PSY FPX 6015 Assessment 4

Adult Development Case and Intervention Analysis

As a person transitions from adolescence to adulthood, they go through various developmental milestones and challenges. Adults have a lot of responsibilities because they may pursue higher education, marry, or bear children. They will also be expected to pay bills or rent and own a home. The majority of adults will be expected to take care of their elderly parents or relatives. Sickness and financial issues also pose problems during adulthood. Lifespan development theories provide one with a concept of what development to expect in adulthood, such as how genetics and the environment play a part (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015). Applying these theories can indicate developmental delay or shifts in an adult.

Katrina’s Case

Katrina is a 45-year-old Mexican American female. She has two children, a son and a newborn daughter. She lives in a small flat with her two children, her grandmother, and herself. Her mother had a heart attack and passed away two months before. It was a terrible shock to Katrina, who visited her mother three times a week to ensure that everything was alright. Her mother had a heart attack one day when Katrina was working. She had difficulties paying for her mother’s funeral. Katrina’s newly born child, Jocelyn, was born a few months before her mother died. Katrina was not yet married since they already considered themselves married. Her boyfriend abandoned her after the birth of their second child. Katrina has not tried dating since her boyfriend left. Additionally, shortly after the loss of her mother, Katrina became less able to perform at work due to mental illness.

She was then terminated because her level of productivity had dropped. She is now concerned with taking care of her family as well and has also stopped communicating with her friends. Katrina was showing signs of depression and attempted to kill herself. Her friend came in during the incident while visiting Katrina. Katrina’s son is concerned about her well-being. She recently had a want to begin dating again. But she has been easily distracted by other issues such as raising her children, working, and caring for her grandmother. She now understands that she only has so much time left to pursue some of her desires.

Primary Challenges

In Katrina’s case, some of the ongoing challenges that she is experiencing are the recent loss of her mother, her suicide attempt, her new baby son, and living with and caring for her grandmother. She was recently fired from her job due to incompetence towards her mental condition. Katrina’s social life has also been affected due to having the sole responsibility of bringing up her two children because she is the one working. Katrina did not give herself enough time to socialize with other individuals to talk to them about her daily struggles. She never discussed her life struggles because her boyfriend left her when she gave birth to her second child. Katrina’s mother’s death has been her biggest challenge since she has a hectic life and has not given herself enough time to grieve the loss of her dear mother.

Death of a parent is a transformation for an adult by figuration of roles and duties and transformation of identity, which can lead to a psychological burden for an adult (Leopold & Lechner, 2015). Katrina enjoyed a close rapport with her mom, and the mom was also her emotional source of support. Her mom was kind and had warm feelings for her, providing her with lots of life’s teachings (Leopold & Lechner, 2015). Subjective well-being reductions may be encountered by losing one’s parent.

Cultural Factors

A person’s culture can influence the development of a person (De France & Hollenstein, 2019). One’s potential for development occurs as a result of successfully achieving the challenges in the regulation motivational processes. A person can also acquire social scripts that involve detailing cultural practices, values, and norms. Cultural script learning produces increased knowledge concerning a life span path or capacity or area of function, such as a physical, cognitive, and/or social-emotional functioning process (De France & Hollenstein, 2019).

Cultural scripts affect one’s understanding and perception of the world surrounding them.

Moreover, assessment of the competency of oneself and other individuals’ competencies is proven to increase when a child progresses from kindergarten to elementary school. Evidence has also shown that adults evaluate their functioning level, and positive expectations about one’s growth can be a predictor of a lower accuracy of beliefs regarding normal growth due to self-worth protective biases (De France & Hollenstein, 2019). Katrina has shown some introspection about her growth in wanting to try dating after realizing she has put others first.

Lifespan Development Theories

Theories There are many theories of lifespan development when it comes to the adult lifespan because there are so many things that are changing so rapidly at this time.

Daniel Levinson was a theorist who wrote about life structures as his main theme.

