Definition or Description:

The field of human development encompasses a number of theories that have applicability in the meta-profession of college teaching. At its base, the higher education experience is intended to promote the intellectual, ethical, social, cultural, and (sometimes) the physical development of the student. Thus, knowledge and expertise in the theories of human development is sometimes critical in the design and development of the entire educational experience.

Comment:

Theories of human development, like those theories specific to learning, can frequently be part of SoTL studies even if not the primary focus. However, developmental studies are often conducted with populations of younger students, and the studies follow their subject through stages of development. SoTL studies most often involve college students of traditional age or adult learners, and the time available for the exploration is limited to one or two semesters; a short period in which to determine developmental changes. These factors limit the frequency of developmental SoTL studies, but not the relevance of the theory as a mechanism for understanding students or for forming the foundation of studies of related issues.

See the Other section below for descriptions of some of the major human development theories. These descriptions have been derived from Life-Span Human Development by Carol K. Sigelman and David R. Shaffer.

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Charles Darwin (1809-1882) believed that young untrained infancts share many characteristics with their nonhuman ancestors and that observing child development might provide insights into the evolutionary history of the human species.

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) challenged prevailing notions of human nature and human development by proposing that we are driven my motives and emotions on which we are largely unaware and that we are shaped by our earliest experiences in life.

Erik Erikson (1902- ) revised Freud's theory by placing more emphasis on social influences, developing stares with a broader focus, emphasizing the ego, expressing a more positive view of human nature, and applying the theory across the entire life span.

Jean Piaget (1896-1980) viewed intelligence as a process that helps an organism adapt to its environment and proposed four major periods of cognitive development.

John B. Watson believed that conclusions about human development and functioning should be based on observations of overt behavior rather than on speculations about unconscious motives or cognitive processes that remain unobservable.

B. F. Skinner believed that the essence of human development is the continual acquisition of new habits of behavior and that these learned behaviors are controlled by external stimuli (reinforcers and punishers).

Albert Bandura claimed that humans are cognitive beings whose active processing of information from the environment plays a major role in learning and human development.

Lev Vygotsky insisted that children's minds are shaped by the particular socialand historical context in which they live and by their interactions with adults.

The information processing approach to human development emphasizes the fundamental mental processes involved in attention, perception, memory, and decision-making by using a computer analogy.

These theories look to investigate the extent to which genetic and environmental differences among people or animals are responsible for differences in their traits.

John Bowlby believed that many infant behaviors that promote emotional attachments have evolved because they make it more likely that the infant will be cared for by adults and will therefore survive.

This perspective looks to find the typical rather than the unique and look for the underlying similarities among cultures in order to define universal occurrences.

Urie Bronfenbrenner emphasized that the developing person is embedded in a series of environmental systems that interact with one another and with the individual to influence development.

These perspectives hold that development arises from the ongoing interrelationships between the changing organism and a changing world. Changes in the person produce changes in his or her environment, changes in the environment produce changes in the person, and this interchange goes on continuously.

These theories investigate the survival of individuals (resiliency) that are faced with adversity (risk).