Developmental Theories & Child Case Study

This assignment delves into the application of developmental theories by Piaget and Erikson to analyze a case study of a 3-year-old child named Jack. The analysis focuses on Jack's speech delay and challenges with toilet training, examining potential influences from his family environment and lack of consistent adult interaction. The essay emphasizes the importance of understanding both normative and non-normative development patterns in children and highlights how these theories are crucial for nurses and midwives to design appropriate interventions and support families.

Running Head: NURSING CASE STUDY
Nursing
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Human development involves different stages from birth till the end of life. The main
stages of development are “infancy childhood, adolescent, adult (early, middle, and late) and old
age”. Understanding these stages is important as at every stage an individual is enabled to
perform the activities of surviving, struggling and maturing. Human beings have social
capabilities and have self-conscious and the changes at different stages of lifespan occur at
beyond the physical realm. The aim of the assignment is to explore the cognitive and social
development in children and factors influencing the child’s development.
Cognitive development refers to different aspects of brain development such as
perceptual skill, information processing, language learning, and other aspects of brain
development. This development is important for maximizing their well-being (Bjorklund &
Causey, 2017). Cognitive development according to Piaget theory there are four different stages
of cognitive development. These are sensorimotor stage (0-2 years), pre-operational stage (2-5
years), concrete operational stage (7-11 years) and formal operational stage (11 years onwards).
In the sensorimotor stage the cognitive development occurs by learning movements of the body
by sensory data such as learning, hearing, touching. In the pre-operational stage, the child can
think of objects symbolically. Intelligence of the child is demonstrated at this age through the use
of symbols, matured language, memory and imagination. However, the thinking remains
egocentric. In the concrete operational stage, the intelligence is demonstrated through logical and
systematic manipulation of symbols related to objects and reversible mental actions. The formal
operational stage is marked by showing the ability to think about the abstract concepts such as
joy, fear or love. At this stage, they are able to test hypothesis, logically (Feldman, 2016). For
this essay, the focus will be on the pre-operational stage (2-5 years), as Jack is 3 years old child.

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Social development refers to development of emotional and social skills across the
lifespan. The development particularly gives attention to childhood and adolescence. Social
development is important as it helps an individual to form positive relationships with family,
friends and relatives ((McAdams et al., 2015). The social development theory by Erikson
explains eight stages of development until 18 years. These eight stages give plenty of room for
growth and development. According to this theory, there are eight stages of social development.
These include trust vs. mistrust (infant-18 months); autonomy vs. Shame (18 months-3 years),
initiative vs. Guilt (3-5 years); industry vs. Inferiority (5-13 years); identity vs. role confusion
(13-21 years); intimacy vs. isolation (21-39 years); generativity vs stagnation (40-65 years), Ego
integrity vs. despair (65 and older). For this essay the focus is mainly on the second stage of
social development as Jack is 3 year old and is currently in this stage (Overton, 2013). At this
stage, Jack and other children of this age group demonstrate interest in learning new concepts
that can be applied in real life.
The normative cognitive development in this age group is demonstrated by making rapid
progress in learning. The children of this age group can quickly adapts the new words such as
“Papa” or “mama” and construct sentences (250 to 500 words). Speech and language is the first
step in the thinking development. At this age, Jack is expected to tell stories, say his name or
age, recognise himself in mirror, and show greater interest in toys (Berk, 2017). Other activities
that show normative social development in children of this age is the intention to perform
independently. The child can develop self-care habits such as eating dressing, and using
washroom. Children in this age group understand sharing of toys or taking turns in games and
other emotional skills such as winning intention in game. Relying on others for these activities
may create guilt and shame leading to psychological crisis (McAdams et al., 2015). Parents pay

