Ego Development – Jane Loevinger

Loevinger, J. (1976). Ego development. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

TRANSITION à  =  a quick way to see that a quote concerns the movement between levels, and not necessarily a level per-se.  However, there is usually information about a stable level implicit in each paragraph.

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p. 15    presocial stage  "The child who remains at the stage where self is indifferentiated from the world of inanimate objects long past its appropriate time is referred to as autistic."

 

p.414   presocial stage "The neonate cannot be described as having an ego.  Its actions can be described as instigated by instinctual drives and guided at first by reflexes, but from the first those drives and reflexes are shaped by the environment they meet (Piaget;  Loewald."

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p. 16    impulsive stage  "Motive, cause, and logical justification are confounded."

                                       "Emotions may be intense, but they are almost physiological."

 

p.415  TRANSITION à  between impulsive and self-protective stages  "The person is

aware of [i.e., is beginning to disembed from] frightening impulses in himself and bewildering forces in the world;  hence he craves a morally prescribed, rigidly enforced, unchanging order.  Autonomy and democracy [the next stage] do not suit him;  he prefers autocracy, and, if permitted, will choose it rather than democracy."

 

p.415   impulsive & self-protective stages  "Its pathological exemplars are the impulse-ridden personalities and what have been called hot psychopaths, by contrast with cool psychopaths, the latter being a subtype of the Self-Protective Stage."

 

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pp.415-416  self-protective stage  "The prototypic authoritarian personality belongs here;  such a

person enjoys obediance and being obeyed (Adorno).  Sullivan's description of the 'malevolent transformation' of some children, the conviction that they are living among enemies, can account for how the sweetness of the normal child takes this turn.  The essence of this stage, the traits that are shared by the normal child and the embittered adult, are summed up by Kohlberg's term, naïve instrumental hedonism.  Behavior is governed by pleasure and pain, rewards and punishments, hence hedonism.  The term instrumental refers to expedient or pooprtunistic relations to other people and to social rules.  The term naïve refers to the concrete nature of the rewards sought and the short term over which personal advantage is calculated.  Concentration on concrete gain and short-term advantage characterizes no only normal children but also intelligent adults of this type, frequently leading to their exposure and undoing."

 

p.416  TRANSITION à  between self-protective and conformist stages  "…it is the

surrender of self-interest in favor of a shared interest and identity that is at issue.  The most vivid evocation of this transition is Ausubel's description of satellization.  Frued's somewhat similar description uses the term narcissism where Ausubel refers to self-esteem, and in Freud's original version the outcome was the acquisition by the child of an ego ideal, omitting the stage stressed by Ausubel where that ideal is represented by omnipotent parents."

 

 

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p.92-93  [3 quadrant analysis!]     conformist stage  "Among tradition-directed people,

conformity is insured by their tendency to follow tradition;  shame is the emotional sanction;  emphasis is on behavior and custom.  Among inner-directed people, conformity is insured by a tendency to acquire early in life internalized goals, which act like an implanted gyroscope;  guilt is the chief emotional sanction;  emphasis is on conscience, character, and self-improvement.  Among other-directed people, conformity is insured by their tendency to be sensitized to expectations and preferences of others;  anxiety is their radar or emotional sanction;  fashion supplants conscience, and personality supplants character….'The tradition-oriented child propitiates his parents;  the inner-directed child fights or succumbs to them;  the other-directed child manipulates them and is in turn manipulated' (Riesman, 1950, p. 70)."

 

p.  409  conformist stage  "Adoption of and identification with parental and other rules and

standards…characterize the Conformist Stage."

 

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p.  417   self-aware level "For Sullivan, the transition from Conformity to the

Conscientious Stage is achieved during preadolescence via the chumship, which fosters mutuality."