He believed that adults have a life structure that includes one’s career, social interaction, and relationships (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015). Changes in a person’s life structure affect an individual’s life. There were seven stages of Levinson’s theory, where adults become invested in new projects and reorganize their life structure (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015).

Katrina’s transitions involve caring for her infant son and her grandmother, adjusting to life without her mother, and getting fired at the workplace indefinitely. In addition, she had been interested in dating, but recent events and challenges in life have pushed this ambition to a secondary level. Another theorist who noted development changes in adulthood was Schaie, who testified to a progression of stages within adult life whereby one must formulate different types of means or ways to utilize one’s intellectual capabilities (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015).

PSY FPX 6015 Assessment 4 Adult Development Case and Intervention Analysis

These developments are developments in family roles and other issues one may face as one grows older, says Schaie. Katrina is at the responsible stage of Schaie’s theory because she must adapt to the changing needs of her children and her mother’s death. Katrina’s dedication to her family stems from her cultural values in Mexico. Morel and Sanchez (2014) term this as Familismo, wherein family is given precedence over the individual’s own needs (Morel and Sanchez, 2014). This principle was also evident in Katrina, who accommodated her daughter, newborn baby boy, and grandma to live with her. She also performed extra work hours in the office in order to keep the family secure financially. Katrina has taken priority in satisfying the needs of her children rather than herself. Lastly, Erik Erikson theorized that humans undergo psychological developments as they age (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015).

Of Erikson’s development stages, his generativity versus stagnation stage is most relevant in this case study. The stage is concerned with guiding the next generation and is significant to one’s career or purpose (Broderick & Blewitt, 2015). Katrina has spent most of her years caring for her children and working full-time. She also continues to guide her children all through their development stages by motivating them and supporting them financially whenever they require it. She too had a great career as a programmer in a large company. She was laid off, however, as she was distracted, and the problems of life made her less productive during working hours. Katrina has no concept of when she would be in a position to obtain another job. Changing one’s career can affect one’s identity (Infurna et al., 2020). Katrina’s responsibility to provide for her family has affected her identity and mood. She does not believe that she is contributing to the needs of her family or to society, something that could have prompted her to attempt suicide.

Interventions for Katrina’s Case Study

Lee et al. (2019) assert that loneliness has been a persistent global health epidemic with serious health consequences. The loss of life that results from loneliness is comparable to the loss that results from smoking 15 cigarettes per day and is greater than obesity. The researchers investigated loneliness and determined it was related to three critical time points: young adulthood, middle age, and old-old age. Loneliness was related to poor mental well-being and unfavorable psychological characteristics. Thus, loneliness can be enhanced by enhancing a person’s wisdom, which involves being able to control emotions, self-reflect, be empathetic, tolerate disagreement, and be resolute. They propose that creating a wiser society to address these matters will create a more connected, less lonely, and happier society. Katrina’s suicide attempt is a cause for concern.

The different stressors currently present in her life are having an effect on her psychologically. Her social isolation can influence her suicidal behavior further. A multi-modal community-based intervention can prove to be helpful in preventing future suicide attempts. This intervention works in strengthening social support and interpersonal relationships within a community along with health-related resources. Education and awareness are put in place in order to assist in enhancing identification of risk indicators and suicidal behaviors (Ono et al., 2008).

PSY FPX 6015 Assessment 4 Adult Development Case and Intervention Analysis

Additionally, social support is developed with individuals who tend to create an environment where others are able to share difficulties and hardships in life, as well as problem-solving mechanisms to ensure mitigation of the difficulties (Ono et al., 2008). Ono et al. (2008) discovered that rates of suicide lowered in this intervention and that it was more effective among the elderly and older adults. Depression has adversely affected neurocognitive functions, especially those regulated by the frontal-subcortical networks, like executive functions, as stated by Dotson et al. (2020).

