16.10.2020

Problems of periodization of mental development of personality. The problem of periodization of mental development. E. Erickson. Classification Features

The problem of age in psychology. Categories: age, height, development. Regulatory status of the age category, the concepts of acceleration and deceleration. The main structural components of age.

Developmental psychology is a special branch of knowledge. Considering the process of child development, she gives characteristics of different age periods and operates with such concepts as "age" and "childhood".

Age concept ambiguous and includes a number of aspects. First of all, they distinguish:

1. Chronological age is determined by a person’s life expectancy (according to the passport);
2. Biological age - a set of biological indicators, the functioning of the body as a whole.

3. Psychological age - a certain level of mental development, which includes: mental age (intelligence indicator); psychosexual age (level of erotic interests); recreational age (spending free time).

In real life, the individual components of age do not always coincide. Psychological age may not be the same as an individual child's chronological age as recorded on their birth certificate and subsequently in their passport.

There is another approach to the concept of age:

Age or age period is a cycle of child development that has its own structure and dynamics.

The age period has certain boundaries. But these chronological boundaries can shift, and one child will enter a new age period earlier, and another later. The boundaries of adolescence, associated with the puberty of children, “float” especially strongly.

Child psychology differs from any other psychology in that it deals with special units of analysis - this is age, or the period of development. It should be emphasized that age is not reduced to the sum of individual mental processes; it is not a calendar date. Age, according to L. S. Vygotsky’s definition, is a relatively closed cycle of child development, which has its own structure and dynamics. The duration of an age is determined by its internal content: there are periods of development and, in some cases, “epochs” equal to one year, three, five years. Chronological and psychological ages do not coincide. Chronological or passport age is only a reference coordinate, that external grid against the background of which the process of mental development of the child, the formation of his personality, takes place.

Acceleration or acceleration (from Latin acceleratio - acceleration) - accelerated development of a living organism. Commonly used to describe accelerated physiological development in humans

Height- quantitative aspect of development processes. The main difference between development and growth: growth comes down to quantitative changes, and development is characterized by qualitative transformations, the emergence of new formations, new mechanisms, processes, structures.
Development- the process of transition from one state to another, more perfect one, the transition from an old qualitative state to a new qualitative state, from simple to complex, from lower to higher.
Development of the psyche is a natural change in mental processes over time, expressed in their quantitative, qualitative and structural transformations.
It is important to distinguish between the concepts of development and maturation. For a number of foreign theories of developmental psychology, maturation is the most important development factor that causally determines certain achievements.

The problem of age in psychology. Periodization of mental development.

Periodization—the division of ontogenesis into separate periods in accordance with a law common to all ontogenesis—is a problematic field in childhood psychology. L.S. Vygotsky in his work “The Problem of Age” (1932-1934) analyzes ontogenesis as a regular process of changing stable and critical ages. The scientist defines the concept of “age” through the idea of the social situation of development - a specific, unique relationship between the child and the reality around him, primarily social. Social situation of development, according to L.S. Vygotsky, leads to the formation of age-related neoplasms. The relationship between these two categories—the social situation of development and new formation—sets the dialectical nature of development in ontogenesis. The idea of the social situation of development is meaningfully revealed in the theory of activity, represented by the names of A.N. Leontyeva, S.L. Rubinshteina, V.V. Davydova, D.B. Elkonina.

When defining the concept of “age” A.N. Leontiev notes: “A change in the place occupied by a child in the system of social relations is something that should be noted when trying to answer the question about the driving forces of the development of his psyche.” In the works of A.N. The Leontief stage of personality development is determined by the following points: the child’s place in the system of social relations and the leading type of activity.

In the cultural-historical theory (L.S. Vygotsky), age is determined by the relationship between the social situation of development and new formations (the structure of personality, consciousness), and in the theory of activity - by the relationship of the child’s place in the system of social relations and leading activity.

In 1971 in the article “On the problem of periodization of mental development in childhood” by D.B. Elkonin generalizes ideas about the driving forces of child development, based on activity theory. The condition for development is the “child-society” system, in which D.B. Elkonin distinguishes two subsystems: “the child is a social adult” and “the child is a public object.” For the first time, age is presented consistently in the logic of the activity approach. When studying the problems of age-related periodization of development, modern domestic psychology is based on several basic principles:

1. The principle of historicism, which allows us to consistently analyze the problems of child development that arose in different historical periods of time.

2. The biogenetic principle, which allows us to systematically study the most important problems of child development, taking into account the interrelations of the driving forces and factors of mental development in each age period.

3. The principle of analyzing the development of the main aspects of human life - the emotional-volitional sphere, intelligence and behavior.

Let us outline the main problems of age-related periodization of mental development:

1. The problem of organic and environmental conditioning of human mental and behavioral development.

2. The influence of training and upbringing on the development of children.

3. Correlation of inclinations and abilities.

4. Comparative influence of evolutionary, revolutionary, situational changes in the child’s psyche and behavior.

5. The relationship between intellectual and personal changes in the general psychological development of the child.

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The problem of periodization of mental development in childhood and early adolescence. Views of L. S. Vygotsky on the periodization of mental development. Modern periodizations of child personality development by A. V. Petrovsky, D. I. Feldshtein. Age crises. Sensitive periods in child development.

The periodization of mental development in childhood is a fundamental problem of developmental psychology. D. B. Elkonin wrote that its development has important theoretical significance, since through determining periods of mental development and through identifying patterns of transitions from one period to another, the problem of the driving forces of mental development can be solved. The strategy for building a system of education and training for younger generations largely depends on the correct solution to the problem of periodization. Dividing a child’s life path into periods allows us to better understand the patterns of child development and the specifics of individual age stages. The content (and name) of periods, their time boundaries are determined on the basis of criteria that the authors of periodizations consider the most important and significant aspects of development.

In the process of ontogenesis - from birth to adulthood - a person goes through several age periods, or stages, which have their own characteristic features. And the first thing that should be indicated in connection with the psychological characteristics of a person at one or another stage of its development, according to A. N. Leontyev, is the place that the child objectively occupies in the system of human relations in the course of his development and under the influence of specific circumstances .

L. S. Vygotsky distinguished three groups of periodization proposed by both foreign and domestic psychologists at the beginning and first half of the 20th century.

Part I Theoretical problems of age-related psi chology

Those ma 2.

I. The first group included attempts to periodize childhood not by dividing the very course of child development, but on the basis of a “step-like” construction of other processes, one way or another connected with child development.

L. S. Vygotsky includes in this group, for example, periodizations of child development based on the biogenetic principle, where the stages of phylogenetic development are taken as a basis. For example, the concept of the American psychologist Grenville Stanley Hall.

Studying the mental development of a child, Hall came to the conclusion that it is based on the biogenetic law formulated by Darwin’s student E. Haeckel. However, Haeckel said that embryos in their embryonic development go through the same stages as the entire genus during its existence. Hall extended the effect of the biogenetic law to humans, proving that the ontogenetic development of the child’s psyche is a brief repetition of all stages of the phylogenetic development of the human psyche.

In the one he created recapitulation theories Hall argued that the sequence and content of the stages of development are determined genetically, and therefore a child cannot evade or bypass any stage of his development.

Hall's student Hutchinson based on the theory of recapitulation, he created a periodization of mental development, the criterion in which was the method of obtaining food. At the same time, the actual facts that were observed in children of a certain age were associated with Hall’s idea and explained by a change in the method of obtaining food, which is (according to Hutchinson) leading not only to biological, but also to mental development. He identified 5 main phases in the mental development of children, the boundaries of which were not rigid, so that the end of one stage did not coincide with the beginning of the next.

1. From birth to 5 years - digging and digging stage. At this stage
children love to play in the sand, make Easter cakes and manipulate
with a bucket and scoop.

2. From 5 to 11 years - hunting and capturing stage. At this stage children
begin to be afraid of strangers, they become aggressive, violent
bone, desire to isolate yourself from adults, especially strangers,
and the desire to do many things secretly.

3. From 8 to 12 years - pastoral stage. During this period, children are more
are eager to have their own corner, and they build their own
shelters are usually in courtyards or in fields, in the forest, but not in the house. They

They also love pets and try to have them so that they have someone to take care of and protect. At this time, children, especially girls, develop a desire for affection and tenderness.

4. From 11 to 15 years - agricultural stage which is associated with
interest in the weather, natural phenomena, and also with love for sado
farming, and for girls, floriculture. At this time, children appeared
Observation and prudence are required.

