Exploring Developmental Theories: A Case Study on Sibling Development

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Contents
INTRODUCTION -...................................................................................................................................2
Body-.....................................................................................................................................................3
Conclusion-............................................................................................................................................6
References –..........................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION -
This assignment explains all the stages of development of human with the help of different
development theories. All these theories were evaluated and compared to find the best theory
for the given case scenario. Theories are studied carefully and then for other examinations
these theories have been used by health care workers. Health care worker uses this
information and suggests the best idea which provides help, counselling and direction for
service users or consumers. The help provided can be focused on the person's own
development or can be explained as a family tree. There are many factors which influence a
person's life and development. All these can be determined by these theories. By indulging
these factors into the evaluation, it promotes health care worker to recognize the recent
matters in development and concentrate more on their work. There are many theories are
developed by various scientists to determine the growth of the individual in every stage of
life. These theories help health care workers identify the condition of the individual and
provide the best possible way to solve their issues.

Body-
The WHO in (1946) describes health as ‘a combination of overall bodily, psychological and
social well being and no disease were present or exist’. This definition recognizes the
necessity of the mental aspect of life and how it can majorly impact a person complete well
being and way of living. Although this theory is somehow not practical and not real, because
it is just impossible to attain ‘a combination of full bodily, psychological and socio
wellbeing’ all the time. The HDR (2016) describes that human growth as ‘it includes the full
human liberty, liberty to feel the complete capability of every individual life, not just of
some, nor of many, but of all life, in all the world and also in future. (Proserpio et.al, 2018)
According to the case scenario, the boy Peter is five years old and he is in the starting stages
of his growth. As per the case scenario, there has currently an incident occur with his sister,
which cause a contusion on his face. Peter was not comfortable to talk about this with anyone
and he also lied to his teacher by saying that this contusion occurs by an accident at home.
Peter was in his young age and in such a small age this accident with her sister will create a
major impact on his future and in his growth. So, it is important to focus on the family as an
overall and recognize what factors could be impacted the growth of Peter. There is another
theory named The Family System Theory (1974) explains that in order to know the way of
behaving of a person, we must include the system in which that person is a part of
Bronfenbrenner's theory of growth. This theory provides a complete method by joining
mental, socio and communal methods overall. This theory is cooperative and it allows care
worker to know the effect that can have on each other's lives. (Dunkel and Harbke 2017) This
theory helps the care worker to assess the condition of Peter and his growth. The case
scenario explains that Jenny, Peter's mother may suffer from anxiety and stress because she
has been found a malignant tumour in her breast. The National Health Services (2017)
describes that ‘depression and anxiety affect your emotions, psychological and also the way
of behaving'. But the family system theory state that the way of behaving of individuality and
growth of a person may be affected by many stresses. The stressor is described as an incident
like loss of a loved one or any life-changing event like the beginning of the new job that will
challenge the whole family. This theory may help health care workers to evaluate the direct
overlap. If this theory will be practised regularly, then it permits the health care worker to
analyse a person's development and recognize where the issues are arising. Health care

