Explain contextual approach to development.

Stages Vs Contextual Approach

Stage Approach: Stage approach says that development is a series of age-related changes that occur across the lifespan of an individual and that development is a series of stages. It means that stage approach assumes the following:

1. Each individual has to pass through same stages.

2. Each new stage builds capacities evolved in the previous stage.

3. Development is age-related.

4. Development is discontinuous.

Famous theorists like Jean Piaget, Lawrence Kohlberg, Erik Erikson, Sigmund Freud all favour stage theories and they have developed their own stage theories on different grounds.

Contextual Approach: Contextual approach states that the development of each individual is influenced by context. This is to imply here that development is governed by situations and experiences of an individual's life. The experiences of all the people are different and therefore their development is also different. Contextual theorists believe that it is the environment that guides the development of an individual. The sum total of these situation all through the lifespan of an individual makes him a fully functional human being.

Famous psychologist like Lev Vygotsky and American psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner. According to Vygotsky, all the mental abilities and processes were reviewed in terms of their historical sequence of events that produced them. While Piaget believed that all development was a result of series of stages, Vygotsky argued that intellectual capacities were the result of the culture in which the child was raised. According to him development consist of gradual internalization primarily through language to form cultural adaptation. Vygotsky also gave the concept of “Zone of Proximal Development” (ZPD). He stated that what child was able to perform on his own was “level of actual development” and what the same child was able to perform with additional adult help was what he called zone of proximal development.

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