5. From 14 to 20 years - stage of industry and trade, or a hundred
diya of modern man. At this time, children begin to realize
explain the role of money, as well as the importance of arithmetic and other precise
Sci. In addition, the guys have a desire to change in different ways.
new items.

Hutchinson believed that from the age of 8, i.e., from the shepherd stage, the era of civilized man begins and it is from this age that children can be systematically educated, which is impossible at the previous stages. At the same time, he proceeded from Hall’s idea that learning should be built upon a certain stage of mental development, since the maturation of the organism prepares the basis for learning.

Both Hall and Hutchinson were convinced that going through each stage is necessary for normal development, and fixation on any of them leads to the appearance of deviations and anomalies in the psyche. Based on the need for children to experience all stages of human mental development, Hall developed a mechanism that helps the transition from one stage to another. This mechanism is the game.

This is how one of the proponents of the recapitulation theory describes child development V. Stern, the periodization of which can also be attributed to the first group: a child in the first months of his life is at the stage of a mammal; in the second half of the year it reaches the stage of a higher mammal - a monkey; then - the initial stages of development of primitive peoples; starting from entering school, he assimilates human culture - first in the spirit of the ancient and Old Testament world, later (in adolescence) the fanaticism of Christian culture, and only in maturity rises to the level of modern culture.

The fortunes and activities of a small child become echoes of centuries gone by. A child digs a passage in a pile of sand - he is attracted to the cave just like his distant ancestor. He wakes up in fear at night - which means he felt himself in a primeval forest, full of

Part I

Topic 2. The problem of age periodization of mental development

Dangers. Oi draws, and his drawings are similar to rock paintings preserved in caves and grottoes.

This same group, according to L. S. Vygotsky, can include periodizations of childhood in accordance with “the stages of a child’s upbringing and education,” with the division of the public education system adopted in a given country (preschool age, primary school age, etc. .).

The concept of a child's mental development, created by /!. Vallon, It is interesting because it outlines the stages of personality development.

The first forms of contact between a child and the environment are affective in nature. During this period, the child is completely immersed in his emotions, and thanks to this, he merges with the corresponding situations that cause these reactions. The child is not able to perceive himself as a being different from other people, from each individual person. The child’s behavior during this period shows that he is constantly busy with something: communicating with other children and adults, playing, constantly changing roles with his partner. But at the same time, he still cannot distinguish the actions of his playing partner from his own. For the child, all these actions remain just two parts of one whole, fitted to each other. A. Vallon illustrates this with numerous examples. Such, for example, as “ball rolling”, “peek-a-boo”, “hide and seek”.

TO three years old the fusion of child and adult, according to A. Vallon, suddenly disappears, and the personality enters a period when the need to assert and conquer one’s independence leads the child to many conflicts. Child contrasts himself to those around him, involuntarily insults them, because he wants to experience his own independence, his own existence. This crisis, according to A. Vallon, is necessary in the development of the child and if they try to smooth it out, it can manifest itself in the child in soft condescension or a certain sense of responsibility. If strongly opposed, it can lead to discouraging indifference or sneaky revenge. By winning victories too easily, the child becomes prone to self-praise, as if forgetting about the existence of others and noticing only himself. A. Vallon provides extremely interesting observations indicating that from this moment the child begins to become aware of his inner life.

The phase of opposition to the environment is followed by a phase of more positive personalism, manifested in two different periods, which are characterized by the child’s interest in himself (“age

grace") and deep, irreversible affection for people. Therefore, raising a child at this age “should be full of sympathy.” If at this age a child is deprived of attachment to people, then “he may become a victim of fears and anxious experiences, or he will experience mental atrophy, the trace of which remains throughout his life and is reflected in his tastes and will.”

Period from seven to twelve to fourteen years leads the individual to even greater independence. From now on, children, along with adults, strive to create a kind of equal society. Now the child is not assessed according to any one characteristic that gives him a permanent place in a certain group of people. On the contrary, the child constantly moves from one category to another. And this is not just a factual position, as it was before, but a position fixed in the concept and realized. The child recognizes himself as the center of various possibilities. The child’s awareness of his personality, according to A. Vallon, is in the “categorical phase.”

In adolescence, the personality seems to go beyond itself. The individual tries to find his meaning and justification in the various social relations that he must accept and in which he seems insignificant. She compares the significance of these relationships and measures herself by them. With this new step in development, the preparation for life that constitutes childhood ends.

The mental development of a child, moving from stage to stage, represents unity both within each stage and between them.

Another example is periodization Rene Zazzo. In it, the stages of childhood coincide with the steps systems for raising and educating children. After the early childhood stage (up to 3 years), the preschool stage begins (3-6 years), the main content of which is education in the family or preschool institution. This is followed by the primary school stage (6-12 years), in which the child acquires basic intellectual skills; stage of education in secondary school (12-16 years old), when he receives general education; and later - the stage of higher or university education. Since development and education are interconnected, and the structure of education is created on the basis of extensive practical experience, the boundaries of the periods established according to the pedagogical principle almost coincide with turning points in child development.

II. The second group consists of concepts that attempt to highlight one of the signs of child development (not external, but internal) as a conditional criterion for age periodization.

.. ,.,..,„. ....

Part I,

Topic 2.

This may include attempts P.P. Blonsky construct a periodization of child development based on dentition, i.e., the appearance and change of teeth. Childhood is therefore divided into three eras: toothless childhood (from 8 months to 2-2.5 years), childhood of milk teeth (up to approximately 6.5 years), childhood of permanent teeth, which ends with the appearance of the third posterior molars (teeth " wisdom").

Libidinal energy, which is associated with the instinct of life, also serves as the basis for the development of personality, human character, and, based on the patterns of its development, 3. Freud created his own periodization. He believed that in the process of life a person goes through several stages that differ from each other in the way they fix libido, in the way they satisfy the life instinct. At the same time, Freud paid great attention to exactly how fixation occurs and whether a person needs foreign objects. Based on this, he identified three large stages, breaking up into several stages.

First stage - libido-object - characterized by the fact that the child needs a foreign object to realize libido. This stage lasts up to a year and is called the oral stage. The erogenous zone is the mucous membrane of the mouth and lips. The child gets pleasure when he sucks milk, and in the absence of food - his own finger or some object. Fixation at this stage occurs if the child cannot realize his libidinal desires, for example, he was not given pacifiers. This type of personality is characterized, from the point of view Freud, a certain infantilism, dependence on adults, parents even in adulthood. Moreover, such dependence can be expressed in both conformal and negative behavior.

Second phase- libido-subject, which lasts until the onset of puberty, is characterized by the fact that the child does not require any external object to satisfy his instincts. Freud sometimes also called this stage narcissism, believing that all people who have experienced fixation at this stage are characterized by self-orientation, the desire to use others to satisfy their own needs and desires, and emotional isolation from them. The narcissism stage consists of several stages. Stages of development are associated with the displacement of erogenous zones - those areas of the body whose stimulation causes pleasure.

The stage, which lasts until about three years of age, is anal. The erogenous zone moves into the intestinal mucosa. The child not only learns certain toilet skills and begins to develop a sense of ownership. Fixation at this stage leads

to the appearance of an anal character, which manifests itself in stubbornness, often rigidity, neatness and frugality.

From three years of age the child moves on to the next phallic the stage at which children become aware of sexual differences. The genitals become the leading erogenous zone. Freud considered this stage to be critical for girls who for the first time begin to realize their inferiority due to their lack of a penis. This the discovery, he believed, could lead to later neuroticism or aggressiveness, which is generally characteristic of people fixed at this stage. This is largely due to the fact that during this period tension increases in relations with parents, primarily with the parent of the same sex, whom the child is afraid of and of whom the parent of the opposite sex is jealous. If until now children's sexuality was directed towards themselves, now children begin to experience sexual attachment to adults, boys to their mother (Oedipus complex), girls to their father (Electra complex).

Tension subsides by age six, when latent stage in the development of sexual instinct. During this period, which lasts until the onset of puberty, children pay great attention to studies, sports, and games.

The third stage is called libido-objectSo how a person needs a partner to satisfy the sexual instinct. This is the last stage characteristic of adolescence. This stage is also called genital, since in order to discharge libidinal energy a person seeks ways of sexual activity characteristic of his gender and his personality type.

III. The third group of periodization of child development, according to L. S. Vygotsky, is associated with the desire to move from “a purely symptomatic and descriptive principle to highlighting the essential features of child development itself.” This is periodization Lev Semenovich Vygotsky and Daniil Borisovich Elkonin.

