The stages of human growth and development.

Q. 2. Discus briefly the stages of human growth and development.

The Stages of Human growth and development together focuses on the ways in which people live and change themselves. These two forms refer to the increases of social change. Although all individuals are different, yet they follow expected patterns of growth and development that are common for all. The study of these processes focuses on describing, explaining, predicting and modifying in trend of social change. The diverse facets of development (physical growth and psychosocial) do not happen in isolation. If we trace the history of the evolution of human growth and development studies we see that it was in the nineteenth century that child development began as a scientific study.

Adolescence was not thought of as a separate stage of human growth and development until the twentieth century. Contributions by G. Stanley Hall introduced adolescences as an important stage and also he was the first psychologist to study aging. Aging only became a major area of study since 1940s. Now-a-days a lot of importance is given to human growth and development as it helps us in understanding the human beings that is ourselves and others from conception to death, the changes we are undergoing in each of the stages. Human beings like all animals, start life as a single cell, the fertilized ovum. This cell divides and grows and develops into the embryo, fetus, child and adult. The Stages of Human growth and development, Growth and development occurs simultaneously, they are distinct biological processes. Growth can be defined as a quantitative increase in size or mass. Measurements of heights in centimeters or weights in kilograms tell us how much growth has occurred in the human being.

The Stages of Human growth and development , growth of a body organ, like kidney, brain can be explained by measuring the number, weight, or size of cells present. Development is defined as a progression of changes, either quantitative or qualitative that head from an undifferentiated or immature state to a highly organized, specialized and mature state, for example, the development of motor skills of a child that results in walking or running. Stages of Human Growth and Development Various educationalists and psychologists have classified the different stages of growth and development and conducted in depth study on each stage and their characteristics. The study into the different stages of human growth and development is important as we can learn the common and particular age changes, when these changes happen, what are the reasons for them to occur, how they further affect behaviour, can these changes be foreseen and are they universal? The stages of human growth and development can be divided into different age groups from the conception in the womb till the death of that human being. These stages are broadly classified into eight categories and these are:

— Prenatal stage— conception to birth

— Infancy and babyhood— birth to three years

— Early childhood—three to six years

— Late childhood— six to twelve years

— Adolescence—twelve to eighteen years

— Young adulthood—eighteen to forty years

— Middle age-forty to sixty—five years

— Late adulthood- sixty—five and above

Let us discuss each of these stages in detail

The Prenatal Stage

The first stage of human growth and development is not from the first day that the child is born into this world but from the day when the child is conceived in the womb of the mother. The beginning of human life has always been very fascinating. The biological beginning of a human being is a moment when a single spermatozoon, one of the million sperm cells from the father, unites with an ovum (egg cell), one of the hundred thousand ova produced and stored in the mother’s body. This process is called fertilization or conception when the sperm and the ovum join together to create a single cell called a zygote. The prenatal stage is the gestation time when the developments occur from conception to the birth; this takes approximately nine months or two hundred and sixty-six days. The zygote replicates again and again with cell division. It develops first into an embryo, then into a fetus, and finally emerges as a complicated human being with millions of cells specializing in various functions of the human body.

The Infancy and Babyhood Stage

The infancy and the babyhood stage is the period between birth to three years of the human being. This stage also is associated to rapid growth and development. Birth normally starts when the fetus is prepared and there are four stages: 1) Dilation of the cervix; 2) Moving down and emergence of the baby; 3) Discharge of the umbilical cord and the placenta; 4) Contraction of the uterus and the revival of the mother. The neonatal period is the first month of the child. This period is the time of transition. At birth the infant’s circulatory, respiratory, gastrointestinal, and temperature regulation systems become independent of the mother’s. The newborn babies alternate between states of sleep, awake, and activity. Sleep takes up majority of their time. In this stage that extents to three years, it is observed that the first year the baby’s body grows very fast. Breastfeeding has high physiological benefits and increases the motherinfant bond. The sensory capacities are present from birth and develop rapidly in the first few months of life.

Physical growth and development occur at gradually decelerated rates throughout babyhood and development of the physiological functions take place at a faster pace. Muscle control starts from head, arm and hand skills. In this period we also observe language development. Communication starts when the baby comprehends what others are communicating to them, and then they communicate with others. Prelinguistic speech, that precedes the words, includes crying, cooing, babbling and imitating sounds. Babies also commonly use gestures. By 10 months, babies begin to understand meaningful speech. The baby begins with the first words by 10 to 14 months. By age three, grammar and syntax are fairly developed. Early social foundations in this stage are important because the type of behaviour baby’s show in social situations affect their personal and social adjustment. These patterns tend to persist life long. Discipline’s role in moral development is mainly in the form of punishment and rewards for wrong behaviour and approved behaviour respectively. Sex role typing also begins in this period. The foundations are laid for psychosocial development including emotions, temperament, and early experiences with parents. This stage also evolves the self-concept of the individual in the following sequence: 

·         Physical self-recognition and self-awareness,

·         Self-description and self-evaluation, and

·         Emotional response to wrongdoing.