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great role in the social and cognitive development of children. Parents help children to learn
social roles through secured attachments. With the emotional support from the parents, a child
learns to navigate the relationships. It fosters the development through subsequent stages of
lifespan. Children interacting with parents learn to express their emotions. Parents provide
learning opportunities to children by helping them to accept challenges leading to normative
development. Deviating from this pattern leads to non-normative development. In case Jack
delayed speech and poor toilet training are non-normative development (Bjorklund & Causey,
2017).
Various factors influence the cognitive and social development in children. Cognitive
development is effected by the biological and environmental factors. Biological factors may
include sense organs, intelligence, maturation and heredity. Good sense organs collect adequate
stimuli and help learn correct concepts. Similarly, children with low intelligence cannot gain
attain full mental capacities. Heredity plays a great role in cognitive development. Some children
may develop similarly to their parents. The environmental factors may include learning
opportunities, economic status, family and society, play and various types of stimuli. If a child
gets too many learning opportunities, better will be the cognition as it increases the mental
capacities (Bjorklund & Causey, 2017). Children living in family with high economic status have
more learning opportunities than low economic status. Play increases a child’s interaction with
environment by responding to stimuli. For example playing with toys can improve the
knowledge of shape. Family and friends are important in cognitive and social development.
Parents can better help a child to understand the environmental stimuli and provide atmosphere
to the children to gain good cognitive capacity. Spending time with family and friends gives the

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child to learn the social and emotional skills. Children will learn to make relationships, express
themselves by dancing and become more independent (Bierman et al., 2014).
Applying the knowledge of the Piaget theory of cognitive development, unable to speak
at the age of 3 is non-normative development in Jack. The factor that may have influenced his
cognitive development is lack of family support. He spends less time with adults as he has
working mother, Vanessa. Jack spends two days in a week in care centre. He gets less learning
opportunities from his family, which may have delayed his speech. By applying the knowledge
of the social development theory by Erikson, it can be interpreted that Jack’s inability to be toilet
rained can be due to lack of virtue called will. Due to poor mother-infant relationship, Jack may
be failing to venture out to assert his will. The caregivers may not be supporting Jack to develop
autonomy (Berk, 2017). Overall it appears that delay in the both the cognitive and social
development in Jack is related to environmental factors. as the nurse informed Vanessa that he is
having normal development milestones. Vanessa must be more responsive to the situation to
enhance the psychosocial development in Jack.
The theories of cognitive and social development discussed in the essay are relevant for
the nursing and midwife practice as responsible for designing appropriate interventions for
children. Considering the present learning, play, family, peers and social support received by the
child the nurses can plan an intervention to reduce delay in cognitive and social skills. Applying
the knowledge of the normative and non-normative development, the nurses will be able to
identify the abnormalities in child at an early stage. For this case study, the nurse can educate
Vanessa about the cognitive and social developmental milestones normal for 3 year old children
and factors that may cause non-normative development (Bierman et al., 2014).

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The essay was helpful in understanding the child’s cognitive milestones and social
developmental stages. The factors that may influence this process are biological and
environmental in nature. These theories are of great help for nursing practice and help children
to attain their full mental capacities. It can be concluded from the case study analysis that
adequate family, and social support is required for normative development and maximizing the
well-being.

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References
Berk, L. E. (2017). Exploring lifespan development. Pearson.
Bierman, K. L., Domitrovich, C. E., Nix, R. L., Welsh, J. A., & Gest, S. D. (2014). Integrating
evidence-based preschool programs to support social-emotional and cognitive
development. Promoting school readiness and early learning: Implications of
developmental research for practice, 231-252.
Bjorklund, D. F., & Causey, K. B. (2017). Children's thinking: Cognitive development and
individual differences. SAGE Publications.
Feldman, R. S. (2016). Development across the life span. Pearson.
McAdams, D. P., & Zapata-Gietl, C. (2015). Three strands of identity development across the
human life course: Reading Erik Erikson in full. The Oxford handbook of identity
development, 81-94.
Modgil, S., Modgil, C., & Brown, G. (Eds.). (2013). Jean Piaget. Routledge.
Overton, W. F. (Ed.). (2013). The relationship between social and cognitive development.
Psychology Press.
Serafica, F. C. (Ed.). (2015). Social-cognitive development in context (Vol. 27). Psychology
Press.

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