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UNDERSTANDING HUMAN DEVELOPMENT: DIALOGUES WITH LIFESPAN PSYCHOLOGY


Edited by

Ursula K. Saudinger
Dresden University
Germany

Ulman Lindenberger
Saarland University
Germany

Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2003

FROM THE BACK COVER

Understanding developmental processes in the individual as well as in 
aggregates of individuals is an important aim of many of the social and 
behavioral sciences.

This book presents a theoretical framework for this endeavor - an 
architecture for the study of human development (biology and culture) and 
posits three central developmental mechanisms (selection, optimization and 
compensation).

TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD
K. Warner Schaie    xi

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS    xiii

LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS    xv

1. WHY READ ANITHER BOOK ON HUMAN DEVELOPMENT?
UNDERSTANDING HUMAN DEVELOPMENT TAKES A METATHEORY AND MULTIPLE DISCIPLINES
Ursula M. Staudinger and Ulman Lindenberger    1

I. THE OVERALL ARCHITECTURE OF LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENT    15

2. ON THE INCOMPLETE ARCHITECTURE
OF HUMAN ONTOGENY:SELECTION, OPTIMIZATION, AND COMPENSATION AS FOUNDATION 
OF DEVELOPMENTAL THEORY
Paul B. Baltes    17

3. AGE DIFFERENCES IN EVOLUTIONARY SELECTION BENEFITS
Thomas B. L. Kirkwood    45

4. AGE DIFFERENCES IN CULTURAL EFFICIENCY: SECULAR
TRENDS IN LONGEVITY
Heiner Maicr and James W. Vaupel    59


II. BASIC PROCESSES OF LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENT:
SELECTIVE OPTIMIZATION VVITH COMPENSATION (SOC)    79

5. THE PROCESS OF SUCCESSFUL AGING: SELECTION,
OPTIMIZATION, AND COMPENSATION
Margret M. Baltes (deceased January, 1999)
and Laura L. Carstensen    81

6. INTENTIONALITY AND TIME IN HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
AND AGING: COMPENSATION AND GOAL ADJUSTMENT IN
CHANGING DEVELOPMENTAL CONTEXTS
Jochen Brandtstddter and Klaus Rothermund    105

7. AN ECONOMIC PERSPECTIVE ON SELECTION, OPTIMIZATION, AND COMPENSATION (SOC)
Jere R. Behrman    125

III. A LIFESPAN VIEW OF SELF AND PERSONALITY    157

8. COMPLETING THE PSYCHOBIOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE
OF HUMAN PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT: TEMPERAMENT,
CHARACTER, AND COHERENCE
C. Robert Cloninger    159

9. THE CUMULATIVE CONTINUITY MODEL OF PERSONALITY
DEVELOPMENT: STRIKING A BALANCE BETWEEN
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE IN PERSONALITY TRAITS
ACROSS THE LIFE COURSE
Brent W. Roberts and Avshalom Caspi    183

10. THE GAIN-LOSS DYNAMIC IN LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENT:
IMPLICATIONS FOR CHANGE IN SELF AND PERSONALITY
DURING OLD AND VERY OLD AGE
Jacqui Smith    215

IV. A LIFESPAN VIEW OF INTELLIGENCE AND COGNITION    243

11. ENABLEMENT AND CONSTRAINT
Henry M. Wellman    245

12. INTERRELATIONS OF AGING, KNOWLEDGE,
AND COGNITIVE PERFORMANCE
Timothy A. Salthouse    265

13. FORMAL MODELS OF AGE DIFFERENCES
IN TASK-COMPLEXITY EFFECTS
Reinhold Rliegl, Ralf T. Krampe, and Ulrich Mayr    289

V. AT THE FRONTIERS OF LIFESPAN METHODOLOGY    315

14. STRUCTURING AND MEASURING CHANGE OVER
THE LIFE SPAN
John R. Nesselroade and Paolo Ghisletta    317

15. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE STRUCTURE OF INTERINDIVIDUAL AND 
INTRAINDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY: A THEORETICAL AND EMPIRICAL VINDICATION OF 
DEVELOPMENTAL SYSTEMS THEORY
Peter C. M. Molenaar, Hilde M. Huizenga, and John R. Nesselroade    339

16. COMBINING MOLECULAR AND QUANTITATIVE GENETICS: DECOMPOSING THE 
ARCHITECTURE OF LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENT
Gerald E. McClearn    361

VI. THE FUTURE OF LIFESPAN PSYCHOLOGY: COMMENTS FROM RELATED FIELDS AND 
NEIGHBORING DISCIPLINES    381

17. THE FUTURE OF LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY: PERSPECTIVES FROM 
CONTROL THEORY
Jutta Heckhausen    383

