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Erik
Erikson
ERIK
Erikson defines human personality in several stages. According to him,
everyone experience eight crises or conflicts in the development phase.
He considers that each crisis is a particular stage of development where
specific learning occurs. And a child must pass the stages, how a stage is
passed affects the next stage.
He
asserts that specific developmental conflict becomes critical at a certain
point in the life cycle, but, it does not mean that attributes of each
stage are only related to one stage. For example, needs of autonomy are
especially important to toddlers but throughout life we must continually
test the degree of autonomy we can express in each new relationship. He
defines the following developmental stages:
TRUST
vs. MISTRUST:
Infant will develop trust if needs are met. If infant's world is
inconsistent, painful, stressful and threatening, he/she learns to
develop mistrust. He says "by "trust" I mean an essential trustfulness of
others as well as a fundamental sense of one's own trustworthiness". He
indicates that the amount of trust derived from early experiences do not
seem to depend on absolute quantities of reinforcer, but rather on the
quality relationship.
AUTONOMY vs. SHAME & DOUBT:
Toddlers try to control the environment by doing small things for
themselves, e.g., holding a feeder. If they able to control, they feel
self-confidence & self control. It has a negative effect if they fail or
are stopped. A sense of loss of self-control and of over control lead to
have a doubt and shame. If a person feels shame it steers to secondary
mistrust. Shame reflects that one feels as one is completely exposed and
gets conscious of being looked at. It steers to excessive self-conscious.
Doubt is the brother of shame.
INITIATIVE vs.GUILT:
This
is the stage when child take initiatives, discovers how the world works
and how it can be affected. If they are supported they take the
initiative, if they are reproached they feel guilty. For the growth of
autonomy a firmly developed early trust is necessary.
INDUSTRY vs. INFERIORITY
Comparison with peers is increasingly important. A negative evaluation of
one's self compared to another is particularly damaging. The danger at
this stage is the development of an alienation or antagonization from
himself and from his tasks due to the feelings of inferiority.
EGO
IDENTITY vs. EGO DIFFUSION :
The
adolescence seeks basic values & attitude that he assigns to his/her
different social roles. If the child fails to integrate the major roles
with opposing value systems the result is ego diffusion. If the earliest
stage is not passed satisfactorily then the adolescent looks most
intensely for men and ideas to whom he can trust to prove oneself
trustworthy.
INTIMACY vs. ISOLATION:
It is
an ability to share one's self with another person without fear of losing
one's own identity. If a youth could not have intimate relationships
with others in late adolescence or early adulthood, he/she may settle for
highly stereotyped interpersonal relations and come to retain a deep
sense of isolation. Non-intimate relationship results in isolation which
can lead to, if necessary, destroy those forces and people whose essence
seems dangerous to oneself.
GENERATIVITY vs. SELF-ABSORPTION:
In
adulthood, after the earlier conflicts have, in part, been resolved, men &
women are free to direct their attention more fully to the assistance of
others. However, failure to resolve earlier conflicts often results in a
preoccupation with one's self.
INTEGRITY vs. DESPAIR:
If
one looks back over one's life and is satisfied that it has meaning and
involvement, then one carries a sense of integrity. But if one's life
seems to be a series of misdirected energies and lost chances, one has a
sense of despair. Clinical and anthropological data suggests that the
lack or loss of this accrued ego integration is signified by disgust and
by despair.
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