2. Personal Development
Theorists
• Age / Stage
• Development proceeds according to a series
of stages adults pass through as they age
• Life Events
• Development coincides with major life events
such as marriage, death of spouse, etc
• Transitions
• Development marked by periods of transition
from one stage to another
4. Daniel Levinson
• Life cycle composed of 4 developmental periods
• Childhood – Adolescence (birth – age 20)
• Early Adulthood (ages 17-45)
• Middle Adulthood (ages 40 – 65)
• Late Adulthood (ages 60 – onward)
• Each transition takes 3-6 years to complete
• Concept of individuation – changing relationship
between self and the world
• Conceived of the midlife crisis
5. Carol Gilligan
• Feminist perspective on age-stage theories
• Highly critical of Levinson’s concept of “the
dream”
• Male identity build upon contrast and
separateness to primary care-giver
• Female identity based on perceptions of
sameness and attachment to primary
caregiver
6. Gilligan, con’t
• Women’s moral judgment proceeds through
three levels
• Focus on self (Level 1)
• Caring for others equated with good (Level
2)
• Caring for others and responsibility for
individual needs (Level 3)
• Two transitions
• Movement from selfishness to responsibility
• Movement from goodness to truth
7. Havighurst
Chickering and Havighurst
• Concept of the “teachable moment” when
the learning opportunity coincides with the
life task at hand
• Identified developmental tasks specific to
white, middle-class North Americans
8. Abraham Maslow
• Highest level of development is reaching self-
actualization
• Accepting of themselves and others
• Problem-centered not self-centered
• Have spontaneity
• Have had mystical or spiritual experiences
• Resist conformity to culture
• Need for privacy
• Deep relationships with a few special others
• Express creativity
9. Roger Gould
• Development is a process of
confronting layer upon layer of
childhood pain
• Development involves separation
from childhood assumptions
10. Erik Erikson
• Development occurs as demands of society
provoke struggle or crisis within the person
• Eight psycho-social stages: five in childhood
based on Freudian concepts
• Adult stages
• Intimacy
• Generativity
• Integrity
12. Neugarten
• Adult development defined by time factors
• Social time
• Development situations are not experienced as crises if
they occur “on time” as socially appropriate
• Crises come from “off time” life events when
experience differs from expectations
• Historical time – creates age appropriate norms
• Chronological age – increases ability to interpret
experience in more refined ways
13. Baltes et al.
• Normative age-graded developmental influences
• Physical maturity, commencement of education,
death of parents
• Normative, historically-determined events
• Economic depressions, wars, etc
• Non-normative influences of great impact
• Experiences unique to the individual such as
contracting rare disease, winning the lottery, etc
14. Riegel
• Individual is a changing person in a changing world
• Human development moves along 4 dimensions
• Inner-biological (maturation, health)
• Individual-psychological (self-concept, self-esteem)
• Cultural-social (rules, regulations, social rituals)
• Outer physical (natural world events)
• When any 2 dimensions are in conflict,
developmental change may occur
15. Merriam and Clark
• To be able to love and to work are the two
goals of successful adult development
• Found 3 patterns unrelated to age or
gender
• Divergent (when one is good, other is
not)
• Steady/Fluctuating (one steady, other
fluctuates)
• Parallel (love and work happiness
coincide)
17. William Bridges
• Life marked by a series of transitions
• Each individual has a characteristic way of
dealing with transitions which will be
repeated throughout life
• Three recurring events
• Endings first
• Neutral zone
• New beginning
18. Sugarman
• Change experience follows a characteristic pattern
• Immobilization – sense of being overwhelmed
• Reaction – sharp mood swings from elation to
despair
• Denial - minimizing the impact
• Letting go of the past
• Testing – exploring new options
• Searching for meaning – a conscious effort to learn
from the experience
• Integration – feeling at home with the change