Theories of Child Psychology

Child psychology theories can be classified as:

I. PSYCHOSEXUAL THEORY:(1905)

Freud believed that personality develops through a series of childhood stages during which the pleasure seeking emergencies of the ID become focused on certain erogenous areas.

BASIC TENETS OF FREUD'S THEORY

3 levels of consiousness:

Consious: what we are thinking about or experiencing at any given moment.
Preconsious: what we can readily call to consciousness(memories, knowledge)
Unconsious:thoughts, desires and impulses of which we are not aware, this is the largest level of consciou sness.

PERSONALITY:

ID- Pleasure principle
EGO- Reality principle
SUPEREGOIdeal conscience

Stage & Age	Characteristic
Oral Stage (0-1)	Child derives pleasure from oral activities like sucking, swallowing etc.. Even put things in their mouth.	Ego Developers
Anal Stage (2-3)	Children begin potty training
Phallic Stage (3-6)	Boys are more attached to their mother - OEDIPUS COMPLEX. while girls are more attached to their fatherELECTRA COMPLEX	Super Ego Developers
Latency Stage (6 to puberty)	Children spend more time and interact mostly with same sex peers.
Genital Stage (Beyond puberty)	Individuals are attracyed to opposite sex peers.

II. PSYCHOSOCIAL THEORY(1963)

Erick Erikson accepted the basic constructs of Freud's theory, but enlarged the theory to include other factors such as culture and contemporary issues. Erikson's theory consists of 8 stages, 5 during childhood and adolescence. Within each stage a crisis must be resolved. This crisis is a major developmental issue that becomes important duribg a specific time period throughout one's life. In order to be successful at solving this crisis, one must balance postivie and a corresponding negative trait.

Erikson's Stages of Psychosocial Development

Approximate Age	Psycho Social Crisis
Infant-18 months	Trust vs. Mistrust
18 months-3 years	Autonomy vs. Shame & Doubt
3-5years	Initiative vs. Guilt
5-13 years	Industry vs. Inferiority
13-21 years	Identity vs. Role Confusion
21-39 years	Intimacy vs. Isolation
40-65 years	Generality vs. Stagnation
65 and older	Ego Integrity vs. Despair

III. COGNITIVE THEORY(1952)

Piaget divided behavioural development into 4 different stages:

Sensorimotor stage
Pre-operational stage
Concrete operational stage 4
Format operational stage

STAGE 1 SENSORIMOTOR STAGE	Between birth to 2 years Infants coordinate sensory experiences with physical and motor actions Symbolic thought begins
STAGE 2 PRE OPERATIONAL STAGE	Between 2-7 years Logically inadequate mental operations are hall mark of this stage, however, Egocentrism and animism are limitations.
STAGE 3 CONCRETE OPERATIONAL STAGE	Between 7-12years This stage includes processes like : seriation, Transitivity, Classification,Decentering, Reversibility,Conservation and Elimination of egocentrism.
STAGE 4 FORMAT OPERATIONAL STAGE	Begins with puberty(11) and continues to adulthood. Develops logic reasoning Uses deductive or inductive logic to make decisions or solve problems. Development of adult egocentrism

BEHAVIOURAL THEORIES:

1. CLASSIC CONDITIONING THEORY(1927):

Ivan pavlov studied conditioned reflexes experimentally. The crucial elememt is the relation between conditioned stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus

PRINCIPLES INVOLVED ARE:

GENERALISATION: Band of stimuli centered around a specific conditioned stimulus.

Eg: A child who has had a painful experience with a doctor in a white coat always assosciates any doctor in white coat, with pain. EXTINCTION: It results if assosciation between conditioned and unconditioned response is not reinforced.
Eg: Subsequent visits to the doctor without any unpleasant experience, results in extinction of fear.

DISCRIMINATION: Opposite to generalisation. When a child is exposed to different clinic settings than those assosciated with the painful experience, the child learn to discriminate between the two.

2.OPERANT CONDITIONING THEORY(1938)

BF Skinner provided insight into consequences of behaviour. 2 major consequences of behaviour:

a) REINFORCEMENT
b) PUNISHMENT

4 types of operant conditioning:

POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT
NEGATIVE REINFORCEMENT
OMISSION
PUNISHMENT

3. HI ERARCY OF NEEDS(1954)

Difficult and impractical to apply on children in a dental setup.

4. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY(1963)

Bandura added the concept of observational learning to environmental/ learning theory.
Observational learning: children learn by observing models and as a result, experience punishment of reinforcement.
Children imitate their models.

Human development involves an interaction between a persons character and behaviour with the environment

MCQs:

1) Fear of white coat in dental operatory is explained by

a) Classical conditioning.
b) Operant conditioning
c) Cognitive development.
d) Anxiety

a) Classical conditioning( Generalisation: A child who has a painful experience with a doctor in a white coat always assosciates any doctor in white coat with pain.)

2) Egocentrism and animation is found in the following stage of cognitive development?

a) Sensorimotor stage.
b) Preoperative stage
c) Operational stage.
d) Concrete operational

b) Pre operational stage ( Egocentrism and animism are limitations of this stage. Whereas, logically inadequate mental operations are hallmark of this stage

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