Human Development: Key Terms and Principles

Important Terms

• Growth involves physical changes from conception to maturity.
• Development means qualitative increase in complexity of function and skill progression.
• Maturation is the biological unfolding of an individual.
• Learning is the process through which experience brings about relatively permanent change in thoughts or behavior.
• Environment encompasses all external physical and social conditions and events.
• A child is defined as a person below 18 years of age, or someone over 18 who is unable to care for themselves.

Approaches to Human Development

• The traditional approach sees extensive changes from childhood to adolescence, stability in adulthood, and decline in old age.
• The life-span approach views development as taking place from conception to death.

Principles of Development

• Development is lifelong and plastic.
• Plasticity refers to the potential for change.
• Development is multi-dimensional, involving physical, cognitive, and socioemotional aspects.
• Development is relatively orderly.
• Development happens gradually.

Basic Issues in Human Development

• Nature vs. Nurture explores the significant influences on human development.
• Assumptions on Human Nature questions if children are inherently good or bad.
• Activity vs. Passivity considers if children are active, curious beings or passive recipients of external influences.
• Stability vs. Change asks if we remain the same as shaped by early experiences or if we evolve into someone different.
• Continuity vs. Discontinuity examines whether development is gradual or involves distinct stages.
• Universality vs. Context-Specific questions if developmental changes are universal or vary depending on context.

Developmental Tasks

• These arise at certain periods in life and successful achievement leads to happiness and success with later tasks.
• Failure results in unhappiness, social disapproval, and difficulty with later tasks (Havighurst, 1972).

Stages of Human Development

• Prenatal Period: from conception to birth, involving tremendous growth and physical development from a single cell.
• Infancy: from birth to 18-24 months, involving extreme dependence on adults and the establishment of locomotion and sensorimotor coordination. Language and psychological activities are just beginning.
• Early Childhood: spanning from the end of infancy to 5-6 years, it marks the preschool years, learning self-sufficiency, developing school readiness, and engaging in play with peers.
• Middle and Late Childhood: 6-11 years (elementary school years), during which fundamental skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic are mastered, and achievement and self-control are increasingly emphasized. Culture is formally introduced.
• Adolescence: approximately 11 to 20 years, starts with rapid physical changes (puberty) and ends at maturity. The highest level of cognition is attained. Seeking independence and discovering their indentity, adolescents pursue more time outside of the family.
• Early Adulthood: about 20 to 40 years, establishing personal and economic independence, career development, looking for a mate and starting a family.
• Middle Adulthood: 40 to 65 years, a time of expanding personal and social involvement and responsibility, assisting the next generation, reaching and maintaining career satisfaction; potential for "empty nest" crisis.
• Late Adulthood: 65 years and above, a time for adjustment to decreasing strength and health which can cause increased dependency. Focus goes towards life review, retirement, and general adjustment.