Phase 2

SUMMARY
The second module deals with the developmental aspect of a child, how a child physically, mentally,
cognitive wise, language, socially and sexually develops as a healthy human being. It is important to
know the normal developmental milestones in order to detect the deviations. The children with
developmental disorders have either missed some of them or have delayed development.
The “physical child” focuses on the physical, brain, central nervous system and motor development of a
child. In case of mental retardation, it is very common to observe delays in physical development as it
affects the overall growth and development and results in deficit in adaptive behaviour. Again, the
children with autism may have some “pruning” issues in the synapses.
The “Thinking Child” deals in details with Piaget’s Cognitive developmental theory, how cognition
matures in a child. Piaget has considered the child as an active agent in the process and explained
schemes like assimilation, accommodation and equilibration via which the entire development takes
place with exposure. The developmental stages as per the age of child have been explained. Though the
entire theory is not above criticism but this gives quite a clear perception of how a “thinking child”
evolves gradually.
The language development section highlights the milestones, the pre-linguistic phase, the babbling
phase, the first word phase, the phrase level, the sentence phase etc. The parents should be keeping a
proper record of these milestones and the teachers can later on work on it if something has been missed
or delayed in a child. Language is a very important aspect as far as intervention of children with
developmental milestones are concerned as most of them across the spectrum lack proper
communication skills as per their age, both verbal and non- verbal.
Erikson’s psycho-social theory highlights the development of self identity in a child through various
phases and conflicts. If a child can overcome the conflict in a positive manner, he or she will develop
positive attributes or ego quality in that particular phase and move one step forward towards “ego
integrity” or self identity. Each phase will pose certain challenges and one has to deal with it in order to
emerge as a socially healthy being.
Lastly, Freud’s psychosexual stages are important to know as Freud himself explains that aggression and
sex are the two primary and primitive drives which form the basis of personality pattern in an individual.
So, it is equally important to determine that a child is having normal psychosexual stages or a child is
developing normally as a sexual being so that he or she can function as a healthy adult in the long run.
Thus, the entire section is on the milestones a physical, thinking, social and sexual being must achieve in
order to have an overall healthy development. If one of these aspects gets affected, then the functional

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No part of this course can be used in any format other than personal study purpose.

level of an individual gets affected. Psychology research works support and has strong evidences that
personality disorders and mental illnesses have their strong base at failing to resolve conflicts in one or
more than one stages Erikson or Freud have been talking about.
The Physical Child
A. The Brain and Nervous System

• The brain develops in spurts. Several short spurts occur in the first years, followed by
longer periods of growth at about ages 4, 6, 10, 13 and 17.
• In most parts of the brain, dendritic and synaptic development (the process of synapse
formation) reaches its first peak between 12 and 24 months, after which there is a
“pruning” of synapses. Periods of synaptic growth followed by pruning of redundant
pathways continue to occur throughout childhood and adolescence.
• Myelination (the process by which an insulating layer of a substance called myelin is
added to neurons) of nerve fibers also occurs rapidly in the early years but continues
throughout childhood and adolescence. Brain structures that are critical to memory and
other forms of complex information processing become myelinated later in childhood.
• Significant changes in brain lateralization (the process through which brain functions are
divided between the two hemispheres of the cerebral cortex) happen in early childhood.
Handedness is weakly related to brain lateralization, but the association between the two
is poorly understood at the present time.
B. The Endocrine and Reproductive Systems

• The physical changes of adolescents are triggered by a complex set of hormonal changes,
beginning at about age 8. Very large increases in gonadotrophic hormones, which in turn
trigger increased production of estrogen and testosterone, are central to the process.
• In girls, sexual maturity is achieved in a set of changes beginning as early as age 8 or 9.
Menarche occurs relatively late in the sequence. Boys achieve sexual maturity later, with
the growth spurt occurring a year or more after the start of genital changes.
• Variations in the rate of pubertal development have some psychological effects. In
general, the children whose physical development is markedly earlier or later than they
expect or desire show more negative effects than do those whose development is “on
time”.


