A Look at Developmental Changes in Isabel: From Childhood to Adulthood - Essay Sample

introduction

Children experience various development changes as they grow older. They experience physical, social/emotional, cognitive, and moral development changes throughout their early childhood to adulthood. The most notable change is the tendency to reduce dependency on their parents and become more independent as they grow. Isabel and Carlos in the assignment scenario are experiencing the changes. Isabel has been selected for examination in this study. Being 13 years old, she has experienced most of the development changes, and therefore, she will be the most appropriate for this paper. Isabel is developing her motor skills, experiencing body growth, developing the need to manage her emotions to satisfy social standards, becoming conscious of pre-moral requirements, and developing the ability to make rational decisions and interpret information.

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Physical Development

Starting from birth, a child goes through consistent body growth, brain development, and motor development. Isabel is in the middle childhood stage, and therefore, her brains, as well as motor skills, have developed considerably. It is estimated that children grow at a rate of 2 to 3 inches per year on average until they attain the age of 11 (Boyd, & Bee, 2015). It is also estimated that by the age of 11, the average height of a girl is 4 feet and 10 inches while the average height of a boy is 4 feet and 9 inches. Additionally, middle-aged children tend to average a weight increase rate of about 6 pounds per year. The muscular and skeletal systems increase in size along with the sizes of other body organs to make a child develop weight with time (Boyd, & Bee, 2015).

A lot of changes occurs in the brain during the development of children like Isabel. The brain volume increases with time and stabilizes at the age of about 18 years. Various regions and structures continue to increase beyond that age. The theory of a leading developmental neuroscientist indicates that the prefrontal cortex affects the development of other brain regions. Additionally, motor skills, including the required skills to play sophisticated games like playing tennis, develops in the middle as well as late childhood. Researchers have revealed that exercise, health, disease, and illness affect the normal physical development of a child. Children who exercise more tend to grow physically stronger (Boyd & Bee, 2015).

Emotional Development

From Erikson's theory, the concept of industry versus inferiority is advanced. When a child is encouraged to make things and see them work, the interest in learning how things work and how they are made increases. Failure to encourage the child to make, build, or work and instead, perceive it as a form of mischief will lead to the child developing a sense of inferiority. In this case, the parenting theory also comes into play. The parenting style that involves the autocratic approach will discourage children from pursuing such endeavors. The autocratic parenting style involves a lot is expected from the children, and in return, love and affection are not shown to them. Children will only thrive in regards to the industry when parents using authoritative or permissive approaches (Boyd & Bee, 2015).

Isabel has probably started experiencing the industry versus inferiority situation. For example, if she is interested in building a toy airplane and encouraged to do so, her sense of industry will increase. It can go beyond to include fixing a bicycle, building a treehouse and many other things. However, if the parents take an autocratic approach to parent and discourage her from doing that because it is against the stipulated rules, Isabel will start developing a sense of inferiority. Additionally, the emotional stability of children can be affected if they are exposed to traumatic events such as violence in war zones. Middle childhood is critical in the development of children because it is the time when they start learning about their social life and make sense of everything around them (Zizek, Garz, & Nowak, 2015).

Cognitive Development

Children in the middle childhood stage start to interpret and process information better, develop intelligence, and in some cases, develop extreme intelligence. Piaget's cognitive development theory indicates that the thoughts of preschool children are preoperational (Barrouillet, 2015). Middle childhood stage children can reason well, although their thinking is affected by their magical beliefs, and egocentrism systems. The theory suggests that children between the age bracket of 7 and 11 years can reason logically and perform concrete operations.

Freud's Psychosexual Development theory explains the development of children in regards to behavior and personality (Barrouillet, 2015). It explains about children starting being aware of their bodies leading to conflict encounters that play a major role in their development. Freud believed that failure to progress properly through cognitive development and other development stages could influence the children's adult behavior. Successful completion of each development stage makes children grow to have healthy adult personalities. Freud believes that personality is shaped during cognitive development and subsequent stages, whereas other theorists believe that personality continues to transform throughout a person's life.

