Life History Interview
On September 04, 1955, Mr. Aguayo was born on a ranch in Mexicali, Baja California. He was one of seven children and was the youngest. The siblings were composed of five boys and two sisters. Mr. Aguayo grew up seemingly achieving milestones as a normal child would. He loved to play with his brothers and their dogs in their ranch. I am currently working as a Social Worker for the In-Home Supportive Services for Los Angeles County and it is there that I have the pleasure of first meeting Mr. Aguayo as a client. The interview took place in his lovely home that he shared with his wife, daughter, and his two grandchildren (boy and girl twins). This paper will try to accomplish three goals. The first is to present a brief narrative of Mr. Aguayo’s life. The second is to present an analysis of Mr. Aguayo’s life development. Last, is to present a reflection of the personal and professional understanding acquired through the interview.
Narrative
The interview was expected to be an easy task as the interviewer was already acquainted with Mr. Aguayo. As the interview began, Mr. Aguayo appeared shy as the interviewer was sitting in front of him. This event was expected as Mr. Aguayo was a shy person. The interviewer sat beside Mr. Aguayo and that seemed to be the best position to conduct the interview. As mentioned above, Mr. Aguayo was the youngest of seven siblings. He loved playing and running around their yard with his six siblings and their dogs. He stated that it was one of his fondest memory and one that gives him the most peaceful feeling. He stated that his family was very close, but their father was very authoritative and was never supportive. He added that his father was never one to show any affection, but that they received that affection from their mother. He recalls that he and his siblings loved singing with their mother until they fell asleep. As the interview progressed, Mr. Aguayo suddenly got teary-eyed as he mentioned the first sad event that he experienced as a child. He recalled feeling sad and lonely when his mother passed away when he was 2-years old. He mentioned that he was very close to his mother. He felt lost and alone, but was relieved that his six other siblings were there to comfort him and that they could provide each other the love that they required as this was not displayed by their father. His father was never the one to show any public display of affection, but the children knew that deep inside he loved them and was also at a loss when their mother passed.
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Mr. Aguayo and his family moved to East Los Angeles, California in his teenage years. He attended Garfield High School. It was there that he experienced bullying which led to his low self-confidence and self-esteem. He was bullied due to the color of his skin and eyes. Mr. Aguayo has very light skin and green eyes which was at that time seemed to be very uncommon for a Mexican male to have. In addition, he was also bullied for his speech disability due to his tongue tie which does not allow his tongue to fully articulate during speech. In high school, he experienced the Garfield walkout of the students to demand equal rights and better education. Not too long, Mr. Aguayo decided to drop out of high school and start looking for employment.
Mr. Aguayo is a very hard-working individual. He mentioned that he would never call in sick even when he did not feel well. He wanted to show his managers that he is a responsible individual and could eventually take on the responsibilities as a supervisor or a manager. Even though his hard work, he was always passed up for the promotion for anything. This increased his feeling of low self-confidence and settled on the fact that he will never amount to anything. In a few years, he met the love of his life. He stated that they knew each other because their fathers were friends but lost contact due to relocations. He mentions that Mrs. Aguayo provided the will and confidence that he required to move forward. In a few years of marriage, they had a son and soon after had a daughter. Mr. Aguayo stated that the birth of his two children further provided him with the motivation to work harder and to set goals of purchasing a house in a better neighborhood. He stated that he did not want his children and grandchildren to live in a gang-infested community. He pushed his two children to attend school and get their degrees.
Mr. Aguayo is now retired and achieved his goals. He accomplished his goal of relocating his family to a very different and safe neighborhood. He now has two grandchildren who he loves very much. He spends his time taking care of the two grandchildren and playing with the three dogs in their yard. He stated that his proudest moments were achieving his goal of relocating his family to a better neighborhood, seeing his two children grow, and acquiring their degrees and his two grandchildren.
Theoretical Analysis
Erik Erikson: Psychosocial Development Stages
The Psychosocial Development of individuals is comprised of eight stages according to Erik Ekison. The eight stages aim to assist in explaining and aid in the understanding of the development of the individual’s lifecycle (Robbins, Chaterjee, & Canda, 2012). The eight stages in Erik Erikson’s Psychosocial development include basic trust versus mistrust, autonomy versus shame and doubt, initiative versus guilt, industry versus inferiority, identity versus confusion, intimacy versus isolation, generativity versus stagnation, and ego integrity versus despair (Munley, P, 1975). Patrick H. Munley explains that Erik Erikson’s eight stages of development take place and match to the sequences of crises that individuals encounter as they mature from birth to adulthood (Munley, P, 1977). In addition, the Psychosocial Development stages suggest that as child grow and develops, the child's network and environment begin to widen, the perception and expectations also change.
