of age, while milestones are in gen-eral nonmonotone functions of age.

CONCLUSIONS

This essay has attempted to stake out a territoryagainst the assault of those who say that research inclinical psychology can never be really scientific,and against those who say that important insightsare revealed only to clinicians. That man has anego and that his ego develops are observations aspalpable, no more tenuous, no more hypotheticalthan that his chromosomes contain DNA. Knowinghow the words "ego" and "development" are usedin psychology and in common speech will suffice tofocus initially on the area to be studied, but it willnot suffice to answer questions as to details. Theseveral psychologists and psychiatrists who haveschemes of ego development similar to that of Table1, and indeed from whom the entries of Table 1have been borrowed, differ from each other in de-tails. To resolve questions raised by such differ-ences requires careful definition of terms, largenumbers of cases, and explicit, replicable observa-tions. These conditions are the province of theresearch worker. This program for resolving dif-ferences of detail by repeatedly collecting evidencethus stands in lieu of a formal definition of egodevelopment. The construct must in that waybecome continually more faithful to the concomi-tances of life. No one has seriously questioned that

the sorts of things described in Table 1 arc part ofego level; the program o[ refining the construct byreferral to evidence is not one among many possibleprograms but the only admissable one for scientificpsychology. Therefore the meaning of ego develop-ment proposed here is not one among many butthe only one scientifically admissable.

Some alternative usages of the term have beenconsidered and rejected. Use of the term to coveronly the earliest period obscures the distinctivenessof ego development, for just at that period egodevelopment is virtually indistinguishable from in-tellectual and psychosexual development. Use ofthe term to cover development of all ego functionsis rejected on the grounds that many ego functionsbut not all develop together as an organic unity;only those ego functions that are part of that or-ganic unity are properly included in the definition.The course of ego development is marked by fearof retaliation, fear of punishment, shame, and guilt,all potent sources of conflict. At its highest estateego embraces the conflict itself; thus the conflict-free ego sphere is not the sphere of ego develop-ment. Finally, the use of the term to cover mas-tery of age-specific problems is ruled out since itmakes the unwarranted assumption that everyonethe same age is at the same ego level. Descriptionof essentially the same developmental events usinga less inclusive term, such as moral character, inter-personal integration, intraception, or conceptualsystem, is ruled out because all are involved atonce, and nothing less than the ego encompasses allof them.

Finally one must ask whether a conscientiousscientist finds it optional whether he devotes hisscientific career to study of variables such as egodevelopment or to study of variables such as re-sponse bias. Arbitrary and artificial variables areof occasional methodological interest, but whenthey become a major focus for many researchersover a long period, one must raise a question ofvalues as a scientist. Ego development has beenpresented not as one interesting personality traitamong many, but as the master trait. It is secondonly to intelligence in accounting for human varia-bility. We owe it to our discipline to be faithful toreality, not only in details but also in where weinvest our lives as scientists. When Brunswik said,let the order of ideas be the same as the order ofthings, he did not mean anything so utilitarian orso banal as that the importance of an area in our

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science must reflect its importance in life. Surelylie meant rather that the structure of our scienceshould reflect the structure of life. On this basisego development must become a focal construct inpsychological theory and research.

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