C. Other Body Systems
• Changes in the height and weight are rapid during the first year and then level off to a
steady pace until adolescence, where a sharp growth spurt occurs.
• Bones increase in number in some joints (e.g. the wrist) but decrease in quantity in others
(e.g. the skull). Bone hardening or ossification, contributes to development of motor
skills.
• Muscle tissue increases primarily in density and lengthy of fibers, with a much larger
increase at adolescence for boys than for girls. Fat cells are added in the early years and
then again rapidly at adolescence, in this case more for girls than for boys.
• Children of 6 or 7 have confident use of most gross motor skills, although there are
refinements still to come. Fine motor skills needed for many school tasks are not fully
developed until some time in the elementary school years.
The Thinking Child
A. Cognitive Development: Structure and Process- Piaget
Piaget assumed that the child was an active agent in his own development, constructing his own
understandings and adapting to the environment through his actions on the world. Cognitive
structures called schemes underlie the stages of cognitive development.
Schemes change through the process of assimilation and accommodation:
Assimilation: the part of the adaptation process proposed by Piaget that involves absorbing new
experiences or information into existing schemes. Experience is not taken in “as is”, however,
but is modified (or interpreted) somewhat so as to fit the pre-existing schemes. Piaget would say
that when a baby handles a decorative glass ball in the same way she learned to manipulate a
rubber ball, she has assimilated the ball to her ball handling scheme. Thus assimilation is an
active process.
Accommodation: The part of the adaptation process proposed by Piaget by which a person
modifies existing schemes as a result of new experiences or creates new schemes when old ones
no longer handle the data. The baby who grasps a glass ball for the first time will respond to the
slipperiness of the surface, compared to what she expected based on her experience with rubber
balls and will accommodate her ball handling scheme. The process of accommodation is the key
to developmental change.


Equilibration: The third part of the adaptation process proposed by Piaget, involving a periodic
restructuring of schemes to create a balance between assimilation and accommodation. For e.g. a
scientist wants to have a theory that will make sense out of every observation, one that has
internal coherence. When new research findings come along, she assimilates them into her
existing theory: if they don’t fit perfectly, the scientist makes modifications (accommodations) in
the theory so that it will assimilate information that previously did not fit. However, if enough
non confirming evidence accumulates, the scientist may have to throw out her theory altogether
or change some basic theoretical assumptions, either response is a form of equilibration.
Conflict between a child’s existing schemes and his observations of the world lead to actions that
eventually result in resolution of such conflicts, or equilibration, as Piaget called the process.
Each stage of development represents a more adaptive equilibration. Equilibration interacts with
maturation, social transmission, and experience to produce changes in children’s thinking.
B. The stages:
1. Piaget’s first stage is the sensori motor period (from birth-18 months)
The infant begins with a small repertoire of basic schemes, from which she moves toward
symbolic representation in a series of six sub stages. Post Piaget studies show infants’ memory
skills to be far more advanced than Piaget thought. Infants can imitate in the earliest weeks but
do not show deferred imitation for several months.
Substage Age Piaget’s Label Characteristics

1 Birth- 1 month reflexes Use of inbuilt reflexes
such as sucking,
looking, no imitation,
no ability to integrate
information from
several sources
2 1- 4 months Primary circular Accommodation of
reactions basic schemes-
grasping, looking,
sucking. Beginning
coordination of
schemes from
different senses such
as looking toward a
sound. Baby does not
yet link bodily actions


to some result outside
the body.
3 4- 8 months Secondary circular Baby becomes much
reactions more aware of events
outside his own body
and makes them
happen again in trial
and error learning.
Imitation may occur.
Beginning of the
understanding of the
object concept.
4 8-12 months Coordination of The baby not only
secondary schemes goes after what she
wants, she may
combine two schemes
to do so such as
knocking a pillow
away to reach a toy.
Imitation of novel
behaviors occurs.
5 12-18 months Tertiary circular Experimentation
reactions begins. Infant tries out
new ways of playing
with or manipulating
objects. Very active,
very purposeful trial
and error exploration
6 18-24 months Beginning of Development of use
representational of symbols to
thought represent object or
events. Child
understands that the
symbol is separate
from the object.
Deferred imitation
first occurs at this
stage
2. The Pre- school years: Pre-operational period (2-6 yrs)