worker recognizes the problems of Peter and his family and helps them with this theory in
order to provide proper focus and start their process of growth normally. There are no stages
of growth of the family, so for recognizing the growth of the family, a single person of the
family has to take an evaluation with the help of theories. Because all theories require an
individual person to evaluate the stages of growth (Cherry 2017). There is one drawback that
no stages are present for the family so to identify the growth many information's has to
combine, by this health care workers face difficulties is able to recognize the information
effectively. There is one more theory present i.e. Bronfenbrenner's theory. This theory assists
health care workers to evaluate the family, for this crucial information's has given about
Peter. This will increase if Peter's value and his existence ignored in the family.
Health care workers can recognize Peter's increasing growth by dividing into various stages
with the help of Sheridan's Theory (1973). This theory gives a physical viewpoint profoundly
on the growth of children. He states that this method does not easily clarify with the growth
and development of the nervous system but is defined as positively or negatively by the
connections between organic and atmosphere impact. This can be described with the help of
evaluation of structure figure that explains how various aspects like parent's capability,
children growth requirement and family and external factors, can impact a child's well-being
and safety. This theory creates an impact on this figure, permit health care workers to put on
these theories to direct and support families in full growth (Lind 2017). This theory describes
that there are mainly four stages of growth and Peter comes in the last stage of child growth,
term as ‘community way of behaving'. Although this theory assists care worker in order to
know stages, the drawback of these theories is that it is limited and do not permit for growth
to increase after 5 years of age. It means that if Peter comes at age six, then he has to search
for a new theory that will be helpful for him to recognize the growth change. Although with
this, the theory also mainly concentrates on physical viewpoint and do not focus on the
emotional, socio and way of behaving viewpoint of growth. Due to this health care worker
will not be able to properly recognize Peter's growth. It means that crucial information may
be overseen. For Peter, it is necessary to find that theory which helps him to combine all the
essential intellectual factors for appropriately recognize and identify full growth. In addition
to this, it is important to evaluate the growth of Peter's sister, Chantelle, with the intention to
recognize what are the causes of past history occur. (Meadows 2017) Chantelle, age is fifteen
years and she started noticing about her unexpected changing behaviour have become
uncertain. Her behaviour towards her teachers was very violent and offensive and also, she

currently been caught drinking alcohol and smoking in school. She was facing problems with
her emotive and way of behaving issues mainly. For this, it is necessary to find a theory
which is focused on this viewpoint.
A scientist named Erikson proposed a theory of Adolescence (1968) in which he describes
the different eight stages of human development. These stages cover the entire life of a
human being. In this theory, the whole family can be included for evaluation. According to
this theory, Chantelle is in the fifth stage of this theory, i.e. Identity v/s Role confusion stage,
which comes between 13-19 years of age. With the help of this theory, health care
professionals can understand the behaviour of Chantelle. According to the theory, in this
stage an individual must go through the severe crisis, to find their identity in the community.
He explains that each stage is interconnected with each other so as if individual suffer in one
stage, then he will also face problem in next stage also. He also stated that the individual
develops strength and weakness through all stages according to their development (Ahmad
et.al, 2016). As smoking and alcohol drinking was included in Chantelle's daily routine, so it
can be suggested that she could be suffering from this stage to find her identity. Maybe she is
finding her true personality and exploring herself. This theory also explores the social life of
an individual and the impact of human development. According to the case scenario,
Chantelle may enter in the wrong community or friends' group and this will create a negative
effect on her behaviour. This theory mainly concentrates on the different view of
development i.e. Mental and behavioural aspect. But this theory does not give any help or
guidance for a person to come out of this stage. It mainly explains that, if an individual
cannot come out of this stage, then he will be failed to grow emotionally as an adult. For
health care workers this theory is not enough to find the condition of Chantelle and for giving
help and support, so other theories may be helpful for Chantelle. (Ryan and Deci 2017)
Chantelle's recent behavioural changes may be because of her puberty stage as she is in her
teenager age. In this stage mood swings are common. Many emotions act together. The role
of society and the media also develop pressure on the individual. This could be also another
reason for Chantelle's changes in her way of behaving. She may feel pressure from the
community or what society thinks about her. In order to achieve self-actualization, one must
achieve a variety of different needs as demonstrate by Maslow and named it Hierarchy.
Chantelle is not able to reach self-actualization because she is not able to fulfil her social
requirement. Professional could help Chantelle's with this Maslow theory and could aid in her

