Stages of Psychological Development

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It was Sigmund Freud who first began developing the theory of the stages of development in a child.  He broke them down into three categories.  Oral, Anal, and Genital.  Genital later began to be known as Hysterical.  I know that Freud has had a lot of bad press over the years and fair to say some of his hypotheses seem to have been way off the mark, but I do believe in many ways he did make a lot of sense.  He also seems to have been misquoted or misunderstood by some. The old chestnut that is always trotted out is the thing about penis envy. But actually Freud never really said this. What he said was that little girls spot that boys have got a penis and therefore wonder what has happened to theirs.  Boys worry that they might lose theirs as some form of punishment.  Anyway this is beside the point, back to stages of development.

When Freud talked about those stages of development he was talking about how the child derives erotic pleasure.  The first organ of pleasure is the mouth.  This of course is very sensible since this is natures way of ensuring that the infant feeds.  The infant derives pleasure from eating and from suckling at the nipple.  This action is not only for the sake of nourishment as can be attested by many a mother who will describe how a child will continue to play with the nipple (thus gaining pleasure from it) long after being sated.  During periods between feeding the infant can often be seen to play with the mouth.  Thrusting the tongue in and out through the gums and the lips stimulating the nerve endings thus getting erotic pleasure.  As the infant grows up it begins to use the mouth to explore both its surroundings and its own sensory pleasure.  This can be seen as the baby puts its hand and fingers in its mouth.  Later in the infants development it begins to put things into its mouth thus learning about its world from using its lips and tongue.  The oral stage lasts for about two years depending on the development of the child.