INTRODUCTION
A dialogue has been conducted between an adult and an 11-year-old boy. The dialogue was conducted to observe how he responds to the set of questions that help us understand kids at this age group better. His answers were recorded in a video and documented. A reflection was written based on our impressions towards his replies to the questions and understand his development psychology at that age.
OBSERVATION
ANALYSIS
Based on the dialogue, Ijal seem to have a great insight considering of his age. At the age of 11, he can be said as advanced in dimension of cognitive and pyschosocial.
When asked about the best thing about himself, we would predict he will points out about his skill in something – games, showing off muscles, being macho and whatnot. But, Ijal answered his best feature is eating a lot and that really says what it means to be a 11 years old, nothing really significant bothers him or any person around his age.
He was asked about what will he do when he is angry. We predict that he will project his anger towards those around him. Ijal answered that he will hurt himself ( bang his face on the wall or slam the table) and cry. He explained that people tend to destroy stuff when they get angry. To compare, these contradicts to our prediction to see how an 11 years old express his anger on stuffs rather than the people around him.
Ijal also was asked if he love anyone at the moment, we predicted that he might be shy and refused to answer the question. Even if he do answer, he will replied with ‘family’ or ‘parents’. But, Ijal surprised us. He said he love girls, and that to clarify that he is not gay. Kids these age explore vocabulary way too much, and read about them. He seems way ahead of his age when answering this questions particularly about love.
He was then asked if he will ever fall in love. Boys that age will be disgusted by the word “love” so we guessed that he will answer “no”. Ijal did said no, but the reason was far more deeper than “being disgusted. He claimed that he is not capable of being loved due to his body shape and how people judge others by body shape.
He was asked his favourite thing about being 11 and we guessed he liked that there were less pressure put against him and the fun he experiences at that age. He answered that his curiosity is his favourite thing at that age.
And when asked about the worst thing about being 11, we predicted he will answer not having freedom like his older siblings ( going out with friends, get to drive, having social medias). He answered that there is nothing worst thing about being 11, he really likes being a kid 🙂
Ijal was asked if he would like to be a certain age. We guessed he might want to be a baby or a teenager. He answered briefly that there is no age he want to try at the moment as being 11 is perfect.
The interviewer asked her about his dislike against older people. We infer that kids dislike how elders nags and rants a lot. Ijal replied that they scold people, sometimes for no reason.
When asked if he has ever been scolded, he replied they do scold him for a reason (which is reasonable) but sometimes a person scold others for no reason and that upsets him.
Ijal was asked what does he want to be when he grow up. We predicted he visualized on something cool like pilot, astronaut, engineer or policeman. Ijal replied that he has been asked the question so many times and he do not know. Yet. But maybe in the future, he will know what he wants to be.
In a nutshell, there are many answers of Ijal that surprised us that how an 11-year-old boy get to think of a response so mature and advanced. Most of his answers are very far from our predictions and to compare, many contradict to our assumptions.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, this page reviewed Erik Erikson’s fourth stage of psychosocial development which is industry vs inferiority. This stage marks the significant introduction of an individual into the community. The objective of the this phase is for the child to become a contributing member of society, who will make contributions that benefit and are cherished not only by his family but by the whole society. (Erikson, 1950).
Hence, to produce a future with contributing youths and adults, society is obligated to provide opportunities for the child to initiate progress with high competency and to engage in a more unending effort to accomplish difficult things and overcome challenges (Issawi & Dauphin, 2017). Interference from the society is important as this stage is where an individual learns their role in the world, which helps them learn to develop “mature, intimate, mutually satisfying, reciprocal, interpersonal relationships”(Blatt, 2006). Thus, encouragements should be rewarded to them during the stage.
REFERENCE
Erikson, E. H. (1950). Childhood and society. WW Norton & Company.
Issawi, S., & Dauphin, B. (2017). Industry Versus Inferiority. Encyclopedia Of Personality And Individual Differences, 1-4. doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_593-1
Blatt, S. J. (2007). A fundamental polarity in psychoanalysis: Implications for personality development, psychopathology, and the therapeutic process. Psychoanalytic Inquiry, 26(4), 494-520.
Aesthetic Disaster 