Personal Self-Analysis of Maram - Case Study Example

? Personal Case Study In my personal case study, I chose to apply these theories: Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory, B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory, Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory, Cognitive-Developmental Theory and Information-Processing Theory. My name is Maram. I am a girl. I was born in Saudi Arabia on 6th of September 1984. My family is made up of eight members, my two parents and five siblings. I have also lived in Riyadh. I graduated from college in 2007 and joined a master’s program in August 2012. I major in Hutment development and leadership with concentration area of the HDL in Murray state. I anticipate graduating on 5th October 2014. Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory My life dates back when I was a little girl. I was a jovial and playful baby. The people around me were truthful which led to the elemental sense of my trustworthiness. I depended on my mother and my father for care, comfort and sustenance. By this time, my relative comprehension of the world came from my parents, particularly my mother, and their interactions with me. My parents’ regularity, warmth and reliable fondness exposed me to a world ruled by trust. There was no point in my life that my parents failed to offer a secure surrounding to meet my basic need. Just like noted under Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory, this would have created mistrust which would have resulted to suspicions, lack of confidence, withdrawal and frustration to me. Just like the Erik Erikson’s theory explains, my mother and father took good care of me as I went through a critical stage of growth. It is essential that a child is taken good care at that age since trust and mistrust can be gained and affect the future life of the child. The theory explains how the child gains mistrust to the surrounding people if he is mishandled. The care giver that I had was appropriate in terms of response and attendance. My parents ensured that they responded on time for any need that required them to attend me. Handling me with great concern was one of the critical factors that shaped me to what I am today. During this age nearing two years, I learned about love from the surrounding. I gained immense affection from the attendance they offered me. When I needed anything, my parents ensured that they provide for me and responded to my cries in the best way possible. This contributed towards achieving the strong platforms that am founded on. The theory explains that when an infant fails to have trust towards his or her care givers, he embraces mistrust towards the surrounding and the entire care givers. Contrary to this, I gained trust towards them and the entire surroundings. This enabled me to have an interesting life as I went through this stage. I also went on my life embracing the aspect of secure world. As I grew older, I started to choose cloths by myself. By the age of 3, I had gained control over eliminative roles and would make choices in my life while I explored the environment around me. Needless to say, my parents still provided a secure environment where I would carry out my own activities at will. My parents were patient and would wait to look at my choices and would correct me if I had gone wrong at some point. At this time of my life, I had developed a strong interest in reading and played with the radio. My parents gave me a chance to express myself and be using different things inside the house and outside. I realized that I could move my limbs through the support of items like the table. After my parents realized that I could move through the support of a items, they bought me a walker that I used to move swiftly with. The walker gave me confidence of moving and enhanced my muscles, where I later decided to walk on my own without support. During this period, I was about two years and was going through the stage of autonomy verses shame and doubt. This is a theory well explained by Erik. I learned many things that allowed me to express myself in terms of decision and capabilities. Moving independently was one of my interesting aspects during this stage of growth. I realized that I was capable of doing things without anyone’s assistance. My parents gave me a chance to express myself instead of withholding me. They provided conducive environment that allowed me to learn by my actions. I recall one time as I was trying to climb up the table and by mistake I slid and hit the ground with my mouth. I cried aloud and my mother told me it was as a result of climbing up the table. She never told me that table was the wrong item. This taught me to learn that everything had a consequence and I should not blame the table for my fall. I learned that engaging in any act has an outcome either positive or negative. This put limit to my attitude that I could do anything and everything without care. During this stage I also learned that there were things that I could do and harm myself instead of improving it. I also achieved a sense of self control and learned to control my body and muscles. As Erik’s theory explains, I faced doubt, and became confident knowing that I can do everything without relying on anyone. The environment that my parents offered me was conducive and this has contributed to the achievements in my current life. Between the age of 3 and 6 years, I was imaging much. I would take on tasks just because I had been active. I was slowly learning the world around me and learning numerous basic principles. I would tie my shoes and tie my school tie and would speak effectively with my parents without any problems. I did not like being idle, and would felt guilty if it happened. I felt the urge to help my mother with her household chores. I would also feel bad if I did something and was not productive as I had anticipated. Such small things bothered me a lot and would feel guilty for not attaining my targets. This was well evidenced when in my lower classes in primary school. I always wanted to top the class after any assessment test and anytime I would be second, I would feel guilty and disoriented. As Erik’s