Erik Erikson's Psychosocial Development Theory ($1) Introduction Erik Erikson was a German psychologist who suffered serious identity crisis in his youthful years. His parents divorced when he wa ...

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Erik Erikson's Psychosocial Development Theory ($1)
Introduction
Erik Erikson was a German psychologist who suffered serious identity crisis in his youthful years. His parents divorced when he was a young child and he stayed with his mother. He then concluded that a need for identity is a major aspect in life. He also felt that the influence of the society on the development of personality should not be underestimated. The psychosocial development theory as articulated by Erikson explains eight stages through which a healthily developing human should pass, from infancy to late adulthood. Each stage involves a crisis that needs to be resolved. If the crisis in a given stage is not resolved, the individual continues to struggle with it and if not completed, is expected to reappear as problems in the future. Success in each stage leads to the development of a virtue and lays the foundation for resolving the crisis at the later stages.
Stage 1: Infancy (Birth to 18 months)
In this first stage, the psychosocial crisis is defined as trust versus mistrust. The child during this stage is completely dependent on adults for fulfillment of their needs. These include, attention, feeding, changing and holding. The caregivers' responsiveness and care influences the child's personality development. If the child's needs are adequately met, the child learns to trust the caregiver and this is then extended to die other people in the child's environment. Failure to respond sensitively and appropriately to the child's needs leads to the development of mistrust. Trust should predominate but the child should develop a little mistrust because not all people in the environment can be trusted and in some circumstances and situations cannot always guarantee trust. The virtue of hope is developed in this stage if the child develops trust. Therefore, if the concept of trust versus mistrust is not addressed, taught and handled during infancy, the individual may be negatively affected for the rest of their life. The person may be unable to form healthy and long-lasting relationships with others. They may then lose hope and continually struggle with overcoming hard times and failures in their life and may never fully recover from them.
Stage 2: Toddler (18 months to 3 years)
The psychosocial crisis at this stage of the development is autonomy versus doubt. During this stage the toddler discovers that he or she is no longer attached to the primary caregiver, but is a separate individual. Toddlers try to do everything for themselves, for example, feeding. They work in and between places, and force adults to do things their own way. They extend boundaries of their own world to include things and activities they are not able to do. During this stage children begin to make their own decisions and judgments. They begin to establish self-control and self-regulation and to challenge adult authority. For example, removing clothes because they are forced by their mother to put