18. WITHOUT GENDER, WITHOUT SELF
Gisela Labouvie-Vief    401

19. CONTRIBUTIONS OF LIFESPAN PSYCHOLOGY TO THE FUTURE
ELABORATION OF DEVELOPMENTAL SYSTEMS THEORY
Richard M. Lerner, Elizabeth Dowling, and Susanna Lara Roth    413

20. THE ADAPTIVE TOOLBOX AND LIFESPAN DEVELOPMENT:
COMMON QUESTIONS?
Gerd Gigerenzer    423

21. THE NATURE-NURTURE PROBLEM REVISITED
Wolf Singer    437

22. SECONDARY SCHOOL AS A CONSTRAINT FOR ADOLESCENT
DEVELOPMENT
Olaf Koller, Jurgen Baumert, and Kai U. Schnabel    449

23. THE SOCIOLOGY OF THE LIFE COURSE AND LIFESPAN
PSYCHOLOGY: DIVERGING OR CONVERGING PATHWAYS?
Karl Ulrich Mayer    463

24. PHILOSOPHY OR THE SEARCH FOR ANTHROPOLOGICAL
CONSTANTS
Jurgen Mittelstrass    483

AUTHOR INDEX    495

SUBJECT INDEX    513

FOREWORD

K. Warner Schaie

I am pleased to write a foreword for this interesting volume, particularly 
as over many years, I have had the privilege of interacting with the 
editors and a majority of the contributors in various professional roles as 
a colleague, mentor, or research collaborator. The editors begin their 
introduction by asking why one would want to read yet another book on human 
development. They immediately answer their question by pointing out that 
many developmentally oriented texts and other treatises neglect the 
theoretical foundations of human development and fail to embed 
psychological constructs within the multidisciplinary context so essential 
to understanding development.

This volume provides a positive remedy to past deficiencies in volumes on 
human development with a well-organized structure that leads the reader 
from a general introduction through the basic processes to methodological 
issues and the relation of developmental constructs to social context and 
biological infrastructure. This approach does not surprise. After all, the 
editors and most of the contributors at one time or another had a 
connection to the Max Planck Institute of Human Development in Berlin, 
whether as students, junior scientists, or senior visitors. That institute, 
under the leadership of Paul Baltes, has been instrumental in pursuing a 
systematic lifespan approach to the study of cognition and personality. 
Over the past two decades, it has influenced the careers of a generation of 
scientists who have advocated long-term studies of human development in an 
interdisciplinary context.

The volume begins with a section on the architecture of lifespan 
development. This section reprints Baltes's seminal 1997 article on the 
incomplete architecture of humans to lay the foundation for discussions of 
life-stage differences in evolutionary selection benefits as well as the 
secular changes in cultural efficiency. This is followed by applications of 
the selective optimization with compensation (SOC) theory to basic 
developmental processes, including a novel economic perspective. SOC theory 
plays a prominent role in the next section, which details a lifespan view 
on self and personality. Here concepts of gains and losses and efforts to 
reconcile the conflicting themes of continuity and change in adults provide 
prominent themes. The section on lifespan views of intelligence and 
cognition traces new directions that have not been broadly covered 
previously. This material is followed by several important contributions on 
new methodological approaches for the study of change, including issues in 
molecular and quantitative genetics.

What is perhaps most interesting and useful in this volume is the final 
section, which includes comments from related fields and disciplines. 
Although many developmental psychologists have begun to pay attention to 
other disciplines, we have heard relatively little from our colleagues that 
specifically addresses developmental issues. The final eight contributions 
span the fields of education, anthropology, sociology, sociobiology, social 
psychology, and experimental psychology. All these contributions contain 
important efforts to view human development as a core process that deserves 
to be incorporated into the theoretical structure of many disciplines.

The contributors to this volume represent a thoughtful selection of some of 
the most productive and creative thinkers on human development in the 
United States and Western Europe. I was greatly stimulated by reading this 
wealth of new thoughts on human development, and I know that no reader will 
put down this book without having been influenced and steered into new 
directions.

ISBN: 1402071981  (cloth)  $175.00 USD
ISBN: 1402073836  (paper)  $75.00 USD

WHERE TO ORDER:

IN THE US

Kluwer Academic Publishers
Order Department, PO Box 358
Accord Station, Hingham, MA  02018-0358
USA

Phone: (781) 871-6600
Fax: (781) 681-9045
Email: kluwer@wkap.com

EUROPE, ASIA, AUSTRALIA AND AFRICA

Kluwer Academic Publishers
Book Department
PO Box 322
3300 AH Dordrecht
The Netherlands

Phone: 31-78-657-60-00
Fax: 31-78-657-64-74
Email: orderdept@wkap.nl

Website: www.wkap/nl  or  www.kluweronline.com

Posted Date:   7/31/2003 

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