Caudel 1

Juan Caudel

Professor Heimbigner

Psy-1100

11/10/17

Signature Assignment: Mating

In class, we learned that according to Erik Homburger Erikson, a German-born American

developmental psychologist, we enter a stage in our lives called Intimacy vs Isolation. This

means we begin to have a need to connect with people and begin to challenge our selfs into

forming close and meaningful relationship. Marriage and dating is a significant part in this stage

in our lifes. This helps us begin to learn about ourselves and who we are as a person. Not only

does this help us figure out who we are, it helps us find and distinguish what we look for in a

partner.

There are a lot of things to consider when searching for a permanent mate. The qualities

that are very important to me and that I look for in an individual are kindness, beauty,

intelligence and compassion. Ideally I would like someone who is loving, caring, goal oriented,

and outgoing and similar moral values and believes. One thing that I truly believe in is that your

future partner and your self should share the same core values to build a strong foundation to

have a successful marriage. Financial and mental stability are also a key factor that can help in

aiding in a successful lifelong marriage. In class we learned that about one fourth of marriages

end in divorce and a big factor to this causes is financial and marital stress. I do not want to be a

part of this statistic and that is why I will do my best to prepare myself to be ready for when the

time comes.
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Theyre many things that I am doing currently and so much more than I can do to prepare

myself for marriage. Through my experiences of dating, I have been able to learn what aspects of

myself I need to improve on. A few things that I have started to do to help me get prepared for

marriage is my continuing my education. It has been proven that furthering your education can

increase your financial stability and lower the risk of divorce in a marriage. Dating has also

helped me prepare by learning what I look for in a partner. I am also digging deeper in to myself

to better understand what type of partner I actually want for myself.

Theory says that men look for a woman that is beautiful, and has good cooking skills and

to be honest, that is what Im looking for in a partner. I will certainly appreciate my partner more

in my life if they are able to take care of me and our children with healthy homemade cooking.

As for women, theory says that women look for a man that can provide and thats what Im

aiming to accomplish. I do feel that as a man, I am responsible for being able to provide for my

family and its expected to be this way in my culture. I was always taught that a man should do

everything that that can to make sure his family is cared for. My father has also showed me what

is expected to be the man of the family.

Professor Heimbigner has taught us how the developing mind adapts and thinks as we

grow from infants into late adulthood. With what I have learned from this course I have been

able to look back in to my life and reflect and better understand the different stages I have gone

through at the time from Freueds psychosexual stages to B.F Skinners behaviorism theory. I

have much to learn still and thanks to this course I have better understanding of what to expect as

the years go by in my life.