This article presents some aspects of two theories of psychological development created from the viewpoint of the dialectical materialism: those of Henri Wallon and of Lev Vygotsky. The work argues that the fact that both these authors developed their theories from the same philosophical roots inspires important approximations between them. Among the aspects shared by these theories the text highlights: the refusal to frame the psychological development within rigid schemes following a linear logic; the idea that human psyche has been and continues to be historically produced by men themselves inside relations they establish with each other and with nature; the defense they promote of the constitutive, and therefore positive, nature of conflicts and oscillation between critical and stable periods that characterize psychological development; and, particularly, the fact that both authors emphasize that an adequate understanding of development requires the analysis of this process in its internal essence, that is, an analysis of the conditionings of the external symptoms of psychological development. Regarding the Wallonian theory, the article draws attention to the idea that development is characterized by the alternation between cognition and affection, reason and emotion; as to the Vygotskyan conception, the text emphasizes that the investigation of psychological development must start from the analysis of a child's activities inside the concrete conditions of his/her life.
Wallon; Vygotsky; Psychological development