3. The concept and stereotypes of social development of a person

Irreversibility, direction and regularity are the main characteristics of any development as a process.

In psychology, the concept of social development of a person means the development of his personality and psyche in the process of establishing diverse social relations.

By personality development is understood the formation of the social quality of an individual as a result of his socialization and upbringing.

The development of the psyche is defined as a natural change in mental processes over time, expressed in their quantitative, qualitative, and structural transformations.

Development is considered in the process of phylogenesis and ontogenesis. Phylogenetic formation of the structure of the psyche is carried out in the course of the biological evolution of the species.

Ontogenetic formation of the structure of the psyche occurs during the life of an individual from birth to death.

There are three main factors of personal development: the makings, activity and external environment.

The teaching of L. S. Vygotsky on the higher mental functions of a person necessitated the study of the development of the human psyche and social development in a dialectical unity.

He was one of the first to study the question of the influence of social conditions on the dynamics of human mental processes, singled out the mental functions of a person, which are formed in the specific conditions of socialization and have some special features.

Two levels of mental processes are defined: natural and higher.

Natural functions are given to the individual as a natural being and are realized in a spontaneous response (as, for example, in animals).

Higher mental functions (HMFs) can be developed only in the process of ontogenesis with social interaction.

The five main signs of HMF are defined: complexity, sociality, mediation, arbitrariness and plasticity.

The difficulty is manifested in the fact that the VPF are diverse in terms of the characteristics of formation and development, in the structure and composition of conditionally separated parts and the connections between them.

The complexity is determined by the specifics of the relationship of some results of human phylogenetic development with the results of ontogenetic development at the level of mental processes.

Sociality VPF determined by their origin.

They can develop only in the process of interaction of people with each other.

The mediation of the HMF is observed in the methods of their functioning.

Arbitrary VPF are according to the method of implementation. A person is able to realize his functions and carry out activities in a certain direction, anticipating a possible result, analyzing his experience, correcting behavior and activity.

The arbitrariness of the VPF is determined by the fact that the individual is able to act purposefully, overcoming obstacles and making appropriate efforts.

The ductility of an HMF is their ability to relatively stable existence, regardless of some damage.

Nowadays, stereotypes of understanding human social development are quite widespread, often declared on a journalistic level by means of mass communication, these include:

1) the stereotype of limiting the age of social development;

2) the stereotype of absolutization of childhood;

3) stereotype of absolutization of predetermined factors;

4) the stereotype of absolutization of inclinations and abilities;

5) the stereotype of unlimited human capabilities.

Consider the essence of the first two stereotypes.

The stereotype of limiting the age of a person’s social development arose as a side effect of the dissemination of research results in the field of child and age psychology.

For many years, the attention of psychologists was primarily focused on the problems of child psychology, the dynamics of child development, age-related changes, contradictions and crises.

Such attention is fully justified, since it is in childhood that the psychological bases of the personality are formed.

The age periods of child development are much greater than those of an adult’s development, and they are more widely known.

The opinion that a person develops to a certain age has spread, and then only the process of aging and extinction goes on.

This is not quite true.

Forms of human development change throughout life: physical development, intellectual, social, spiritual.

Some forms of development predominate at different age stages of life.

The dominance of physical development is replaced by the predominance of the intellectual, then social and spiritual.

Many of the greatest discoveries were made by scientists whose age exceeds 50 years.

The same can be said about the creation of many works of art.

Moreover, the creative activity of the individual is considered by modern psychology as the most favorable condition for a long and productive life.

An adult is interested in modern psychology no less than a child.

The sciences that study an adult person, for example, androgogica - the science of the laws of development, training and education of adults, are intensively developing and spreading.

The second stereotype of understanding of human social development is associated with the first and is largely due to them.

This is a stereotype of absolutization of childhood .

The essence of this stereotype lies in the erroneous opinion that in childhood all prerequisites for the development of the personality are laid.

Childhood so significantly determines many areas of social development of the individual and the life course of the individual, that his absolutization at first glance seems correct.

The world-famous works of Z. Freud and E. Bern had a special influence on the ideas about the meaning of childhood.

However, these studies have studied the problems of social pathology, the development of neuroses, caused by violations of socialization and education in childhood.

The coordinated actions of people are distinguished by high plasticity and flexibility.

