ABSTRACT

In their observation of the development of a person, anthropologists have used two main approaches: life passage studies, and life history studies.1 Life passage (or life cycle) studies emphasise the requirements of society, showing how the people of a group socialise and enculturate their young in order to make them into viable members of society. Life history studies, in contrast, emphasise the experiences and requirements of the individual-how the person copes with society, rather than how society copes with the stream of individuals. This difference in emphasis in anthropological studies is also found in sociological and psychological studies.2