Person Project Assignment

Person Project Assignment

Carmen Westarp
Salt Lake Community College
Professor Lemmons
PSY 1010 Human, Growth and Development
November 2014

Person Project Assignment

Abstract
Utilizing the text, Invitation to the Life Span (2014), this paper reflects my understanding
of key concepts and various components within each chapter in regards to the lifespan
perspective from infancy to geriatrics. To write this paper I utilized events from within
my own life from infancy until the present In order to gain a deeper perspective through
the application thereof, I followed these events by hypothetical but very plausible
occurrences. This paper demonstrates my unique and personal perspective of nature,
nurture and its impact throughout my life.

Person Project Assignment

Person Project : Chapter One

Am I the product of nature or nurture? There is much debate surrounding this

question but developmentalists find this debate to be invalid, proposing the question of
how much not which as nature effects nurture and nurture effects nature (Berger 5).
Many people are oblivious to the connections between genetics and environment
though the two constantly interact. This is the story of my lifespan summarizing the
interactions between nurture and nature throughout.
Lynn is a 23 year old caucasian woman who is in excellent health but suffers from
bipolar disorder. Her parents were emotionally abusive and at 17 she ran away from
home eliminating contact and disowning her previous life. Shortly after she married an
older man and at 19 she gave birth to a son which took a toll on her marriage, her
husband became abusive and 13 months later she ran away from florida to california
where she found work as a file clerk clerk, filed for divorce, relinquished her parental
rights to an adoptive couple and sought to start a new life.
Ricardo is a 33 year old immigrant from mexico, he is physically fit and while he
exhibits signs of depression he manages it well. He was an only child and at age 11 he
found himself orphaned. Until the age of 17 he attended a military school after which he
pursued no further education. He began smoking and drinking at 15 and became caught
in a web of addiction. At 22 he found an outlet within the LDS church which enabled him
to overcome his addictions, he became a member and served a mission. At 25 he gained
citizenship within the united states and pursued an apprenticeship as an electrician.

Person Project Assignment

Lynn and Ricardo met through mutual friends within their church, Ricardo asked
Lynn on a date and after 9 months they got married. The couple greatly anticipated
having a family of their own and began to pursue just that without hesitation. After
several months of trying a sperm penetrates an ovum, fusing together to form a zygote.
During a two week period the zygote rapidly duplicates and divides. Eventually the cells
divide into two groups one which will form the placenta and the other which will become
the very core of me, the embryo (Berger 48, 58). Implantation of the outer cells are
successful and thus begins my life.
The couple is elated, they go to the doctor who informs them of the potential
complications and risks which could impact my development. Lynn pays close attention
and heeds his advice as she remains active, monitors her nutrition and even quits her job
to reduce stress as Ricardo has excellent health insurance and a sufficient wage. At 12
weeks the couple goes in for an ultrasound to monitor my development, at this point my
gender is evident and it is revealed that I am a girl as anticipated by Lynn and Ricardo.
They have already decided to name me Carolina after Ricardos grandmother. As the
pregnancy nears its end the doctor discusses the delivery plan with Lynn, he urges her to
have a c-section since her first born was delivered this way as he wants to avoid
complications such a uterine rupture (Berger 66). Without hesitation Lynn complies and
they set the date for the delivery to be February 14th.
Tuesday February 14th at 8:45am I enter the world and meet Lynn and Ricardo
face to face, I will know them as mom and dad. I am 6lbs. 12 oz., 20 inches long and
have a full head of hair. My reflexes are responsive and no complications are present
among me or mom. Mom holds me tightly near her chest, gently stroking my cheek with

