Influential theory of lifelong psychological development by child psychologist Erik Erikson.

The German-born child development expert Erik Erikson (1902-1994), who emigrated to the United States in the 1930s, published his theory of developmental stages in the 1950 volume Childhood and Society. Erikson broke with traditional Freudian psychologists in attributing major developmental significance to stages of life beyond early childhood and also in his emphasis on the role of the ego. In addition, Erikson, like other psychodynamic theorists after Freud, did not give sexuality the preeminent place it occupied in the work of his famous predecessor. In contrast to Freud's psychosexual stages, the stages of development outlined by Erikson are called psychosocial stages. Erikson is also known for for mulating the concept of the adolescent identity crisis.

Erik Erikson

Erikson's developmental framework consists of eight stages that cover the entire life span. At each...