L. S. Vygotsky based his periodization on two criteria: dynamic and content. From the point of view of the dynamics of development, he divided childhood into critical and lytic periods, and gave a qualitative description of crises. On these Based on this, he built the following periodization:

Newborn Crisis™;

Infancy (2 months - 1 year);

Crisis of one year; early childhood (1-3 years);

24__________________ Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

Crisis 3 years;

Preschool age (3-7 years);

Crisis 7 years;

School age (7-13 years)

Crisis 13 years;

Puberty (14-17 years);

crisis 17 years.

Stable periods make up most of childhood. They last, as a rule, for several years. And age-related neoplasms, which form so slowly and for a long time, turn out to be stable and are fixed in the structure of the personality.

L. S. Vygotsky attached great importance to crises and considered the alternation of stable and crisis periods as a law of child development. Crises, unlike stable periods, do not last long, a few months, and under unfavorable circumstances they can last up to a year or even two years. These are brief but turbulent stages during which significant developmental shifts occur and the child changes dramatically in many of his traits. Development can take on a catastrophic character at this time.

The crisis begins and ends imperceptibly, its boundaries are blurred and unclear. Exacerbation occurs in the middle of the period. For the people around the child, it is associated with a change in behavior, the appearance of “difficult to educate”, as L. S. Vygotsky writes. The child is out of the control of adults, and those measures of pedagogical influence that were previously successful now cease to work. Affective outbursts, whims, more or less acute conflicts with loved ones are a typical picture of a crisis, characteristic of many children. Schoolchildren's performance decreases, interest in classes weakens, academic performance decreases, and sometimes painful experiences and internal conflicts arise.

However, different children experience crisis periods differently. The behavior of one becomes difficult to bear, while the behavior of the other hardly changes.

The main changes that occur during crises are internal. The child's interests and values change.

From the point of view of content, L. S. Vygotsky divided childhood based on the new formations of each period, that is, from those mental and social changes that determine the consciousness and activity of children of a certain age.

Topic 2. The problem of age periodization of mental development

D. B. Elkonin uses three criteria in his periodization:

1. Social development situation- this is the one system relations, in
which the child enters into society, And That, How he is orientated in it
rushes.

2. Main, or leader, type of activity child during this period,
determining the main direction of development in one or another,
age.

3. Basic psychological neoplasms development, i.e.
an ability that develops in a child during the implementation of
leading type of activity.

D. B. Elkonin, based on the classical principles of periodization, subjected a thorough analysis to the content-objective side of activity and came to the conclusion that the process of a child’s life in society, which is uniform in nature, in the course of historical development bifurcates, splits into two sides:

Mastering the motivational-need sphere of the personality (learning
knowledge of the world of communication);

Mastering the operational and technical sphere (mastering the subject
new world).

D. B. Elkonin discovered the law of alternation and periodicity of different types of activities: at a certain stage, the child’s activity is aimed at learning about relationships with people, the type of activity is communication, then comes the stage of learning how to use objects, the type of activity is object-manipulative. Each time, contradictions arise between these two types of activity, which become the cause of development. Crises development are called transitions from one leading type of activity to another. A crisis is a unique, behavioral indication of a child’s need for change: a change in the system of relationships with adults, the emergence of a new subject of joint activity with adults, i.e., a new leading activity. Moreover, each era of child development is built on the same principle. It opens with activities in the field of communication.

Taking into account the law of periodicity, D. B. Elkonin explains the content of development crises in a new way. Yes, 3 years and 12 years - crises of relationships, followed by the formation of orientation in human relationships; 1 year And 7 years - crises that open orientation in the world of things.

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This is how D. B. Elkonin’s periodization of mental development appears in general (Table 1).

Table 1. Periodization of mental development according to D. B. Elkonin

Early childhood era (up to 3 years)

1. Infancy(before 1 of the year). The leading activity here is
emotional communication. At 2-2.5 months the child appears computer
lex revival upon the appearance of an adult: smile, motor response
tion, etc. By 6 months, this communication activity develops, the child
recognizes mom. Adults develop the child’s hand: give him a toy,
include it in communication through an object, leading to actions with
meth. By the age of one year, the child begins to develop a need for verbal communication.
nom communication.

At the border between infancy and early childhood, there is a transition to actual objective actions, to the beginning of the formation of the so-called practical, or sensorimotor intelligence.

2. Early age(actually early childhood) (1-3 years). Here
leading activity - object-manipulative. Child
opens and closes the door, pours sand, etc. He takes over
actions with a spoon, pencil, bucket, handkerchief, etc. This
operational and technical phase.

During this period of time, objective actions serve as a way for the child to establish interpersonal contacts. Communication, in turn, is mediated by the child’s objective actions and is practically not separated from them. But by the age of 3, the child begins to compare himself with adults and declare "I", "I" myself".

Topic 2. The problem of age periodization of mental development Tia

Childhood era (3-11 years old)

1. Preschool childhood (3-7 years). The desire for independence
you bring the child out password game, imitating human relationships
in the process of labor. Thanks to play techniques, the child accepts
plays the role of an adult and models their interpersonal relationships in the game
nia. Thus, role-playing game, combining communication and subject
activities, ensures their joint influence on child development
ka. He has a need to take a new social position,
and by the end of this period the child has a desire for something
to study, he wants to get the result of his activities as
grades, drawn to learning.

2. Junior school childhood(7-11 years old). This is the operational phase
technical activities, mainly educational activities. Rebbe
nok learns to read and write. In the process of learning, intelligence is formed
lectual and cognitive abilities, the system develops
the child’s relationships with others - his own practice
and relationships with other people. But the time comes and he wants to
reflect the behavior of adults; wants equal treatment.
The next era is coming.

The era of adolescence (11-17 years old)

1. Younger adolescence (11-14 years old). A new idea appears
activity - activity of intimate-personal, emotional
communication with peers, a union with equals arises
As children age, leaders emerge. There is a “feeling grown up”
"sti" is a special form of new formation of consciousness, through which
the sprout compares itself with others, finds role models,
restructures its activities and relationships.

It is important here that the child’s social circles do not go beyond the control of adults - “difficult age”, “turning point”.

2. Youth - older adolescence(14-17 years old). The child has
the need for self-knowledge reappears, the self is formed
consciousness, tasks of self-development, self-improvement are set,
self-actualization. Professional and personal
new self-determination, it is important for him to know who he will be. Leading Dey
activity - educational and professional(again operational-technical
nic phase), during which a worldview is formed,
professional interests, ideals.

D. B. Elkonin’s periodization is the most common in Russian psychology.

Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

Topic 2. The problem of age periodization of mental development

Among other modern periodizations of child development, the periodizations of A. V. Petrovsky and D. I. Feldstein deserve attention.

A. V. Petrovsky considers personality development as a process of integration in various social groups.

In the periodization of A. V. Petrovsky, the periods of early childhood, kindergarten childhood, primary school age, middle school age and senior school age are distinguished. The first three form the era of childhood, in which the process of adaptation prevails over the process of individualization. The era of adolescence (the period of middle school age) is characterized by the dominance of the process of individualization over the process of adaptation, and the era of youth (the period of high school age) is characterized by the dominance of the process of integration over the process of individualization.

Thus, according to A.V. Petrovsky, childhood is mainly the child’s adaptation to the social environment, adolescence is the manifestation of one’s individuality. Integration into society must occur in youth.

The formation of personality is determined by the characteristics of the child’s relationships with members of the reference group. The reference group is the most significant for the child compared to others; he accepts its values, moral standards and forms of behavior. At each age stage, he is included in a new social group, which becomes the reference group. First it is a family, then a kindergarten group, a school class and informal teenage associations. Each such group is characterized by its own activities and a special style of communication. It is precisely the “activity-mediated” relationship between the child and the group that influences the formation of his personality.

When a child enters a new stable group, he, first of all, adapts to it - assimilates the norms in force there, masters the forms and means of activity that its other members have. This is the first phase of personality formation in a social group - adaptation phase. It involves the child losing his individual traits. The growing contradiction between the achieved result of adaptation - the fact that he has become like everyone else in the group, and the child’s unsatisfied need for the maximum manifestation of his individual traits - gives rise to the second phase - individualization. The child begins to look for ways to express his individuality in the group. The third phase is what happens integration individuals into a group: the child retains only those individual traits that meet the needs of the group

development and one’s own need to make a significant “contribution” to the life of the group, and the group to some extent changes its norms, having adopted personality traits that are valuable for its development.

