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Chapter 32 - From Philosophical Anthropology to Developmental Psychology: Working Pasteur’s Quadrant

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 February 2025

By
J. Lawrence Aber
Edited by
Frank Kessel
Frank Kessel
Affiliation:
University of New Mexico
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Summary

In this chapter I describe how my interests in and commitment to developmental psychology grew in a multidimensional, discontinuous, nonlinear fashion. Prominent early personal, social, and intellectual influences included: coming of age in the 1960s, transitioning from fervent Catholicism to philosophy and science as my guiding stars through college and graduate school. I shape my story around the notion that “half of life is accident, and the other half is what one intentionally makes out of accident.” I began my work by focusing on the nature, causes and consequences of child maltreatment. Pursuing further research, practice, and policy interests, I conducted theory-informed longitudinal studies of the influence of risk factors (especially poverty and violence) on various dimensions of developmental processes and outcomes. More recently, I shifted focus to the design, conduct and analysis of randomized trials of school and/or neighborhood-based, social-emotional learning interventions, in the USA and then in conflict-and-crisis affected countries in the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. Creating and supporting collaborations with students, colleagues, and organizations has been critical throughout.

Keywords

early rootsphilosophical anthropologychild maltreatmentchild povertyprograms and policiescomplexityPasteur’s Quadrant
Type
Chapter
Information
Pillars of Developmental Psychology
Recollections and Reflections
 , pp. 361 - 372
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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References

Suggested Reading

Aber, J. L. (1994). Poverty, violence, and child development: Untangling family- and community-level effects. In Nelson, C. (Ed.), Threats to Optimal Development: Integrating Biological, Psychological, and Social Risk Factors. The Minnesota Symposia on Child Psychology, Vol. 27 (pp. 229–272). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Aber, J. L. & Allen, J. (1987). Effects of maltreatment on young children’s socioemotional development: An attachment theory perspective. Developmental Psychology, 23(3), 406–414.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aber, J. L., Belsky, J., Slade, A., & Crnic, K. (1999). Stability and change in mothers’ representations of their relationship with their toddlers. Developmental Psychology, 35(4), 1038–1047.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Aber, L., Brown, J. L., & Jones, S. M., Berg, J., & Torrente, C. (2011). School-based strategies to prevent violence, trauma, and psychopathology: The challenges of going to scale. Development and Psychopathology, 23(2), 411–421. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954579411000149.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Aber, J. L., Jones, S. M., & Raver, C. C. (2007). Poverty and child development: New perspectives on a defining issue. In Aber, J. L., Bishop-Josef, S. J., Jones, S. M., McLearn, K. T., & Phillips, D. A. (Eds.), Child Development and Social Policy: Knowledge for Action (pp. 149–166). Washington, DC: APA Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aber, J. L., Tubbs Dolan, C., Kim, H., & Brown, L. (2021). Children’s learning and development in conflict- and crisis-affected countries: Building a science for action. Development and Psychopathology, 33(2), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954579420001789.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

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