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The theory of bio-ecological systems: the six layers

Development refers to the biological, psychological, and emotional changes that occur in humans between birth and death. There is a wide variety of influences in a person’s life as they age, whether they’re the same throughout life or different. There are many different theories in psychology to relate to the development of a person. Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Systems Theory is an example of a theory that focuses on layers of development, that can be visualized as a series of circles. The innermost circle is the person level which includes biological traits surrounded by multi-layers of environment, microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and chronosystem. In each layer there are multiple different influences that affect them throughout all periods of development.

The first layer of the Bioecological Systems Theory addresses the person level which includes factors such as age, sex, and health. During the prenatal period, by the 12th week after conception, my parents found out that I would be a girl which set the stage for the development I would encounter based on my gender. According to Tanner, by the second year, an individual has reached about 50 percent of his or her potential adult height and 20 percent of their adult weight. By my second year, I weighed an average amount and was a proper height for a 2 year old, so that showed good trends in my growth pattern, meaning I was a healthy baby. In the period of early adulthood, gender is a factor that will influence career progress. According to the U. S. Department of Commerce, women are still not making near the amount men make for the same work done. This is the most prevalent in the male-dominated fields, which my field of nursing is not necessarily male dominated, but males still make more money than women do at the same job. So I will be receiving less pay than a male of the same qualifications and job duties.

In the bioecological systems theory, the second layer is called the microsystem. The microsystem includes the developing person’s immediate environment. In the microsystem, one of the members that belong to it is family. Family is one of the largest influences in an infant’s life since they spend so much time around them. During the prenatal period, DiPietro and her colleagues found that mild to moderate maternal stress during the second half of the prenatal period was associated with a child’s higher scores on standardized tests. This is because the mild to moderate stress is bearable stress, which is often considered to be a stimulating or challenging experience. According to Hart and Risley, they found that mothers who have professional jobs tend to talk to their children and read to their children twice as much as parents on welfare do. Furthermore, by the age of 3 children of professional parents tend to have twice the vernacular than the children of welfare parents. Hart and Risley, also stated that the rate of language development predicts intelligence and academic achievement. Being raised by two professional parents influenced my early language development, allowing me to have a more extensive vocabulary than others, and exhibit high academic achievement. In the stage of early childhood, the parenting style has a significant influence on development. My parents fell into the category of authoritative parenting style, which according to Baumrind is when the adult encourages verbal give and take, sharing with a child this reasoning behind a policy, and soliciting his objections when he refuses to conform. A common benefit to this parenting style is typically high academic achievement, as stated by Aunola, Stattin, and Nurmi. This parenting style lead me to higher academic achievement, and learning how to be self reliant and responsible. In early childhood, preschool is a daytime activity most children attend, and it helps with social development. At the age of 3, I daily attended a high quality preschool. Preschool, especially high quality ones were found to lead children to be more self-confident, independent, and knowledgeable according to Clarke-Stewart & Allhusen. During the stage of middle childhood, parents start training children for greater self-control by co-regulation. According to Maccoby, co-regulation is where parents exercise general supervision, whereas children gain in moment-to-moment self-regulation. The practice of this new concept by my parents, led me to gain more self-control and more motivation to learn new skills. In middle childhood, children enter the school system, and begin their learning career that will continue for years to come. The classroom setting can influence a child’s learning ability. The classroom setting I learned in would most closely fall into the collaborative learning classroom, which this setting is grounded in Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory of cognitive development. This allowed me while learning to develop effective social skills, high academic achievement, and cooperative behaviors. During adolescence, parents tend to be a source of support and guidance, while allowing adolescents more freedom, stated by Galatzer-Levy & Cohler. My parents giving me more freedom to go out with friends and do more things I wanted during my adolescent years helped me become independent, responsible, and a well-adjusted individual. According to Stickle, peer orientation is higher in adolescence than in any other time in life. Independence from the family system is explored more thoroughly in the peer group. Galatzer-Levy & Cohler said that a closeness to friends grow, but the family still provides the secure base for adolescents to venture out into the world with increasing autonomy. In early adulthood, your family structure may or may not shift from your parents to your spouse and your own children. According to Greenhaus & Beutell, work can interfere with family responsibilities, or vice versa. Work-family conflict can be related to time-based or strain-based conflict. Working as many hours as I do, puts a strain on my relationship with the family that I do live with because I rarely ever see them or have free time to spend with them. This influenced me because I try to manage my time well with family and I cherish the time I do get to spend with them.

In the bioecological systems theory, the third layer is called the mesosystem. The mesosystem refers to the relationships among different members of the microsystem. In middle childhood, children are in school full-time, so they spend quite a large amount of time around their teachers. Also, teacher and parent interaction is important for the student. According to Akiba, LeTendre, and Scribner, students whose parents are more actively involved in classroom activities, will receive more supportive interaction from their teachers. My mother was a very school-involved parent, always helping out with field trips, art days, or whatever volunteer opportunities for my class she could, which bettered my relationship with my teachers.

The fourth layer of the bioecological systems theory is called exosystem. The exosystem refers to the social settings in which the developing person may or may not be directly involved; however they will still be influenced. In the period of early adulthood, social media has become a method of communication. Jackson et al., states that extraverted individuals tend to spend more time online and communicate more with email than more introverted individuals. Personally being more of an extraverted individual, this allows me to communicate via social media and reach out to more people and create a vast friend group by being social.

The fifth layer of the bioecological systems theory is called the macrosystem. The macrosystem includes the beliefs, values, and traditions of different cultures and societies in which a person develops and in which microsystem, mesosystem, and exosystem are embedded. In the adolescence period, teens are finding themselves and their beliefs, and values. According to Harter, by adolescence period self-concept comes to include attitudes, beliefs, roles, and goals. In the society that I grew up in, I acquired my beliefs and values based on it, and it made me more likely to show prosocial behavior over aggressive behavior towards other. In early adulthood many people attend college, which can be seen as a belief or tradition based on the culture or society one was raised in. Along with the tradition for college, there also has to be some source of motivation for learning. According to Boggiano & Pittman, extrinsic motivation can be a source for college; this is externally generated driven by what the person will receive as a result of learning. For me, attending college is purely from extrinsic motivation because I know that as a result of going to college I will be able to do the job that truly makes me happy and is what I want to spend my life doing.

In the bioecological systems theory, the sixth and final layer is called the chronosystem. The chronosystem, is a historical time period in which an individual develops. Children in older school age group at the time of the marital breakdown, anger is a common reaction. According to Wallerstein, abandonment is also a common fear among children with divorcing parents. When my parents divorced at this time in my life, I remember lashing out towards them because I was upset and also shutting them out of my life. My relationship with my father definitely suffered after the divorce. During my adolescent period, I had to deal with a death of a close family member. Like Leming & Dickinson stated, at the heart of any grieving process is the coping of the loss of a relationship. This influenced my development because you life and death in a different light than before, and realize that life is short.

Each one of these layers comes together to describe the development of a person in different areas of their lives and the interactions between them. Anything can influence a person’s development in either a positive or a negative way. The layers start out simple in the center and branch out to hold deeper depth, meaning, and influences. Every event that occurs in a person’s life will count towards their development. The development of a person is a very long process that starts before one is born till the day they die.

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