theory explains, this stage is known as the initiative versus guilt stage. It is the third out of the eight stages that were explained by Erik Erikson. In this level of development, I was in a critical need of realizing my strong point and doing everything efficiently. I tried to work everything the way it was supposed, and felt guilty when things turned the other way. In life there must be two answers which are the aspect of winning and the aspect of loosing. This means that it is possible for a person to have either of the answers. Getting the negative answer was at times challenging and me to feel guilty for attaining that result. However, my care givers ensured that I understood both the possible outcomes of any engagement. This helped me to be ready for the two results and to work on ensuring that I get the positive answer that. However, when I got either answers, my caregivers ensured that I have ways of dealing with the situation. In this stage, I learned the aspect of being independent and relied on my own. I gained tactics of being initiative as I applied the skills of being to be a sole player. In school I discovered I was good in playing tennis. When my parents realized this, they bought me tennis ball and made me a pitch. They encouraged me to continue playing and advancing the moves in my favorite sport. I had freedom in expressing myself in terms of games and extra curriculum activities. However, my caregivers ensured that I did not become overconfident in my undertakings. The environment they created for me has entirely contributed to what I am today. B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory As I got to 6 years of age, I started asking myself whether I would make it in the world. I started taking part in activities which would expose me to responsibility. In school, I was involved in activities that would give me responsibilities to perform. I was also involved in activities that would make me a good and desirable person and worked at doing everything right. At this stage, I also developed an undesirable behavior of talking back and being rebellious to anyone who tried to talk to me. I had many friends and loved skating, where we used to go out and stay late while skating. Some of the people in my group were smokers and engaged in negative behaviors. They were rebellious too. As I continued to be in their company, I became rebellious and rude. Our skating games went on as expected. We started to come back late that required and went against our parents wishes. The trend continued, and on a certain day, my parent became offended by my behavior. They told me that I would not be going to the skating games if I will be getting back late. They established a curfew for me not to go out for one week. The following week I was supposed to go out with the group but not get back late. Out of the previous punishment, it was thorough not to repeat the mistake of coming home late. If I would come home late, my parent would not allow me to go out at any other time. As a result, I would loose the company of my group and be left by myself without friends. Again, I would not engage in my favorite sport of skating. For this and other relate reasons, I was sensitive not to repeat the mistake. I changed my behavior and when my parents realized, they rewarded me with a new skating board. I was happy and so I went on to come home early, and they increased their reward. They used to offer me a present after I came home early. The habit stuck in me and there was no other day that I came home late. I grew up to love skating and during this age I was the best student in skating. In my adolescence, I was worried about how I appeared to my friends and how they perceived me. In this regard, I got involved in activities in school that gave me mandate to preside over some activities. I thought this would help me in shaping my identity and how people around me perceived me. I knew that if I didn’t get to shape my life by this time, there would be severe implications in my future life. This would have negative impacts in my life where I would face the consequences alone. During adolescent stage, a person develops mentally and physically, and encounters new adult hood features in his or her bodies. It is a critical stage where a person can change to the better or change to the worse. The choices remain on the particular person in relation to the surrounding. The care takers and parents have a responsibility of ensuring that they offer advices to their children during adolescent stage. This is a crucial stage where I was about to loose my confidence and suffer from inferiority complex. This did not happen since my guardians were there for me and they ensured that I get every advice I needed. They rewarded me for joining new extra curricular groups in school. They encouraged me to continue enjoying in these groups and fight to become top controller. This helped me retain my confidence and courage as I applied my skills in the leadership of the groups. By the time I attained my youthful adulthood, I had set my eyes on goals and targets that I would desire to attain in life. By the time I got to my adulthood, I had known what to work towards and was anxious to mix my identities with my friends. After establishing my identities in my adolescence, I was now ready to commit to marriage. I am now married with four children and ready to make compromises and sacrifices required by marriage. There are demanding experiences that are required by married people in order to make a perfect home. The experiences I got through out my life have helped me attain my current position in my marriage life. As I grew up, my parents encouraged me to read. This made me a good reader. At my early ages, my behaviors were modified by the consequences surrounding the events. My parents used both positive and negative rein forcers in cultivating certain behaviors in me. They always rewarded me for good performance in school and as a result I became a hardworking girl. On the other hand, my parents would punish me for any unruly behaviors or failures. This explains B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory in understanding my development. Albert