Human Development Interview

 

 

Human Development Interview

 

INTEGRITY

 

Gary Thomas Anderson

 

Liberty University

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By NPS Photo [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

 

Abstract

 

Psychoanalyst Erik Erikson believed that society and culture introduce certain challenges at each stage of the developmental lifespan. In so far as this assignment is concerned I chose to interview my step-father-n-law. He asserted that he is to remain anonymous so I will call him “Frank.” Frank is in what Erikson would call late adulthood. In this stage of the developmental lifespan, Erikson’s stage of psychosocial developmental challenge is “Ego-integrity vs. despair.” Frank’s overall opinion of where he is at is in agreement with Erikson’s model. That is, he sees himself as positively sensing unity in his life accomplishments. He has a sense of integrity. He also related some of the challenges during his earlier stages of development that have served to bring him where he is at today.

 

 

Integrity

            I interviewed my step-father-n-law. He is in what Erikson would call “late adulthood.” In his words, “I am content with who I am and where I am at this stage in my life.” I learned that Frank has a sense of integrity. I could not sense any despair.

I did pick up on the fact that he had some regrets but I noticed he had a way of not allowing these regrets to affect his current status in life. I noted that even though he may not have resolved the challenges at some points in his life he managed to eventually resolve the crisis. For example, Frank had many jobs during his middle adulthood stage. I knew this prior to the interview. Frank has always spoke of his adventurous career. But this interview is the first time that we have directly attempted to fit them into a formal developmental stages model.  

When I revealed Erikson’s “Generativity vs. Stagnation” that is attributed to middle adulthood Frank was able to pinpoint negative experiences that led him from one job to the next one (Feldman, 2014).  Overall, Frank looked back at his career as a roller-coaster ride and he concluded that he did sense a contribution to the continuity of life as Erikson would put it (2014).

In my interview with Frank I noticed that he kept going back to his career and his life work. He framed each stage of his development in how he either contributed or failed to contribute based on his view regarding his career challenges. The fact that Frank spoke at length pertaining to his career was interesting. He did speak of family and his faith but not as much as he spoke about his work. In an article from the Journal of Counseling and Development entitled Work-Life Balance for Men: Counseling implications, authors Amanda M. Evans, Jamie S. Carney, and Morgan Wilkinson state that “many men find that when life events do not go their way, they are good at compensating behaviorally” (Carney, Evans, Wilkinson, 2013). This supported Frank’s ability to look back over his career with the ability to compensate for the various challenges that he had during his middle adulthood stage.

 

In the article from the Journal of Counseling and Development entitled Work-Life Balance for Men: Counseling implications, authors Amanda M. Evans, Jamie S. Carney, and Morgan Wilkinson go on to offer that “Integrity, a virtue often associated with men, focuses on the client’s ability to live honestly through authentic living” (Carney, Evans, Wilkinson, 2013) Frank has reached this stage in his life. I would conclude that he has achieved a balance. A work-life balance. Even though Frank may have had difficulty in his middle-adulthood stage of development he was able to finally resolve the crisis.

In my research I noted that according to the article from the Journal of Counseling and Development, as cited above, the authors wrote about “Emotional Closure” (Carney, Evans, Wilkinson, 2013).  This is where I ended up at with my interview with Frank. Emotional closure, occurs when an individual engages in an honest dialogue and thereby identifies problem solving techniques which can then aide the individual in alleviating distress that can be related with balancing multiple roles (2013). It is my concluding opinion that Frank has found a way to alleviate stress along the way in his life which has led him to his current stage of a sense of unity in life’s accomplishments(Feldman, 2014). He has reached the stage of integrity as Erikson would have it (Feldman, 2014).

References

Feldman, R. S. (2014). Development across the life span (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ:

Pearson Education, Inc.

Carney, S. J., Evans, M. A., Wilkinson, M. (2013). Work-life balance for men: Counseling

implications. Journal of counseling & development. Vol. 91, Number 4.