HUMAN

DEVELOPMENT
 CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
 To describe the meaning and process of
development,
 To explain the influence of heredity,
environment and context on human
development,
 To identify the stages of development and
describe the major characteristics of
infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood
and old age
 To reflect on your own course of
development and related experiences.
 What is developmental psychology?
 What are the challenges faced in
development?
 What are the factors influencing our
development?
 What are the changes that you have
noticed in yourself, your parents and
your peers?
MEANING OF DEVELOPMENT
 Development is the pattern of
progressive, orderly, and
predictable changes that begin
at conception and continue
throughout life.
 Development mostly involves
changes — both growth and decline,
as observed during old age.
 PROCESS OF DEVELOPMENT
Biological Process
 Development due to genes inherited from
parents, such as in height and weight,
brain, heart, and lungs development, etc.
Cognitive Process
 The role of cognitive processes in
development relate to mental activities
associated with the processes of knowing
and experiencing, such as thought,
perception, attention, problem solving,
etc.
Socio-emotional Processes
 Refers to changes in an individual’s
interactions with other people, changes in
emotions, and in personality.
 A child’s hug to her/his mother, a young
girl’s affectionate gesture to her/his
sibling, or an adolescent’s sorrow at losing
a match are all reflections of socio-
emotional processes deeply involved in
human development.
LIFE-SPAN PERSPECTIVE ON
DEVELOPMENT (LSP)
 Development is lifelong
 The various processes of human
development, i.e. biological, cognitive,
and socio-emotional are interwoven in the
development of a person throughout the
life-span.
 Development is multi-directional.
 Development is highly plastic
 Development is influenced by historical
conditions.
 Development is the concern of a
number of disciplines.
 An individual responds and acts on
contexts, which include what was
inherited, the physical environment,
social, historical and cultural
contexts. People keep on changing
with changing contexts.
 GROWTH DEVELOPMENT MATURATION EVOLUTION
• Growth • Development is • It is the • Evolution
refers to an a process by changes refers to
increase in which an that follow species-
the size of individual an orderly specific
body parts grows and sequence changes.
or of the changes • Largely • Natural
organism as throughout the dictated by selection is an
a whole. life cycle. the genetic evolutionary
blueprint process

• It can be • Development is • They unfold • Evolution

measured or directional and from within proceeds at a
quantified, includes and follow very slow
for example, growth of the an inner, pace.
growth in organism genetically Emergence of
height, determined human beings
weight, etc. timetable from great
apes took
about 14
million years.
 FACTORS INFLUENCING
DEVELOPMENT
 The interaction of heredity and environment
plays the major factor in human
development.
 The actual genetic material or a person’s
genetic heritage is known as genotype.
 Phenotype is the way an individual’s
genotype is expressed in observable and
measurable characteristics.
 Genes set the limit and within that limit the
environment influences development.
(ex- short height and introvert nature)
 Theory by Sandra Scarr (1992) states that
the environment parents provide for their
children depends to some extent on their
own genetic predisposition.
 For example, if parents are intelligent and
are good readers they would provide their
children with books to read, with the likely
outcome that their children would become
good readers who enjoy reading.
 Children also choose certain environment
based on their genotype (Ex- Interest in
music, dance, etc.)
 These interactions with environment keep
changing from infancy through adolescence.
CONTEXT OF DEVELOPMENT
 Development does not take place in a
vacuum. It is always embedded in a
particular sociocultural context.
2 Theories on context of
development