Each phase of personality development in a group has its own specific difficulties. If a child fails to overcome the difficulties of adaptation, he may develop such personal qualities as conformity, lack of initiative, timidity, and lack of self-confidence. If the difficulties of the second phase are not overcome and the group rejects the child’s individual traits, this can lead to the development of negativism, aggressiveness, and inadequately inflated self-esteem.

Disintegration in a group leads either to the fact that a child is forced out of the group, or to his isolation in a group from which he cannot leave. On the contrary, successful integration in a group of a high level of development - a team - contributes to the formation of collectivism as a personality trait.

A child can belong to prosocial and antisocial groups. In the latter case, he develops corresponding antisocial traits.

D.I. Feldshtein determines the position of the “I” in society as the main criterion for the development of a child’s personality from birth to early adolescence.

He identifies two blocks of social development of the individual. These blocks can be designated as phases of formation personality. In the first phase (from 0 to 10 years) - the phase of childhood itself - the formation of personality occurs at the level of not yet developed self-awareness. In the second phase (from 10 to 17 years) - the phase of adolescence - there is an active formation of the self-awareness of a growing person, acting in the social position of a socially responsible subject. The identified phases cover certain cycles of personality development, recording the result of this form of social development - the formation of the child’s position in the system of society and the implementation of this position.

Infancy (0-1 year). Direct emotional communication arises, which is the child’s leading activity at this age. This basic activity of the infant is determined by the very nature of man as a social being. Child in that The period is focused on establishing social contacts.

Early childhood (1-3 years). The child has a need V social behavior and at the same time lacking the ability to act socially. Moves to the fore and becomes leading pre* metal-manipulative activity, during which the child

Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

Topic 2. The problem of age periodization of mental development

masters not only the form of human communication between people, but above all the socially developed ways of using all the things around him.

Preschool age (3-6 years old). Having mastered the operational and technical side of activity in constant contacts with adults, the child goes beyond the boundaries of immediate everyday relationships. Developed play activity becomes the leading activity during this period. The game acts, firstly, as an activity in which the child’s orientation occurs in the most general, functional manifestations of people’s lives, their social functions and relationships. Secondly, on the basis of play activity, the child develops And development of imagination and symbolic function.

Junior school age (6-10 years). The leading activity becomes educational activity, that is, social activity aimed at mastering theoretical forms of thinking. This activity is characterized by the assimilation of initial scientific concepts in certain areas of knowledge; children form the basis of orientation in theoretical forms of reflecting reality. With the full development of this activity, children develop the necessary arbitrariness of mental processes, an internal plan of action and reflection on their own actions, on their own behavior as the most important features of theoretical consciousness.

Adolescence (10-15 years). Children are included in a qualitatively new system of relationships, communication with friends and with adults at school. For a child of this age, the scope of activity expands significantly, and most importantly, the nature of this activity changes qualitatively, its types and forms become significantly more complex. Teenagers participate in many different types of activities: in educational work, in socio-political, cultural and mass work, in physical education and sports activities, in organizational work, etc. Changes in the social position of a child in adolescence, his desire to occupy a certain place in life, in society, in relationships with adults are reflected in the adolescent’s sharply increased need to evaluate himself in the system of “me and my usefulness to society,” “me and my participation in the life of society.” It is this activity that becomes leading during this age period. In extensive prosocial activities, the need of adolescents to build new relationships with adults and to realize independence is most optimally satisfied.

Senior school age (15-17 years). The most important feature of this age is that here the leading activity again becomes educational activity, actively combined with a variety of labor, which is of great importance both for choosing a profession and for developing value orientations. The main psychological new development of this age is the student’s ability to draw up his own life plans, look for means of realizing them, and develop political, aesthetic, and moral ideals, which indicates a growth in self-awareness. Actively combined with socially recognized work, socially oriented educational and professional activities not only develop the cognitive and professional orientation of senior schoolchildren, but And provides a new level of their self-determination associated with the transformation of a high school student’s “internal position” (awareness of his “I” in the system of actually existing relationships) into a stable life position, according to which life plans are oriented towards the needs of society.

Concluding the conversation about the criteria for the periodization of child development, it should be noted that in each period there are optimal opportunities for the most effective formation And development of certain psychological And behavioral properties and qualities. This is the so-called age-related sensitivity, i.e. increased sensitivity for the development of this mental property. Each child in his development goes through periods of increased sensitivity to certain influences, to mastering one or another type of activity.

Thus, early childhood itself (2-3 years) is the most favorable age for the development of a child’s speech; at 5-7 years old the child is most ready to master reading; in middle and older preschool age, children enthusiastically play role-playing games And exhibit extraordinary abilities to transform; Primary school age is sensitive for the development of educational skills and abilities And etc.

It is important to note that these periods of special readiness to master special types of activity end sooner or later, and if some function has not received its development in a favorable period, then subsequently its development turns out to be extremely slow: it is difficult or completely impossible.

It is during the period of highest sensitivity that you should carry out amplification, that is, skillfully saturating age with what it requires for the development of the functions needed at this moment. But you can't use artificial acceleration(acceleration). If a 4-5 year old

Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

betsk to develop logical intelligence, it is almost impossible to achieve results. At this time, it is necessary to saturate his vocabulary, develop his imagination, imaginative intelligence.

Basic Concepts

Amplification - saturation of age with the content necessary

for the development of functions.

Acceleration - acceleration of development.

Age-related neoplasms are mental and social changes that determine the consciousness and activity of children of a certain age.

Age crises are turning points in development that separate one age stage from another.

Sensitive periods are periods of increased sensitivity for the development of a given mental property.

The social situation of development is the system of relationships into which a child enters in society, and how he orients himself in it.

Bibliography

1. Vallon A. Mental development of the child. - M., 1968.

2. Vygotsky L. S. The problem of age periodization of children
development. // Vygotsky L. S. Questions of child psychology. -
1972. № 2.

3. Kulagina!!. YU. Age-related psychology. - M., 1999.

4. Martsinkovskaya T.D. History of child psychology. - 1968.

5. Obukhova L. F. Child psychology: theories, facts, problems. -
M, 1995.

6. Shaglaeva O. A. Child psychology. - M., 2001.

7. ElkoninD. B. On the problem of periodization of mental development
I in childhood / Questions of psychology. - 1971. No. 1.

The psychoanalytic direction appeared earlier than others. His subject is human emotions and interpersonal relationships. The founder of the psychoanalytic direction and the author of the theory of psychosexual development was Sigmund Freud.

Numerous observations that Freud made led him to the conclusion that human thoughts and behavior are largely unconscious in nature. Most often they arise as a result conflict between reality-related consciousness, on the one hand, and subconscious sexual or aggressive impulses, on the other. According to Freud, these impulses (or drives) are caused by the instincts inherent in Man, and, above all, by repressed desires, the satisfaction of which is prohibited at the level of consciousness and which are repressed into the subconscious. These desires act without our knowledge and manifest themselves in slips of the tongue, mistakes, dreams, involuntary deviations from adequate behavior and can influence the choice of profession or a person’s creativity.

The origins of behavior are seen by Freud in the conflict between three psychological structures: “It”, “I”, “Super-ego”.

“It” is the most primitive component - a set of biological drives and needs, subject to the pleasure principle. This is part of the child’s hereditary baggage when he is born, first of all instincts. Sexual urges (libido) - the source of energy associated with the instinct of life exists within the “It”, in addition, the basis of the “It” includes needs

Topic 3.

In food, water, heat, etc., which are called organic, or bodily.

“I” is a mental structure guided by the principle of reality allowing him to evaluate at any moment the appropriateness or feasibility of actions motivated by the needs of the “It”. “I” takes into account the features of the situation, properties and relationships of the external world.

"Super-ego"- this structure is the bearer of moral norms and plays the role of criticism And censor. It is formed under the influence of the social environment and its prohibitions, And Every action of a person, planned by his “I” under the pressure of “It”, is assessed from the point of view of good and evil. Therefore, if the “I” decides to satisfy any need to please the “It”, but as opposed to the “Super-I”, then the “I” will experience a feeling of guilt, reproaches of conscience, a feeling of “sin”. And since the demands on the “I” from the “It”, “Super-Ego” and reality are incompatible, conflicts and tension inevitably arise, from which the personality is saved with the help of “defense mechanisms”. Freud identifies the following defense mechanisms: substitution, suppression, projection, rationalization, sublimation, etc.

Substitution - replacing an unattainable goal with another completely achievable one. So, a person who has returned from work, where he had been resignedly enduring the dissatisfaction and claims of his boss all day, kicks the dog or takes out his anger on people close to him.

