Development as a Multidimensional Process: Individual and Social Constituents

Abstract

Efforts to integrate social and psychological aspects of development require more attention to explanatory processes, rather than normative age descriptions, and a conceptualization of the environment in dynamic rather than static terms. We propose a framework that identifies three distinct kinds of developmental processes, based on their different forms of relation to the environment: physical ontogeny, habituation, and cognitive generativity. Two general kinds of social processes are also discussed: social reality production/ reproduction and social allocation. We conclude with a consideration of the implications for research and theory.