Theories Of Individual Differences And Lifespan Development

Choose two theories of Individual differences and two theories of Lifespan development from the following list:

• Freud’s theory of personality
• Eysenck’s theory of personality
• Maslow’s theory of personality
• Spearman’s theory of intelligence

• Bowlby’s theory of attachment
• Vygotsky’s theory of cognitive development
• Kohlberg’s theory of moral development
• Chomsky’s theory of language acquisition

Freud’s Theory of Personality

Psychology can be defined as the science of mind and behavior, including unconscious and conscious phenomena, as well a thought and feeling. Individual differences are chronic tendencies or psychological traits that convey internal causality, a sense of consistency and personal distinctiveness. There are a number of theories which are based on these human differences. On the other hand, life- span development theory provides a framework for understanding the ageing in humans. This report focuses on two individual differences theories (Freud’s Theory of Personality and Eysenck’s Theory of Personality) and two lifespan development theories (Bowlby’s theory of attachment and Kohlberg’s theory of moral development) along with their evaluation with two pieces of research.

Description of Theory

The Freud's theory of personality contain three elements namely the id, the ego and the superego. All these elements work together for the purpose of creating complex human behaviors. Each of these components is responsible for adding its unique contribution to personality along with interacting in a way such that it has a powerful influence on every individual.  However, the emergence of these three elements takes place at different points in the life of an individual. According to Frued’s theory, there are specific aspects of the personality that are more primal and therefore pressurize an individual for acting upon the most basic urges. The remaining parts of the personality work for counteracting these urges and striving themselves for conforming to the demands of the reality (Schultz and Schultz, 2016).

The Id- This is the one and only element of personality which exists in an individual right from the birth. However, this aspect is completely unconscious and includes the primitive and instinctive behaviors. The id has been regarded as the source of all psychic energy by Frued which, in turn, makes it a primary component of personality.  The driving factor of id is pleasure principle, which struggles for immediate satisfaction of all wants, desires and needs (LeVine, 2018).

The Ego- This component of personality performs the function of dealing with the reality. According to Frued, the id is responsible for the development of the ego, which ensures that expression of the instincts of id can be done in a mode which is suitable in the real world. The functioning of ego takes place in preconscious, conscious and unconscious mind.

The Superego- The superego is the last component of personality and is that aspect which holds all the internalized moral ideals and standards which are acquired by the individuals from both society and parents. In other words, it is the sense of right and wrong. Guidelines are provided by the superego for the purpose of making judgments. Furthermore, the emergence of superego takes place around the age of five (Ewen and Ewen, 2014).

The evaluation of the Freud’s Theory of Personality provides that the personality of an adult comprises of entire childhood experiences and is based on the manner in which these experiences have been unconsciously and consciously processed within the human developmental stages. The necessary tasks of every developmental stage are not completed by each person. This can be the result of the mental condition which requires psychoanalysis for the achievement of proper functioning. The id is placed in the forefront decision making due to a number of mental illnesses. According to the theory, the neurotic person is mostly affected as a result of the principles of the theory. The personality structures proposed by Freud are assumed to be in constant conflict with each other. Many of the concepts adopted by Freud are without any scientific support, environmental and social influence (Willmott, Ryan, Sherretts, Woodfield and McDermott, 2018).

Evaluation

The criticism of the theory is based around the fact that the Freud formulated the theory of personality development on the study of abnormal individuals. Since the theory is not scientific, it is often regarded as unreliable by the critics. However, the theory can be regarded as strong as it takes into account various aspects of human behavior and is therefore universally applicable. Freud’s theory of personality development has sparked and endured much further research into the personality development area. This research and ideas are often used by the feminists for gender development.  Freud’s theory provides that when the social standards are incorporated within an individual, it is experienced in the form of conscience. This is the point of time which shapes the personality of an individual. Moreover, during the entire lifespan of the individual, no other psychological structures emerge. Until death, these three structures will regulate the psychological life.  (Abu- Raiya, 2014)

Description of Theory

Eysenck’s theory of personality is grounded on the basis of biological factors and argues that a type of nervous system is inherited by the individuals due to which their learning and adaptation to the environment abilities is affected. According to Eysenck, people have two particular personality dimensions namely extroversion vs. introversion and neuroticism vs stability. Later on, a third dimension was supplemented in the model namely psychoticism vs. socialization. This theory provides that people with high extroversion are friendly and are ready to associate with others, on the other hand, people with high introversion always engage in solitary behaviors and have a high need to be alone and therefore, limit their communications with others (Eysenck, 2017).

