{"id":280,"date":"2019-12-17T22:06:56","date_gmt":"2019-12-17T22:06:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-esc-westernciv-humandevelopment\/chapter\/m1-4-what-is-human-development\/"},"modified":"2020-01-17T00:43:18","modified_gmt":"2020-01-17T00:43:18","slug":"m1-4-what-is-human-development","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-esc-westernciv-humandevelopment\/chapter\/m1-4-what-is-human-development\/","title":{"raw":"M1 \u2013 4. What Is Human Development?","rendered":"M1 \u2013 4. What Is Human Development?"},"content":{"raw":"
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Human development is the study of human growth and change across the lifespan, from conception to death. Human development is peculiar in the social and behavioral sciences in that its primary study is on humans as organisms that grow and develop within particular human environments. Although the academic field of human development emerged relatively recently with the advent of the child study movement in the mid to late 19th century (Siege & White, 1982), people have always been intrigued by the sometimes dramatic changes that characterize human lives. As existentialist philosophers have insightfully pointed out, we are the one species that is keenly aware of our own mortality\u2014that one day our lives will end. This existential awareness of death in the human life cycle has been a frequent theme in Western literature, as poignantly expressed in the following famous passage from Shakespeare\u2019s As You Like It:<\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n

\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_103\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"231\"]\"\" William Shakespeare, 1564-1616 (the Chandos portrait<\/span>[\/caption]\r\n

All the world\u2019s a stage,\r\nAnd all the men and women merely players:\r\nThey have their exits and their entrances;\r\nAnd one man in his time plays many parts,\r\nHis acts being seven ages.\r\nAt first the infant, Mewling and puking in the nurse\u2019s arms.\r\nAnd then the whining school-boy, with his satchel\r\nAnd shining morning face, creeping like snail\r\nUnwillingly to school.\r\nAnd then the lover,\r\nSighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad Made to his mistress\u2019 eyebrow.\r\nThen a soldier,\r\nFull of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,\r\nJealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,\r\nSeeking the bubble reputation.<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

This passage also directs our attention to another important aspect of the contemporary study of human development: the attempt to identify and describe the normal predictable stages<\/em> of the human life cycle. Within this investigation of normative stages of development, scholars are concerned with both change and continuity in development and how these influences interact. The most influential stage theories include Freud\u2019s theory of psychosexual development (Renkins, 2017), Erikson\u2019s (1994) psychosocial theory of ego development and identity formation, Piaget\u2019s cognitive-developmental perspectives (Morra, Gobbo, & Marini, 2013), and beyond, to more modern interpretations such as Bronfenbrenner\u2019s (1979) ecological systems.<\/p>\r\n

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Human development is the study of human growth and change across the lifespan, from conception to death. Human development is peculiar in the social and behavioral sciences in that its primary study is on humans as organisms that grow and develop within particular human environments. Although the academic field of human development emerged relatively recently with the advent of the child study movement in the mid to late 19th century (Siege & White, 1982), people have always been intrigued by the sometimes dramatic changes that characterize human lives. As existentialist philosophers have insightfully pointed out, we are the one species that is keenly aware of our own mortality\u2014that one day our lives will end. This existential awareness of death in the human life cycle has been a frequent theme in Western literature, as poignantly expressed in the following famous passage from Shakespeare\u2019s As You Like It:<\/em><\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n

William Shakespeare, 1564-1616 (the Chandos portrait<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

All the world\u2019s a stage,
\nAnd all the men and women merely players:
\nThey have their exits and their entrances;
\nAnd one man in his time plays many parts,
\nHis acts being seven ages.
\nAt first the infant, Mewling and puking in the nurse\u2019s arms.
\nAnd then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
\nAnd shining morning face, creeping like snail
\nUnwillingly to school.
\nAnd then the lover,
\nSighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad Made to his mistress\u2019 eyebrow.
\nThen a soldier,
\nFull of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
\nJealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
\nSeeking the bubble reputation.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This passage also directs our attention to another important aspect of the contemporary study of human development: the attempt to identify and describe the normal predictable stages<\/em> of the human life cycle. Within this investigation of normative stages of development, scholars are concerned with both change and continuity in development and how these influences interact. The most influential stage theories include Freud\u2019s theory of psychosexual development (Renkins, 2017), Erikson\u2019s (1994) psychosocial theory of ego development and identity formation, Piaget\u2019s cognitive-developmental perspectives (Morra, Gobbo, & Marini, 2013), and beyond, to more modern interpretations such as Bronfenbrenner\u2019s (1979) ecological systems.<\/p>\n

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Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t
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CC licensed content, Original<\/div>