Making Human Beings Human: Bioecological Perspectives on Human Development

by Urie Bronfenbrenner (editor)

Making Human Beings Bioecological Perspectives on Human Development is a landmark collection that traces and summarizes Urie Bronfenbrenner′s thoughts on the bioecological theory of human development and recommends avenues for future research. The majority of the twenty-three retrospective articles were written by Bronfenbrenner, while some were written with colleagues in his own or related fields, over the course of six decades. The book′s articles document the domain of inquiry that has emerged gradually over many years and has now acquired a title of its own-the bioecological theory of human development. Making Human Beings Human is a culminating work by a prominent figure in the field of human development and will help to shape the future of the field.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Human Development, Reference, Sociology

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Dr. Urie Bronfenbrenner was a Russian-born American psychologist and academic best known for his ecological systems theory.

Professor Bronfenbrenner received a bachelor's degree in psychology and music from Cornell University in 1938.
He earned a master's in education from Harvard in 1940, and a doctorate in developmental psychology from the University of Michigan in 1942. He served as a psychologist in various military units during World War II. His daughter, Dr. Kate Bronfenbrenner, followed him into academia and is a well known labor relations scholar.

Reviews

[Michael Sanchez · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book for my Developmental Psychology course. The book is a series of papers that Bronfenbrenner wrote during the course of his career. His research is quite interesting: that we are both affected by our environment and affect our environment. We truly do have the capability to design the life we want to live by being selective about with who and where we spend our time.

[Patrick Cook · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this for a developmental psychology class I am taking. I can't say I enjoyed it, but I did learn some things. Since it approaches developmental psychology almost entirely through Bronfenbrenner's essays, it is both very repetitive and somewhat limited in perspective. It's also undeniably dated, sometimes hilariously so (comparisons between the US and other countries include the Soviet Union and East Germany). Still, I learned enough from this book for it to merit three stars.

[danielle; ▵ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting enough. A bit meta, as it talks more about the process of studying behavioral psychology than behavioral psychology itself.

[Mills College Library]

155.9 M2355 2005