For the objective of evaluating the life and development of Mr. Aguayo, this paper will not focus on all eight stage of Psychosocial development stages. The central focus will be on two of the stages: identity versus role confusion and ego integrity versus despair. This will assist in narrowing the analysis of Mr. Aguayo’s developmental stage during his teenage years through adulthood.
The identity versus role confusion stage is one of Erik Erikson’s Psychosocial Development stages This stage is where the child evolves from a teenager to becoming an adult, which is around twelve years old and eighteen years old (Robbins, Chatterjee, & Canda, 2012). This is the stage wherein the individual starts to connect his prior self to the individual he will become. Moreover, this is a life stage where the individual will begin to deal with issues such as puberty and deciding the proper societal and gender roles. If the individual fails in this stage, the individual will go through the stage of role confusion which causes the individual to question who they are and what their role is. According to Levesque (2014), the ego identity is the individual’s impression to determine who they are and how to accept who they are as persons in society. In addition, an individual’s great idea of self-identity assists in merging the various characteristics of the individual into oneself, therefore, safeguarding the individual from unpredicted changes of various aspects in their life (Levesque, 2014).
Looking at Mr. Aguayo’s life, it can easily be determined that he has a solid understanding of who he is at the age of sixteen. Although he was shy, he was determined to prevent others from bullying him and to start looking for employment to assist in providing for his immediate family. He took initiative in looking for odd jobs. In addition, he took the initiative to learn various skills to make him more employable. He recognizes where his skills are better suited, and he also discovered his weakness in school and other aspects of his life. Mr. Aguayo did not experience any sense of uncertainty about who he wanted to become. Mr. Aguayo noted that he knew at an early age that his family was important to him and to his identity.
According to Robbins, Chatterjee, & Canda (2012), ego identity is the individual’s capability to acknowledge their responsibility for the different choices that they made and to discover the significance and fulfillment in their lives. When the individual begins to accept their choices and finds satisfaction in their own lives, this is when they have attained ego identity (Erickson, Klein, &Rapaport, 1994). All throughout the interview, Mr. Aguayo did not present an indication of discontent in his life. He continually expressed that he was grateful and does not regret anything that transpired. He added that not every experience was good, but he stated that even the bad experiences made him who he is today. Moreover, Mr. Aguayo stated that he would not change anything in his life, and everything was as it should be. This is a man who achieved ego identity even before the interview was conducted.
A study conducted by Tahreen and Shahed (2014) investigated the connection between ego despair, ego integrity, social support, and condition of life in relation to the individual’s health. The research was conducted by locating a total of one hundred individuals with different backgrounds, marital and employment statuses, and different education levels. They located fifty men and fifty women to participate in the study. The participant was given a number of questions intended to evaluate the conditions mentioned. Tahreen and Shahed discovered that the mental health of the individual is clearly associated to the social support received by the individual. Furthermore, the study showed that the amount of ego integrity also assisted in calculating mental health and that the amount of social support received by the individual can calculate the degree of ego identity (Tahreen and Shahed, 2014).
Mr. Aguayo is clearly surrounded by close family. Even though Mr. Aguayo’s father never showed affection, this was substituted by the affection of his brothers and sister who loved him very much. Mr. Aguayo is also surrounded by his family and friends who provides support. Mr. Aguayo mentioned during the interview that there was one time in his life where he was unable to work due to a health condition. He was worried that he was not able to feed his wife and two children. He stated that as soon as his close friends and family learned about his condition, they all went out of their way to take food to his family and to take him to the doctor. He added that even his brothers-in-law stayed with them to take care of his family until he managed to start working again. The study conducted by Tahreen and Shahed identified a connection between physical health and employment (Tahreen and Shahed, 2014). It was amazing to discover that Mr. Aguayo has retained his good health and appears to be very strong. He is now seventy-five years old and still appears in good health. He mentions that he only goes to the doctor when he is ill. He still walks around the block and keeps active by taking care of his two grandchildren.
