The Child and Adolescent

Learners and Learning

Principles
MODULE 3

Prepared by: Roselyn G. Pangapalan, LPT

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
At the end of the lesson, the students should be able to:
explain Freud’s view about child and adolescent development.
describe Piaget’s stages of cognitive development in your own
words.
Introduction
Freud’s views about human development are more than a
century old. He can be considered the most well known
psychologist because of his very interesting theory about the
unconscious and also about sexual development. Although a
lot of his views were criticized and some considered them
debunked, (he himself recanted some of his earlier views).
Freud’s theory remains to be one of the most influential in
psychology. His theory sparked the ideas in the brilliant
minds of other theorists and thus became the starting point of
many other theories, notable of which is Erikson’s
psychological theory.
 Freud’s Stages of Psychosexual
Development
  EROGENOUS DESCRIPTION OF THE STAGE FIXATIONS
ZONE

Oral Stage (birth to Mouth The child is focused on oral pleasures As a result, these persons
18 months) (sucking). Too much or too little may become too
satisfaction can lead to an Oral Fixation dependent on others,
or Oral Personality which is shown in easily fooled, ad lack
an increased focus on oral activities. leadership traits. On the
This type of personality may be oral other hand, they may also
receptive, that is, have a stronger fight these tendencies and
tendency to smoke, drink alcohol, become pessimistic and
overeat, or oral aggressive, that is, with aggressive in relating with
a tendency to bite his or her nails, or use people.
curse words or even gossip.
 EROGENOUS DESCRIPTION OF THE STAGE
ZONE
Anal Stage (18 months Anus The child finds satisfaction in
to 3 years) eliminating and retaining feces.
Through society’s expectations,
particularly the parents, the child
needs to work on toilet training. Let
us remember that between one year
and a half to three years the child’s
favorite word might be “No!”.
Therefore a struggle might exist in
the toilet training process when the
child retains feces when asked to
eliminate, or may choose to defecate
when asked to hold feces for some
reason.
FIXATIONS
In terms of personality,
fixation during this stage
can result in being anal
retentive, an obsession
with cleanliness,
perfection, and control; or
anal expulsive where the
person may become
messy and disorganized.
 EROGENOUS DESCRIPTION OF THE STAGE FIXATIONS
ZONE
Phallic Stage Genitals During the preschool age, children become A fixation at this stage could
(ages 3 to 6) interested in what makes boys or girls different. result in sexual deviances
Preschoolers will sometimes be seen fondling their (both overindulging and
genitals. Freud studies led him to believe that avoidance) and weak or
during this stage boys develop unconscious sexual confused sexual identity
desire for their mother. Boys then see their father according to psychoanalysts.
as a rival for her mother’s affection. Boys may fear  
that their father will punish them for these feelings,
thus the castration anxiety. These feelings comprise
what Freud called Oedipus Complex. In Greek
Mythology, Oedipus unintentionally killed his
father and married his mother Jocasta.
Psychoanalysts also believed that girls may also
have a similar experience, developing unconscious
sexual attraction towards their father. This is what
is referred to as the Electra Complex.
 EROGENOUS DESCRIPTION OF THE STAGE FIXATIONS
ZONE

Latency Stage (age 6 to   It’s during this stage that sexual urges
puberty remain repressed. The children’s
focus is the acquisition of physical
and academic skills. Boys usually
relate more with boys and girls with
girls during this stage.

Genital Stage (puberty   Begins at the start of puberty when

onwards) sexual urges are once again
awakened. In the earlier stages,
adolescents focus their sexual urges
towards the opposite sex peers, with
the pleasure centered on the genitals.
Freud’s Personality Components
The ID.
Freud says that a child is born with the id.
The id plays a vital role in one’s personality because as a
baby, it works so that the baby’s essential needs are met.
The id operates on the pleasure principle.
It focuses on immediate gratification or satisfaction of its
needs. So whatever feels good now is what it will pursue
with no consideration for the reality, logicality or
practicality of the situation.
The EGO.

As the baby turns into a toddler and then into a preschooler,
he/she relates more with the environment, the ego slowly
begins to emerge.
The ego operates using the reality principle.
It is aware that others also have needs to be met. It is practical
because it knows that being impulsive or selfish can result to
negative consequences later, so it reasons and considers the
best response to situations. As such, it is the deciding agent of
the personality. Although it functions to help the id meet it
needs, it always takes into account the reality of the situation.
The SUPEREGO.
Near the end of the preschool years, or the end of the phallic
stage, the superego develops.
The superego embodies a person’s moral aspect. This develops
from what the parents, teachers and other persons who exert
influence impart to be good or moral.
The superego is likened to conscience because it exerts
influence on what one considers right or wrong.
According to Freud, a well-adjusted person is one who has strong
ego, who can help satisfy the needs of the id without going
against the superego while maintaining the person’s sense of
what is logical, practical and real.
 Topographical Model

