Life span perspective of human development

When studying these changes, he noted that most changes occurred between birth and adolescence and no change was seen to occur during adulthood stage. Boyd, Bee & Johnson (2015) also noted that digressions occurred during the old age. He later acknowledges that a person’s lifespan begins from the point one is conceived to death. In lifespan development, nature and nurture are perceived to be more than the perspectives as they influences who the individual will be. The relationship between lifespan perspectives and human development is life-long. Cognitive is a developmental and human growth theory emphasizing on structure and development of thought. Piaget realizes that children are thoughtful and curious and therefore cognitive theory takes place in four phases namely sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational.

All these stages are age-related. Sensorimotor is from birth to age two where children understand the world using motor and senses. According to Guest (2011), age two to age six involves preoperational stage which involves the use of language. On the other hand, human developments embrace the world as diverse and containing many cultures as part of individual developments, and therefore, it is multicultural. A culture contains a collection of persons sharing similar characteristics and commonalities, and therefore, a culture does not consider race and ethnicity. On the other hand, according to Kail & Cavanaugh (2018), human development is multi-contextual which proves its adaptations from the social and the physical environments which individuals are subjected to throughout their life span. Another developmental characteristic of a life span perspective is plasticity.

This characteristic state that all individuals have features which can be affected at any point in their life and bring about changes. When focusing on the environmental influences on human growth and development, Guest (2011) focused mainly on the social and economic factors. He investigated the roles that pollutant and other aspects of human-made environment play in affecting the patterns of human growth and development. Studies show that air pollution has other harmful effects on human growth and not only on the respiratory organs. Indoor pollution, especially from poor housing conditions, can lead to ill health which is a negative impact on human growth and development. A good example is exposure of lead from lead paint which causes obstructions with normal brain development.