Arrested development refers to a term that has several meanings depending on the industry or field it is being used. In the medical field for example, arrested development literally refers to a condition wherein physical development has stopped. Patients who have medical conditions that are characterized by physical development concerns are often referred to as cases of arrested development. A condition called dwarfism for example literally refers to people who can’t grow taller because of medical and hormonal reasons. The limbs of people with dwarfism are so small sometimes that they are being likened to dwarfs. The so-called arrested development in terms of their bones and limbs make them unable to physically grow at a normal rate or level.

In the psychology field, arrested development is also used as a term describing people who have mental disorder s. In these cases, the mental part of development is the one involved. With arrested development of a person’s mental structure or process, the typical result is that of a mentally-impaired person. People who have a mental type of arrested development will often display problems with cognition and/or intelligence. It is also common for these patients to have accompanying motor and speech problems. The stoppage of development in their brains basically resulted to impairments in the physical, mental, and developmental aspect.

Some people also use the term “arrested development” to people who are not exposed to the right experiences and situations resulting to lack of the right social, emotional, intellectual, and even physical skills. This is especially applicable to people in their teenage years that are unable to develop certain desired behaviors and skills like responsibility and initiative among many others. Teenagers who do not engage in the socializing or those who do not participate in meaningful activities are said to be prone to arrested development. By limiting their experiences, these teens are said to be unable to fully develop in terms of their sense of responsibility. In this sense, these teens are stuck in their own way of arrested development.