PSY paper

Developmental psychology studies the psychological development and growth of individuals from birth to death. It categorizes people in stages and focuses on the changes, responses and behaviors that each person experiences as part of a certain stage pertaining to areas such as biological, cognitive, emotional and social processes. Some even explain the growth of moral development. Since the childhood and adolescence periods account for the largest number of change occurrences, they are focused on with a significant proportion of stages and theories. This specific area of psychology is very important and useful in understanding the growth of individuals relative to their age and maturation specifically. Adolescents often argue a lot with their parents and struggle to find the right friends who match who they are. Jessica experiences similar challenges, which will be explained through the psychological concepts punishment and analyzed with the pre-conventional and identity vs. role confusion stages.

My sister’s friend, Jessica, is seventeen-years old and lives with her two parents, father and mother, and two younger siblings. She is currently a junior at Grover Cleveland HS. Jessica has many friends; she is friends with a group that is less-known, quiet and disciplined, and another that is popular, extravagant and more concerned with seeking their own pleasures, which her mom labels as “bad.” She does not stay with one group more than the other, but tries to hang out with both to see which one she likes more. Her parents are concerned with her socializing and mingling with the bad group. However, she often disobeys her parents and goes to parties with them and her parents had no choice other than grounding her and not permitting her to go outside except for school. Following the punishment, Jessica stopped going out with her friends.

Punishment is any change or event that takes place following a certain behavior that reduces the chance of it occurring again. While there are positive and negative punishments, the situation described corresponds to negative punishment. This type of punishment works to decrease the possibility of a behavior or response occurring by removing a rewarding and desirable stimulus. In this case, Jessica’s parents are using negative punishment to eliminate her behavior of going out with the group that they do not like. They do this by grounding her and not allowing her to leave the house unless it is for academic and school purposes. Thus, they are taking away some of her freedom and opportunity to do what she wants and socialize in the way she desires. In response to the punishment, Jessica obeyed her parents and stopped hanging out with that group.

The pre-conventional stage is the first level of Kohlberg’s theory of moral development and reasoning, which involves the thinking that considers what is right and wrong. This stage approximately refers to individuals before the age of nine who interpret morality and follow the rules for the sole reason of avoiding punishment and acquiring rewards. Although Jessica does not belong in that age interval, she is still considered to be in the pre-conventional stage, given the described situation. When her parents started giving her punishments for being friends with the group that is bringing her down, Jessica quitted her behavior as a way to evade the consequences. Thus, in this particular condition, Jessica was in the pre-conventional stage where she was only concerned with the punishment when considering doing some behavior.

The identity vs. role confusion is the fifth stage of Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development. It is during this period of the lifespan that adolescents go through many changes including biological, societal, academic and social changes. Such changes lead the person to become an adult, but it builds up many questions of identity and thus, the crisis of this stage is searching for an identity and finding a sense of self. Given her age and experience, Jessica definitely falls under the identity vs. role confusion stage. Jessica is working to find her sense of self by trying different roles. She is trying different groups of friends to see which one she will like more or one that she can base her identity on. She might even integrate the different roles to make a single identity. Thus, Jessica is currently in the identity vs. role confusion stage and is facing the challenge of finding a sense of who she is and who she wants to be.

If Jessica is twelve years old, or five years younger, some of the described theories above would be applied differently. Jessica’s parents would have still followed the same punishment to stop her behavior. If she quitted her behavior in response to the punishment when she is 17, she would have probably done the same if she was younger. Jessica’s reasoning to why she obeyed her parents would still only consider the punishment or reward given. However, the slight difference would be the placement in Erikson’s stages. If Jessica is 12, she would be in the borderline between industry vs. inferiority and identity vs. role confusion stages. She would be coming out of one and entering into the other. In this case, she would leave the industry vs. inferiority stage with a sense of competence, encouraged and able to do tasks successfully. With the success from the first, she would go into the other and start attempting to find her identity.

Overall, developmental psychology is significant in explaining what an individual goes through during certain periods of their lifespans. Jessica’s described situation reflects her struggle with identity and thus, reflects her placement into Erikson’s psychosocial stage of identity vs. role confusion as she tries to find her sense of self through different friendships. Her parents use operant conditioning, and specifically punishment, to attempt to decrease her behavior of hanging out with certain groups. In response, she obeys them for the sole reason of avoiding the punishment and consequence.