In the neuroticism/ stability dimension, individuals with high neuroticism have a sympathetic nervous system and are more anxious and therefore their emotive state and bodies lean towards a flight-or-fight reaction. On the other hand, people with high stability, requires more stimulation for activating their flight-or-fight reactions which, in turn, makes them more emotionally stable (Eysenck, 2017).

In the psychoticism/ socialization dimension, individuals with high psychoticism are impulsive, cold, autonomous thinkers, antisocial, unconventional and unreceptive. On the other hand, people with high socialization are expected to have high instinct control and therefore they are empathetic, selfless, conventional and supportive (Eysenck, 2017).  

This theory suffers from certain weaknesses in respect of the research and measurement. Eysenck pointed out that diverse system of cortical arousal are activated in diverse people. In other words, there is no certainty regarding which arousal system will be activated in a specific individual at a specific point of time. Another arsea of uncertainty is associated with the attribution of connectedness while trying to recognize the reasons behind the response of particular person under given conditions. The assumptions made under Eysenck’s personality theory are similar to Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory. The theory was capable of inspiring several generations of researchers but has certain limitations as well. These limitations are on account of cognitive processing and individual differences in performance which are linked with personality traits. The specific areas of concern are complex processing handling, neglected adaptive significance of traits, etc. (Matthews, 2016).The theory is heavily based on learning theory methodology and concepts. There was lack of exposure to patients and lack of clinical experience which, in turn, made him result in conclusions that are out of the clinical reality. This can be explained in the form of an over simplistic view regarding the connection between psychological disorders and personality (Claridge, 2016).

Eysenck’s Theory of Personality

Description of Theory

The Bowlby’s theory of attachment emphasizes on the significance of a safe and unquestioning bond between a mother and an infant on the well- being and development. Attachment can be defined as the long lasting psychological association with a important individual that results in pleasure while networking at the time of stress. The attachment theory recognized the emotional tie of an infant to the caregiver as a reaction that supports endurance. This idea was applied in the context of infant- caregiver bond. The theory does not consider feeding as the origin for attachment. The dominant theme of the theory is that that the mothers who are responsive and available for the needs of their infants are able to form a feeling of security in their children. In other words, the attachment must act in the form of a foundation of being capable of forming other secure relationships. The infants are aware about the fact that the caregiver is reliable which, in turn, generates a protected base for the child for exploring the globe. The equipped behaviors of babies are cooing, crying, babbling and smiling for the purpose of ensuring the adult attention. Moreover, the adults are also biologically programmed for responding to infant signals. The four phases of attachment according to the theory are pre- attachment phase (from birth to 6 weeks), “attachment of making” phase (6 weeks – 6 to 8 months), “clear cut” attachment phase (6-8 Months to 18 Months-2 Years) and formation of reciprocal relationship phase (18 Months – 2 Years and on).  The different styles of attachment are avoidant attachment, secure attachment, disorganized/ disoriented attachment and resistant attachment (Holmes, 2014).

The attachment theory of Bowlby is based on enormous body of research along with some conceptual elaborations. The theory provides that many adaptive advantages are provided by the adaptive security during every stage of life; however, there are a number of studies that indicate that approximately half of the human species are insecure with respect to attachment or are insecurely attached. The research further provides that differences in personality and attachment orientation have significant implications on adaptation in different life domains, which is mostly neglected by the attachment researchers (Ein- Dor, 2014).  The assumption of Bowlby further provides that it is the physical separation that results in deprivation; on the other hand, some researchers argue that it is not physical separation rather it is disruption of attachment. Bowlby’s work further provided that mother is the central care giver and therefore, care should be provided to the child on continuous basis which, in turn, imply that mother should not go for work. However, mothers are caregivers in only a small percentage of society, there are relatives and friends in various cases who are involved in care of children.  

The attachment theory has observed only a single attachment style as adaptive and has branded others maladaptive. Certain researches have taken places which address the probability that there are probable adaptive benefits of insecure attachment styles under particular environment conditions (Ein-Dor and Hirschberger, 2016).

Evaluation

Kohlberg’s theory of moral development is inspired by Piaget’s work. There are six stages of moral development as per the Kohlberg’s theory of moral development which is further separated into three levels namely pre- conventional, conventional and post- conventional (Crain, 2015).

Pre-Conventional Morality- At this level, children are only concerned with safeguarding their own interest and this is their idea of morality. This is done by way of escaping punishment and learning rapidly which, in turn, secures other benefits by pleasing others (Crain, 2015).

