The Ecology of Human Development

Experiments by Nature and Design

Urie Bronfenbrenner

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Year: 1981
• ISBN:
  9780674252950
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Here is a book that challenges the very basis of the way psychologists have studied child development. According to Urie Bronfenbrenner, one of the world's foremost developmental psychologists, laboratory studies of the child's behavior sacrifice too much in order to gain experimental control and analytic rigor. Laboratory observations, he argues, too often lead to "the science of the strange behavior of children in strange situations with strange adults for the briefest possible periods of time." To understand the way children actually develop, Bronfenbrenner believes that it will be necessary to observe their behavior in natural settings, while they are interacting with familiar adults over prolonged periods of time.This book offers an important blueprint for constructing such a new and ecologically valid psychology of development. The blueprint includes a complete conceptual framework for analysing the layers of the environment that have a formative influence on the child. This framework is applied to a variety of settings in which children commonly develop, ranging from the pediatric ward to daycare, school, and various family configurations. The result is a rich set of hypotheses about the developmental consequences of various types of environments. Where current research bears on these hypotheses, Bronfenbrenner marshals the data to show how an ecological theory can be tested. Where no relevant data exist, he suggests new and interesting ecological experiments that might be undertaken to resolve current unknowns.Bronfenbrenner's groundbreaking program for reform in developmental psychology is certain to be controversial. His argument flies in the face of standard psychological procedures and challenges psychology to become more relevant to the ways in which children actually develop. It is a challenge psychology can ill-afford to ignore.

PART ONE

An Ecological Orientation

1.

Purpose and Perspective

In this volume, I offer a new theoretical perspective for research in human development. The perspective is new in its conception of the developing person, of the environment, and especially of the evolving interaction between the two. Thus development is defined in this work as a lasting change in the way in which a person perceives and deals with his environment. For this reason, it is necessary at the outset to give an indication of the somewhat unorthodox concept of the environment presented in this volume. Rather than begin with a formal exposition, I shall first introduce this concept by some concrete examples.

The ecological environment is conceived as a set of nested structures, each inside the next, like a set of Russian dolls. At the innermost level is the immediate setting containing the developing person. This can be the home, the classroom, or as often happens for research purposes—the laboratory or the testing room. So far we appear to be on familiar ground (although there is more to see than has thus far met the investigator’s eye). The next step, however, already leads us off the beaten track for it requires looking beyond single settings to the relations between them. I shall argue that such interconnections can be as decisive for development as events taking place within a given setting. A child’s ability to learn to read in the primary grades may depend no less on how he is taught than on the existence and nature of ties between the school and the home.

The third level of the ecological environment takes us yet farther afield and evokes a hypothesis that the person’s development is profoundly affected by events occurring in settings in which the person is not even present. I shall examine data suggesting that among the most powerful influences affecting the development of young children in modern industrialized societies are the conditions of parental employment.

Finally, there is a striking phenomenon pertaining to settings at all three levels of the ecological environment outlined above: within any culture or subculture, settings of a given kind—such as homes, streets, or offices—tend to be very much alike, whereas between cultures they are distinctly different. It is as if within each society or subculture there existed a blueprint for the organization of every type of setting. Furthermore, the blueprint can be changed, with the result that the structure of the settings in a society can become markedly altered and produce corresponding changes in behavior and development. For example, research results suggest that a change in maternity ward practices affecting the relation between mother and newborn can produce effects still detectable five years later. In another case, a severe economic crisis occurring in a society is seen to have positive or negative impact on the subsequent development of children throughout the life span, depending on the age of the child at the time that the family suffered financial duress.

The detection of such wide-ranging developmental influences becomes possible only if one employs a theoretical model that permits them to be observed. Moreover, because such findings can have important implications both for science and for public policy, it is especially important that the theoretical model be methodologically rigorous, providing checks for validity and permitting the emergence of results contrary to the investigator’s original hypotheses. The present volume represents an attempt to define the basic parameters of a theoretical model that meets these substantive and methodological requirements. The work also seeks to demonstrate the scientific utility of the ecological model for illuminating the findings of previous studies and for formulating new research problems and designs.

The environment as conceived in the proposed schema differs from earlier formulations not only in scope but also in content and structure. On the first count, the ecological orientation takes seriously and translates into operational terms a theoretical position often lauded in the literature of social science but seldom put into practice in research. This is the thesis, expounded by psychologists and sociologists alike, that what matters for behavior and development is the environment as it is perceived rather than as it may exist in “objective” reality. In the pages that follow, this principle is applied to expose both the weaknesses and the strengths of the laboratory and the testing room as contexts for assessing developmental processes. Evidence exists of consistent differences in the behavior of children and adults observed in the laboratory and in the actual settings of life. These differences in turn illuminate the various meanings of these types of settings to the participants, as partly a function of their social background and experience.