Person Project Assignment

her finger as dad wiggles all my fingers and toes in awe of the life he helped create.
These actions are the beginning of our parent-infant bond (Berger 69). Mom makes the
decision to breastfeed me for a variety of reasons some of those reasons being to bond,
provide me with adequate nutrition, provide me with antibodies against disease, decrease
allergies and asthma and the list goes on (Berger 109). After three days we are released
from the hospital, our destination is a townhouse in a quiet well-kept neighborhood where
I have my very own room. Mom and dad take turns caring for me, they capture my
attention through high pitched tones often repeating themselves which scientists refer to
as child-directed speech (Berger 121). I exhibit preattachment as I seek mom and dads
attention though crying, calming at the sound of their voices or seeing their faces. Mom
and dad develop synchrony with me as they do things like wave their finger in front of
me waiting for me to grasp it, in response to me doing so they react by smiling, as I grow
interaction grows into consecutive responses of exaggerated boos and waving hands
followed by laughter (Berger 141, 143). Mom and dad carefully stimulate my cognitive
development as they continue to interact and communicate with me, read to me, sing to
me and express their love. They find excitement in every little milestone I reach. I smile
and laugh often, seek and enjoy interaction and I am described as a happy baby. My
temperament displays that of surgency (Berger 138) . My cognitive development is
accompanied by physical growth. I grow in height and weight and my muscle
development increases along with my stability enabling me to walk and cause mischief, I
become a little scientist as I use motor skills to do things such as push a cup of juice from
off the table in anticipation of Its results, pull out pots and pans from the cupboards
banging them together, tasting them and attempting to fit them inside one another (Berger

Person Project Assignment

116). At 18 months I become a sister to a brother named Robert and I am not excited as
mom shifts her focus towards him. Among the arrival of Robert also comes financial
stress and my parents find themselves at a lower socioeconomic status (SES). This brings
more stress to mom than dad who faced extreme poverty in his youth. Attachment
towards mom becomes more of an insecure-avoidant one as I am no longer the center of
her focus. I learn to play alone and in turn ignore her presence. The attachment with dad
becomes more secure as he is more deeply involved, I am discontent at his departure and
show excitement at his presence. He is the only one that I will allow to put me to bed
(Berger 144). Independence within my zone of proximal development (ZPD) is
encouraged through scaffolding, mom and dad remain observant in regards to my
abilities and needs, they are careful to assist and not take over. Providing me with
motivation to encourage my actions (Berger 185). As I observe my parents behavior
towards Robert I exhibit the element of social learning by involving myself in his care
eventually helping him within his own ZPD doing things such as coaxing him away from
danger and encouraging him to crawl (Berger 151). As time goes on the maturity of my
prefrontal cortex increases and my egocentrism shifts. I come to the awareness that I can
place blame on Robert (Berger 188). Mom leaves Robert with me while she helps a
neighbor during which time I decide to play with the phone. I take the phone book down
and sit in the kitchen calling random numbers one by one, one of those numbers being
911. What is your emergency? asks the voice over the phone, I become silent and in a
panic I hang up. Mom comes home and shortly after there is a knock on the door. A
police officer is standing there. Hello Mam, Is everything ok? He asks. Yes officer,
may I help you? She replies. 911 received a call from this address. Im sorry officer

Person Project Assignment

it mustve been one of my children, It wont happen again She says apologetically. It's
ok Mam. you have a nice day. Mom turns around with a scorn look on her face,
Carolina were you playing with the phone? I look at her with bewilderment, No
mommy Robert did it Mom scolds robert who just smiles back at her. My parents
exercise an authoritarian approach in their parenting as they implement discipline through
spanking and loud verbal reprimand but they also apply characteristics of an authoritative
approach as they allow compromise, opinion and remain open to emotional factors
(Berger 217). Our family grows with the addition of two sisters Elizabeth and
Alexandria. We fall into an even lower SES status and their willingness to compromise
fades, opinion becomes obsolete and emotions are ignored. The stress of low-income, the
disadvantage of lower education limiting employment opportunities, as well as caring for
four young children is influential in the tension and hostility present within our home.
Mom and dad project their stress onto me and my siblings as they become verbally
abusive, constantly yell and implement physical force. The constant confrontation
becomes detrimental to development (Berger 302, 303). In school I have always been
popular as I am outgoing, exhibit kindness and offer empathy among my peers. I have
also proven myself to be highly intelligent but as the stress and negativity at home
increase my emotional regulation falters and I begin to internalize the actions and
comments of my peers. I become timid, withdrawn and my anxiety increases. I slide into
a status of unpopularity defined by withdrawn-rejection (Berger 305, 306). My grades
begin to drop in correlation with the stress at home and a strained relationship with mom
and dad. As I hit puberty I find myself in a greater struggle emotionally, academically,
and the lack of a support system only encourages these struggles. I search for a place to