Suppression - repressing desires or a conflict situation into the subconscious, “forgetting” it: “It was far away And for a long time, as if not with me.” It also develops to restrain emotions of fear, the manifestation of which is unacceptable for positive self-perception: fear of flying on an airplane, fear of public speaking, etc.

Projection - transferring one's own feelings onto other people And experiences that are unacceptable from the point of view of the “Super-Ego”. “Why don’t you love me anymore?” - such a person asks his wife, whom he subconsciously already wants to leave.

Rationalization - searching for convenient reasons to justify the inability to perform some act or, conversely, to justify unacceptable behavior. “This girl is too stupid to waste time on,” says the young man, whose advances do not evoke a response. “The grapes are green” - according to Aesop, in the fable “The Fox and the Grapes”, when the animal cannot get the berries.

Sublimation - a type of repression, one of the mechanisms due to which forbidden sexual or other instinctual

This energy is transferred in the form of activities acceptable to the person and to the society in which he lives. A favorite activity in this case is a kind of replacement for the satisfaction of mental impulses blocked in childhood.

Of course, mental defense mechanisms can only partially ease anxiety and tension until a person finds a more rational way to resolve the problem.

However, if a person resorts to psychological defense too often or distorts reality too much, a condition may develop. neurosis. Sometimes the separation from reality that occurs as a result of repression And the release of the “It” from the control of the “I” and the “Super-Ego” leads a person to “withdrawal from the world,” which is characteristic of psychosis.

So, personality, according to Freud, - it is the interaction of mutually motivating and restraining forces. In accordance with the presented ideas about the structure and genesis of the main force components of personality, Freud developed the concept of psychosexual development of the child, in which All stages of mental development are characterized by a certain way of manifestation (or non-manifestation) of libido through erogenous zones inherent in a particular age.

German-born American psychologist Eric Erickson, Having graduated from the Vienna School of Psychoanalysis and emigrated from fascist Europe to the USA, he continued to develop Freud's theory. Based on ideas about human psychosexual development in the 50s. XX century, he developed a theory that focuses on the social aspects of development, on the problems of human adaptation to the social environment.

Erikson's concept is called epigenetic, since in his views he adhered to the principle of genetic predetermination of the stages that a person necessarily goes through in his personal development from birth to old age.

The central concepts in Erikson's periodization are identity and self-identity (ego-identity). To be yourself in the eyes of significant others, including in your own eyes, acting in a variety of life circumstances - this is the “spring”, the driving force of development that underlies Erikson’s periodization.

In the process of life, the child enters into new relationships with the world, expands the radius of significant people and more or less unconsciously makes a choice and resolves crisis contradictions of this type from

wearing, which determines the direction of development at each age level. This direction can be productive, and then the child develops positive new formations that are appropriate for a given age, leading to strengthening of self-identity. But this direction can go along an anomalous line, and then destructive formations develop that destroy the sense of self-identity (integrity).

Erikson identified and described eight life psychological crises (stages of the life path) that inevitably occur in every person, while Freud’s stages 3 are not rejected, but are included in periodization at certain stages. At each stage, the child experiences a specific crisis, the essence of which is a conflict between opposing states of consciousness and psyche. If these conflicts are resolved successfully, then the crisis does not take acute forms and ends with the formation of certain personal qualities, which together make up one or another type of personality.

Like Freud, Erikson believed that only a healthy adult is able to satisfy his needs for personal development, the desires of his own “Ego” (“I”) and meet the demands of society. For example, if a person is young and healthy, then he should choose a profession that would be interesting for him and at the same time necessary for society.

The child experiences the first crisis in the 1st year of life. It is associated with the satisfaction of the basic physiological needs of the child by the person caring for him. The significant adult is the mother. With the positive development of the child, trust in people is formed.

When a child is weaned too early, as a result of the child’s neglect, mistreatment, and emotional isolation, distrust of people and withdrawal from communication arise.

The second crisis is associated with the first learning experience, with teaching the child to be clean. If significant adults - parents who understand and accept the child, help him control natural functions, he gains the experience of autonomy, gains independence and self-confidence. The child looks at himself as an independent person, but still dependent on his parents.

On the contrary, too strict or inconsistent external control develops shame and self-doubt. He feels his

maladjustment, is afraid of losing control over his own body, he develops a strong desire to hide his inferiority from others.

The third crisis corresponds to preschool childhood. This is where the child’s self-affirmation occurs. He shows curiosity and activity in studying the world around him, imitates adults, engages in gender-role behavior, constantly makes plans and tries to implement them. All this contributes to the development of a sense of initiative. With abnormal development, experiences of repeated failures form a feeling of guilt, passivity, envy of other children, depression and evasiveness, and the absence of signs of gender-role behavior.

The fourth crisis occurs at school age. Here teachers and school become significant adults. Depending on the atmosphere in the school and the methods of education, the child develops a taste for work or, conversely, a sense of his own inferiority. In the first case, hard work, a sense of duty, a desire to achieve success are formed, and skills and abilities are developed. In the case of abnormal development - avoidance of difficult tasks, situations of competition with other children, conformism, a sense of futility of the efforts made, doomed to remain mediocre throughout life.

The fifth crisis corresponds to adolescence and early adolescence. It is experienced by children of both sexes in search of identification - the assimilation of patterns of behavior of significant other people, which are, first of all, peer groups. There is an active search for oneself, life self-determination, and the solution to the question “who to be?” and experimentation in different roles. Formation of worldview. Clear sexual differentiation in interpersonal behavior. With abnormal development - confusion of roles, concentration of mental strength on self-knowledge, the desire to understand oneself to the detriment of the development of relationships with the outside world and people, shyness. Decrease in labor activity. Confusion in worldviews, negativism.

The sixth crisis - early adulthood (20-40 years) - is associated with the search for intimacy with a loved one, with whom the cycle of “work - birth of children - rest” will have to be completed and children will be provided with proper development. Satisfaction with personal life. Desire for contact with people. Significant others: friends, sexual partners, co-workers, rivals. In case of abnormal development -

Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

Topic 3. Theories of child development in foreign psychology

Avoidance of people, especially close, intimate relationships with them. Difficult character, unpredictable behavior. Misrecognition, isolation. The appearance of the first symptoms of mental disorders, allegedly arising under the influence of hostile forces.

The seventh crisis - the crisis of 40-60 years - is characterized by the development of generativity, a sense of preserving the race, expressed in interest in the next generation and its upbringing. Feeling proud of your children. This is a period of high productivity and creativity in a variety of areas. Mature, full, varied life. With abnormal development - stagnation, selfishness, self-centeredness, unproductivity at work, exceptional care for oneself, impoverishment of interpersonal relationships in the family.

The eighth crisis - aging - is the end of life's journey, and its resolution depends on how this path was passed. Summing up, a calm, balanced assessment of the past, awareness of the integrity of the life lived, its completeness and usefulness, the ability to come to terms with the inevitable, the understanding that death is not terrible. Significant others - “my kind” - all of humanity. With abnormal development - despair. A feeling of a wasted life, the meaninglessness of existence, loss of faith in oneself and others, fear of death and the inability to start life anew.

So, E. Erikson created, of course, a psychoanalytic concept about the relationship between the “I” and society, but it allows us to assess the importance of the childhood period in the entire process of personal development and provides the key to understanding this process.

People go through these 8 stages at different speeds and with different success. Unsuccessful resolution of the crisis at any of them leads to the fact that, when moving to a new stage, a person carries with him the need to resolve contradictions inherent not only in this, but also in the previous stage. However, in this case it is much more difficult.

The cognitivist direction is represented by the theories of J. Piaget, J. Bruner, L. Kohlberg, which appeared in the 60s. XX century

French psychologist Jean Piaget a new concept of intellectual development was proposed. He showed that the thinking of children differs significantly from the thinking of adults and that children are active subjects of their own mental development. J. Piaget emphasizes the fact that thinking is formed even before it becomes speech, and expresses the opinion that speech is just one of the symbolic activities that is formed in society.

in the general direction of the development of cognitive processes and giving the child the opportunity to “document” the successes achieved.

The basis of Piaget’s concept of a child’s intellectual development is the process interactions between the organism and the environment. And its main idea is that intellectual operations are carried out in the form of integral structures (or schemes). These structures are formed thanks to balance, towards which evolution tends.

From his point of view, the development of cognitive processes is the result of the individual’s constant attempts to adapt to changes in the environment that throw him out of balance and, thereby, to compensate for these changes. Thus, the main goal of rational human behavior and thinking is adaptation to the environment, and external influences force the body to either modify existing structures (or diagrams) actions if they do not meet the adaptation requirements, or develop new schemes. By schemes we mean the repeated organization of actions in typical situations.

