Life-span development covers the period from _ to _.
A. birth; middle adulthood
B. conception; old age
C. infancy; early adulthood
D. conception; death
The correct answer and explanation is:
Correct Answer: D. conception; death
Explanation (300 words):
Life-span development refers to the study of how individuals grow and change throughout their entire life, encompassing physical, cognitive, emotional, and social development. The correct range for life-span development is from conception to death because human development does not start at birth but rather at conception—when a sperm fertilizes an egg to form a zygote. This marks the beginning of the prenatal stage, which includes significant physical and biological development.
The idea that development continues until death acknowledges that humans continue to experience changes in abilities, knowledge, relationships, and personality throughout life. These changes can be growth-oriented (like learning new skills), adaptive (like coping with loss), or degenerative (like memory decline in old age).
Psychologists such as Erik Erikson and Jean Piaget have contributed major theories emphasizing that development occurs in stages across the entire life span. Erikson’s psychosocial theory, for example, outlines eight stages of human development from infancy to late adulthood, each involving a key conflict or task that contributes to psychological growth.
Life-span development is traditionally broken down into key stages:
- Prenatal (conception to birth)
- Infancy and toddlerhood (birth to 2 years)
- Early childhood (2–6 years)
- Middle childhood (6–12 years)
- Adolescence (12–18 years)
- Early adulthood (18–40 years)
- Middle adulthood (40–65 years)
- Late adulthood (65 years to death)
Understanding life-span development from conception to death allows researchers, educators, healthcare professionals, and caregivers to support individuals appropriately at every age. This perspective emphasizes that each stage of life has its own challenges, needs, and potentials, making human development a lifelong process—not one that stops at a certain age.