Person Project Assignment

belong among my peers and in my freshman year I find comfort within a group that
relates to my struggles. Through them I face an introduction with drugs and alcohol. In
the beginning I am apprehensive and weary in regards to drug use but after much
observation I use inductive reasoning to come to the conclusion that there is no harm in
drug use and the warnings against drugs and alcohol that Ive received in the past are
nothing more than scare tactics used to induce fear. I begin to drink and smoke
marijuana. The risks I take become more grandiose as I go from skipping school to get
wasted, to stealing beer from the local supermarket to support my habit. While many
would view the risks I take as reckless I honestly have little sense of inhibition and the
risks lack transparency. I am not fully to blame for this as my prefrontal cortex lacks
maturity causing excitement and pleasure to overshadow caution (Berger 332). I develop
and apply the aspect of invincibility fate to my life as I disregard my mortality and hold
the perspective that I will not be a statistic in the juvenile correctional system nor will I
become a statistic in alcohol related death or injury, I will not graduate to harder drugs or
find myself enslaved to substance abuse (Berger 333). In school I am failing miserably as
I apply an entity approach to intelligence, I find myself convinced that I am stupid and
see little point in studying or applying myself to anything that involves effort (Berger
341). As my grades steadily decline my parents attempt to intervene, but I have closed
myself off and they stand to be the last people I would ever want to discuss things with.
Why are you failing so many classes, are you stupid? dad asks, Are you doing drugs
with those worthless friends of yours? my mom questions. I become defensive and
respond in a verbally aggressive manner screaming I guess I am just stupid so leave me
alone and dont talk about my friends like that. They become frustrated at my refusal to

Person Project Assignment

let them in and regress to hostility and immature emotional regulation as my father
pushes me up against the wall he slaps me across the face, You are never to talk to us
that way again he demands. He lets go of me and I hold back my tears, as I retreat to the
comfort of my room. I cant wait to escape.

Chapter Two

Another day, another fight, I find myself at increased vulnerability. I cut myself
to redirect my emotions, I have been doing this for several months now and my addictive
relationship with it has only gotten worse as well as my depression. Upon the discovery
of my self-mutilation my parents force me see a therapist named Kathy but its too late, I
begin to more intensely question my ability to continue on as I entertain myself with
suicidal ideations. Eventually my ideations lead to parasuicide (Berger 378). I overdose
on aspirin and cut my wrists. My youngest sister Alexandria is unfortunate enough to find
me, she calls 911 and I am rushed to the hospital where my stomach is pumped and I
receive stitches. I wake up to the bickering of my therapist and parents. All three of them
stop mid-discussion turning towards me. I love you. whispers dad as he throws his
arms around me, mom leans in and kisses my forehead and kathy gently proceeds to ask
me questions. She then turns to my parents and says, You have two choices, you can
either send her to an inpatient facility or I will court order you to. My parents
begrudgingly agree to comply. I receive treatment in an intensive care unit and after three
months it it is deemed that i will need further treatment which will take place in a group
home. Upon arrival I immediately find myself accepted among the other girls. I fall into

