Table 12:1 Theories of Human Development/Developmental Psychology and Adaptive Information Processing in EMDR therapy with children: Implications for treatment Theorist Theory Type of Development AIP/child therapy Anna Freud Developmental Lines Maturational Reciprocal relationship between maturation and the environment effects languaging of EMDR protocol Jean Piaget Cognitive Development Cognitive Child’s stage of cognitive development effects therapist’s interpretation of cognitive processing – therapists must ask, “At what stage of cognitive development is this child?” Lev Vgotsky Social Contextualism How children develop cognitions How children develop concepts, and metacognitions interpret symbols and learn self- Zone of Proximal regulation. Also, how has this child’s Development culture effected development? Uri Bronfenbrenner Ecological Systems Theory Impact of Environmental Systems The therapist must take into account on child’s experience of the world multiple levels of processing both internal and external to the child Erik Erickson Psychosocial Stages of Children develop based on At what stage of psychosocial Development mastery of tasks at different development is the child? How has stages of psychosocial the child resolved previous stages of development development? Has child successfully mastered each stage? Jerome Kagan Temperament Innate temperament Consider not only the child’s temperament, but also the interaction between the child’s temperament and that of the caregiver. In the P-C relationship, are the temperament’s complimentary or conflicting? J.B. Watson & B.F. Skinner Behaviorism Conditioned behaviors and the The therapist must consider, what in impact of reinforcement the environment is either negatively or positively reinforcing the child’s omission of behaviors? Lawrence Kohlberg Stages of Moral Morality How is the child’s stage of moral Development development impacting the child’s perception of the events and of abuse? Jerome Bruner Cognitive Learning Narrative construction of reality The therapist needs to consider, how Theory/Narrative has the individual child constructed Construction of Reality Cognitive Development their own unique interpretation of Scaffolding Theory reality? John Bowlby & Attachment Theory Development of secure The therapist must explore the Mary Ainsworth attachments child’s attachments and how healthy the relationships are in the child’s environment and how attachment traumas may need to be processed in therapy .