If Isabel is subjected to a reasoning ability experiment, she will probably reason logically to solve the puzzle. For example, two clay balls are shown to Isabel. Then, one of the clay balls is rolled into a long shape while the other one maintains the shape of a ball. If then, Isabel is asked which shape contains more clay, she will most likely say that they all contain the same amount of clay because she has developed the cognitive reasoning demonstrated in Piaget's Cognitive Developmental Theory. Additionally, if Isabel goes through every development stage and completes them successfully, she is likely to develop a healthy personality to confirm the Freud's Psychosexual Development theory (Crain, 2015).

The grammar, vocabulary, metalinguistic awareness, reading, and writing capabilities of a child beyond the age of 11 are superior, and they can organize their vocabularies into groups. Isabel has developed proper grammar, vocabulary, and other language skills. She has even mastered the metalinguistic awareness whereby she understands a preposition is and how to define words, as well as how they fit in various contexts (Zizek, Garz, & Nowak, 2015).

Development of Ethics

The provocative cognitive-developmental theory groups moral development into three main categories, including pre-moral, conventional, and post-conventional. Under the pre-moral category, there is obedience versus punishment as well as individualism versus exchange. Under conventional, there is a good boy versus a good girl as well as law and order. Gilligan's moral development theory also shades more light into the development of girls and women in general. The theory also has three categories, just like Lawrence Kohlberg's: pre-conventional, conventional, as well as post-conventional (Gibbs, 2019).

Kohlberg's theory occurs in the development of almost all children, and Isabel is not an exception. The concept behind Isabel's reasoning at the age of 13 is obedience versus punishment. The external authorities dictate rules and regulations. The child reasons that the failure to obey the rules will lead to physical consequences which include punishment. Children at this stage perceive observing rules as a means of avoiding punishment. Isabel has also started to understand the differences in viewpoints, a concept that falls under individualism and exchange (Gibbs, 2019).

Isabel's Development Stages in Comparison to Maria's and Carlos's

Isabel and Carlos are still undergoing childhood development stages, but Isabel is ahead of Carlos in the development ladder. Isabel's brain is more developed than Carlos's. Isabel is at the later stages of physical development because she is now about 4 feet tall. Carlos, on the other hand, is barely 3 feet tall. Carlos's emotions are not mature. Therefore, he cannot control and manage them to suit the set standards. Additionally, he can barely reason logically and perform an operation successfully. If a logical test is carried about his cognitive development, he will not identify the amount of clay in the two shapes as equal, taking the already mentioned example. When it comes to moral development, Carlos is still in the early stages of Kohlberg's theory, and therefore, he only relates the rules to consequences of not following them. In the case of Isabel, she can think logically and even perform complete operations. However, Isabel is also still in the early stages of moral development. On the other hand, Maria underwent all the stages of childhood development. It can be argued that Maria's personality and how she turned out to be in general was significantly impacted by the way she went through the childhood stages (Gibbs, 2019).

Conclusion

Isabel has progressed in terms of physical, emotional, cognitive, and moral development, although she has not developed fully to reason like an adult and have the body size of an adult. All the stages of childhood development are crucial in the life of a child and parents can take part by applying appropriate styles to parenting to make sure the children complete all the development stages. It can be concluded that the development process shapes the physical, emotional, and moral well-being of a child in the future.

References

Barrouillet, P. (2015). Theories of cognitive development: From Piaget to today. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273229715000325

Boyd, D., & Bee, H. (2015). Lifespan development. Pearson Education Limited. Retrieved from http://115.127.115.77:8080/xmlui/handle/123456789/1260

Crain, W. (2015). Piaget's cognitive-developmental theory. In Theories of development: Concepts and applications (pp. 132-170). Routledge. Retrieved from https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315662473/chapters/10.4324/9781315662473-12

Gibbs, J. C. (2019). Moral development and reality: Beyond the theories of Kohlberg, Hoffman, and Haidt. Oxford University Press. Retrieved from https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=related:5126qTFAMn4J:scholar.google.com/&scioq=Lawrence+Kohlberg,+moral+development+theory&hl=en&as_sdt=0,5&as_ylo=2015

Zizek, B., Garz, D., & Nowak, E. (Eds.). (2015). Kohlberg revisited. Springer. Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Dw6rCAAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=Lawrence+Kohlberg,+moral+development+theory&ots=iSo0PkJ6gi&sig=4EQbVLau5ooo40EY9GilSJWzkQs