Analysis of a Life Stage: Adolescence

Similarly, as Bee (1999) has commented, life span development encompasses recognition of the simultaneous effects of "nature" and "nurture" on the developing organism - in this case, the human child. Human "nature," expressed as gender, biology, genetics, and individualized skills and deficits, is but one influence on the developing child. "Nurture," or the environmental influences, includes culture, family, role models, and other influences found in the social and cultural setting in which the child is raised (Bee, 1999).

Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, spent more than fifty years observing the behavior of his own and other children as they grew from infancy to adolescence (Bee, 1999). From these observations, Piaget constructed a theory of cognitive development that is bas

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five (when the Oedipus complex is repressed by the child's fear of castration at the hands of the father), and the age of twelve (when the energy of the sexual instinct is greatly added to by physiological changes taking place within the reproductive system, the sexual and aggressive instincts of the child are subdued. It is this period that Freud and his followers characterize as the latency period, a term used to suggest that vital drives and instincts are in a state of temporary suspension. As puberty begins, these sexual and aggressive impulses are revived. As a result of this revival, a number of stresses and strains emerge that will continue to characterize the period known as adolescence. During adolescence, a number of adaptations and transformations will take place that will eventually culminate in the stabilization of the individual's personality. Because it is a prelude to adolescence, the latency period takes on heightened significance from the psychoanalytic perspective. In this area, Erikson (1961) can be said to follow much of Freud's reasoning. Late adolescence and adulthood, according to the Freudians, are marked by two seemingly contradictory possibilities. On the one hand, the well-integrated adult mu
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