Psychosocial Perspective
(This is an excerpt from a University Of Metaphysical Sciences course at www.umsonline.org,
please feel free to visit the school website)
Erik Erikson in Insight And Responsibility (1964), prominently addressed the issue of hope in his psychosocial theory of development. He stated, “Hope is both the earliest and most indispensable virtue in the state of being alive.” It is the earliest virtue to develop because it is born in infancy when a mother reliably provides warmth, food, and comfort. This experience fosters the first organization of perceptual stimuli (“mother”) into an object with enduring qualities in the “thing world.” If her care is sufficient, this first object engenders a favorable expectation for “things” in general. Erikson emphasized this interpersonal basis of hope. He described the reciprocation of smiles between an infant and its caregiver as causing a desire in the parent to be responsive; to confirm and inspire further smiling (and hope) through loving care.
Erikson's view thus holds that site for the development of hope is a powerful and benevolent entity which will work in one's interest. This perspective provides some understanding of hope. It should be noted that successful development of life is dependent upon the fulfillment of previous tasks and virtues. This highlights the crucial importance of establishing hope during infancy as a basic and indispensable trait.
If hope is, in fact, established as a basic quality, Erikson saw it as having resiliency in maturity which can accommodate specific disappointments. A person learns to imagine what is possible and transfers his hopes to better prospects. Increased success with this discriminating process verifies that hopefulness is useful, and thereby inspires further hopefulness.
Thus, it can be seen that Erikson saw hope as a trait underlying and inspiring human activity in a broad fashion. It is not merely something which is turned on and off situationally. Hope is an approach to life. This formulation is reflected in his definition: “Hope is the enduring belief in the attainability of fervent wishes, in spite of the dark urges and rages which mark the beginning of existence.”
It is noteworthy and consistent with the idea that hope is rooted in infancy, for many adults assume a helpless and child-like posture in the act of prayer; an expression of faith which for the faithful, engenders hope. Erikson's discussion of hope is in substantial agreement with Burton in his essay “Hope And Schizophrenia” in the Psychoanalytic Review (1973) and Winnicott in Therapeutic Consultations In Child Psychiatry (1971) on the point that unrealistic hope, or an exclusive condition of hopefulness, is maladaptive. Such hope could only be fulfilled by “a paradise in nature, a utopia in social reality, and a heaven in the beyond.” Thus, reality demands and psychosocial theory postu¬lates that the next essential virtue in development is “Will,” which serves to temper hope through “increased judgment and decision in the application of drive.” Finally, Erikson in Insight And Responsibility (1964), asserts that a hopeless person “regresses into as lifeless a state as a living organism can sustain” foreshadows empirical work by Beck in The Prediction Of Suicide (1974) on the relationship between hopelessness and suicide.