Adaptation, according to Piaget, occurs through two mechanisms:

1) assimilation - actions with new objects in accordance
with already developed skills and abilities;

2) accommodation - the desire to change the skills themselves
in accordance with changed conditions.

J. Godefroy gives the following example: when a child is spoon-fed for the first time, he has to learn to adapt to the new situation. If the child tries to suck a spoon (assimilation), then he will soon be convinced that such behavior is ineffective, and will be forced to modify, modify the movements of the lips and tongue (accommodation), to take food from a spoon.

As a result of accommodation in the child’s psyche and behavior, the disturbed equilibrium and the discrepancy between existing skills and new conditions for performing actions is eliminated.

These processes function throughout a person's life and stimulate his cognitive development.

Piaget identified 3 main stages of a child’s intellectual development from birth to 15 years. Stages are levels (or steps)

Part I Theoretical problems of developmental psychology

developments that successively replace each other, with a relatively stable equilibrium achieved at each level.

I. Sensorimotor stage (from 0 to 1.5-2 years). It is characterized by the formation and development of sensory and motor structures, knowledge of oneself as a subject of action. The child looks, listens, touches, smells, tastes, manipulates, etc. This stage includes 6 substages.

1. Innate reflexes(0-1 month) - sucking, grasping And etc.
Caused by external stimuli and, repeated, become increasingly
more effective.

2. Motor skills(from 1 to 4 months) - grasping the bottle
with a pacifier, sucking movements at the sight of this bottle, etc.
Formed as conditioned reflexes as a result of interactions
the child’s interaction with the environment.

3. Circular reactions(from 4 to 8 months) - grabbing the rope, you
shaking a rattle to make it rattle.
A consequence of the development of coordination between perceptual and mental
tor systems.

4. Coordination (differentiation) of means and goals(from 8 to 12 months
tsev) - moving an adult’s hand away in order to reach a hidden
behind her is a toy. Actions become more deliberate
nym.

5. Discovery of new funds(from 12 to 18 months) - pulling towards you
tablecloth, takes out a toy lying on the table. The effect reaches
happens by chance, but causes the child to form a connection between
his actions and their results.

6. Invention of new means(from 18 to 24 months) - looking for a way
open the box to take out candy or put something in
her. This is the first manifestation of the "interiorization of thought as a result
combination of existing schemes to find a new solution
problem (such as insight).

By the end of stage I (by 2 years), the child psychologically separates himself from the outside world and assimilates enough elements to begin symbolic activity. Volitional control of one’s own behavior begins to form.

II. Specific Operations Stage(from 2 to 11 years). Here actions are gradually internalized and transformed into operations- mental actions that have reversibility. Reversibility means

Topic 3. Theories of child development in foreign psychology ____________4J.

for the child the opportunity, having completed the corresponding action, to return to its beginning by performing the opposite action. For example, having built a house from cubes, you can destroy it, and then put it back together in the same or some other form.

On preoperative level(from 2 to 5 years) language acquisition and presentation of objects are underway And their images in words; actions are constantly internalized, thinking develops. At first, thinking is egocentric character and focuses on what the child sees and knows. In most cases, he considers objects and phenomena as his direct perception gives them:

The child thinks that the moon follows him when he walks: runs when he runs away, stops when he stops. Two plasticine balls of equal weight cease to be equal for him as soon as one of them is rolled out in the shape of a sausage: “The sausage is longer, which means it is larger,” says the child.

It is especially difficult for him to take the position of another person, to see objects and phenomena through his eyes. Piaget describes the following conversation with a child:

Do you have a brother?

Arthur,” answered the child.

Does he have a brother?
-No.

How many brothers do you have in your family?

Do you have a brother?

Does he have brothers?

Not at all.

Are you his brother?
-Yes.

Then he has a brother?

The child’s speech is also egocentric, since he speaks only from his own point of view, without trying to take the point of view of his interlocutor. When two small children discuss something, each of them talks about himself and himself. Everyone he meets is an interlocutor, and only the appearance of interest in his words is important, although he may have the illusion that he is being listened to and understood.

Part I Theoretical problems of age Noah

psychology

Topic 3. Theories of child development in foreign psychology

Verbal egocentrism reaches its greatest value (75% of all spontaneous speech) at the age of 3 years. Then it decreases by 5-6 years. AND at the level of specific operations, after 7 years, according to Piaget, egocentric speech disappears.

The emergence of elementary logical reasoning in relation to objects and events in the child also dates back to this time. He begins to understand that the shape and quantity of a substance do not depend on each other, he can arrange objects according to various criteria (by height or weight), and he can classify objects on separate grounds. By the age of 7, he also develops the ability to understand flexible And reversible operations corresponding to logical rules.

At the end of this period (by the age of 11), the child understands more and more deeply the relationships between the characteristics of objects, gains an understanding of the conservation of mass and volume, time, speed, and measurements using a standard. And etc. This allows him to solve mathematical and physical problems and forms logical thinking.

III. Stage of formal operations (from 11 before 15 years). At this stage, the child is able to think logically, using abstract concepts, reasoning, formulating and testing hypotheses. His conceptual thinking develops fully, allowing him to imagine numbers as far from concrete experience as a billion, facts of the distant past, and to assimilate complex classifications.

L. S. Vygotsky, having become interested in the facts of child development identified by J. Piaget, explains them differently. But above all, he conducts research on egocentric speech. In his experiment, a child encounters a difficulty in his activity, for example, while drawing, at some point he does not find the right colored pencil. When difficulties arise, egocentric statements increase twice as much. What is the child talking about?

The scientist defines the concept of “age” through the idea of the social situation of development - a specific, unique relationship between the child and the reality around him, primarily social. Social situation of development, according to L.S. Vygotsky, leads to the formation of age-related neoplasms. The relationship between these two categories—the social situation of development and new formation—sets the dialectical nature of development in ontogenesis. The idea of the social situation of development is meaningfully revealed in the theory of activity, represented by the names of A.N. Leontyeva, S.L. Rubinshteina, V.V. Davydova, D.B. Elkonina.

L.S. Vygotsky considered mental neoplasms characteristic of each stage of development as a criterion for age periodization. He identified “stable” and “unstable” (critical) periods of development. He attached decisive importance to the period of crisis - the time when a qualitative restructuring of the functions and relationships of the child occurs. During these periods, significant changes are observed in the development of the child’s personality. According to L.S. Vygotsky, the transition from one age to another occurs in a revolutionary way.

Periodization of the psyche (L.S. Vygotsky): 1) neonatal crisis; 2) infancy (2 months - 1 year); 3) crisis of one year; 4) early childhood (1 – 3 years); 5) crisis of three years; 6) preschool age (3 – 7 years); 7) crisis of seven years; 8) school age (8 – 12 years); 9) crisis of thirteen years; 10) pubertal age (14 – 17 years); 11) crisis of seventeen years.

The criterion for A.N. Leontiev’s age periodization is leading activities. The development of leading activity determines the most important changes in the mental processes and psychological characteristics of the child’s personality at this stage of development.

1. The principle of historicism, which allows us to consistently analyze the problems of child development that arose in different historical periods of time.

3. The principle of analyzing the development of the main aspects of human life - the emotional-volitional sphere, intelligence and behavior.

The main problems of age-related periodization of mental development:

1. The problem of organic and environmental conditioning of human mental and behavioral development.

2. The influence of training and upbringing on the development of children.

3. Correlation of inclinations and abilities.

4. Comparative influence of evolutionary, revolutionary, situational changes in the child’s psyche and behavior.

5. The relationship between intellectual and personal changes in the general psychological development of the child.

In Russian science, there are two ideas about age: physical age and psychological age. Transitions from one age to another are accompanied by changes in the physical characteristics and psychological characteristics of the child; they are called crises of age-related development. A crisis indicates that changes are taking place both in the child’s body and psychology, and that certain problems arise in development that the child cannot resolve on his own. Overcoming a crisis means moving to a higher stage of development, to the next psychological age (R.S. Nemov).

