Basic factors affecting children's psychological development
As a whole, the factors affecting human psychological development can be divided into two major aspects, namely heredity and environment. Heredity is the biological transmission of traits from parents to offspring through genes, and genetic factors refer to those factors in biological organisms that are connected to genetic genes. They are based on the development of genetic traits, including the physiological maturity of biological organisms; Environmental factors mainly include all external factors that affect the development of biological organisms, such as the natural environment and social environment necessary to maintain the survival of biological organisms. For human development, social environment and education have become the main environmental factors. Regarding how both heredity and environment influence and restrict psychological development, there are mainly four views.
1. Genetic determinism
Genetic determinism emphasizes the role of genetic factors in children’s psychological development and advocates that psychological development is determined by innate and unchanging genetic genes. The process of psychological development is the process of self-development and self-exposure of innate genetic qualities. Children's psychological development is mainly the result of physiological maturity, and the external environment and education play a minimal role. People who hold this view believe that children's intelligence and personality qualities are already determined in the genes of the germ cells, and the role of the environment is only to trigger, promote or delay the self-expansion of innate qualities, but cannot change its essence.
Britain’s F. Golton was the founder of genetic determinism. He published the famous “Hereditary Genius” in 1869, clearly declaring: “A person’s ability is determined by Inherited, it is genetically determined to the same extent that the shape and body organization of all organisms are genetically determined." G.S. Hall, one of the pioneers of American psychology and the first president of the American Psychological Association. It is also believed that human psychological development is mainly determined by genetics. Under the influence of evolutionary thought, Hall proposed the theory of recurrence of psychological development, believing that individual development is nothing but a recurrence of the evolution of the human race. His typical argument is that "an ounce of inheritance is worth a ton of education." A. Gessel put forward the famous "maturity theory" through his own research and observation of children's development, arguing that psychological development is the result of biological maturity, and maturity is the first factor that affects development. He believes that psychological development is determined by its inherent immutable laws and sequences. Individual differences in development reflect the innate differences of people. He emphasizes that the health care of congenital eugenics is better than the upbringing of acquired environment. His views were very popular in the West in the 1940s and 1950s, and had a great influence on children's education at that time.
Genetic determinists one-sidedly emphasize family origin and over-exaggerate the role of innate inheritance, thus ignoring the influence of acquired environment and education on children's psychological development. This is the fatal point of their views.
2. Environmental determinism
Contrary to the view of genetic determinism, environmental determinism one-sidedly and mechanically emphasizes the decisive role of education and environment on psychological development and believes that children’s psychological Development is completely determined by the environment. It attaches great importance to the influence of environment and education on human development and denies the role of human subjective initiative, genetic quality and children's age characteristics.
The philosophical origins of environmental determinism can be traced back to the "blank slate theory" of the British empirical determinist J. Locke. He believed that the human mind is like a blank slate, and all human concepts come from experience. There is simply "no innate principle". J.B. Watson, the founder of the behaviorism school, can be said to be the most typical representative of environmental determinism. Based on quoting Pavlov's classical conditioning theory, he emphasized the role of learning and the environment in the formation of children's behavior. It plays a central role in and proposes that as long as there are appropriate environmental conditions, most behaviors can be acquired or eliminated through learning. It is believed that individual psychological development is the process of a stimulus-response chain that is learned and gradually complicated in an appropriate environment.
His view of extreme environmental determinism that environment and education are the only conditions for psychological development and that education is omnipotent is fully reflected in his famous saying: "Give me a dozen healthy and well-endowed babies, and in the specific environment I set, If I educate them in the environment, I am willing to guarantee that if I choose a baby at will, regardless of his talents, hobbies, orientations, abilities, talents, and the race of his ancestors, he can be trained to become any kind of expert I choose: Doctors, lawyers, artists, business leaders, and even beggars and thieves.” New behaviorist psychologist B.F. Skinner inherited Watson’s environmental determinism and believed that any human behavior can be determined by external factors. To shape, change, control or correct through reinforcement or punishment.
Affected by environmental determinism, some educational practitioners often tend to overindulge in the education process, thus causing adverse effects on children's physical and mental development. The fundamental error of environmental determinism is that it denies the subjective initiative of psychological reflection, denies the role of internal factors in psychological development, and one-sidedly emphasizes and exaggerates the role of environment and education in children's psychological development. It is a mechanistic view of development.