Conventional morality- This is the stage when children learn different authorities and rules. They further get aware that there are certain conventions which govern their behavior and they are required to learn obeying them. This stage does not make any distinctions between legal principles and moral principles. This level is divided into two stages, first is where children are concerned with safeguarding the favor of others along with pleasing others and second stage allows the children to extend the principle to cover the entire society (Peters, 2015).

Pre- Conventional Morality- This stage allows children to learn what is right and wrong from the moral viewpoint and what is right and wrong as per the rules. Sometimes breaking a rule is regarded as the correct thing to be done. These moral principles are utilitarian principles of mutual benefit which is closely associated with the stage of social order, but is non- authoritarian and universal in nature (Peters, 2015).

The Kohlberg’s theory of moral development has been criticized by the critics and is called an attempt for the purpose of making his own moral belief seem to be psychological facts. The theory also seems to possess a troubling normative aspect. In other words, the theory suggests certain moral reasoning which is better than that provided by others. Some studies suggest that some children of age 6 are also capable of attaining vague concepts relating to universal ethical principles and are therefore capable of distinguishing between moral and universal along with non- moral, arbitrary and conventional.  The Kohlberg’s theory further provides that the individuals belonging to every culture are progressing in moral reasoning through six separate chronological stages sequence. The codes and moral values are developed with the help of interaction between the environment and the individual. Along with this, the moral judgment are characterized according to the reasoning of the person for delinquent behavior rather than what person thinks of its content (Herzog and Einat, 2016).     

The moral development theory of Kohlberg is majorly reliant on the philosophy and rationale of the well- known Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget and American philosopher John Dewey. Obvious gender bias has been exercised in the moral development theory by Kohlberg. The individuals are presented with the moral dilemmas as it would depict the resources needed for moving upward. The individuals trying to engage in upward mobility will make the use of morality for generating the required momentum for constituting a stage change (Barron, 2015).

Conclusion

Therefore, it can be concluded that Psychology is the science of mind and behavior, including unconscious and conscious phenomena, as well a thought and feeling. This report focused on Freud’s Theory of Personality, Eysenck’s Theory of Personality ,  Bowlby’s theory of attachment and Kohlberg’s theory of moral development along with their evaluation with two pieces of research. Freud’s Theory of Personality and Eysenck’s Theory of Personality are the theories of individual differences while Bowlby’s theory of attachment and Kohlberg’s theory of moral development are the theories of lifespan development.

References

Abu- Raiya, H., 2014. Western psychology and Muslim psychology in dialogue: Comparisons between a Qura’nic theory of personality and Freud’s and Jung’s ideas. Journal of religion and health, 53(2), pp.326-338.

Barron, K., 2015. A conceptual analysis of cognitive moral development and voice behavior in an organization. International Journal of Business & Public Administration, 12(2).

Claridge, G. 2016. Hans Eysenck's contribution to our understanding of personality and psychological disorders: A personal view. Personality and Individual Differences, 103 (2016), pp.93-98.

Crain, W., 2015. Theories of Development: Concepts and Applications: Concepts and Applications. Psychology Press.

Ein- Dor, T.  2014. Attachment dispositions and human defensive behavior. Personality and Individual Differences, [Online]. Available at: https://sci-hub.tw/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2014.09.033 [Accessed on: 17 December 2018].

Ein-Dor, T. and Hirschberger, G., 2016. Rethinking attachment theory: From a theory of relationships to a theory of individual and group survival. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 25(4), pp.223-227.

Ewen, R. and Ewen, R.B., 2014. An introduction to theories of personality. Psychology Press.

Eysenck, H., 2017. The biological basis of personality. Routledge.

Herzog, S. and Einat, T., 2016. Moral judgment, crime seriousness, and the relations between them: an exploratory study. Crime & Delinquency, 62(4), pp.470-500.

Holmes, J., 2014. John Bowlby and attachment theory. Routledge.

LeVine, R.A., 2018. Culture, behavior, and personality: An introduction to the comparative study of psychosocial adaptation. Routledge.

Matthews, G. 2016. Traits, cognitive processes and adaptation: An elegy for Hans Eysenck'spersonality theory. Personality and Individual Differences, 103(2016), pp. 61-67.

Peters, R.S., 2015. Moral Development and Moral Education (Routledge Revivals). Routledge.

Schultz, D.P. and Schultz, S.E., 2016. Theories of personality. Cengage Learning.

Willmott, D., Ryan, S., Sherretts, N., Woodfield, R. and McDermott, D., 2018. Motivation: A Critical Consideration of Freud and Rogers’ Seminal Conceptualisations. Polish Psychological Bulletin, 49(2), pp.229-234.