The child is able to use mental symbols to represent objects to himself internally. Despite this
advance the pre school age child still lacks many sophisticated cognitive characteristics. In
Piaget’s view such children are still egocentric, rigid in their thinking, and generally captured by
appearances. Post studies clarified that the pre-schoolers are much less egocentric than Piaget
thought. By age 4, children can distinguish between appearance and reality in a variety of tasks.
Pre-schoolers develop surprisingly a sophisticated Theory of Mind, i.e. ideas of how minds
work. They understand that other people’s actions are often based on thoughts and beliefs.
3. The school –aged child: Concrete Operations (6-12 yrs)
The child acquires powerful new mental tools called operations such as reversibility.
Reversibility: One of the most critical of the operations Piaget identified as part of the concrete
operations period: the understanding that actions and mental operations can be reversed. For
example, if a child understands that A is bigger than B, he also understands that B is smaller than
A.
According to Piaget, at 7 or 8 the child first grasps the principle of class inclusion, the idea that
subordinate classes are included in larger, superordinate classes. Bananas are included in the
class “fruit”, fruits are included in the class “food” and so forth.
Piaget also proposed that reversibility underlies the school- aged child’s ability to use inductive
logic. She can reason from her own experience to general principle. For example, she can move
from the observation that when you add another toy to a set and then count the set, it has one
more toy than it did before, to a general principle that adding always makes more.
The children as per Piaget are not good at deductive logic at this stage, which requires starting
with a general principle and then predicting some outcome or observation, like going from a
theory to hypothesis.
The concrete operational child is good at dealing with things he knows or can see and physically
manipulate- that is, he is good with concrete, or actual things; he does not do well with mentally
manipulating ideas or possibilities. Piaget thought that deductive reasoning did not develop until
the stage of formal operations in adolescence.
4. Adolescence: Formal Operations (12yrs onwards)
This is the fourth stage of cognitive development as per Piaget. It is characterized by the ability
to apply basic operations to ideas and possibilities as well to actual objects and by the emergence
of systematic problem solving and hypothetico- deductive logic.


Recent research reveals that many of Piaget’s descriptions of sequences of cognitive
development can be questioned. Siegler’s work shows that cognitive development is less steplike
than Piaget proposed. Children may use a variety of different strategies, varying in complexity,
on the same kind of problem. Still the repertoire of strategies does become more complex with
age. The Language Development
A. Theories:
• The environmental theories focus on the fact that the language development of a child depends
on the imitation. Better the verbal imitation skills of the child, more is the language
development.
• Another environmental theory supports the fact that if the child is positively rewarded or his
language development is reinforced, then the better will be the progress.
• Recent studies have given more emphasis on the helpful quality of the simpler form of parent-
to-child language called “motherese” or infant directed language and on the role of expansion
and reconstruction of the children’s sentences.
• Nativist theories assume that the child is born with a set of operating principles that focus him
on relevant aspects of language input.
• Constructivist theories hold that the child constructs language at the same time and in the same
manner as he constructs other cognitive understandings.
B. Individual & Group Differences in Language Development:
Children show differences in both vocabulary and grammar in language development due to their
genetic and environmental differences. Despite the variation children learn to speak skilfully by 5 or 6
yrs. In the initial years two styles of language development can be distinguished.
1. Referential: focusing on objects and their description

2. Expressive: focusing on words and forms or further social relationships.
The sequence of language development is usually remarkably consistent across the languages. There are
few variations like children learning Turkish do not attain the stage of two words in grammar acquisition.
The development of awareness of sound pattern is important to learn to read and write. Sound- letter
correspondence, the phoneme- grapheme connection, syllabification and comprehension of the parts
through word play is extremely necessary at the initial years of childhood.
C. The phases:
• Pre- linguistic phase: before the first word: The ability to discriminate different types of
language sounds
• An infant coos and produces babbling sounds that gradually more closely approximate the
sounds he hears and uses gestures in communicative ways.


• By 10 months of age, an infant understands 30 or more words though the verbal vocabulary is
extremely limited. The receptive develops faster than the expressive.
• The early words appear around 1 year of age.
• The first words are simple and are used for only specific objects and situations.
• Vocabulary grows slowly at first and then usually spurts in a naming explosion.
• By 16- 20 months of age, most children have vocabulary of 50 or more words.
• By 30 months of age, the average vocabulary is 600 words.
• Children continue to learn new words throughout the pre-school years and add approximately
10 words a day by the time they are ready to begin elementary school.
• Holophrase: refer to infants using single words combined with gestures, as sentences. E.g. the
utterance “ball” may mean “this is a ball” or “I want to play with ball” depending on the context.
• The first two word sentences usually appear between the ages 18-24 months. They are short,
grammatically simple and lack various inflections. But they can express agent-object, agent-
location, and object- possession relationships.
Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory
The Development of ego identity (self concept)
Age Ego quality Stage Activities