development with these theories throughout her growth as an individual. Piaget's cognitive
therapy of growth resembles that of Erickson's theory which works upon the emotive and
psychosocial perspective of growth (Heard 2018). These theories could also help Chantelle as
currently she is psychologically disturbed and requires assistance in these fields. Chantelle
comes under the formal operation stage out of four categories of Piaget's theory. By
categorising growth stages, it becomes easier for professionals to assess, perform
psychosocial state and provide proper aid. However, these theories can only help the care
workers to a certain extent as when Chantelle crosses her adolescence and reaches her
adulthood a new theory of development will have to be formed and implemented on her.
Children perceived the world in their own way and form their own wisdom and these what
Piaget's theories emphasized upon. Children can make sense of incomplete information
without the need for acquiring information on the entire topic. A young person easily finds
the solution to any problem in their adolescence stage. According to this theory, in an
adolescence stage, the intellectual capability of the young adult is higher to find the solution
to any problem in the easiest way. The environmental factor is also responsible for
behavioural changes in an individual. These factors automatically develop changes within the
person. (Clifford 2017)
Chantelle's development affected by various factors as discussed in Piaget's theory. It
arranges slackly and may develop some misunderstanding when evaluating the individual. A
relationship discusses in this theory between individual, a way of behaving and atmosphere,
but it is not yet confirmed that which factor develop impact more. Recognise this information
can help health care workers when doing work with employees and permit them to strongly
recognize exactly where the problem present. Between Erickson and Piaget's theories, there is
one more theory, i.e. Bowlby's development theory. This theory mainly focuses on the
starting stages of life and in the end stages of development, it becomes important. This theory
states that ‘various forms of bond results from various forms of relations. This theory
describes the physical viewpoint of development and permits an understanding of all
outcomes of ignoring a bond or closeness in the starting stages of development (Crain 2015).
This theory can assist care workers to evaluate Chantelle's childhood and link it with her
recent problems. The case scenario explains that Jenny, Chantelle's mother had a problematic
delivery and birth with Chantelle and her mother also gone through the postnatal depression.
In future development as well, this factor may destroy Chantelle bond with her mother. The
rate of success of a Chantelle bond with her mother can be analysed by the behaviour of her

mother and father or caregivers at the start of development. He also states that ‘there is some
proof that how it is released by individual mother and father found in large grade whether or
not he develops up to psychological health. Bowlby also suggests that for good psychological
health, newborns want a safe and uninterrupted relationship with the person for up to at least
five years of life. Due to Jenny’s post-natal depression, Chantelle’s bond with her mother at
the start of her childhood was not good and it may affect her psychological health in her life.
If healthcare workers are not getting time to use this theory, then they could evaluate
Chantelle’s past and present and use this information to see the large picture of her life. So,
this theory can also be used by health care workers for finding Peter’s stage of development
because he is recently in his crucial stage of bonding. (Howard 2017)
Conclusion-
At last, all these theories explain the essence of children's growth and the various factors that
can impact their next increment. Every theory describes these methods in various ways and
all have various points of view on positive or negative. Bronfenbrenner's family system
theory permits health care workers to evaluate the family as overall, as well as concentrate on
a person. This then allows care workers to recognize the recent problems and how these are
affecting Peter's recent growth. Also, this, Bronfenbrenner's theory of growth emphasizes the
necessity of communication within a family and describes how various stressor can affect a
person's growth. Although with this, Sheridan's theory divides growth into stages to permit
health care workers to recognize the information more effectively. But Sheridan does not take
into account the emotive, socio and behavioural point of view of growth, its outcomes with
crucial information. Erickson's theory of adolescence has developed an emotive and
behavioural point of view. Erickson theory considered as important for Chantelle because
these are the fields where she requires the most help and support. Piaget's intellectual theory

of growth also includes external factors that will affect Chantelle's recent growth. This theory
will also permit health care workers to measure her environment and atmosphere and give
solutions to aid her and improve her growth more. Another theory of Bowlby stays his
thought by evaluating the interaction in all overtime of childhood. By completing this, it
permits care workers to differentiate any capable factors that have affected interaction and
affecting future growth. Bowlby's theory of interaction can be put in both Chantelle and
Peter, as it evaluates the effect of interaction at the starting stages of life. If these theories are
put in correctly and effectively, then it could help health care workers to help families and
increasing the progression of growth continues.

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