Introduction: Purpose, Goals, and Methods
Taking a retrospect at one’s own development is a good way to analyze the current behavioral patterns and define the issues that may possibly jeopardize building relationships with the people around. In the given research, I am going to take a look at my won cognitive development through the lens of various cognitive development theories (CDTs) and check the effects of various internal and external factors on my life. Thus, I will learn not only to apply the theories that I have learned to practice but also to define the aspects that I will have to work on later.
In Search for My Own Self: From Early Childhood to These Days
The journey starts in early childhood
Naturally, browsing through my early childhood memories is quite complicated, seeing how I remember quite little about the given stage of my life. However, there were some choice moments that I clearly remember as the pivoting points of my development. For example, I can still recall some of the games that my mother used to play with me to develop my ability to think logically and be able to communicate.
Piaget’s theory at its best
Perhaps, one of the best ways to demonstrate a child’s development of cognitive and analytical skills, Piaget’s theory can be easily applied to my childhood memories. As an infant, I played with a teddy bear. Being a single parent, my mother had to leave me in daycare, yet I protested against being alone. To calm me down, my mother suggested that I draw a portrait of my teddy bear, which I did. Therefore, my ability to cognize the world through object permanence (tactile functions) transformed into symbolic thinking (transfer of the tactile experience into visual one).
Erikson: at the sixth stage
My childhood development can also be seen through the prism of Erikson’s stages of cognitive development. An alternative to Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s theories, it also has the right to exist, which my childhood experience has confirmed. I developed trust in my mother at the stage of infancy. It should be noted that the link between trust and breastfeeding, which Erikson provided, seems quite inconsistent, since in my case, mother-child relationships were very strong, even though my mother gave up breastfeeding when I was six weeks and started using bottle feeding. Like other children, I started fighting for my autonomy when I was around three; with little experience of raising children, my mother did not encourage my attempts at being independent properly and scolded me down when I failed, which resulted in enhancing my shame and doubt.
Vygotsky: the world around me
My childhood impressions, however, can also be analyzed from the point of view provided by Vygotsky. For instance, in my early childhood, I refused to share my toys with my playmates. The given phenomenon, in fact, can be explained with the help of Vygotsky’s theory. Noticing my greediness, my mother started giving me examples of generosity. For example, she tried to have me around when lending money, books, etc., to her friends and giving her things to charity. Thus, my mother performed the function of a scaffold, teaching me the basic principles of sharing.
Psychodynamic theory: new discoveries
Motivated both consciously and unconsciously, in accordance with the principles of psychodynamic theory, I learned new skills from interacting with the environment around me and the emotions that I had in the process. Sometimes these experiences were useful, like the pride that I felt after being praised for reading a very long word without mistakes at school. However, some of the emotions blocked my enthusiasm as a learner for quite along. For example, even now, I shiver a bit when I need to strike a match because of the burn that I got at five when playing with my mother’s lighter when she could not see me.
Growing pains: teenage angst
Much like any other teenager, I had to face a number of problems in order to accept the new patterns of relationships and to learn new communication skills. Apart from the way in which society works, I also had to learn how to be accepted and, at the same time, remain an individual. To describe the stages that I had to pass in the course of this transformation, Sternberg’s theory should be used.
Sternberg’s theory: from conventional to creative intelligence
I must admit that, as a child, I did not socialize with the rest of the children much; as a result, growing into a teenager, I was socially awkward most of the time. What I knew about people and society, I learned mostly from books and soon discovered that there was a huge gap between novels and reality. At this point, my development could be viewed through the lens of Sternberg’s theory.
Practical sub theory in action: acquiring communication skills
In the fifth grade, I started working on my communication skills. The process of skills acquisition was rather complicated, even though I had some experience in communication. In accordance with Sternberg’s theory (Bussey & Bandura, 1999, p. 677), I had to learn the basics of conventional communication principles before choosing the communication patterns that suited me best.
