poop
...his stage occurs while the baby is two years old, in this stage toddlers learn to exercise will do things for themselves, or they doubt their abilities. The third stage is called the preschooler between the ages of three and five (initiative vs. guilt). During this stage preschoolers learn to initiate tasks and carry out plans, or they feel guilty about efforts to be independent. The fourth stage is called the elementary school stage (competence vs. inferiority) from the ages of six through puberty. During this stage children learn the pleasure of applying themselves to tasks, or they feel inferior. In the fifth stage is the adolescence stage (identity vs. role confusion) this stage occurs during the ages of thirteen years into twenties. The sixth stage is called young adulthood (intimacy vs. isolation) during the ages of around 21 through 40 young adults struggle to form close relationships and to gain capacity for intimate love, or they feel socially isolated. The seventh stage is called middle adulthood (generativity vs. stagnation) during the ages of 41 through about 60 the middle-aged discover a sense of contributing to the world, such as through family and work, or they may feel a lack of purpose. During late adulthood ages 60 and up, (integrity vs. despair) during this stage when reflecting on his or her life, the older adult may feel a sense of satisfaction or failure. According to Dr. C. George Boeree "Erikson is a Freudian ego-psychologist. This means that he accepts Freud's ideas as basically correct, including the more debatable ideas such as the Oedipal complex, and accepts as well the ideas about the ego that were added by other Freudian loyalist such as Heinz Hartmann and, of course, Anna Freud. However, Erikson is much more society and culture- oriented than most Freudians, as you might except from someone with his anthropological interest, and he often pushes the instincts and the unconscious practically out of the picture. Perhaps because of this, Erikson is popular among Freudians and non-Freudians alike." "According to Erikson, personality develops in steps determined by human organism's readiness to move toward, to be aware of, and to interact with a widening social world - a world that begins with a dim image of mother and ends with an image of humankind." Erikson's stages are very interesting; stages five and six are going to be describe in detail in my paper. Stage five is adolescence, beginning with puberty and ending around 18 or 20 years old. The task during adolescence is to achieve ego identity and avoid role confusion. It was adolescence that interested Erikson first and most, and the patterns he saw here were the bases for his thinking about all the other stages. Ego identity means knowing whom you are and how you fit in to the rest of the society. It requires that you take all you've learned about life and mold it into a unified self-image, one that your community finds meaningful. There are a number of things that make things easier: First, we should have a mainstream adult culture that is worthy of the adolescent's respect, one with good adult role models and open lines of communication. Further, society should provide clear rites of passage, certain accomplishments and rituals that help to distinguish the adult from the child. In primitive and traditional societies, an adolescent boy may be asked to leave the village for a period of time to live on his own, hunt some symbolic animal, or seek an inspirational vision. Boys and girls may be required to go through certain test of endurance, symbolic ceremonies, or educational events. In one way or another, the distinction between the powerless, but irresponsible, time of childhood and the powerful and responsible time of adulthood, is made clear. Without these things, we are likely to see role confusion, meaning an uncertainty about one's place in society and the world these things. When an adolescent is confronted by role confusion, Erikson said he or she is suffering from an identity crisis. In fact, a common question adolescents in our society ask is a straight-forward question of identity: "Who am I?" One of Erikson's suggestions for adolescence in our society is the psychosocial moratorium. He suggests you take a little "time-out". If you have money, go to Europe. There is such a thing as too much "ego identity", where a person is so involved in a particular role in a particular society or subculture that there is no room left for tolerance. Erikson calls this maladaptive tendency fanaticism. A fanatic believes that his way is the only way. Adolescents are of course known for their idealism, and for their tendency to see things in black-and-white. These people will gather other around them and promote their beliefs and life styles with regard to others' rights to disagree. The lack of identity is perhaps more difficult still, and Erikson refers to the malignant tendency here as repudiation. They repudiate their member in the world of adults and, even more, they repudiate their need for an identity. Some adolescents allow themselves to "fuse" with a group, especially the kind of group that is particularly eager to provide the details of your identity: religious cults, militaristic organizations, groups founded on hatred, groups that have divorced themselves from the painful demands of mainstream society. They become involved in destructive activities, drugs, or alcohol, or you may withdraw into their own psychotic fantasies. After all, being "bad" or "nobody" is better than not knowing who you are. If one successfully negotiates this stage, one will have virtue Erikson called fidelity. Fidelity means loyalty, the ability to live by society standards despite their imperfections and incompleteness and inconsistencies. "For adolescents not only help one another temporarily through much discomfort by forming cliques and by stereotyping themselves, their ideals, and their enemies; they also perversely test each other's capacity to pledge fidelity" ...