The aim of this study was to identify elements of social representations about life-span development, guided by the Theory of the Central Core. A questionnaire was filled out by 210 educators, distributed in four groups (60 children educators, 60 adolescent educators, 60 adult educators and 30 senior citizen educators). The study allowed the idenfication of elements of social representations about development and its internal organization. The results indicated that the child was associated with games, innocence and dependence; the adolescent with body transformations, existencial crisis and sexuality; the adult with productivity, work, stability and the senior citizen with wisdom and experience.
Social representations; human development; life-span