Three and two-factor theory
In view of the obvious one-sidedness of genetic determinism and environmental determinism, some psychologists have proposed the two-factor theory, which advocates that psychological development is determined by genetic and environmental factors. The two factors of environment are determined simultaneously.
German psychologist L.W. Stern is a representative figure of the two-factor theory. He believes that psychological development is not simply the gradual emergence of innate instincts, nor is it simply influenced by the outside world, but is the result of the combined development of the individual's inner qualities and the external environment. American psychologist R.S. Woodworth is also a supporter of the two-factor theory.
Although the two-factor theory has overcome the one-sided tendency of genetic determinism and environmental determinism to simply emphasize strict factors, its treatment of the relationship between heredity and environment is relatively mechanical and fails to see the dialectic between the two. and dynamic relationship, and does not see the role of children's practical activities in their own psychological development. It simply combines the effects of genetics and environment. It can be said to be a harmonious and compromised view that lacks substantial significance. theoretical development.
4. The perspective of dialectical materialism
In the view of dialectical materialists, the views of genetic determinism, environmental determinism and two-factor theory on psychological development are biased. However, they also believe that this does not mean that the role of these factors can be completely ignored when considering psychological development issues. The problem lies in how to correct the relationship between heredity, environment and education.
First of all, genetic quality and physiological maturity are the necessary material prerequisites and foundation for children's psychological development. Genetic qualities mainly refer to those innate anatomical and physiological characteristics of the organism's structural form, sensory and nervous system, etc., which provide the possibility for human psychological development. Without a normal genetic predisposition, a person's psychology would have to be small to develop normally. For example, children with anencephaly are born without a normal brain, so they cannot think and can only have some lowest-level feelings; some children with congenital color blindness and deaf-mute will definitely not be able to become painters and singers. Therefore, genetic predisposition is an important prerequisite for children's psychological development. In addition, physiological maturity, especially brain development, is also closely related to psychological development. After the baby is born, the structure and function of the various parts of the body and its organs with certain genetic qualities are not well developed. It still needs a long period of growth and development to achieve structural perfection and functional maturity. Children's psychological development is restricted to a certain extent by the laws of physiological development and is directly related to physiological maturity and development. Therefore, just like genetic quality, physiological maturity is also the necessary material basis for children's psychological development.
Secondly, social environment and education play a decisive role in children's psychological development under certain conditions. As we all know, genetic quality and physiological maturity only provide certain possibilities for psychological development, but do not determine psychological development. Whether this possibility can become a reality depends mainly on environmental and educational conditions.
Psychological development is realized in human activities. Without human living conditions and human society, people cannot talk about social practice activities, and genetic qualities cannot be brought into play. It can be said that social living conditions not only determine the corresponding psychological content, but also determine the level, speed, direction and individual differences of children's psychological development. It is worth specifically pointing out that among Duntian's environmental factors, education plays a leading role in the process of psychological development.
Finally, children's psychological development motivation is developed through the movement of psychological contradictions generated in activities. Psychological development is achieved with age and the interaction of various conditions inside and outside the individual. Individual growth and maturity and active learning are internal factors that promote psychological development, while the external environment and education are external conditions that promote psychological development. Regarding the relationship between internal and external causes, dialectical materialism believes that external causes are the conditions for change, internal causes are the basis for change, and external causes work through internal causes. The internal cause or internal contradiction of human psychological development is the inconsistency between the new needs caused by the external environment and education constantly putting forward new demands on children during the interaction between subject and object, and the children's original psychological level or psychological state. The resulting imbalance is the fundamental driving force for children's psychological development. Internal and external factors are always in a constantly changing interaction. The external environment and education act on individuals at a certain level of development, and only when they are transformed into internal factors at a certain level can they promote individual development. For example, in teaching activities, the teacher puts forward a new requirement to the students, but the students' original psychological level cannot meet this need. At this time, the students will be out of balance with the current learning environment. In order to maintain balance, children New needs arise, and conflicts arise between this new needs and the original psychological level. The development and resolution of conflicts promote the development of children's psychology.