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This page revised and Copyrighted: Theon Doxazo |
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04.1.4.0 |
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I'd like to discuss a term that I have been avoiding for some time. That is the term 'stage'. In Developmental Psychology the term 'stage' has a very distinct meaning. A true 'stage' theory implies that the various qualities in the developmental sequence each have certain characteristics. That is: one stage is qualitatively different from another. A person will have similar qualities within a stage, and different qualities across stages. Normally each of the stages remain somewhat stable for quite a while. When changes do happen, they may occur quickly.
One example of this 'stage-wise' development is the process of learning to walk. When a baby learns to walk it first begins by being able to roll and twist it's body about. Then it begins crawling. Later it learns to stand. Then to walk with assistance, later to walk independently, and eventually to run. In the general course of events, one must complete and become competent at the lower 'stages' of development and as one does so, one is then able to acquire new abilities that use these previously learned skills as a foundation. During this process there is lots of trial and error as one learns, but once a skill has been mastered it is very uncommon to revert only to a previous level of function.
As a result, a true stage theory speaks of a process of development that is often clear, consistent, and is (often) believed to be physiologically-based. As the human brain continues to develop, to wire itself together, changes appear in the abilities of the person that were not there previously. One classic example of this are the abilities Piaget described as 'conservation'. For example: make two equal-sized balls of clay. After the child has looked at them, take one of the balls and roll it out into a long 'snake'. Ask, which of them is bigger. The child chooses the 'snake' because it's 'longer'. He doesn't realize that they both have the same amount of clay, they've just changed their shapes. At about the 7th year of life the child is not able to conserve one day and, seemingly, able to conserve the next. I have clearly seen this change occur in as little as one week. With no formal training, the child acquires the ability to conserve. Yes, there are different tasks associated with assessing conservation and frequently one will not develop them all at the same moment. It may take a few weeks for this to spontaneously appear, but appear it does.
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