Ego Integrity Vs Despair Summary
Erik Erikson was a psychologist who presented a theory of personality based psychosocial development based on eight psychosocial stages. The last of these stages, Ego Integrity vs Despair, occurs in the post-retirement years (age 55 to 65 until death). According to Sneed (2006), during this stage the individual reflects on what his or her life meant and develops a “theme of wholeness and continuity in the sense of belonging to something that transcends the individual lifecycle” (p. 149). Often the individual will review the successes and disappointments of their life and will resolve conflicts in their interpersonal relationships. Erikson (1998) states the goal of this stage is “the ego’s accrued assurance of its proclivity for order