Urie Durganand Sinha

Bronfenbrenner’s (1977) has
contextual view of presented an
development ecological model for
emphasises the role of understanding the
environmental factors development of
in the development of children in Indian
an individual. context.
BRONFENBRENNER’S CONTEXTUAL
VIEW OF DEVELOPMENT
 The Microsystem is the immediate
environment/setting in which the individual
lives. It is in these settings where the child
directly interacts with social agents
Ex- family, peers, teachers, and neighbourhood.
 The Mesosystem consists of relations
between these contexts.
Ex- How parents relate to teachers and friends
of the child.
 The Exosystem includes events in social
settings where the child does not participate
directly, but they influence the child's
experiences in the immediate context.
Ex- transfer of father or mother, financial
setting at home
 The Macrosystem includes the culture in
which the individual lives.
Ex-type of culture the child grows in
 The Chronosystem involves events in the
individual’s life course, and socio-historical
circumstances of the time.
Ex- divorce of parents or parent’s economic
setback, and their effect on the child.
 In a nutshell, Bronfenbrenner’s view is that a
child’s development is significantly affected
by the complex world that envelops her/him-
whether it be the conversations s/he has
with her/his playmates, or the social and
economic life circumstances into which s/he
is born.
DURGANAND SINHA’S
ECOLOGICAL MODEL
 Ecology of the child could be viewed in terms of two
concentric layers.
 The “upper and the more visible layers” and
“surrounding and less visible layers”
 The “upper and the more visible layers” consist of
home, school, peer groups, and so on.
 The factors influencing development of the child in
the visible upper layer constitutes:
i. Home, its conditions in terms of overcrowding,
space available to each member, toys, technological
devices used, etc.
ii. Nature and quality of schooling, facilities to which
the child is exposed,
iii. Nature of interactions and activities undertaken
with peer groups from childhood onwards.
 The elements of the surrounding layer of
ecology constitutes:
i. Geographical environment- It includes
space and facilities for play and other
activities available outside the home
ii. Institutional setting provided by caste,
class, and other factors,
iii. General amenities available to the child
like drinking water, electricity, means of
entertainment and so on.
OVERVIEW OF DEVELOPMENTAL
STAGES
 Development is commonly described in terms
of periods or stages.
 Human life proceeds through different stages.
For ex, you are at present in the stage of
adolescence and after a few years you will
enter the stage of adulthood
 During a particular stage, individual progresses
towards an assumed goal which is a state or
ability that s/he must achieve in the same
order as other persons before progressing to
the next stage in the sequence. These are
known as the developmental tasks.
 PRENATAL STAGE
 The period from conception to birth is known as
the prenatal period. Typically, it lasts for about 40
weeks.
 Factors Affecting Prenatal Development:

1. Maternal characteristics- includes mother’s age,

nutrition, and emotional state.
2. Disease or infection carried by the mother can
adversely affect prenatal development.(HIV,
German measles, etc.)
3. Teratogens- the environmental agents that cause
deviations in normal development that can lead
to serious abnormalities or death. Ex- Drugs,
smoking, alcohol, X Ray, any radiations,
environmental pollutions and pollutants can
cause severe abnormalities in the unborn child.
 INFANCY
 Age 0 to 2 years is called infancy
 New born develop neural activities of the brain
in a rapid rate. Cerebrum is partly developed.
 The activities needed to sustain life functions
are present in the new-born like breathing,
sucking, swallowing and the ability to
discharge the bodily wastes.
 The new-born's in their first week of life are
able to indicate what direction a sound is
coming from, can distinguish their mother’s
voice from the voices of other women, and can
imitate simple gestures like tongue protrusion
and mouth opening.
MOTOR DEVELOPMENT
 The new-born's movements are governed by
reflexes that are automatic, built-in
responses to stimuli.
 Before the new-borns have had the
opportunity to learn, reflexes act as adaptive
mechanisms.
 Some reflexes present in the new-born like
coughing, blinking, and yawning persist
throughout their lives. Others disappear as the
brain functions mature and voluntary control
over behaviour starts developing.
 Finer skills like grasping and reaching for
objects, sitting, crawling, walking and running
develops in this stage gradually.
 SENSORY ABILITIES
Vision in New-born:
 New-borns prefer to look at some stimuli
rather than others such as faces.
 The new-born's vision is estimated to be
lower than the adult vision.
 By 6 months it improves and by about the
first year, vision is almost the same as that of
an adult.
 New-born's might be able to distinguish
between red and white colours but in general
they are colour deficient and full colour
vision develops by 3 months of age.
Hearing in New-born:
 Infants can hear immediately after birth.
(hearing test)
 As the infant develops, proficiency at
localising sound also improves.
 Able to distinguish voice of the mother.

