About Development
An Open Educational Resource
About Development
An Open Educational Resource
About Development is an Open Educational Resource (OER) that outlines a broad biological approach to the understanding of development. The materials on this site are designed to complement traditional psychological and neuroscientific angles by highlighting the central place of development in the history and maintenance of life on earth.
Undergraduate courses on developmental psychology typically focus on cognitive, social, and emotional change in infancy and childhood, and may also cover development over adulthood and into the later decades of life. In neuroscience programs, a developmentally-oriented course may take students deep into the cellular and molecular details of the development of the brain and nervous system. About Development provides wider context for both these approaches by allowing us to step back and see development as a dynamic, multiscale process that unfolds both across individual lifespans and across much longer periods of time.
The materials are organized into five main sections, each of which tackles a particular set of questions. The overall goal is to understand development without relying on simplistic notions such as "nature vs. nurture" that may be intuitively attractive but that fall apart when you subject them to further questioning.
This resource originates in work by Peter J. Marshall at Temple University in Philadelphia (USA). For background on this OER project as well as reading tips and information on licensing and attribution, see this page.
Links to further reading that can supplement each section can be found here.
Understanding development means more than simply describing changes that happen with age. We can observe that something “develops”, but how do we actually explain developmental change?
The Big Picture of Development
Individual development unfolds within larger historical, cultural, and evolutionary contexts. By examining development through multiple explanatory frames, from individual lifespans to deep evolutionary time, we can gain a richer understanding of change in living systems.
What is Development Directed Towards?
This discussion asks whether development should be seen as moving toward specific outcomes, or whether it is better understood as a more open-ended process.
Development and Multicellularity
All living things originated from single-celled organisms. The evolution of multicellularity introduced new opportunities and constraints that shaped the emergence and development of complex organisms.
How can something truly new arise in development? Is there "information" or some configuration of matter present in the developing individual that determines what comes next?
Lessons from the Ancient Greeks
Aristotle’s ideas on form and matter continue to shape how we think about development. Revisiting his philosophical insights provides an explanatory framework that can take us beyond simplistic views of development.
Aristotle’s framework of material, formal, efficient, and final causes offers a pluralistic approach to understanding development. Rather than seeking a single cause for change, this perspective emphasizes the need to consider multiple explanatory factors.
Views of DNA as a fixed blueprint for development have shifted towards a more dynamic outlook on developmental processes. Here we explore shifting views of genetics and how the research in the "postgenomic era" has challenged a simplistic view of genetic determinism.
Development unfolds through a network of interacting influences, rather than following a fixed genetic program. Developmental Systems Theory (DST) moves beyond simplistic nature-versus-nurture thinking to show how development involves a complex web of relations.
DNA as a Developmental Resource
Instead of viewing DNA as an instruction manual, this perspective treats it as a resource that provides a scaffold for development. By viewing genes as a resource in a wider developmental system, we can better understand how reliable developmental outcomes arise.
Studying life cycles provides insight into the connections between individual development and evolutionary change. This exploration challenges mainstream perspectives by placing development at the center of evolutionary change.
Beyond DNA, epigenetic regulation plays a crucial role in shaping development. This discussion examines influences that modify gene expression and that contribute to developmental plasticity and adaptation.
How did developmental processes originate in the history of life? Tracing the emergence of developmental mechanisms from single-celled organisms to multicellular complexity sheds light on the foundations of growth and change.
Energy, Entropy, and Complexity
The flow of energy is fundamental to life. By considering thermodynamic principles, we can better understand how living systems maintain complexity in a universe that trends toward disorder.
Instead of seeing life as a series of discrete individuals, this piece examines the idea that life is a continuous flow of cells through time. This presents challenges to conventional notions of "when life begins" and it highlights the interconnectedness of all living things.
The evolution of complex bodies created new opportunities and constraints for life on Earth. Understanding how multicellular bodies emerged provides insight into the intricacies of development.
The Evolution of Brains in Bodies
Nervous systems did not evolve in isolation. Instead, they co-evolved with bodies. This piece explores how the structure and function of brains were shaped by movement, sensory processing, and bodily complexity.
Developmental constraints and plasticity play key roles in shaping early brain organization. Examining how neural structures emerge offers insight into the interplay between genetic and experiential factors.
What are the limits and possibilities of neural plasticity? This discussion investigates how the brain adapts to change, from early development through adulthood.