This meta-analysis was based on cognitive control, which revolves around goal-directed behavior. Goal-directed behaviors encompass goal selection, response selection, and performance monitoring. The researchers established a high correlation between depression and cognitive control research. Clinical depression and subthreshold depression correlated with cognitive control impairments. This research brings to the forefront the need for clinicians to screen for cognitive control dysfunction among depressed patients, especially in the latter part of adulthood.

Interventions in Psychedelic Therapy for Katrina’s Case Study

The most prevailing theme in all the psilocybin for depression studies is that after a dose of psilocybin, a great number of patients decrease depressive symptoms. Davis et al. (2021), whose objective was to determine the effects of psilocybin on major depressive disorder, drew this conclusion. Other research reporting the same result was Carhart-Harris et al. (2017) and Carhart-Harris et al. (2021), following the administration of psilocybin to treatment-resistant depression patients and a comparison of psilocybin and escitalopram. Davis et al. (2021) and Carhart-Harris et al. (2021) also observed that psilocybin exerted an immediate and long-lasting antidepressant effect.

These researches have reduced depressive, anxious, and suicidal symptoms. A different approach is the theme of connectedness throughout psychedelic studies. For example, Forstmann et al. (2020) hypothesized that social connectedness and transformative experience mediate the mood-enhancing effects of psilocybin and other psychedelics in a naturalistic context. This research was important because it indicates that the use of psilocybin and other psychedelics in a naturalistic context is linked to feelings of personal transformation, enhanced feelings of social connectedness, and enhanced positive mood. Applying psilocybin as a treatment for Katrina’s depression and low feelings of connectedness would be out of my field of specialization. Psilocybin is an intense instrument to be utilized together with therapy to bring about good and long-lasting results for a patient.

Conclusion

Katrina is a working woman aged 45 who has experienced a few recent incidents that have resulted in a shift in her behavior and subsequent suicide attempt. Her Mexican cultural values of familismo influence most of her decisions, since she always puts her family’s needs ahead of her own. The introduction of social support interventions, like the community-based multimodal intervention or possible psychedelic therapy, will allow Katrina to receive the support to grieve her mother’s death and not feel isolated in taking her family with her. She will have a venue to ventilate her issues and anxieties and problem-solve solutions with the social support group on how she can overcome her obstacles.

PSY FPX 6015 Assessment 4 Adult Development Case and Intervention Analysis

Infurna, F. J., Gerstorf, D., & Lachman, M. E. (2020). Midlife in the 2020s: Opportunities and challenges. American Psychologist, 75(4), 470–485. https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000591

Lee, E. E., Depp, C., Palmer, B. W., Glorioso, D., Daly, R., Liu, J., Tu, X. M., Ho-Cheol, K., Tarr, P., Yamada, Y,

& Jeste, D. V. (2019). High prevalence and adverse health effects of loneliness in community-dwelling adults across the lifespan: the role of wisdom as a protective factor. International Psychogeriatrics, 31(10), 1447-1462. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1041610218002120

Leopold, T., & Lechner, C. M. (2015). Parents’ death and adult well-being: Gender, age, and adaptation to filial bereavement. Journal of Marriage and Family, 77(3), 747–760. https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12186

Morel, G. M., & Sanchez, O. (2014). Latinos, perceived discrimination, and depression: The moderating effects of Familismo. PsycEXTRA Dataset. https://doi.org/10.1037/e540652014-001

Ono, Y., Awata, S., Iida, H., Ishida, Y., Ishizuka, N., Iwasa, H., Kamei, Y., Motohashi, Y., Nakagawa, A., Nakamura, J., Nishi, N., Otsuka, K., Oyama, H., Sakai, A., Sakai, H., Suzuki, Y., Tajima, M., Tanaka, E., Uda, H., … Watanabe, N. (2008). A community intervention trial of a multimodal suicide prevention program in Japan: A Novel Multimodal Community Intervention Program to prevent suicide and suicide attempts in Japan, NOCOMIT-J. BMC Public Health, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-8-315