Constancy and Change in Human Development

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Harvard University Press, 1980 - 754 páginas

How malleable is human nature? Can an individual really change in meaningful ways? Or, are there immutable limits on the possibilities of human growth set in place by the genes and by the early experiences of childhood? These are questions which touch our deepest political and personal concerns; and they have long been a matter of fierce debate in the behavioral sciences.

Constancy and Change in Human Development takes a thorough inventory of the growing body of research which now bears upon these questions. Editors Brim and Kagan have assembled an outstanding group of specialists in human growth and commissioned them to assess questions of change and continuity in physical, mental, and emotional development throughout the life span. Beginning with three general chapters which place the ideas of continuity and discontinuity in historical and philosophical perspective, the book moves across a broad spectrum of developmental issues, ranging from the basic adaptability of the human central nervous system to the effects of social institutions which seek to promote individual change. There are chapters on physical growth, health, cognitive development, personality, social attitudes and beliefs, occupational careers, psychosis, and criminal behavior. Throughout these chapters, the recurring question is whether development can be seen as a continuous process in which early stages reliably predict subsequent events, or whether instead there are sharp discontinuities which render individual development essentially unpredictable. The variety and richness of the answers to this question provide a summary of human development which is unparalleled in any other single volume.

Dentro del libro

Contenido

A View of the Issues
1
Perspectives on Continuity
26
The Continuous and the Discrete
75
Continuities and Change
113
The Dynamics of Growth Organization
163
ISBN 9780674166257
166
The Endocrine System
229
Physical Health
272
The Course of Schizophrenic Psychosis
325
Cognitive Development in Childhood
359
Cognitive Development in Adulthood
445
Longitudinal Study of Personality Development
530
Values Attitudes and Beliefs
596
Criminal Behavior over the Life Span
641
Index
739
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Acerca del autor (1980)

Jerome Kagan was Daniel and Amy Starch Research Professor of Psychology Emeritus at Harvard University.

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