Bundura’s social cognitive theory is well illustrated in my life development. This theory is embedded on the fact that individuals learn by observing what other people do. Since I was a child, I loved the way my mother spoke and wished to talk like her. As a result I started imitating her as I talked. I now talk like her. My mother was my role model and admired her hard work. I always tried to work with zeal on any activity that I was performing. My current behaviors are adopted from my mother as I grew up. Being my role model, I used to admire her way of doing things and wanted to become like her when I grew up. Right now as I am a married woman with a husband and kids, I portray my mother’s character ranging from behavior to talking. This confirms the social cognitive theory. If my mother was a bad woman, I would also be a bad woman to my husband and kids. This is because I tapped her behaviors and code of conduct. Combined with characters learned in school and leadership skills got during my adolescent stage, I am a woman of potential and I have leadership traits got from the way I was brought up. The cognitive developmental theory notes that life is made up of different phases of development where a child encounters different situations which they address through increased mental capabilities. It is only when they are able to overcome the challenges that they can move to the next stage. When I was 3, I loved to assist my mother with cleaning my room. I would watch and imitate my mother and she gave me encouragement. I was able to clean my room through my mother’s encouragement which made me move to that developmental stage of cleaning my room alone. I also got skills of being self reliant as I grew up, where my mother would leave me behind. I would start doing whatever I used to her do, and went on to complete the chores. I later learned from my mother to be self reliant and complete my things. Information-Processing Theory As I interacted with friends and other members of the family, my thinking evolved. I obtained a lot of information from the environment around me. The environment acted as a source of data input into my mind as elaborated in information processing theory. On the other hand, my mind acted as a storage and processor of the information which I would retrieve anytime later on. The information processing theory has also contributed to achievements that I have now. I have achieved many things in relation to information processing theory where I could see new things and tap them into my head to be released later in life. There are tremendous applications that I have managed to implement from the information I saw during my childhood. For instance the way I handle my kids is the same way that my mother used to handle us with my brothers and sisters. In this theory, I was able to tap information techniques and apply it later in the required time and place. The theory explains how a child taps information and synthesis it to apply them in life and do the same. I was able to adapt to the things I saw being done by the people around me. I started with doing the things that my mother used to do. This is simply because my mother was my mentor and I could follow every little thing she was doing to imitate her and become like her. I also started doing other things that my aunts did like washing clothes and talking the same way they talked. The theory helped me to cognitively develop and attain what I have achieved today. Many things I saw through my development stages are still a crucial aspect in my current life and achievements. I remember a time we were out with my friends to do skating. We met a new friend on our way who was older and an expert in skating. He explained to us all the ways he had used to enable him become an expert in skating. Always he was shown us, he pronounced the word champion. In this regard, I was able to tap his system and later apply it in my skating system. It is after two days that I found out that I could not skate without pronouncing the word champion. I adapted to his information through the theory of information processing theory. In this regard, I developed through this stage with much of learning from the theory. Information processing theory explains that a kid should be in a position to tap information from older people and later apply it in life. As such, the information communicated and the general involvement of a guardian or a caretaker towards a younger person should be filtered and contribute to the positive growth of the child. This is because the child will tap the information, synthesis it and later put it the way she or he heard it being put. I have strong leadership traits that I got from my mother, and apply them in my current life as I continue. The traits that I have are friendly to all types of human beings. However, there is one aspect I don’t like about myself. I am harsh on my kids at some points that do not require me to be harsh. I plan to solve this issue by subjecting myself to going through the leadership platform process that I was brought up on. The leadership traits have helped me in my current life and I wish to apply them in my future career as a leader. The plan I have for my life and ways I intend to rectify on my traits is through a series of lessons. The lessons will ensure that I go through an informative process that will enlighten and touch my consciousness. The consciousness of a person helps one to have control over every situation while going for the best option as a leader. The process transforms a person’s take on the leadership skills and applies them in life. The process involves a lookup of a combination of all the theories above. By subjecting myself on the strict and enlightening process, I will experience gradual change in my harsh response and anger control. I realize that all of the above theories and leadership processes have helped me achieve so much in life and I also intend to advance more as a continue with my career subjection, Reference: Top of Form Newman, B. M., & Newman, P. R. (2009). Development through life: A psychosocial approach. Australia: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning. Bottom of Form Read More