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peer pressure as I proceed to follow their lead and adopt their ideals. They provide me
with deviancy training teaching me how to discreetly break the rules while maintaining
the illusion of cooperation (Berger 366).Our relationship is one of negative proportion.
After what seems like years I am released. As my parents havent visited once and I have
no intentions of residing with them, I venture out on my own beginning my journey
towards achieving identity. According to erickson I am within the stage of identity versus
role confusion as I question and pursue who I am, my role in society, my values and
beliefs as well as my plans for the future (Berger 356). I drop out of high school, obtain
certification as a CNA and find full-time employment achieving vocational identity
(Berger 359). In the spirit of rebellion I also embrace my newfound freedom as I binge
drink four out of seven days a week. I fail to view my behavior as harmful in anyway
considering that alcohol is legal at 21 but the patterns I exhibit definitely fall under the
category of drug abuse as abuse is present among both legal and illegal substances
(Berger 398). Its apparent that Ive taken many destructive risks in life but I have always
been a good girl in the regards to sexuality, things change though. Maybe if I had known
of the danger that was lurking around the corner I wouldve exercised more caution. It
was a typical night of binging until my vision blurred and I couldnt walk. A man keeps
approaching me attempting to kiss and touch me, I push him away over and over. Upon
waking up I open my eyes only to be met by the face of the man whom I had kept
pushing away the night before. In a panic I attempt to get up and discover my pants
around my ankles. Immediately I find myself flooded by devastation and disgust, it is in
this moment that my achievement of gender identity comes to a halt, as I feel violated
and the certainty I once had about when, how and with whom to express my sexual drives

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becomes disconcerted (Berger 360, 361). I quickly pull up my pants, grab a bottle of rum
and walk out the door. Drinking with friends for pleasure and sheer enjoyment transforms
into using alone to avoid and deny problems setting myself up for addiction, memory
impairment and damage to the hippocampus putting my self control at risk. I also find
myself graduating to harder drugs (Berger 384). Time goes on I find myself utilizing
emotion-focused coping as I replace my guilt and fear with acceptance (Berger 443). As a
result of my acceptance instead of avoiding sex and indulging in feelings of guilt and
shame, I learn towards sexually promiscuity as I detach emotional connections related to
sex. Eventually I find myself pregnant and it pushes me to utilize postformal thought by
taking into account the situational constraints, circumstantial elements, applying logic
and integrating emotion (Berger 399, 400). I have only quit abusing drugs due to my
pregnancy, my socioeconomic status is not sufficient enough to care for a baby the way I
would like, I have no support from a partner or family, I would like to be a mother but
also lack emotional stability and in considering these things I apply practical intelligence
coming to the resolution that adoption will be best for the baby and myself (Berger 450).
The adoption encourages me to place emphasis in achieving and reassesing identity. In
regards to religious identity I acquire the ability to separate spirituality from religion and
aim to make this my focus, I continue to find myself content with my vocational identity,
my political identity reflects my apparent lack of concern in political issues which has
remained constant and my gender identity is reevaluated as I seek to procure intimacy.
The crisis of intimacy versus isolation is achieved in attaining a partner whom one can
share their life with as well as self-sacrificing commitment (Berger 469). I begin dating a
friend Dirk who assisted me emotionally during my pregnancy, several months into our

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relationship we decide to cohabitat. After three years I begin to feel security and
assurance in my personal achievement of intimacy and shortly after making this
assessment I find myself pregnant. Tyler is not pleased and responds to the news by
stating, You need to either have an abortion or give it up, Im not meant to have a kid
and Im not going to. I look at him and firmly retort, Well Dirk those arent options I
am willing to consider and if you dont want to be involved no one is going to make you,
I am perfectly capable of doing this on my own. I walk out the door and refrain from
looking back. I cant deny the disappointment and fear that I feel but compared to my
first pregnancy there are more positive factors in my favor as I have health insurance, I
am financially stable, my ability to deal with problems has improved, I am surrounded by
positive influence and Ive overcome substance abuse. While I remain estranged from my
biological family with the exception of my sister Alexandria, the friends within my social
convoy have welcomed me as fictive kin within their families, even coaxing the younger
children to refer to me as Aunt Carolina (Berger 473). Several hours after leaving I return
home to find that Dirk and all of his belongings are gone. It sinks in that I will enter into
the stage of generativity versus stagnation alone, as I will become a single mother raising
a child on my own, providing them with emotional and financial support, mentoring and
teaching them (Berger 464). During my pregnancy I prepare for the flexibility and
compromise to come. I work as a CNA in the alzheimer unit and I continue working
throughout the duration of my pregnancy, my job requires patience and empathy and I
would like to think that my role as a caregiver would prepare me for motherhood but I try
not to disillusion myself as I realize that work is different from parenthood. One of my
biggest fears is that I will carry out the concept of linked lives, reflecting family patterns

