A Life-Span View - Assignment Example

Personal Case Study I am a girl named Mram. My preferred name is Mram. I was born in Saudi Arabia on 9th of June 1984. My family is made up of eight members, my two parents and five siblings. I have also lived in Riyadh. I graduated from college in 2007 and joined a master’s program in August 2012. I major in Hutment development and leadership with concentration area of the HDL in Murry. I anticipate to graduate on 5th October 2014. My life dates back when I was a little girl. I was a jovial and playful baby. The people around me were truthful which led to the elemental sense of my trustworthiness. I depended on my mother and my father for care, comfort and sustenance. By this time, my relative comprehension of the world came from my parents, particularly my mother, and their interactions with me. My parents’ regularity, warmth and reliable fondness exposed me to a world ruled by trust. There was no point in my life that my parents failed to offer a secure surrounding to meet my basic need. Just like noted under Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory, this would have created mistrust which would have resulted to suspicions, lack of confidence, withdrawal and frustration to me (Kail & Cavanaugh 23). My parents were the regular sources of comfort, food, love, which taught me to trust. As I grew older, I started to choose cloths by myself. By the age of 3, I had gained control over eliminative roles and would make choices in my life and explored the environment around me. Needless to say, my parents still provided a secure environment where I would carry out my own activities at will (Kail & Cavanaugh 40-45). My patients were patient and would wait to look at my choices and would correct me if I had gone wrong at some point. At this time of my life, I had developed a strong interest in music and played with the radio. I would put some loud music which my parents would control by informing me to reduce the high volume. I was able to feed myself now and would wash my cloths and use the bathroom on my own. Between the age of 3 and 6 years, I was imaging much. I would take on tasks just because I had been active. I was slowly learning the world around me and learning numerous basic principles. I would tie my shoes and tie my school tie and would speak effectively with my parents without any problems. I did not like being idle, and would felt guilty if it happened. I felt the urge to help my mother with her household chores. I would also feel bad if I did something and was not productive as I had anticipated. Such small things bothered me a lot and would feel guilty for not attaining my targets (Kail & Cavanaugh 114-168). This was well evidenced when in my lower classes in primary school. I always wanted to top the class after any assessment test and anytime I would be second, I would feel guilty. As I got to 6 years of age, I started asking myself whether I would make it in the world. I started taking part in activities which would expose me to responsibility. In school, I was involved in activities that would give me responsibilities to perform. I was also involved in activities that would make me a good and desirable person and worked at doing everything right. At this stage, I also developed an undesirable behavior of talking back and being rebellious to anyone who tried to talk to me (Kail & Cavanaugh 207-221). I had many friends and loved skating. In my adolescence, I was worried about how I appeared to my friends and how they perceived me. In this regard, I got involved in activities in school that gave me mandate to preside over some activities. I thought this would help me in shaping my identity and how people around me perceived me. I knew that if I don’t get to shape my life by this time, there would be severe implications in my future life. By the time I attained my youthful adulthood, I had set my eyes on goals and targets that I would desire to attain in life. By the time I got to my adulthood, I had known what to work towards and was anxious to mix my identities with my friends. After establishing my identities in my adolescence, I was now ready to commit to marriage. I am now married with four children and ready to make compromises and sacrifices required by marriage. As I grew up, my parents encouraged me to read. This made me a good reader. At my early ages, my behaviors were modified by the consequences surrounding the events. My parents used both positive and negative reinforcers in cultivating certain behaviors in me. They always rewarded me for good performance in school and as a result I became a hardworking girl. On the other hand, my parents would punish me for any unruly behaviors or failures. This explains B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory in understanding my development (Kail & Cavanaugh 375). Albert Bundura’s social cognitive theory is well illustrated in my life development. This theory is embedded on the fact that individuals learn by observing what other people do (Kail & Cavanaugh 28). Since I was a child, I loved the way my mother spoke and wished to talk like her. As a result I started imitating her as I talked. I now talk like her. My mother was my role model and admired her hard work. I always tried to work with zeal on any activity that I was performing. The cognitive developmental theory notes that life is made up of different phases of development where a child encounters different situations which they address through increased mental capabilities. It is only when they are able to overcome the challenges that they can move to the next stage. When I was 3, I loved to assist my mother with cleaning my room. I would watch and imitate my mother and she gave me encouragement. I was able to clean my room through my mother’s encouragement which made me move to that developmental stage of cleaning my room alone. As I interacted with friends and other members of the family, my thinking evolved. I obtained a lot of information from the environment around me. The environment acted as a source of data input into my mind as elaborated in information processing theory. On the other hand, my mind acted as a storage and processor of the information which I would retrieve anytime. Works Cited Kail, Robert V, and John C. Cavanaugh. Human Development: A Life-Span View. Australia: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2010. Print. Read More