Different kinds of settings are also analyzed in terms of their structure. Here the approach departs in yet another respect from that of conventional research models: environments are not distinguished by reference to linear variables but are analyzed in systems terms. Beginning at the innermost level of the ecological schema, one of the basic units of analysis is the dyad, or two-person system. Although the literature of developmental psychology makes frequent reference to dyads as structures characterized by reciprocal relations, we shall see that, in practice, this principle is often disregarded. In keeping with the traditional focus of the laboratory procedure on a single experimental subject, data are typically collected about only one person at a time, for instance, about either the mother or the child but rarely for both simultaneously. In the few instances in which the latter does occur, the emerging picture reveals new and more dynamic possibilities for both parties. For instance, from dyadic data it appears that if one member of the pair undergoes a process of development, the other does also. Recognition of this relationship provides a key to understanding developmental changes not only in children but also in adults who serve as primary caregivers—mothers, fathers, grandparents, teachers, and so on. The same consideration applies to dyads involving husband and wife, brother and sister, boss and employee, friends, or fellow workers.

In addition, a systems model of the immediate situation extends beyond the dyad and accords equal developmental importance to what are called N + 2 systems—triads, tetrads, and larger interpersonal structures. Several findings indicate that the capacity of a dyad to serve as an effective context for human development is crucially dependent on the presence and participation of third parties, such as spouses, relatives, friends, and neighbors. If such third parties are absent, or if they play a disruptive rather than a supportive role, the developmental process, considered as a system, breaks down; like a three-legged stool, it is more easily upset if one leg is broken, or shorter than the others.

The same triadic principle applies to relations between settings. Thus the capacity of a setting—such as the home, school, or workplace—to function effectively as a context for development is seen to depend on the existence and nature of social interconnections between settings, including joint participation, communication, and the existence of information in each setting about the other. This principle accords importance to questions like the following: does a young person enter a new situation such as school, camp, or college alone, or in the company of familiar peers or adults? Are the person and her family provided with any information about or experience in the new setting before actual entry is made? How does such prior knowledge affect the subsequent course of behavior and development in the new setting?

Questions like these highlight the developmental significance and untapped research potential of what are called ecological transitions—shifts in role or setting, which occur throughout the life span. Examples of ecological transitions include the arrival of a younger sibling, entry into preschool or school, being promoted, graduating, finding a job, marrying, having a child, changing jobs, moving, and retiring.

The developmental importance of ecological transitions derives from the fact that they almost invariably involve a change in role, that is, in the expectations for behavior associated with particular positions in society. Roles have a magiclike power to alter how a person is treated, how she acts, what she does, and thereby even what she thinks and feels. The principle applies not only to the developing person but to the others in her world.

The environmental events that are the most immediate and potent in affecting a person’s development are activities that are engaged in by others with that person or in her presence. Active engagement in, or even mere exposure to, what others are doing often inspires the person to undertake similar activities on her own. A three-year-old is more likely to learn to talk if others around her are talking and especially if they speak to her directly. Once the child herself begins to talk, it constitutes evidence that development has actually taken place in the form of a newly acquired molar activity (as opposed to molecular behavior, which is momentary and typically devoid of meaning or intent). Finally, the molar activities engaged in by a person constitute both the internal mechanisms and the external manifestations of psychological growth.

The sequence of nested ecological structures and their developmental significance can be illustrated with reference to the same example. We can hypothesize that a child is more likely to learn to talk in a setting containing roles that obligate adults to talk to children or that encourage or enable other persons to do so (such as when one parent does the chores so that the other can read the child a story).

But whether parents can perform effectively in their child-rearing roles within the family depends on role demands, stresses, and supports emanating from other settings. As we shall see, parents’ evaluations of their own capacity to function, as well as their view of their child, are related to such external factors as flexibility of job schedules, adequacy of child care arrangements, the presence of friends and neighbors who can help out in large and small emergencies, the quality of health and social services, and neighborhood safety. The availability of supportive settings is, in turn, a function of their existence and frequency in a given culture or subculture. This frequency can be enhanced by the adoption of public policies and practices that create additional settings and societal roles conducive to family life.

A theoretical conception of the environment extending beyond the behavior of individuals to encompass functional systems both within and between settings, systems that can also be modified and expanded, contrasts sharply with prevailing research models. These established models typically employ a scientific lens that restricts, darkens, and even blinds the researcher’s vision of environmental obstacles and opportunities and of the remarkable potential of human beings to respond constructively to an ecologically compatible milieu once it is made available. As a result, human capacities and strengths tend to be underestimated.

The structure of the ecological environment may also be defined in more abstract terms. As we have seen, the ecological environment is conceived as extending far beyond the immediate situation directly affecting the developing person—the objects to which he responds or the people with whom he interacts on a face-to-face basis. Regarded as of equal importance are connections between other persons present in the setting, the nature of these links, and their indirect influence on the developing person through their effect on those who deal with him at first hand. This complex of interrelations within the immediate setting is referred to as the microsystem.

The principle of interconnectedness is seen as applying not only within settings but with equal force and consequence to linkages between settings, both those in which the developing person actually participates and those that he may never enter but in which events occur that affect what happens in the person’s immediate environment. The former constitute what I shall call mesosystems, and the latter exosystems.

