Stages of Personal Development: Part II

Ways People Develop Their Beliefs & Viewpoints

This post provides summary tables of several of the theories. Table 4 is from the work of cognitive developmental theorist Erik Erikson (1902–1994). Erikson, a high school dropout who studied on his own by traveling, reading, and carefully observing the behaviors of those around him, developed a humanistic theory of human development after studying briefly with Freud. Like many of this book’s subjects, and this book’s author, he saw he could learn more of what he wanted to learn and focus on by setting his own learning agenda. He believed that neither Freud’s theories nor behaviorism could fully explain the intricate course of human development. In Identity, Youth, and Crises (1968), Erikson described a series of eight interdependent developmental crises that all individuals face. How each crisis is resolved has a lasting effect on the person’s self-image and view of society. Borrowed from Lester Lefton’s Psychology, 5th Edition (1994), Table 15, below, describes Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development.

Table 15: Erikson’s Eight Stages of Psychosocial Development