D.B. Elkonin says that the main mechanism for changing age periods of development is leading activity. The main provisions of the periodization of development by D.B. Elkonin are as follows: the process of child development is divided into three stages:

1. Preschool childhood (from birth to 6-7 years);

2. Junior school age (from 7 to 10-11 years, from first to fourth grade of school);

3. Middle and senior school age (from 11 to 16-17 years old, from fifth to eleventh grade of school).

The entire period of childhood according to age physical classification is divided into seven periods:

1. Infancy (from birth to one year of life);

2. Early childhood (from 1 year to 3 years);

3. Junior and middle preschool age (from 3 to 5 years);

4. Senior preschool age (from 5 to 7 years);

5. Junior school age (from 7 to 11 years);

6. Adolescence (from 11 to 13-14 years);

7. Early adolescence (from 13-14 to 16-17 years).

Factors of mental development are the leading determinants of human development. They are considered to be heredity, Wednesday And activity b. If the action of the heredity factor is manifested in the individual properties of a person and acts as a prerequisite for development, and the action of the environmental factor (society) is in the social properties of the individual, then the action of the activity factor is in the interaction of the two preceding ones. In the biogenetic (biologization) direction, the child is considered as a biological being endowed by nature with certain abilities, character traits, and forms of behavior. Heredity determines the entire course of his development - both its pace, fast or slow, and its limit - whether the child will be gifted, achieve a lot or turn out to be mediocre. The environment in which a child is raised becomes just a condition for such initially predetermined development, as if manifesting what was given to the child before his birth. Within the framework of the biologization direction, the theory of recapitulation arose, the main idea of which was borrowed from embryology. An embryo (human fetus) during its intrauterine existence goes from the simplest two-celled organism to a human being. This theory is based on Haeckel's law: ontogeny (individual development) is an abbreviated repetition of phylogeny (historical development). The opposite approach to the development of a child’s psyche is observed in the sociologizing (sociogenetic) direction. John Locke believed that a child is born with a soul as pure as a wax board (or a blank sheet of paper). On this board, the teacher can write whatever he wants, and the child, not a wax board (or a blank sheet of paper). On this board, the teacher can write whatever he wants, and the child, not burdened by heredity, will grow up the way his close adults want him to be. Conclusion: the environment was considered as the main factor, the child’s activity was not taken into account.
It is obvious that both approaches - both biologization and sociology - suffer from one-sidedness, downplaying or denying the importance of one of the two development factors.

At the end of the 30s. N. Miller, J. Dollard, R. Sears, J. Whiting and other young scientists at Yale University made an attempt to translate the most important concepts of psychoanalytic personality theory into the language of K. Hull's learning theory. They outlined the main lines of research: social learning in the process of raising a child, cross-cultural analysis (study of child upbringing and development in different cultures), personality development.

On this basis, concepts of social learning are developed, the central problem of which has become the problem of socialization.Socialization- this is a process that allows a child to take his place in society, this is the advancement of a newborn from an asocial “humanoid” state to life as a full-fledged member of society. All newborns are alike, but after two or three years they are different children. This means, say proponents of social learning theory, that these differences are the result of learning, they are not innate.

J. Piaget showed that the thinking of children differs significantly from the thinking of adults and that children are active subjects of their own mental development. According to his theory, the ability for logical thinking is established in infancy and improves from year to year, obeying certain patterns. According to Piaget's concept, mental skills are acquired naturally - as the general development of the child's body occurs and the horizons of the world the child explores expand. A significant part of children’s activity occurs in games, which the scientist considered as an indispensable component of their important work in studying surrounding objects - people, phenomena, objects. He believed that this form is necessary for the normal mental development of the child and the successful process of his growing up. According to J. Piaget, a person in his mental development goes through 4 large periods:

1) sensory-motor (sensorimotor) - from birth to 2 years;

2) pre-operative - from 2 to 7 years;

3) period of concrete thinking - from 7 to 11 years;

4) the period of formal logical, abstract thinking - from 11 - 12 to 18 years and beyond.

All children go through these periods, but with some differences.

L. Kohlberg introduces the concept moral development. He identifies 3 levels of moral development:

Pre-moral level(from 4 to 10 years). At this level, actions are determined by external circumstances and the point of view of other people is not taken into account. This level corresponds to the stage of pre-operational thinking and the stage of concrete operations. In the first stage of this level, judgments are made on the basis of whether the action will be punished or praised. In the second stage, judgments are made on the action in relation to the benefits that can be derived.

Conventional level(from 10 to 13 years old). Actions are assessed in accordance with the norms accepted in society. This level corresponds to the stage of specific operations. In the third stage, the main criterion for judgment is the approval or disapproval of other people. At the fourth stage, the child is guided by generally accepted norms and laws.

Post-conventional level(from the age of 13) is assessed as true morality, which presupposes a high level of mental development. This level is possible at the stage of formal operations. At the fifth stage, judgment about an action is based on respect for human rights and recognition of democratic norms. At the sixth level, the main judge is conscience, regardless of the opinions of other people and generally accepted norms.

Kohlberg notes that many people never reach the fourth stage of moral development, and only 10% of people over 16 years of age reach the sixth stage. L. Kohlberg's periodization of moral development concerns mainly one aspect of human mental development, although it is related to the cognitive capabilities of children of different ages.

Came to interesting conclusions in his work DI. Feldstein. In his opinion, the activation of one side of activity does not displace or replace its other side, providing only new opportunities for personal development. In this process, the patterns of reverse action are clearly visible. It occurs at all stages of ontogenesis. For example, in the process of educational activity, a primary school student activates the subject-practical, cognitive sphere. In the process of a child’s cognitive activity, new formations such as volition and reflection appear, and they cause the need to realize one’s own behavior and master the norms of relationships, which is typical for a teenager. He is actively developing self-awareness and developing social activity. Since activity develops in socially useful activities, where a teenager realizes himself for others, he begins to strive for practical activities, which a senior schoolchild is engaged in.

DI. Feldstein introduces the idea of the alternating development of two personal positions of the child: I in society and I and society. The first position is characterized by the predominance of the socialization process. New relationships with people make the contours of the child’s personality unclear, and he is susceptible to the influence of society. The second position acts as a process of individualization. Its content is awareness of oneself as a subject of social relations. The position of the subject, according to Feldstein, arises already in a three-year-old child; at six years old it is replaced by his attitude towards new socializing influences. However, in a teenager from 10 to 15 years of age, based on the development of consciousness and self-awareness, the position of “I” and “society” again prevails.

In general, research emphasizes that throughout the entire development of personality in ontogenesis, there are different levels of social maturity of the individual, but the main nodes of this development are reflected in three stages:

1. Until the age of three, when the baby becomes aware of the presence of other people.

2. From the age of three, when the child becomes aware of his Self. The Self asserts itself, masters the norms of human relations, trying to orient itself to the assessment of adults, which is primarily determined by the need for socially significant and socially valued activities.

3. From the age of ten, when a teenager strives to establish his Self in the system of social relations. This stage already presupposes both awareness of communication and self-management in the process of communication, i.e. developed personality.

It is precisely the levels of social development that are most favorable for the formation of personality, its core qualities, and therefore for the system of educational influences that the school and society as a whole should provide.

In contrast to chronological age, which expresses the duration of an individual’s existence from the moment of his birth, the concept of psychological age denotes a qualitatively unique stage of ontogenetic development, determined by the laws of the formation of the organism, living conditions, training and upbringing and having a specific historical origin (that is, at different times age had different psychological content, for example, primary school age was distinguished with the introduction of universal primary education).

Age in psychology is a specific, relatively time-limited stage in the mental development of an individual and his development as a personality, characterized by a set of natural physiological and psychological changes that are not related to differences in individual characteristics.

The first attempt at a systematic analysis of the category of psychological age belongs to L.S. Vygotsky. He viewed age as a closed cycle with its own structure and dynamics.

Age structure includes:

1.social development situation- the system of relations in which a child enters society; it determines which areas of social life he enters. It determines those forms and the path by which the child acquires new and new personality traits, drawing them from social reality as the main source of development, the path along which the social becomes individual. The social situation of development determines how the child navigates the system of social relations and what areas of social life he enters.

2.leading type of activity- activity in which other types of activity arise and differentiate, basic mental processes are restructured and personality changes. The content and forms of leading activity depend on the specific historical conditions in which the child’s development takes place. Leontyev also described the mechanism of changing the leading type of activity, which manifests itself in the fact that in the course of development, the previous place occupied by the child in the world of human relations around him begins to be perceived by him as inappropriate to his capabilities, and he strives to change it. In accordance with this, his activities are being restructured.

3.central age neoplasms- at each age level there is a central new formation, as if leading the entire development process and characterizing the restructuring of the child’s entire personality on a new basis. Around this neoplasm, all other particular neoplasms and developmental processes associated with neoplasms of previous ages are located and grouped. Vygotsky called those developmental processes that are more or less closely related to the main new formation the central lines of development. Vygotsky’s law of uneven child development is closely related to the concept of the main new developments of age: each side of the child’s psyche has its own optimal period of development - the sensitive period. In turn, the concept of sensitive periods is closely related to Vygotsky’s hypothesis about the systemic structure of consciousness: no cognitive function develops in isolation, the development of each function depends on what structure it is included in and what place it occupies in it.

