Some Ingredients for Constructing Developmental Models

Author(s):

Freedle, Roy O.

Publication Year:

1973

Report Number:

RM-73-27

Source:

ETS Research Memorandum

Document Type:

Report

Page Count:

17

Subject/Key Words:

Child Development, Environmental Influences, Learning Processes, Markov Process, Models, Probability

Abstract

Elusive developmental processes are most often examined in the context of the philosophic problem of scientific determinism. The Markov process model, enhancing a probabilistic viewpoint for the explanation of developmental data, should be restricted. Attention should be focused on the immediate context and situational setting of a subject. The situational perception of a subject cannot be divorced from a subject's active reconstruction of past experiences not separated from cyclic phenomena and external regularities. Obligatory and optional features of a task a subject performs are viewed as a function of the immediate contextual situation. Examples center on the developmental processes of a child.

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