Strengths and Weakness
Erik Erikson’s Psychosocial Development theory is not exempt from weaknesses and strengths. The most prominent strength of the theory is that it permits space for the individual to grow and permits crises to develop with the different stages of the theory. This shows that every individual is unique and takes a different speed of progression to go through the eight stages of development. Some individuals may take a longer time to fully realize ego identity as compared to Mr. Aguayo who seemed to discover who he was and who he wanted to be at an earlier age. Erickson’s Psychosocial Development theory allows for the development of a crisis in the individual’s life. This crisis’ to does mark the end due to the capacity of the individual to gain knowledge and mastery to get out of the crisis.
One weakness in Erikson’s theory is that it does not provide any benchmark or standard to determine how and when the individual reached competency in each of the eight stages of the theory. In going through the crisis, there is no indication of the reasons why the individual faced the crisis, Furthermore, a benchmark does not exist to explain when and how an individual could achieve mastery of any of the stages. Mr. Aguayo is an individual who seemed to have encountered an identifiable crisis in identity versus role confusion and ego integrity versus despair. Erik Erickson’s theory was the simplest to apply to Mr. Aguayo due to the fact the he did not go through and crises in the identity versus role confusion and ego integrity versus despair. It was apparent that he achieved mastery in both stages.
Personal Reflection
As I started to locate individuals who are seventy years old and above, I had a feeling that Mr. Aguayo would be the best person to approach for the assignment. Although I knew him as a client, I did not really know him personally, especially his very personal experiences and his family stories. I assumed that this interview would be very easy as I knew Mr. Aguayo. It was surely the opposite. There are parts of a person that you truly would never know and discover until you can sit down with then and listen. The elderly has so much to offer. Personal experiences in twined with a history that we may never get to experience are there to be offered by them if we are willing to listen.
The challenge with the interview was not about where to start but rather how to end it. There is a wealth of knowledge and experience to be gained just from listening. I found myself yearning to listen and grasp more understanding on how this individual before me mustered enough will to go the crisis’ that he faced and achieved his goals.
Mr. Aguayo is a shy man who has some difficulty in telling his story. I tried a few ways to tackle the issue. At first, I was sitting opposite to him on the table and he seemed a little reluctant and shy. After some time, I asked him if I could just sit beside him while he told me his story which made him more comfortable. Form the interview. The idea of self-determination came to mind as Mr. Aguayo continued with his stories. The idea of self-determination is the capability of n individuals to determine the direction of their lives and how to live it without any pressure from outside forces (Self-determination, 2016). It is easy to see that Mr. Aguayo lives in his own terms and chooses to live his life without any hesitation whether coercive forces are present. He chooses to break through the pressure to achieve his goals.
The biggest knowledge that I gained from the interview is that no one is immune or exempted from pressures or barriers in life that make it seem hard to achieve any goals. Mr. Aguayo has enlightened me to the fact that anyone can achieve their goals if there is determination and perseverance. Individual is in charge of their life and they also have the ability to break through the barriers that life has put in their way. Professionally, it was interesting to know that value of family whether immediate or secondary has a tremendous effect on the individual’s identity and perspective of life. During the whole interview, Mr. Aguayo did not express a single complaint about life and its barriers which shows that each person calculates their own experiences very in a different way.
References
- Erikson, E.H., Klein, G.S., and Rapaport, D. (1994). Identity and the life cycle. W.W. Norton & Company: New York City, New York Levesque, R.J.R. (2014). Ego Identity. Encyclopedia of Adolescence. 813-814
- Munley, P. (1975). Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development and vocational behavior. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 22(4), 314–319. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0076749
- Munley, P. (1977). Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development and career development. Journal of Vocational Behavior., 10(3), 261–269. https://doi.org/10.1016/0001-8791(77)90062-8
- Robbins, S.P., Chetterjee, P. and Canda, E.R. (2012). Contemporary Human Behavior Theory: A
- Critical Perspective for Social Work (3rdED). Pearson: Upper Saddle River, NJ
- Self-determination. (2016). Dictionary.com. Retrieved December 9, 2016 from http://www.dictionary.com/browse/self-determination
- Tahreen, S.F. & Shahed, S. (2014). Relationship between ego identity, despair, social support, And health related quality of life. Pakistan Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 12(1), 26-33. Retrieved December 8, 2016 from http://libproxy.usc.edu/login?url=http:// search.proquest.com.libproxy2.usc.edu/docview/178929949?accountid=14749
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