4.age crises- turning points on the developmental curve that separate one age from another. Foreign psychologists, contemporaries of Vygotsky, viewed age-related crises either as growing pains or as a result of disruption of parent-child relationships. They believed that there could be a crisis-free, lytic development. Vygotsky viewed crisis as a normative phenomenon of the psyche, necessary for the progressive development of the individual. The essence of the crisis, according to Vygotsky, lies in resolving the contradiction between the previous social situation of development, on the one hand, and the new capabilities and needs of the child, on the other. As a result, an explosion of the previous social situation of development occurs, and a new social situation of development is formed on its ruins. This means that the transition to the next stage of age development has taken place. Vygotsky described the following age-related crises: the newborn crisis, the one-year crisis, the three-year crisis, the seven-year crisis, the thirteen-year crisis. Of course, the chronological boundaries of crises are quite arbitrary, which is explained by significant differences in individual, sociocultural and other parameters. The form, duration and severity of crises can vary markedly depending on the individual typological characteristics of the child, social conditions, characteristics of upbringing in the family, and the pedagogical system as a whole. Thus, for Vygotsky, age-related crises are the central mechanism of age dynamics. He derived the law of age dynamics, according to which the forces driving the development of a child at a particular age inevitably lead to the denial and destruction of the very basis of development of his age, with internal necessity determining the annulment of the social situation of development, the end of a given era of development and the transition to the next age steps.

Answering the second part of the question, we note that there are many different periodizations of mental development, both foreign and domestic authors. Almost all of these periodizations end with high school age; very few authors described the entire life cycle (primarily E. Erikson).

We will consider the periodizations of L.S. Vygotsky, as the creator of the doctrine of age, D.B. Elkonin, as a generally accepted concept in our country, D.I. Feldstein, Z. Freud, as the founder of psychoanalysis, a direction that is very popular in the world, E. Erikson, since it was he who first described the entire life cycle.

Vygotsky believed that when creating a periodization of mental development, it is necessary to take into account the dynamics of the transition from one age to another, when smooth “evolutionary” periods are replaced by “jumps.” During lytic periods, qualities accumulate, and during critical periods, their realization occurs.

The generally accepted concept in our country is Elkonin’s concept, which is based on the idea of changing the leading type of activity. Considering the structure of activity, Elkonin noted that human activity is two-faced, it contains human meaning, that is, the motivational-need side and the operational-technical side.

In the process of child development, the motivational-need side of the activity is first mastered, otherwise objective actions would not make sense, and then the operational-technical side is mastered. Then they alternate. Moreover, the motivational-need side develops in the “child-adult” system, and the development of the operational-technical side occurs in the “child-object” system.

Elkonin’s concept overcame an important drawback of foreign psychology: the opposition between the world of objects and the world of people.

Elkonin reconsidered the problem: the child and society” and renamed it “the child in society.” This changed the view on the relationship between “child and object” and “child and adult.” Ellko6nin began to consider these systems as “a child is a social object” (since for a child, socially developed actions with him come to the fore in the object) and “a child is a social adult” (since for a child an adult is, first of all, a bearer of certain types of social activities).

The child’s activity in the “child – social object” and “child – social adult” systems represents a single process in which the child’s personality is formed.

According to Elkonin, the crises of 3 and 11 years are crises of relationships, after which orientation in human relationships arises. And the crises of the 1st year and 7th year are crises of worldview that open up orientation in the world of things.

DI. Feldstein developed the ideas of Vygotsky and Elkonin and created on their basis the concept of a pattern of level-by-level development of personality in ontogenesis.

Feldstein considered the problem of personality development as a process of socialization, and he considered socialization not only as a process of appropriating socio-historical experience, but also as the formation of socially significant personality qualities.

According to this concept, a purposeful consideration as an object of research of the characteristics of the social development of children, the conditions for the formation of their social maturity and the analysis of its formation at different stages of modern childhood allowed the author to isolate two main types of actually existing positions of the child in relation to society: “I am in society.” “I am in society” and “I and society.”

The first position reflects the child’s desire to understand his Self - what am I? What can I do?; the second concerns awareness of oneself as a subject of social relations.

The formation of the position “I and society” is associated with the actualization of activities aimed at mastering the norms of human relationships, ensuring the implementation of the individualization process. The child strives to express himself, highlight his I, contrast himself to others, express his own position in relation to other people, having received from them recognition of his independence, taking an active place in various social relationships, where his I acts on an equal basis with others, which ensures his development a new level of self-awareness in society, socially responsible self-determination.

The subject-practical side of the activity, during which the child’s socialization occurs, is associated with the affirmation of the position “I am in society.”

In other words, the development of a certain position of the child in relation to people and things leads him to the possibility and necessity of realizing the accumulated social experience in such activities that most adequately correspond to the general level of mental and personal development. Thus, the position “I am in society” is especially actively developed during the periods of early childhood (from 1 to 3 years), primary school age (from 6 to 9 years old) and senior school age (from 15 to 17 years old), when subject-practical side of the activity. The position “I and society,” the roots of which go back to the infant’s orientation toward social contacts, is most actively formed in preschool (from 3 to 6 years) and adolescence (from 10 to 15 years) when the norms of human relationships are especially intensively absorbed.

Identification and disclosure of the characteristics of the child’s different positions in relation to society made it possible to identify two types of naturally occurring boundaries of the social development of the individual, designated by the author as intermediate and key.

The intermediate stage of development - the result of the accumulation of elements of socialization - individualization - refers to the child’s transition from one period of ontogenesis to another (at 1 year, 6 and 15 years). The nodal turning point represents qualitative shifts in social development, carried out through the development of personality; it is associated with a new stage of ontogenesis (at 3 years, 10 and 17 years).

In the social position that develops at the intermediate stage of development (“I am in society”), the developing personality’s need to integrate himself into society is realized. At the key turning point, when the social position “I and society” is formed, the child’s need to determine his place in society is realized.

Z. Freud, in accordance with his sexual theory of the psyche, reduces all stages of human mental development to stages of transformation and movement through different erogenous zones of libidinal energy. Erogenous zones are areas of the body that are sensitive to stimulation; when stimulated, they cause satisfaction of libidinal feelings. Each stage has its own libidinal zone, the stimulation of which creates libidinal pleasure. The movement of these zones creates a sequence of stages of mental development.

1. Oral stages (0 – 1 year) are characterized by the fact that the main source of pleasure, and therefore potential frustration, is focused on the area of activity associated with feeding. At this stage, there are two phases: early and late, occupying the first and second years of life. It is characterized by two sequential libidinal actions - sucking and biting. The leading erogenous zone is the mouth. At the second stage, the “I” begins to emerge from “It”.

2. Anal stage (1 – 3 years) also consists of two phases. Libido is concentrated around the anus, which becomes the center of attention of the child, accustomed to neatness. The “Super-I” begins to form.

3.phallic stage (3 – 5 years) characterizes the highest level of child sexuality. The genital organs become the leading erogenous zone. Children's sexuality becomes objective, children begin to experience attachment to parents of the opposite sex (Oedipus complex). “Super-I” is formed.

4. latent stage (5 – 12 years) is characterized by a decrease in sexual interest, libido energy is transferred to the development of universal human experience, the establishment of friendly relationships with peers and adults.

5.genital stage (12 – 18 years) is characterized by the return of childhood sexual desires, now all former erogenous zones are united, and the teenager strives for one goal - normal sexual communication

E. Erikson considered the stages of personality development from the point of view of the tasks that society sets for a person, and which a person must solve:

1.infancy – the formation of basic trust in the world / mistrust

2.early age – autonomy / shame, doubt about one’s own independence, self-reliance

3. age of play – initiative / feeling of guilt and moral responsibility for one’s desires

4. school age - achievement (formation of hard work and ability to handle tools) / inferiority (as awareness of one’s own ineptitude)

5. adolescence – identity (the first integral awareness of oneself, one’s place in the world) / diffusion of identity (uncertainty in understanding one’s Self)

6.youth – intimacy (searching for a life partner and establishing close friendships) / isolation

7.maturity – creativity / stagnation

8. old age – integration / disappointment in life

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Problems of periodization of mental development of personality. The problem of periodization of mental development. E. Erickson. Classification Features

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