We study human development to understand, explain, predict and sometimes control behavior. Theory is a set of hypotheses or assumptions about behavior. Personal theories affect our daily lives because it helps us to understand the behaviors of people we meet. We need to have theories that are more formalized and rooted in scientific principals because we can't fully understand human development if we solely use our informal theories.
2. What is Bronfenbrenner's "ecology of human development?" List and discuss Bronfenbrenner's original four nested systems of the ecological environment. Describe the recent theoretical revisions in Bronfenbrenner's theory that focus on the chronosystem.
Ecology of human development is the scientific study of the progressive, mutual accommodation between an active, growing human being and the changing properties of the immediate settings in which the developing person lives, as this process is affected by relations between these settings, and by the larger contexts in which settings are embedded. The four nested systems are the microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and the macrosystem. The most recent theoretical revision made in Bronfenbrenner's theory is that it includes the chronosystem. The microsystem holds the interactions between a child and the immediate environment and the resulting behaviors. This is the most basic level. The mesosystem works with the microsystem and they are closely related and they influence each other. The exosystem are the settings the child may not be a part of, but it influences the child's development in significant ways. The macrosystem is the most complex system, and it consists of the customs, values and laws considered important in a child's culture. The chronosystem explains how time simultaneously affects environment and the person. Time is now considered an important factor.
3. Compare Super and Harkness's developmental niche model with Bronfenbrenner's bio-ecological approach. What are the three components of the developmental niche model? What two anthropological concepts regarding culture do Super and Harkness believe to be critical to the understanding of behavior within context?
The developmental niche shows that as the world around the child changes, so does the child. Bronfenbrenner's ecological model shows an individual and the world around them influences the individual and the changes happening around them. The three components of the developmental niche model are 1) the social and physical settings or contexts of everyday life 2) culturally determined customs of childcare and child rearing 3) the psychology of the caretakers or the characteristics of a child's parents. The two anthropological concepts are the immediacy of the culture and it's integrating nature.
4. List and discuss Piaget's four stages of cognitive development and explain how the major concepts, including scheme, assimilation, accommodation, and adaptation apply to cognitive changes in each stage.
The four periods of cognitive development according to Piaget are the sensorimotor period, preoperational period, concrete operations and formal operations. The sensorimotor period is when the child understands the world largely through immediate action and sensation. The highlight of this stage is object permanence, which means that the child can understand that an object remains the same or continues to exist even if it is not seen. The preoperational period is when there is a development of language, use of symbols and there is egocentric thinking. Concrete operations is obtained when a child can perform tasks that involve conservation, which are specific properties of an object (a number or an amount) do not change in spite of rearranging it or changing the way it looks, but you don't take away any of the pieces. It just looks different. The formal operational period is when a child is able to deal with hypothetical situations and abstract thinking. Cognitive development occurs as a result of children's attempts to adapt to their environments and to make sense of the environment taking place around them.
5. Compare and contrast Piaget's and Vygotsky's theories of human development and point out how key concepts discussed in each contribute to our understanding of cross-cultural human development.
Piaget stated that cognitive development was largely an individual accomplishment, directed and shaped only partly by the environment, but he never said much about the importance of social context in learning, and that is what Vygotsky's theory stresses the most. He believed that development was the result of interaction between culture and historical factors. Culture is a social construction, and cognition is rooted in language and cultural experience. By learning about both Piaget and Vygotsky's theories, we can use each to learn more about cross-cultural human development. While one theory states the general idea of what an individual may be capable of, the other can show us just how major a factor culture is on that particular individual.