Experimental sub theory in action: training communication skills
After learning new skills, I tried them on the people around me in an attempt at winning them over. In some cases, my attempts were successful – I managed to find a sidekick when I enrolled in an art class. However, in a number of instances, these attempts led nowhere, which made me work harder on my social skills.
Gender issues and Chodorow’s theory: defining the differences
However, intelligence development and the skill of thinking outside of the box were not the only issues that I had to learn in the process of growing up. As I had stressed previously, at the age of 11, my knowledge of the social and physiological differences between boys and girls made me flock with girls of my age. However, at the age of 14, I started feeling that building relationships with boys are also an important part of my cognitive experience.
I remember dating boys at 15–17 and being romantically involved; however, it was all a part of growing up and cognizing the world and people around me, which was the key reason why these relationships never went anywhere. Perhaps, being relatively short, these experiences did not lead me to succumb to “women’s universal subordination that is based on a social, rather than a biological, explanation” (Ryle, 2012, p. 135), as Chodorow put it.
The world, through the lens of a young adult
Triarchic theory is still powerful: new experiences
After I gave birth to my daughter, I discovered a whole new world of new experiences. Not all of them were positive – some included such problems as fighting fears when my daughter got sick, etc. However, by learning to be a mother, I realized that I have a plethora of both practical and artistic skills to learn. Therefore, Sternberg’s theory of learning to handle new tasks is still powerful. For example, while I used to be quite awkward when teaching my daughter to talk, I now feel experienced enough to develop sets of exercises for her creative learning.
Horney and Freud’s legacy: gender theories
As I have stressed above, I have been having issues in communication with the opposite sex. The given issues must have been stemming from my childhood experience. Being a child of a single mother, I could not observe the interactions between a man and a woman and, therefore, had to discover the specifics of gender relationships on my own. As Freud specifies, the so-called scripts, i.e., patterns of relationships, are learned in late childhood (Ryle, 2012, p. 135); in my case, these scripts did not include a male counterpart, which was the key stumbling block in my relationships with my male friends. As a result, I seem to have developed what Horney defined as a masculinity complex, which makes my gender relationships even more complicated (Paris, 2003, p. 22).
Divorce and the associated threats: Jung
I have to admit that at some point in my development, I had to face a serious crisis. In contrast to my expectations, my family life left much to be desired in terms of relationships with my husband. The problems that I encountered could be traced back to my Electra complex, as Jung (Borovečki-Jakovljev & Matacic, 2005, p. 351) defined it. Being raised by a single parent, I had little to no examples of interactions between a husband and a wife, which meant that I had to create my own interactional patterns.
Conclusion: Personal Development in Retrospect
Evaluating my experience, I must admit that I have a number of issues to confront. While my development did not differ much from the development of other children, such factors as being raised by a single parent and failing at claiming my independence in early childhood have affected my character and, therefore, shape my current behavioral patterns.
What needs to be addressed
As Jung’s theory allowed defining, I will have to work on learning to build relationships with men. Without a particular pattern learned from early childhood, the given task is extremely complicated. However, the situation that I face at present also has a positive side to it – I do not have the inherently wrong male-female relationship pattern based on the example set by my parents.
Future developmental prospects
Despite the fact that I already have a number of behavioral patterns cemented in my brain, changes in the environment that I live in, particularly new influences and interactions with new people mat possibly change the way I build relationships with people around me. By using the theories listed above to analyze my behavioral patterns, I will be capable of shaping my attitude towards other people and be open to new experiences.
Reference List
Borovečki-Jakovljev, S. & Matacic, S. (2005). The Oedipus complex in contemporary psychoanalysis. Collegium Antropologicum 29(1), pp. 351–360.
Bussey, K., & Bandura, A. (1999). Social cognitive theory of gender development and differentiation. Psychological Review, 106(6), pp. 676-713.
Paris, B. J. (2003). Horney & humanistic psychoanalysis. In Frager, R. & Fadiman, J. (Eds.), Personality and personal growth (pp. 1–29). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.
Ryle, R. (2012). How do we learn Gender? Questioning Gender (pp. 119–165). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.