Lifespan human development and “the humanistic perspective”: A contribution toward inclusion.

Abstract

Humanistic psychology has a long tradition of developmental thought. Yet, no place has been reserved for a specifically humanistic perspective in developmental psychology textbooks. This article presents a humanistic perspective to serve as a convenient guide for the potential creation of a textbook entry. A highly condensed account of Existential-Humanistic Self-Development Theory (EHSDT) is outlined and compared with the theories that most frequently garner coverage in developmental textbooks. Suggestions for further research on the major themes of EHSDT are also provided. These include the role of the imagination in shaping the trajectories of lifespan development, the intercorporeal and multicultural embeddedness of the narrative imagination, the self-cultivation process, cooperative culture creation, thriving amid paradox, and the ways in which motivational dynamics operate within diverse social contexts. Carefully planned rollout of such research should help prevent further marginalization of explicitly humanistic developmental theory on the basis that it challenges some of the fundamental assumptions of the established theories and, accordingly, tends to be met with resistance or, at best, indifference.

Existential Givens in the COVID-19 Crisis

“…Using Greening’s (1992) four dialectical existential givens as a guiding framework, imbalances in aspects of life in the United States have been explored from the vantage point of how COVID-19 has illuminated them. Then existential–humanistic theorizing and research have been offered as a vision of how these dialectical forces can be transcended by confronting the paradoxes and activating the creative potential therein (Arons, 2020; DeRobertis & Bland, 2018) and by employing the creative imagination to responsibly cultivate one’s life trajectory (DeRobertis, 2017; DeRobertis & Bland, 2019).…”

The existential obituary writing technique for emerging adults: Thematic and content analyses.

“…Moreover, Baxter Magolda and Taylor (2016) suggested that college educators should intentionally help students develop self-authorship in order to successfully navigate adult life. By jumpstarting their employment of the creative imagination as a guide for identifying goals to responsibly shape their life trajectory (Bühler, 1961; DeRobertis, 2017; DeRobertis & Bland, 2019), the obituary writing exercise shows promise for the possibility of the students engaging in a longer-term process of self-cultivation.…”

“…Inviting individuals to directly confront the reality of their mortality provides an opportunity for existential learning, in which “something about a person’s life circumstances [is] changed such that [one] cannot go on as before” (DeRobertis, 2017, p. 43). In turn, a sense of revitalizing intentionality (May, 1969; Schneider & Krug, 2017) is sparked which spurs a process of self-transcendence and self-cultivation that employs the creative imagination to shape one’s developmental trajectory (DeRobertis, 2017; DeRobertis & Bland, 2019).…”

Piaget and Husserl: Comparisons, contrasts, and challenges for future research.

“…More generally, one might seek to take up Piaget’s insights concerning the developmental progression toward formal operations in a more graded, dynamical, and integrative in a way that does not suffer from the groundlessness suggested above (Husserl, 1970). So, for example, one might consider Piaget to have provided a multimodal language to articulate the various cognitive configurations involved in one’s situated, ever-changing world-relations rather than positing lockstep phase shifts (see DeRobertis & Bland, 2020). One might also consider accessing the Husserlian inspired work of Merleau-Ponty (2010, e.g.…”