Theories of personality development

To answer the question of why and how development takes place, it is first of all necessary to answer the question of what we mean by development as such. In everyday usage, this word is, of course, associated with improvement, but in a scientific context, the content is more polysemantic. For example, we say: "the process of degradation is developing." What do we invest in it? What are we talking about? Naturally, this can not be called perfection. Therefore, the consideration of the process of human development, requires some initial refinement.

Let us dwell on one of such conditions, which in itself represents one of the theories, or rather, a metatheory, which regards man as an object of the material-spiritual nature of the universe. Today this problem is the subject of a scientological study, because no single modern science can provide exhaustive answers to questions of human evolution.

If, however, we restrict the scope of the consideration of the problem to the problems of the traditional, sociological-psychological subject field, it should be borne in mind that in this sense we will deal with the analysis of something (the individual, in this case) initially existing in a certain initial state.

To date, the most popular theories of personality development (or conceptual points of view, generalizing several theories), which are very contradictory and, moreover, are not sufficiently developed. This lack of development is explained by the fact that all of them represent, according to one of the most famous researchers of this problem, A. Maslow, "the abstraction of the highest level."

We will name and consider some of them.

Psycho-sexual theory of human development (Z. Freud), as the dominant factors that determine personal development, highlights such as attraction, emotional complex and features of the sex-role behavior of the individual. At the same time, Freud and his followers distinguish five basic stages of personality development.

In this theory of personality development, like psychosocial analysis, its authors (E.Erikson, DB El'konin), unlike Z. Freud, see the social aspect as the dominant development. The dominant factors in this process are socio-historical and cultural-spiritual aspects. So, according to Erikson, each stage of human development is associated with overcoming a certain conflict, the nature of which depends on age, external causes and many other motives. For example, school conflicts, as a rule, often amount to overcoming the contradictions that arise between the teenager's sense of inferiority and diligence, understanding the principles of freedom and misunderstanding the role of moral criteria of behavior that limit this freedom, etc.

In the theory of the development of the personality of the famous French psychologist and teacher J. Piaget, the intellectual and cognitive sphere is the main criterion of development, therefore the concept of Piaget was called cognitive. This theory acquired special prominence during the scientific polemics with the outstanding Soviet pedologist L. Vygotsky. The subject of discussion was the question of the primary and secondary development and education. According to Piaget, each age stage contains certain limiting limits of the development of the human cognitive potential.

Vygotsky and his followers - P.P. Blonsky and A.N. Leontiev - in the framework of the activity theory of personality development, argued that such limits are practically surmountable by external factors, such as education and education.

L. Kohlberg, based on the views of J. Piaget, substantiated the theory of development, the main criteria in which are indicators of a moral nature. It is argued that there is a direct relationship between the intellectual and the moral. In this sense, the preconditionary and postconventional stages of personality development are singled out, which, according to the representatives of this doctrine, is completed by 25 years.

Behavioral, or behavioral doctrine (L. Kohlberg), considers the development of the personality as a permanent process of increasing and expanding its role set, which is achieved by training.

The humanistic theory (K. Rogers, A. Maslow) regards man as an end in itself for the development of mankind as a whole. In their opinion, it is very difficult to establish any patterns in the dynamics of such a complex phenomenon, which is a person, a person. Therefore, he (man) is a self-valuable creature that develops according to its own laws, the development logic of which should not be interfered at all, one can only adapt to it.

To date, there is no common view on the problem of personal development. In addition, ideas about the capabilities and abilities of a person are changing rapidly, and therefore the vision of these processes is changing. These theories consider only certain aspects of personal development.