Developmental psychology is concerned with how we develop, interact, how our cognitive ability changes and how our biological make up changes occurs during our lifetime. The following project is a qualitative analysis of three semi-structured interviews by three different interviewers of a middle aged couple, which aims to study how their life experiences and how their environment have contributed to their own development. The research has shown that influences can limit and enable development, and a persons own life experience will also affect the influence that they have on future generations.
Introduction Through this project I will investigate the topic of lifespan development, examining how we change over a life time and particularly how our personality develops, our social interactions, cognitive changes as we mature and how biological changes affect us. Lifespan psychologists consider human development as a transaction between the individual and their environment. This is the main idea behind developmental contextualism which suggests that development is affected by the whole of a person’s life.
There has been previous research conducted surrounding lifespan development, one researcher Bronfenbrenner (1993) suggested that development results from a person interacting with his/her environment, he uses an ‘ecological theory of development’ where a ‘macrosystem’ (containing several subsystems – ‘microsystem’, ‘mesosystem’ and ‘exosystem’) is used to characterize a cultural or social structure and how their interaction influences a persons development.
A microsystem refers to the social, symbolic and physical nature of the immediate environment. A mesosystem contains two or more microsystems which the same person inhabits (a workplace and family setting for example). An exosystem describes links that take place between two or more settings, at least one which is inhabited by the person (which has indirect influence on the persons social development (eg a partners job). Development research suggests that a large influence is that which occurs socially, with relationships with others.
These may be horizontal relationships (those with equal power or vertical relationships (one person has more knowledge or power than the other). Horizontal relationships occur between friends, siblings, colleagues and peers. Vertical relationships are those between a parent and a child, siblings and teacher/student. However these definitions are not fixed and can alter dependant on the situation. Within a marital relationship there could be an unequal power distribution and this could vary during the relationship
Attachment theory describes how early relationships with parents impact on other relationships throughout life. We ‘seek proximity’ and a ‘secure base’ with people that we are attached to emotionally, when these bonds break down many people seek psychological help. Psychologists from various backgrounds try to explain the importance of emotional bonds through attachment theory. It is believed that attachment styles are formed during infancy from first relationships with caregivers, these could define a persons style within all future relationships, but are necessarily fixed.