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and carrying out similar approaches to parenting (Berger 421).

Before I know it I am the mother to a daughter, Audrey. She is beautiful and I
love her immensely but she has a difficult temperament that becomes a stressor. Stressors
accumulate as I work full time and serve as both her mother and father. Life revolves
around work and parenthood. Relationships with friends are distant and my lack of
intimacy causes me to feel isolation. After a couple of years become comfortable with the
idea of dating and I allow my friend to set me up on a date with her friend McKay.
Instantly we hit it off and we relate on our ecological niches as we are both single
parents, spiritual, with similar life goals. Together we enroll in college and encourage
each other to go beyond comfort. College enhances my critical thinking and I begin to
apply it within my life, it is what pushes me to forgive my parents and pursue a
relationship as I begin to look through new perspectives, attain my own self-worth and
self-esteem. After two years we get engaged, followed by our marriage a year later.
Mckay and I find frustration in our roles as step-parents but also happiness. We exert
caution in our reactions to unacceptable behavior with Aubrey and Cassie, we also strive
to remain realistic in our expectations as overreaction towards them could destroy
relationships (Berger 483).
Finishing college relieves stress, brings about financial gain, as well as intrinsic
rewards which had once been rare. As our circumstances have changed we discuss having
a baby but find ourselves quickly discouraged as we now have unruly, emotional teenage
daughters and soon we will mostly likely become the caretakers our parents. As we do
find ourselves to be a part of the sandwich generation our daughters still live at home,
seek emotional support and require our financial support, while our parents hint at their

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needs for more emotional support and fish for our help around their homes. Their
mortality becomes more apparent (Berger 485). Dad is the first to go and I approach his
death with normal grief as I find myself in denial struggling to accept the absence of his
existence, feeling sorrow, crying at random and eventually coming to its acceptance
(Berger 592). Mckay and I assume many of the financial obligations of mom while she
lives with my sister Alexandria. There is tension and discontent between our other
siblings who claim to be too busy and financially strapped to help.
As we grow, our parents grow, our children grow, they have children of their own
and we become grandparents. We are compassionate grandparents, we love our
grandchildren. We love spoiling them and entertaining them but we are careful to not be
intrusive or overly involved (Berger 556, 557). As I look in the mirror reflecting thinning
hair, liver spots, thinning skin and wrinkles my aging is more than evident. I attempt to
slow my senescence through nutrition, exercise, crossword puzzles and encourage Mckay
to do the same. I also make a conscious effort to disregard ageist assumptions which is
harder to do than one would think. I had never really considered that I would one day
become a victim of ageism or that I would have to recognize when I subconsciously
accepted ageist assumptions. As ageism can become a self-fulfilling prophecy its
important to implement mind over matter and exercise independence whenever possible
(Berger 500, 501). I find myself within Ericksons last stage of conflict, integrity versus
despair achieving integrity as I reflect on my past I regret nothing in life, find value
throughout, continue to seek wisdom and find contentment with death (Berger 537). My
relationship with Mckay has been long term as we have been married for 56 years and
our happiness as well as the quality of our relationship has improved, everyday we still

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kiss and every night we go on sunset walks. One particular evening at the end of one of
our walks I trip as i am walking up the stairs, I hit my head logging a piece of my skull
into my brain resulting in my death.

References:

Berger, K. (2014). Invitation to the life span (Second ed.).