0-1 yr Hope develops Basic trust vs basic • Most
mistrust fundamental
stage in life.
• Based on
dependability
and quality of the
child’s caregivers.
• If a caregiver fails
to provide
adequate care
and love, the
child will not be
able to trust and
depend upon the
adults in his life.
2-3 yrs Will develops Autonomy vs shame • Children gaining
and doubt a bit of
independence
• Perform basic


actions
• Make simple
decisions
• Parents can help
children develop
a sense of
autonomy by
allowing the kids
to make choices
and gain control
over food
choices/toy
preference/clothi
ng selection.
4-5 yrs Purpose emerges Intiative vs guilt • Children begin to
through an ideal assert their
balance power and
control over the
world through
directing play
and other social
interactions.
• Successful feel
capable and able
to lead others.
• Failures are left
with a sense of
guilt, self- doubt
and lack of
initiative.
6-12 yrs Competence or Industry vs inferiority • Children develop
belief develops a sense of pride
in their
accomplishments
and abilities.
• Encouraged
children develop
a feeling of
competence and
belief in their
skills.
• Little or no
encouragement


will doubt their
abilities.
13-18 yrs Fidelity develops Identity vs role • Explore their
confusion independence
and develop a
sense of self.
• Proper
encouragement
and
reinforcement
can fetch a
strong sense of
self and a feeling
of independence
and control.
• Those who
remain unsure of
their beliefs and
desires will feel
insecure and
confused about
themselves and
the future.
19-25 yrs Love develops Intimacy vs Isolation • People exploring
personal
relationships.
• a/q to Erikson, it
is vital that
people develop
close, committed
relationships
with other
people.
• A strong sense of
personal identity
is important for
developing
intimate
relationships.
• Successful people
will form
relationships that
are committed


and secure.
• People with poor
sense of self will
suffer emotional
isolation,
loneliness and
depression.
26-40 yrs Care develops Generativity vs • Focus is on
stagnation career and
family.
are productive
and contribute
positively.
• Failures are
unproductive and
uninvolved.
40 above Wisdom develops Integrity vs despair • Reflecting back
on life.
will feel a sense
of integrity with
few regrets and a
general feeling of
satisfaction.
• Failures are left
with a feeling of
being wasted,
bitterness and
with many
regrets.

• The child’s emerging self-concept has several elements, including the awareness of the self as
separate from others and the understanding of self permanence which may collectively called
“subjective self” and an awareness of the self as an object in the world – the objective self. The
subjective self develops in the first year of life.
• Real self awareness and the objective self emerges in the second year.
• In the early childhood, the child begins to categorize herself in basic ways, such as by age, size,
and gender.


• Children gain an understanding of their emotions during early childhood. The ability to regulate
emotion during early childhood predicts how well children function in social settings during the
school years.
• The self concept becomes steadily more abstract in the elementary and high school years. It not
only includes actions but likes, dislikes, beliefs and more general personality characteristics.
• During adolescence, there may be a re-evaluation of the self which Erikson calls “identity crisis”.
• The child develops self-esteem at 7 or 8 yrs. Self- esteem develops out of child’s experiences
with success and failure, the value which he associates to the activities at which he succeeds or
fails, the feedback that he gets about his performance from his peers and parents.
Sigmund Freud proposed five psychosexual stages:
1. The Oral Stage: Birth- 1 Year
As per Freud the mouth, lip and tongue are the first centres of pleasures for a baby. The child’s earliest
attachment is to the person who provides the pleasure in the mouth, usually the mother. For normal
development, the baby requires some optimum level of oral stimulation, not too much neither too little.
If the optimal amount of stimulation is unavailable, then some libidinal energy may remain “fixated” on
the oral mode of gratification in future. Such an individual will have strong preferences for oral
pleasures in later life like smoking, gum chewing, nail biting, thumb sucking etc.
2. The Anal Stage: 1-3 years
As the body matures, the baby becomes more and more sensitive about the anal region. The libido now
centres on the anus. The ego has developed, the child is now aware that he has his own right and wishes
which can bring him in conflict with the demands of the outside world. As adults impose restriction on
when and where the child can defecate during potty training, the nature of the first conflict with the
authority is determined and the child’s future relationship with all forms of authority takes it shape on
the basis of this.
Early or harsh potty training leads to the development of an “anal-retentive” personality who is
obsessively tidy, punctual and respectful of authority. They can be stubborn, miser and very particular
about their possessions. It is the pleasure related to what they got from holding on to their faeces as
toddlers till their mothers ask them to perform on toilet seats.
The anal expulsive had a very liberal toilet training regime on the other hand. On adulthood they like
giving things away, they are messy, rebellious and disorganised.