New-borns respond to touch and they can

even feel pain.
Both smell and taste capacities are also
present in the new-born.
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
 Jean Piaget stressed that children actively
construct their understanding of the world.
 As children grow, additional information is
acquired and they adapt their thinking to
include new ideas, as this improves their
understanding of the world also improves.
Piaget’s Sensorimotor stage in infancy:
 Infants experiences the world through senses
and interactions with objects through looking,
hearing, touching, mouthing, and grasping.
 The new-born lives in the present.
 What is out of sight is out of mind.
 According to Piaget, children at this stage do
not go beyond their immediate sensory
experience and they lack object
permanence
 The awareness that the objects continue to
exist when not perceived is known as
object permanence.
 Gradually by 8 months of age the child starts
pursuing the object partially covered.
 The basis of verbal communication seems to
be present in infants.
 Vocalisation begins with the infant’s
babbling- between 3 to 6 months of age.
SOCIO-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
 Babies from birth are social creatures.
 An infant starts preferring familiar faces and
responds to parent’s presence by cooing and
gurgling.
 Starts showing a preference for their mother’s
company.
 The close emotional bond of affection that
develop between infants and their parents
(caregivers) is called attachment.
 Study by Harlow and Harlow (1962)
 The study clearly demonstrates that providing
nourishment or feeding was not crucial for
attachment and contact-comfort is important.
 According to Erik Erikson (1968), the first year
of life is the key time for the development of
attachment.
 It represents the stage of developing trust or
mistrust.
 A sense of trust is built on a feeling of physical
comfort which builds an expectation of the world
as a secure and good place.
 If the parents are sensitive, affectionate, and
accepting, it provides the infant a strong base to
explore the environment. Such infants are likely to
develop a secure attachment.
 On the other hand, if parents are insensitive and
show dissatisfaction and find fault with the child,
it can lead to creating feelings of self-doubt in the
child. They develop an insecure attachment
 CHILDHOOD
Milestones in Childhood
 The child’s growth slows down during early
childhood as compared to infancy.
 The child develops physically, gains height and
weight, learns to walk, runs, jumps, and plays
with a ball.
 Socially, the child’s world expands from the
parents to the family and adults near home
and at school.
 The child also begins to acquire the concepts
of good and bad, i.e. develops a sense of
morality.
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
Early development follows 2 principles:
1. Development proceeds Cephalocaudally that is
from the cephalic or head region to the caudal
or tail region. Children gain control over the
upper part of the body before the lower part.
2. Growth proceeds from the centre of body and
moves towards the extremities or more distal
regions — the Proximodistal trend, that is
children gain control over their torso before
their extremities.
The growth and development of the brain are
important as they help in the maturation of
children’s abilities, such as eye hand coordination,
holding a pencil, and attempts made at writing.
MOTOR DEVELOPMENT
 Gross motor skills during the early
childhood years involve the use of
arms and legs, and moving around
with confidence and more
purposefully in the environment.
 Fine motor skills — finger dexterity
and eye-hand coordination — improve
substantially during early childhood.
 During these years the child’s
preference for left or right hand also
develops.
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
 The child’s ability to acquire the concept
of object permanence enables her/him to
use mental symbols to represent objects.
Cognitive development in early childhood
focuses on Piaget’s stage of
preoperational thought
 The child gains the ability to mentally
represent an object that is not physically
present. Ex- Drawing tree, mountain etc.
 This ability of the child to engage in
symbolic thought helps to expand her/his
mental world
Salient features of Preoperational Stage:
1. Egocentrism (self focus)- children see the world
only in terms of their own selves and are not
able to appreciate others’ point of view.
2. Animism- process of thinking that all things are
living, like oneself. They attribute life-like
qualities to inanimate objects.
3. Intuitive thought- questions help the child to
know why things are as they are and they engage
in asking many questions (between 4 and 7
years).
4. Centration- focusing on a single characteristic or
feature for understanding an event. Ex- size of
the glass.
 Between 7 and 11 years of age (the period of
middle and late childhood) intuitive thought is
replaced by logical thought.
 This is the stage of Concrete Operational thought,
which is made up of operations — mental actions
that allow the child to do mentally what was done
physically before.
 Concrete operations are also mental actions that
are reversible. Ex- Study with clay.
 Concrete operations allows the child to appreciate
that there are different ways of looking at things,
which also results in the decline of her/his
egocentrism.
 The child at this stage cannot do abstract thinking
and still cannot manipulate ideas in the absence of
objects.
SOCIO-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
 The important dimensions of children’s socio-
emotional development are the self, gender and moral
development.
 The developing sense of independence makes children