The Early Childhood Stage

The stage of early childhood extends from three to six years. It is called by different names as the toy age, preschool age, troublesome age or the pre-gang age. Physical development proceeds at a slow rate in early childhood; the physiological habits started in the babyhood stage get confirmed in this stage. This period is also the skill acquiring period as the child easily repeats and picks up skills. The Stages of Human growth and development , Speech development improves quickly as also in comprehension. The emotional development follows a particular pattern according to intelligence, gender, family background and child rearing practices experienced by the individual. Play is important for the overall development of the child. Play is influenced by the motor skills acquired by the child, their popularity among other group-mates and the socioeconomic status of their families. Parents, companions and different family relationship play an important role in the socialization process and in developing the self-concept of the child. Parents influence children’s behaviour through discipline, ways of teaching, self-control and acceptable behaviour The Stages of Human growth and development.

The Late Childhood Stage

Late childhood extends from six years to twelve years. This period is before the period when the child is sexually mature. The physical growth in this period is relatively at an even rate and is influenced by health, nutrition, immunization, sex and intelligence. The skills developed in the late childhood can be categorized into four groups: self-help skills, social-help skills, school skills, and play skills. All areas of speech-pronunciation, vocabulary, and sentence structure improve rapidly. The Stages of Human growth and development, Older children learn to control the overt expressions of their emotions and to use emotional catharsis to clear pent up emotions caused by social pressures. Older children are interested in activities with their peer and want to belong to a group or gang. These children will often reject parental standards, develop antagonistic attitude towards persons of the opposite sex.

The Adolescence Stage

 Adolescence extends from twelve years to eighteen years, the period when the individual becomes sexually mature and ends when the individual is legally mature. This period in the life span of the individual is important, as it is a transitional phase, a time of changes, a problem age, a time when the individual looks for an identity and a threshold of adulthood. In adolescence puberty is a short phase, it occurs at different ages for boys and girls. The average age in girls is thirteen and is marked by the onset of menarche or first menstruation and in boys is fourteen years and is determined by the nocturnal emissions. The rapid growth and change in puberty is determined by hereditary factors and environmental factors like nutrition, health, and emotional stress. Puberty changes affect physical well-being, attitudes and behaviour. The Stages of Human growth and development, It’s important that individuals in puberty relate to normalcy and do not develop negative self-concept, unable to accept the bodily changes and the sex-roles demanded on them by society.

The Young Adulthood Stage

Young adulthood extends from age eighteen to approximately age forty, when the physical and psychological changes occur and also accompany the beginning of the loss of reproductive capacity. The young adulthood is the settling period and the reproductive age, a time of commitments and independency, there are changes in value system. The adult adjusts to new life patterns. The aids to mastering the developmental tasks of this stage are physical efficiency, motor and mental abilities, motivation and a good role model. The personal interests include interests in clothes and keeping themselves presentable. The adult wants to be mature and respectable and wants status in money and religion matters. Social activities in this period are mostly reduced because of family, vocational and professional responsibilities. This is the time that individuals have to plan their professional life and settle in an occupation. Social mobility in men most of the time is due to their own efforts and hard work. While in women, social mobility could be because of their achievements they move up the social ladder or because they marry into a higher-class family and they move up the social ladder.

The Middle Adulthood or Middle Age Stage

 Middle adulthood or middle age begins at forty and extends to sixty years. In this period physical and psychological decline is observed. Middle age can be a difficult time and successful adjustment to this stage depends on the essential base laid down in the earlier stages. This age is called the dreaded period of transition and stress.

This period is also of achievements and of evaluations. Sometimes this is also the time of boredom and empty nests as children have grown up and moved out for higher studies or employment or married off. The individuals are suddenly lonely and don’t know how to manage their free time. Physical changes occur in appearance, physiological functioning and sexuality and adjusting to it can get very difficult. In women the menopause changes is because there is reduction in estrogen and there is psychological stress. While in men there is a physiological and psychological changes which affect their attitude, behaviour and self-evaluation. In today’s times, more so the success in adjusting to middle age is by successfully being able to hide your physical signs of aging and to be involved with ways to keep oneself young and trim. Mental decline in the middle age also starts. The interests in religion are also on the increase in the middle age. In this age group there are changes in the recreational interests. There is an interest in physical recreation, which involves fewer persons, apart from lesser recreational interests the middle age individual is more adult oriented than family oriented. It is observed that social interests and activities are greatly inclined by social-class status, sex, and marital status.

The Late Adulthood (Old Age) Stage

Late adulthood or old age begins at sixty and extends till death. Physical and psychological decline fastens up in this period. In today’s modern times, medical techniques and cautious clothing and grooming interests make many men and women to look, act, and feel as they did when they were much younger. It has been observed that there is difference in individuals in their effect of aging as physical aging precedes psychological aging The physical changes include changes in appearance, and in the different internal physical systems, changes in different physiological functioning, sensory and sexual changes. The changes in motor capacities are changes in strength and speed, more time needed to learn new abilities. There are different causes for the changes in the mental abilities of the individual in this stage, important among these are lack of environmental stimulation and lack of motivation to be mentally alert. Changes in interests are caused because of different reasons like deterioration in health and economic status, change in residence and marital status and change in values.

Changes in recreational activities in old age are because of changes in health, economic and marital status, living conditions. Thus there is a shift in how they spend their time for recreations. The Stages of Human growth and development, The employment opportunity for older workers are restricted by compulsory retirement, hiring practices, pension plan, social attitudes, sex of the workers and the kind of work. Retirement causes change in their roles, interests, values and life patterns. Thus there is reduction in income and loneliness. Due to the death of the spouse there is cause for adjustment again. The most common living arrangements for the elderly in our society are: an elderly couple lives alone, an elderly couple live with their married son and family, an elderly widow or widower lives with the married child, now a days there is also elderly living in homes for the elders.

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