3. The Phallic Stage: 3-5 years
At 4/5 yrs age, the genitals become increasingly sensitive. Children of both sexes normally begin to
masturbate at this age. In Freud’s view, one of the significant phase at this stage is Oedipus Complex.
According to Freud, in the phallic stage, the boy having discovered his penis naively wishes to use his
newfound source of pleasure to please his old source of pleasure, his mother. He becomes envious of
his father who has access over mother’s body in a way the boy doesn’t. The boy also sees his father as a
powerful and threatening figure with the power to castrate. The boy is caught between desire for his
mother and fear of his father’s power.
Most of these feelings and the conflict are unconscious. The boy does not have overt sexual feelings or
behave sexually towards his mother. But the result of the unconscious conflict is anxiety. In order to
handle this anxiety, Freud explains the boy responds with a defensive process called “identification”.
The boy incorporates the image of his father and attempts to match his own behaviour to that image.
This is how the boy not only reduces his fear from father but also imbibe some power like him. It is the
“inner father” with his values and moral judgements that serves as the core of child’s superego.
According to Freud, a parallel process occurs in girls, the Electra Complex, where the girl considers the
mother as rival and craves for sexual attention of the father. The girl also resolves her anxiety by
identification with the mother with age.
4. The Latency Stage: 5-12 years
This is a sort of resting period after the phallic stage before entering into the next major change in the
child’s sexual development. The child has already resolved the oedipal conflict and is now experiencing
the calm after the storm. At this stage one identifies himself or herself with the same sex parent, an
extension of the end of phallic stage and thus same sex peer interaction is the main characteristic of this
phase. One experiences “same sex crushes” for elders and teachers during this phase of psychosexual
development.
5. The Genital Stage: 12-18 yrs or older
The further changes in hormone and sexual organs reawaken the sexual energy in the child. At this
stage a more mature form of sexual attachment occurs. The child’s sexual objects are now people of the
opposite sex. Freud points out that not everyone matures through this stage to get into a heterosexual
love in later life. The people who do not have satisfactory oral stimulation period lack the foundation of
basic love relationship. The children who couldn’t overcome the Oedipus conflict cannot arrive at a
completely satisfactory identification with the same sex parent and thus experience difficulty in coping
with the re-arousal of the sexual energy in adolescence. And herein comes the homosexual orientation
development or some other alternatives.


Optimal development at each stage requires an environment that satisfies the needs of each period. The
baby needs sufficient oral and anal stimulation, the 4 yr old boy needs a father present to identify with,
a mother who is not too seductive. An inadequate early environment will leave a residue of the
unresolved conflicts and unmet needs which will affect the subsequent stages. Thus the first 5/6 yrs of a
child is highly crucial for the individual personality development as per Freud.


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Phase 2

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SUMMARY

The Physical Child

A. The Brain and Nervous System

B. The Endocrine and Reproductive Systems

The Thinking Child

A. Cognitive Development: Structure and Process- Piaget

Schemes change through the process of assimilation and accommodation:

Substage Age Piaget’s Label Characteristics

2. The Pre- school years: Pre-operational period (2-6 yrs)

3. The school –aged child: Concrete Operations (6-12 yrs)

4. Adolescence: Formal Operations (12yrs onwards)

1. Referential: focusing on objects and their description

Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory

The Development of ego identity (self concept)

Age Ego quality Stage Activities

Sigmund Freud proposed five psychosexual stages:

1. The Oral Stage: Birth- 1 Year

2. The Anal Stage: 1-3 years

4. The Latency Stage: 5-12 years

5. The Genital Stage: 12-18 yrs or older

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