 

p.454-455   self-aware level "Particularly among those close to the Conformist Stage,

as many inmates and many junior and senior high school students are, the weight of the community feeling generated by the institutional arrangement should be effective.  For example, the frequent community meetings and group pressure to maintain the advantages of the community without offending higher authorities or the wider community in which the school or prison is situated must facilitate development to the Conformist Stage.  The guiding idea of fairness or justice may serve as a pacer, facilitating the growth of those at the Conformist Stage in the direction of the Conscientious Stage.  Opportunity to consider the feelings and points of view of others, to observe cognitive-moral conflict, and to participate in group decisions about moral issues should benefit various levels."

 

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p.  21  conscientious stage  "The Conscientious person sees himself as the origin of his own

destiny.  He aspires to achievement….[which] is measured primarily by his own standards, rather than mainly by recognition or by competitive advantage, as at lower levels.  An aspect of the characteristic conceptual complexity is that distinctions are made between, say, moral standards and social manners or between moral and esthetic standards.  Things are not just classed as 'right' and 'wrong.'  A Conscientious person thinks in terms of polarities, but more complex and differentiated ones:  trivial versus important, love versus lust, dependent versus independent, inner life versus outward appearances….He experiences in himself and observes in others a variety of cognitively shaded emotions.  Behavior is seen not just in terms of actions but in terms of patterns, hence of traits and motives."

 

p. 409   conscientious stage   "…mutual love and respect are characteristic potentialities of the

Conscientious Stage.  From them develop the toleration of individual differences and devotion to disinterested justice that mark the highest estate of conscience and the Autonomous and Integrated stages of ego development."

 

p.21     conscientious stage   "A person at this stage is less likely than the conformist to feel

guilty for having broken a rule, but more likely to feel guilty if what he does hurts another person, even though it may conform to the rules."

 

pp. 417-418  TRANSITION à  from conscientious to individualistic stages  "Psychologists who

have some insights into directions and dynamics of ego development above the Conscientious Stage include Isaacs, C. Sullivan, Grant, and Grant (Warren), Kohlberg, Perry, Maslow, and probably Rogers.  For Isaacs, the transition from the Beta to the Alpha level is marked by a struggle to recognize individuality in one's self and others and by recognition of increasingly complex interpersonal interacitons and effects.  For Sullivan, Grant, and Grant, the transitions to the sixth and seventh levels are marked by growth in self-perception as much by changes in interpersonal relations.  At the sixth level the person perceives self as distinct from the role he plays, at the seventh level he perceives integrating processes in self and others.  Rogers calls attention to the greater immediacey of feelings and fluidity of personal constructs at the upper end of his continuum.  The latter point particularly is related to increase in realistic perception at the highest stages, 'lesser blindness,' as Maslow terms it.  Perry emphasizes change towards commitment and affirmation in a relativistically conceived universe;  developmentally mature commitment is distinguished from immature uncritical belief by acceptance of a respect for alternative beliefs of others.  Toleration for ambiguity (Frenkl-Brunswik) and ability to live intensely in the present (Rogers;  Schachtel) are aspects of the highest stages."

 

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pp. 22-23  individualistic level "…marked by a heightened sense of individuality and a concern for emotional dependence….What characterizes this level is the awareness that it is an emotional rather than a purely pragmatic problem, that one can remain emotionally dependent on others even when no longer physically or financially dependent.  To proceed beyond the Conscientious Stage a person must become more tolerant of himself and others.  This toleration grows out of the recognition of individual differences and of complexities of circumstances at the Conscientious Stage.  Relations…are now seen as partly antagonistic to the striving for achievement and the sometimes excessive moralism and responsibility for self and others at the Conscientious Stage.  Moralism begins to be replaced by an awareness of inner conflict….Increased ability to tolerate paradox and contradiction leads to greater conceptual complexity, shown by awareness of the discrepancies between inner reality and outward appearances, between psychological and physiological responses, between processes and outcome.  Psychological causality and psychological development, which are notions that do not occur spontaneously below the Conscientious Stage, are natural modes of thought to persons in the Individualistic Level."

 

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p.23     autonomous stage  "…there is a high toleration for ambiguity."

"The autonomous person…recognizes the limitaitons to autonomy, that emotional interdependence is inevitable.  He will often cherish personal ties as among his most precious values."