Comparing Theories of Child Development

Standards of comparison - theories, models, paradigms, and such; the contents of child development theories; sources of theories - cultural origins of scientific theories; commonsense attribution theory; perspective A - distinguishing normal from abnormal development; the psychoanalytic tradition - Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis; Erikson's variation on Freud's theme; perspective B - identifying states of consciousness; behaviourism and social learning models - Skinner's operant conditioning; social learning theory and contextualism; perspective C - judging the appropriateness of research methods; the growth of thought and language - Piaget's cognitive development theory; Vygotsky and the Soviet tradition; perspective D - estimating the future of stage theories; computer analogs and the self - information-processing theories; conceptions of the self - humanistic and otherwise; perspective E - speaking of cause; environments, genetic plans, and the biological child - ecological psychology; ethology and sociobiology; a bio-electrochemical model; perspective F - charting trends of the times; theory centered in values - moral development - Kohlberg's view of moral development; an integrated moral development theory; perspective G - depicting theories in the guise of metaphors.