Individual Development and Social Change

Explanatory Analysis

1st Edition - April 5, 1985
Editors: John R. Nesselroade, Alexander Von Eye
Language: English
eBook ISBN:
9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 7 4 8 2 - 9

Individual Development and Social Change: Explanatory Analysis represents a convergence of three lines of emphasis now visible in developmental research and theory building. The… Read more

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Individual Development and Social Change: Explanatory Analysis represents a convergence of three lines of emphasis now visible in developmental research and theory building. The three are (1) the life course as a focus for the study of development and social change, and their interrelationships; (2) the life-span orientation to the study of individual development, with its acknowledgment of the salience of contextual features for understanding development; and (3) the growth of methodological innovations that provide more appropriate and powerful ways of exploiting data gathered to describe and explain developmental change processes. The book opens with a study on how major cultural change originates and unfolds over time. This is followed by separate chapters on the use of sequential designs for explanatory analyses; evolutionary aspects of social and individual development; the concepts of the theory of causal and weak causal regressive dependence; and the concepts of age, period, and cohort from the perspective of developmental psychology. Subsequent chapters examine development and aging as lifelong processes of historical populations; the methodological integration of natural and cultural science perspectives in developmental psychology; and application of the multifaceted methodology to the mutuality of constraint between sociocultural group and individual dynamics.

Contributors

Preface

1. Evolution and Innovation in Sociocultural Systems: A Punctuated Equilibria Model

I. Introduction

II. The Contributions and Limitations of a Darwinian Approach to Culture Change

III. Paradigm Shift: The Punctuated Equilibria Model

IV. A New Paradigm of Sociocultural Innovation

V. Examples of Punctuated Equilibria in Techno-economic Change

VI. Conclusion

References

2. Sequential Strategies as Quasi-experimental Designs: Possibilities and Limitations in Explanatory Analysis

I. Introduction

II. Models of Individual Development and Social Change in the Context of Sequential Strategies

III. Empirical Applications of Sequential Strategies

IV. Conclusions

References

3. Evolutionary Aspects of Social and Individual Development: Comments and Illustrations from the World System Perspective

I. The Context of Development and the Development of Context

II. Toward Worldwide Institutionalized Individualism: The Trend at the State Level

III. The Institutionalization of Individualism at the World System Level

IV. Conclusions

References

4. Causal Regressive Dependencies: An Introduction

I. Introduction

II. Introductory Examples

III. Causal and Weak Causal Regressive Dependence

IV. Illustrative Applications

V. Conclusion

Appendix

References

5. Structure Identification Using Nonparametric Models

I. Structures

II. Relations in Structures: A Formal Approach

III. On the Detection of Structures

IV. Application to the Study of Development and Change

V. Summary

References

6. Individual and Context in Developmental Psychology: Conceptual and Theoretical Issues

I. Introduction

II. Key Questions of Human Development

III. The Concepts of Time and Timing in the Contextual Perspective

IV. Limits and Problems of a Contextual Perspective

V. Conclusions

References

7. Age, Period, and Cohort Analysis and the Study of Individual Development and Social Change

I. Introduction

II. Historical Perspectives

III. Age, Period, and Cohort Effects

IV. Interpretation of Effects

V. A Substantive Illustration of Concepts

VI. Conclusion

References

8. Individual Development and Aging as a Population Process

I. Introduction

II. Statement of the Thesis

III. Evolution, Development, and Aging: A Synergistic Relationship in Human Society

IV. Individual Development: A Critique of Personological Thinking

V. A Conceptual Schema of Development as a Population Process

VI. Developmental Change Functions in Historical Populations

VII. Strategies for Analyzing Human Development as a Population Process

VIII. Conclusion

References

9. Individual Development in Social Action Contexts: Problems of Explanation

I. Introduction

II. Laws and Quasi Laws, Plasticity and Universality of Development

III. Structural Implications and "Pseudoempirical" Research in Developmental Psychology

IV. Developmental Psychology as a Natural and Cultural Science: Problems of Integration

V. Conclusion

References

10. Multifaceted Systems Modeling: Structure and Behavior at a Multiplicity of Levels

I. Introduction

II. A Brief Review of Multifaceted Systems Modeling

III. Multifaceted Model Framework for Issues in Mutuality of Constraint

IV. Conclusions

References

11. Analysis of Qualitative Data in Developmental Psychology

I. In Search of Appropriate Methods within the Framework of Qualitative Developmental Theories and Models

II. Illustrations from Different Fields of Developmental Psychology

III. Statistical Methodology

References

12. The Generalized Group Effect Model

I. Introduction

II. Hierarchically Nested Design

III. Generations Design

IV. Group Polarization

V. Conclusion

References

Author Index

Subject Index