The Unconscious.
Freud said that the most what we go through in our lives,
emotions, beliefs, and impulses deep within are not available to
us at a conscious level. He believed that the most of what
influence us is our unconscious.
The Conscious.
Freud also said that all we are aware of is stored in our
conscious mind. Our conscious mind only comprises a very small
part of who we are so that, in our everyday life, we are only
aware of a very small part of what makes up our personality;
most of what we are is hidden and out of reach.
The subconscious.
The last part is the preconscious or subconscious. This is the
part of us that we can reach if prompted, but is not in our active
conscious. It’s right below the surface, but still “hidden”
somewhat unless we search for it. Information such as our
telephone number, some childhood memories, or the name of
your best childhood friend is stored in the preconscious.
  
Conscious
 

Preconscious
Superego

Ego* Nonconscious
 

Unconscious
Id

  *Note: Ego is freefloating

in all three levels.

Freud’s Conception of the Human Psyche

(The Iceberg Metaphor)

 Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

 Jean Piaget’s Cognitive Theory of Development is truly a

classic in the field of educational psychology. This theory
fueled other researches and theories of development and
learning. Its focus is on how individuals construct knowledge.
Basic Cognitive Concepts
Schema. It refers to the cognitive structures by which
individuals intellectually adapt to and organize their
environment. It is an individual’s way to understand or create
meaning about a thing or experience. It is like the mind has a
filing cabinet and each drawer has folders that contain files of
things he has had an experience with.

Assimilation. This is the process of fitting a new experience

into an existing or previously created cognitive structure or
schema.
Accommodation. This is the process of creating a new schema.

Equilibrium. Piaget believed that people have the natural need

to understand how the world works and to find order, structure,
and predictability in their life. Equilibration is achieving proper
between assimilation and accommodation. When our
experiences do not match our schemata (plural of schema) or
cognitive structures, we experience cognitive disequilibrium.
This means there is a discrepancy between what is perceived and
what is understood. We then exert effort through assimilation
and accommodation to establish equilibrium once more.
 Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development
STAGE 1. SENSORI-MOTOR STAGE (BIRTH TO
INFANCY)
This is the stage when a child who is initially reflexive in
grasping, sucking and reaching becomes more organized in his
movement and activity.

Object Permanence- this is the ability of the child to know

than an object still exists even when out of sight. This ability is
attained in the sensory motor stage.
STAGE 2. PRE-OPERATIONAL STAGE (2 TO 7 YEARS)
This is roughly corresponding to the preschool years.
Intelligence at this stage is intuitive in nature. At this stage, the
child can now make mental representations and is able to
pretend, the child is now ever closer to the use of symbols.
Symbolic Function. This is the ability to represent objects and
events. A symbol is a thing that represents something else.
Egocentrism. This is the tendency of the child to only see his
point of view and to assume that everyone also has his same
point of view. The child cannot take the perspective of others.
Centration. This refers to the tendency of the child to only focus
on one aspect of a thing or event and exclude other aspects.
Irreversibility. Pre-operational children still have the inability
to reverse their thinking. They can understand that 2+3 is 5, but
cannot understand that 5-3 is 2.
Animism. This is the tendency of children to attribute human
like traits or characteristics to inanimate objects. When at
night, the child asked, where the sun is, she will reply, “Mr.
Sun is asleep.”
Transductive reasoning. This refers to the pre-operational
child’s type of reasoning that is neither inductive nor
deductive. Reasoning appears to be from particular to
particular, i.e., If A causes B, then B causes A.
Stage 3. Concrete-Operational Stage (8 to 11 years or the
elementary years)
This stage is characterized by the ability of the child to
think logically but only in terms of concrete objects.
Decentering. This refers to the ability of the child to
perceive the different features of objects and situations.
No longer is the child focused or limited to one aspect or
dimension. This allows the child to be more logical when
dealing with concrete objects and situations.
Reversibility. During the stage of concrete operations, the
child can now follow that certain operations can be done
in reverse.
Conservation. This is the ability to know that certain
properties of objects like number, mass, volume, or area do not
change even if there is a change in appearance.

Seriation. This refers to the ability to order or arrange things

in a series based on one dimension such as weight, volume or
size.
Stage 4. Formal Operational Stage (12 and 15 years)
In the final stage of formal operations covering ages 12 and 15
years, thinking becomes more logical. They can now solve
abstract problems and can hypothesize.

Hypothetical Reasoning. This is the ability to come up with

different hypothesis about a problem and to gather and weigh
data in order to make a final decision or judgment. This can be
done in the absence of concrete objects. The individuals can
now deal with “What if” questions.
Analogical Reasoning. This is ability to perceive the
relationship in one instance and then use that relationship to
narrow down possible answer in another similar situation or
problem.

Deductive Reasoning. This is the ability to think logically by

applying a general rule to a particular instance or situation.
Thank you!