Finally, the complex of nested, interconnected systems is viewed as a manifestation of overarching patterns of ideology and organization of the social institutions common to a particular culture or subculture. Such generalized patterns are referred to as macrosystems. Thus within a given society or social group, the structure and substance of micro-, meso-, and exosystems tend to be similar, as if they were constructed from the same master model, and the systems function in similar ways. Conversely, between different social groups, the constituent systems may vary markedly. Hence by analyzing and comparing the micro-, meso-, and exosystems characterizing different social classes, ethnic and religious groups, or entire societies, it becomes possible to describe systematically and to distinguish the ecological properties of these larger social contexts as environments for human development.

Most of the building blocks in the environmental aspect of the theory are familiar concepts in the behavioral and social sciences: molar activity, dyad, role, setting, social network, institution, subculture, culture. What is new is the way in which these entities are related to each other and to the course of development. In short, as far as the external world is concerned, what is presented here is a theory of environmental interconnections and their impact on the forces directly affecting psychological growth.

Furthermore, an ecological approach to the study of human development requires a reorientation of the conventional view of the proper relation between science and public policy. The traditional position, at least among social scientists, is that whenever possible social policy should be based on scientific knowledge. The line of thought I develop in this volume leads to a contrary thesis: in the interests of advancing fundamental research on human development, basic science needs public policy even more than public policy needs basic science. Moreover, what is required is not merely a complementary relation between these two domains but their functional integration. Knowledge and analysis of social policy are essential for progress in developmental research because they alert the investigator to those aspects of the environment, both immediate and more remote, that are most critical for the cognitive, emotional, and social development of the person. Such knowledge and analysis can also lay bare ideological assumptions underlying, and sometimes profoundly limiting, the formulation of research problems and designs and thus the range of possible findings. A functional integration between science and social policy of course does not mean that the two should be confused. In examining the impact of public policy issues for basic research in human development, it is all the more essential to distinguish between interpretations founded on empirical evidence and those rooted in ideological preference.

It is clear that the desirability of a reciprocal relation between science and social policy follows from the inclusion, in the theoretical model of the environment, of a macrosystem level involving generalized patterns of ideology and institutional structure characteristic of a particular culture or subculture. Public policy is a part of the macrosystem determining the specific properties of exo-, meso-, and microsystems that occur at the level of everyday life and steer the course of behavior and development.

Especially in its formal aspects, the conception of the environment as a set of regions each contained within the next draws heavily on the theories of Kurt Lewin (1917, 1931, 1935, 1938). Indeed this work may be viewed as an attempt to provide psychological and sociological substance to Lewin’s brilliantly conceived topological territories.

Perhaps the most unorthodox feature of the proposed theory is its conception of development. Here the emphasis is not on the traditional psychological processes of perception, motivation, thinking, and learning, but on their content—what is perceived, desired, feared, thought about, or acquired as knowledge, and how the nature of this psychological material changes as a function of a person’s exposure to and interaction with the environment. Development is defined as the person’s evolving conception of the ecological environment, and his relation to it, as well as the person’s growing capacity to discover, sustain, or alter its properties. Once again, this formulation shows the influence of Lewin, especially of his emphasis on a close interconnection and isomorphism between the structure of the person and of the situation (1935). The proposed conception also leans heavily on the ideas of Piaget, particularly as set forth in The construction of reality in the child (1954). The present thesis, however, goes considerably further. By contrast with Piaget’s essentially “decontextualized” organism, it emphasizes the evolving nature and scope of perceived reality as it emerges and expands in the child’s awareness and in his active involvement with the physical and social environment. Thus the infant at first becomes conscious only of events in his immediate surroundings, in what I have called the microsystem. Within this proximal domain, the focus of attention and of developing activity tends initially to be limited even more narrowly to events, persons, and objects that directly impinge on the infant. Only later does the young child become aware of relations between events and persons in the setting that do not from the outset involve his active participation. In the beginning the infant is also conscious of only one setting at a time, the one that he occupies at the moment. My own treatment of development not only includes the infant’s awareness of the continuity of persons across settings, as implied by Piaget’s concept of perceptual constancy, but also encompasses his dawning realization of the relations between events in different settings. In this way the developing child begins to recognize the existence and to develop an emerging sense of the mesosystem. The recognition of the possibility of relations between settings, coupled with the capacity to understand spoken and written language, enables him to comprehend the occurrence and nature of events in settings that he has not yet entered himself, like schqol, or those that he may never enter at all, such as the parents’ workplace, a location in a foreign land, or the world of someone else’s fantasy as expressed in a story, play, or film.

As Piaget emphasized, the child also becomes capable of creating and imagining a world of his own that likewise reflects his psychological growth. Again, an ecological perspective accords to this fantasy world both a structure and a developmental trajectory, for the realm of the child’s imagination also expands along a continuum from the micro- to the meso-, exo-, and even macro- level.

The development of the child’s fantasy world underscores the fact that his emerging perceptions and activities are not merely a reflection of what he sees b...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Foreword
• Preface
• Contents
• Part One: An Ecological Orientation
• Part Two: Elements of the Setting
• Part Three: The Analysis of Settings
• Part Four: Beyond the Microsystem
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index