Urie Bronfenbrenner: biography of this developmental psychologist.

We review the life of this researcher focused on how context affects child development.

Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917-2005) was a Russian-American psychologist who contributed much knowledge to theories of child development. He maintained a holistic perspective from which he proposed an Ecological Systems Theory, one of the most important contributions to developmental psychology.

The following is a review of Urie's life. we will review the life of Urie Bronfenbrenner in a brief biography, seeing what his most important work consists of.We will see what his most important work consists of and the professional background that was decisive for his development as a psychologist and researcher.

Urie Bronfenbrenner: biography of a pioneer in developmental psychology

Urie Bronfenbrenner was born in Moscow, Russia on April 29, 1917. At the age of 6, Bronfenbrenner moved with his family to the United States, where his father would work as director of research at the New York Institute for the Mentally Handicapped.

In 1938, Bronfenbrenner graduated with a degree in psychology and music from Cornell University, followed by graduate study in developmental psychology at Harvard University, and finally earned a doctoral degree in the same field from the University of Michigan in 1942.

Several years after completing his studies, and in the course of the during the course of World War IIBronfenbrenner served as a psychologist in the armed forces of the U.S. Army. Many of these experiences were an important basis for the theories he would later develop.

After working in the military, he taught at various universities on psychology, human development, family studies, among other topics. Part of his objectives during his professional development were centered on the theories of human development to have a direct impact on both psychology students on both psychology students and on policy and public opinion in general.

It was from this that Bronfenbrenner participated in an important way in the design of programs, where he was able to translate the theories on psychological development into operational language, specifically in the area of child development and lower income socioeconomic sectors in the United States.

What is a system according to Bronfenbrenner?

The Ecological Theory of Systems is Bronfenbrenner's main work.. In this, he plans a perspective of psychological development that brings together different theoretical proposals, not only evolutionary psychology but also social psychology.

Broadly speaking, he talks about how an individual develops not only from his genetic load or the education he receives from his nuclear family, but that in this development there are elements in different environments that are also determinant. For example, the school, the work environment, the neighborhood, the culture.

This is so because humans are not only Biological beings, but also relational, i.e., our personality and our psychological development are determined by the environment in which we live, our personality and our psychological development are shaped to a large extent by the characteristics of the systems in which we live and that make us have things in common or different with each other.

Each system coexists, there is not one above the other but they are interrelated. For this reason, if one system is altered in a major way, this can affect the need for exploration and the child's readiness to learn in the other systems.

Likewise, each contains roles, norms and rules, each contains roles, norms and rules that together are determinants of human development.

The 5 systems of the Ecological Theory

It is an "ecological" theory of systems because it focuses on the relationship that exists between the different environments and how this relationship determines the development of the human being. Ecological Systems Theory is now considered to be one of the bridges between biological and biological perspectives. one of the bridges between biological, psychological and social (biopsychosocial) perspectives on development..

For Bronfenbrenner there are five fundamental systems for individual psychological development, ranging from the family to political and economic structures: the microsystem, the mesosystem, the exosystem, the macrosystem and the chronosystem. We review them very briefly below.

Microsystem

This is the immediate and closest environment. It is fundamentally our group of belonging: family, caregivers, school, neighborhood, peers..

Mesosystem

It is composed of the connection between different environments of the microsystem, for example, between home and school.

3. Exosystem

The exosystem is composed of the environments that are considered secondary, because they affect development indirectly. For example, the place where the parents work.

4. Macrosystem

This last system is composed of the cultural environment. Sometimes it goes unnoticed, but it is from it that certain behavioral norms are generated that affect other systems. An example is the cultural differences between Western and non-Western cultures, or the differences between political and economic systems.or the differences between political and economic systems.

5. Chronosystem

Some time later, Bronfenbrenner added a fifth system to his theory. The chronosystem is composed of the patterns of our development throughout life and through the different environments mentioned above.

Outstanding works

Among the most representative works of Urie Bronfenbrenner's thought are the following Two Worlds of Childhood (1972), Influencing Human Development (1963) y The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and Design (1963). (1979).

Bibliographical references:

• New World Encyclopedia. (2015). Urie Bronfenbrenner. Retrieved May 31, 2018. Available at http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Urie_Bronfenbrenner.