do things in their own way.
According to Erikson, the way parents respond to the
child’s self-initiated activities leads to developing a
sense of initiative or sense of guilt.
 Self understanding in early childhood is limited to
defining oneself through physical characteristics like I
am tall, she has black hair, I am a girl, etc.
 During middle and late childhood, the child is likely to
define oneself through internal characteristics such as,
“I am smart and I am popular” etc.
 Starts comparing themselves to their peer group and
social groups.
MORAL DEVELOPMENT
 Learning to differentiate between
the rightness or wrongness of human
acts, distinguish right from wrong,
to feel guilty, to put themselves in
other people’s position, and to help
others when they are in trouble, are
all components of moral
development.
 Lawrence Kohlberg, studied the moral
development in children, which are age related.
 The young child before 9 years of age, thinks in
terms of external authority that is according to
her/him, actions are wrong because s/he is
punished, and right because s/he is rewarded.
 As the child grows, by early adolescence, s/he
develops moral reasoning through set of rules of
others, such as parents or laws of the society.
These rules are accepted by the children as their
own.
 Children view rules as absolute guidelines, which
should be followed.
 Moral thinking at this stage is relatively inflexible.
As they grow, they gradually develop a personal
moral code.
GENDER AND SEX ROLES
 The most powerful roles into which people are
socialised are gender roles.
 They specify the range of behaviours which are
considered appropriate for males or females.
 While sex refers to the biological dimension of
being male or female, gender refers to the
social dimension of being male or female.
 Gender identity of male or female begin to
acquire by the time they are about 3 years old
and can accurately label themselves as boys
and girls. As they grow, preferences can be
evidenced in their toys and play.
 A gender role is a set of expectations that
prescribes how females and males should
think, act and feel.
Factors influencing Gender Socialization:
1. Parents
2. Peers
3. Media
 The “gender typing” occurs when
individuals are ready to encode and organise
information along the lines of what is
considered appropriate or typical for males
and females in a society.
 ADOLESCENCE
 The term adolescence derives from the Latin
word adolescere, meaning “to grow into
maturity”.
 It is the transitional period in a person’s life
between childhood and adulthood.
 Adolescence is commonly defined as the
stage of life that begins at the onset of
puberty, when sexual maturity, or the
ability to reproduce is attained.
 The physical changes that take place during
this stage are universal but the social and
psychological dimensions of the adolescent’s
experiences depend on the cultural context.
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
 Puberty or sexual maturity marks the end of
childhood and signifies the beginning of
adolescence, which is characterised by
dramatic physical changes in both, growth
rate, and sexual characteristics.
 The hormones released during puberty result
in the development of primary and secondary
sexual characteristics.
 The primary sexual characteristics include
those directly related to reproduction
 The secondary sexual characteristics
 include features or signs of achieving sexual
maturity.
 In girls, the onset of menstruation is called
menarche while for boys it is characterized by
acceleration in growth, facial hair, and changes
in voice.
 The growth spurt generally begins at the age of
12 or 13 for boys and at the age of 10 or 11 for
girls.
 Physical development during adolescence is
also accompanied by a number of psychological
changes.
 Around puberty adolescents show an increase in
interest in members of the opposite sex and in
sexual matters and a new awareness of sexual
feelings develops.
 The development of a sexual identity defines the
sexual orientation and guides sexual behaviour.
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENTAL CHANGES
 Adolescent’s thought becomes more abstract,
logical, and idealistic; they become more capable of
examining their own thoughts, others’ thoughts, and
what others are thinking about them.
 According to Piaget formal operational thought
appears between the age of 11 and 15.
 During this stage adolescent thinking expands
beyond actual concrete experiences and they begin
to think more in abstract terms and reason about
them.
 Adolescent thought is also idealistic.
 Adolescents begin to think about ideal
characteristics for themselves and others and
compare themselves and others with these ideal
standards.
 According to Piaget adolescent uses
a type of logical thinking which is
called hypothetical deductive
reasoning.
 Thinking becomes more systematic in
solving problems- they think of
possible courses of action, why
something is happening the way it is,
and systematically seek solutions.
 Adolescents develop a personal moral
code for Ex- choosing a bad behaviour
like smoking or cheating in exam
 Adolescents also develop a special kind of
egocentrism.
 According to David Elkind, imaginary
audience and personal fable are two
components of adolescents’ egocentrism.
1. Imaginary Audience: It is adolescent’s
belief that others are as preoccupied with
them as they are about themselves. They
imagine that people are always noticing
them and are observing each and every
behaviour of theirs.
2. Personal Fable: This involves their sense of
uniqueness. Adolescents’ sense of
uniqueness makes them think that no one
understands them or their feelings.
FORMING AN IDENTITY
 Identity is who you are and what your values,
commitments and beliefs are.