Although for all recurring situations there is a network of conventional norms, every situation is unique. People are able to cope with difficulties.

Such flexible coordination is possible because each participant acts independently, adapting to other participants as they move towards a common goal.

In each case, the person makes a decision and acts in accordance with his own assessment of the situation.

George Meade argued that mutual adaptations are greatly facilitated by the ability of people to form ideas about themselves as perceptual objects. This process is provided by accepting the roles of others.

Each person is able to form an “I-image” - he can imagine what he looks like in the eyes of other people involved in this situation.

Personal responsibility is fixed by the person at the moment when he imagines what other participants expect from him.

There are moments when self-consciousness is very acute: those who are not used to public speaking and are forced to turn to the group may forget what they wanted to say.

Sometimes self-awareness is almost completely absent. If a person is absorbed in an exciting picture, he is not aware of anything but the development of the plot.

In most cases, people are between these two extremes.

A person is especially clearly conscious of himself in those situations where people are dependent on each other.

Any person who depends on cooperation with others becomes especially susceptible to their views.

He cannot afford to do such a thing that would cause others to hesitate, deprive him of their support.

The formation of "I-images" is the spread of an adaptive tendency.

Images arise when a kind of obstacle appears in the activity; the same principle holds true for “i-images”. A person begins to recognize himself as a special object in such situations when he depends on others.

According to J. Mead, self-control is possible because the actions of people in relation to themselves are largely the same order as their actions in relation to other people or the actions of others in relation to them.

According to Z. Freud, the feeling of guilt can be considered as a form of self-punishment.

Self-control is impossible without “i-images”.

As long as a person is not able to treat himself as a perceptual object and clearly imagine how he should act, he cannot react to his actions.

When a person has formed an “I-image”, an imaginary rehearsal takes place, during which possible reactions of others to his act are evaluated.

Self-awareness serves as a defense against impulsive behavior. It allows people to isolate themselves from others and make their behavior more conventional.

Thanks to deliberate planning, actions become less spontaneous.

Self-control is associated with such behavior, which varies depending on how it looks from the point of view attributed to other participants in joint activities.

The essence of sex-role identification of individuals is the assimilation by the subject of psychological traits, behavioral traits characteristic of people of a particular gender.

In the process of primary socialization, the individual learns the normative ideas about the somatic, psychological, behavioral properties characteristic of men and women.

The child is first aware of his belonging to a certain sex, then he forms the social ideal of gender-role behavior, corresponding to his system of ideas about the most positive features of specific representatives of the given sex.

The mechanism of sex-role identification is undergoing significant changes in the modern world.

In traditional societies devoid of social dynamics, sex-role identification is distinguished by relatively rigid certainty, which is associated with a clear social fixation of masculinity (social standard of masculinity) and femininity (standard of femininity).

To refer to people who successfully combine male and female psychological qualities, the American psychologist S. Bey introduced the concept of androgyny .

In the process of socialization, the androgynous individuals appear to be the most adaptive, since, without violating the standard behavioral patterns of the representatives of their own sex, they have certain psychological qualities that constitute the social merit of the other gender.

The more patriarchal a country is, the more one can observe a rigid division of activity into traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine.

D. Myers considers such a division depending on the factors of culture and epoch.

Sexual socialization has significant differences in the industrial society, agricultural society and nomadic cultures (nomadic and collector cultures).

Gender differences between men and women, defining a set of expected patterns of behavior, are denoted as gender differences , or gender social roles .

The dynamics of sex-role identification processes in the controversial conditions of modern socialization contributes to the emergence of negative socio-psychological phenomena.

Violations of sex-role identification occur most often with improper upbringing, for example, when the parents really wanted a boy, and a girl was born, which they raised as a boy, and vice versa.

Sometimes this happens if only one parent takes part in raising a child, representing the standard of only male or only female behavior.

There is a confusion of roles, leading to disruption of normal relations with representatives of the other sex.

Sometimes fashion can negatively affect the processes of sex-role identification if it is aimed at eliminating differences in dress style, behavior patterns and characteristic social manifestations of men and women.

Sex-role identification is one of the leading mechanisms of socialization in any society.

It accompanies the implementation of many other mechanisms: social assessment of the desired behavior, imitation, conformism, etc.