 The primary task of adolescence is to establish
an identity separate from the parents.
 A detachment process enables the individual to
develop a personalised set of beliefs that are
uniquely her or his own.
 In the process of achieving an identity the
adolescent could experience conflict with
parents and within herself or himself.
 This “identity confusion”, according to Erikson,
can lead to individuals isolating themselves from
peers and family; or they may lose their identity
in the crowd.
1. Cultural background
2. family and societal values,
3. ethnic background and
4. socioeconomic status all prevail upon the
adolescents’ search for a place in society.
 Increase amount of time is spend with peers and
they constantly need acceptance.
 At times conflicting situations with parents lead
to increased identification with peers.
 Generally parents and peers serve complementary
functions and fulfil different needs of the
adolescents.
 Vocational commitment is another factor
influencing adolescent identity formation.
 The question “What are you going to be when you
grow up?”
SOME MAJOR CONCERNS:
Peer Pressure:
 Conforming to peer pressure can be both
positive and negative.
 Adolescents are often confronted with
decisions regarding smoking, drugs, alcohol,
and breaking parental rules, etc. due to peer
pressure
Delinquency:
 It refers to a variety of behaviours, ranging
from socially unacceptable behaviour, legal
offences, to criminal acts.
 Ex- truancy, running away from home,
stealing or acts of vandalism.
Substance Abuse:
 Adolescent years are especially vulnerable to
smoking, alcohol and drug abuse.
 Some adolescents take recourse to smoking
and drugs as a way of coping with stress.
 Adolescents who are more vulnerable to
drugs, alcohol, and nicotine use, are
impulsive, aggressive, anxious, depressive,
and unpredictable, have low self-esteem,
and low expectation for achievement.
 Drug use if continued long enough can lead
to physiological dependency, i.e. addiction to
drugs, alcohol or nicotine may seriously
jeopardise the rest of the adolescents’ lives.
Eating Disorders:
 The obsession with self, living in fantasy
world and peer comparisons lead to certain
conditions where one becomes obsessed with
their own bodies.
1. Anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder that
involves relentless pursuit of thinness
through starvation. Controlling diets and so
on.
2. Bulimia is another form of an eating
disorder in which the individual follows a
binge-and-purge eating pattern. The
bulimic goes on an eating binge, then
purges by self-induced vomiting.
 ADULTHOOD
 An adult is generally defined as someone who
is responsible, mature, self-supporting, and
well integrated into society.
 The assumption of adult roles is directed by
an individual’s social context. Ex: Marriage
age, living with parents, etc.
 In early adulthood, two major tasks are,
exploring the possibilities for adult living
and developing a stable life structure.
 A transition from dependence to
independence occurs during adulthood.
Career and Work:
 Earning a living, choosing an occupation, and
developing a career are important themes for
people in their twenties and thirties.
 Developing and evaluating a career becomes an
important task of adulthood.
Marriage, Parenthood, and Family:
 The adjustments that young adults have to make
when entering a marriage relate to knowing the
other person if not known earlier, coping with each
other’s likes, dislikes, tastes, and choices.
 Becoming a parent can be a difficult and stressful
transition in young adults.
 Death of a spouse or divorce creates a family
structure that becomes complicated and sometimes
difficult.
PHYSICAL CHANGES IN ADULTHOOD
 Physical changes during middle ages are
caused by maturational changes in the
body.
 A gradual deterioration in some aspects of
physical functioning such as decline in
vision, sensitivity to glare, hearing loss
and changes in physical appearance (e.g.,
wrinkles, grey hair or thinning of hair,
weight gain) occurs in middle and late
adulthood.
 Memory tends to show greater decline,
while wisdom may improve with age.
 OLD AGE
 The challenges of old age includes coping
with retirement, widowhood, illness, or
death in the family.
 The myth of old age as a draining and
frightening phase of life is changing as now
there are people who have crossed seventy
years of age or so and are quite active,
energetic, and creative.
 They are competent and are valued by
society in many walks of life.
 We have aged people in politics, literature,
business, art and science.
Factors for successful ageing focuses on
1. how effective we are at work,
2. how loving our relationships are in our family,
3. how good our friendships are,
4. how healthy we are, and
5. how cognitively fit we are.
 Retirement from active vocational life is
quite significant in old age.
 Some people perceive retirement as a negative
change. They consider it as a separation from
an important source of satisfaction and self-
esteem.
 Others view it as a shift in life with more time
to pursue their own interests.
 In old age feeling of loss of energy, and dwindling of
health and financial assets, leads to insecurity and
dependency.
 The elderly tend to look towards others to lean on and
to care for them (becomes dependent on children).
Death
 Although death is more likely to occur in late
adulthood, death can come at any point in
development.
 The deaths, especially of children and younger adults,
are often perceived to be more tragic than those of
others.
 Those left behind after the death of their partner
suffer deep grief, cope with loneliness, depression,
financial loss and are also at risk of many health
related problems.
 Death is perceived differently in various cultures.