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Human Development That You Selected. Then, Compare Essay

¶ … human development that you selected. Then, compare the major components of the two theories. Finally, describe which theory best explains the influence of culture on human development and why. Support your responses using the resources attached and current literature. Theories of human development:

Indigenous psychology vs. transactional models

The field of psychology has grown increasingly sensitive to the need to take into consideration cultural differences when evaluating theories of human development. Previously, theories such as Piaget's concept of cognitive stages and Terman's conception of intelligence tended to view development as a universal trajectory, applicable to all cultures. In contrast, "Indigenous psychology advocates examining knowledge, skills, and beliefs that people have about themselves, and studying them in their natural contexts" (Kim & Park 2006: 289).

Theories of indigenous psychology can help explain seemingly inexplicable...

Self-efficacy theory has long linked high self-esteem to high levels of achievement in school. Intelligence and success is usually seen as rooted in the individual's character. But in South Korea, individual achievement and self-efficacy not valued as highly in the culture. Instead, a strong cultural belief in hard work and fulfilling social obligations has resulted in a high level of academic achievement compared with the United States. Korean values reflect the Confucian ideal of character: character is something that must be worked at and willed, rather than something that is simply ' expressed' as in the United States belief system. This translates into high levels of academic success for Korean students. Students believe that they must work hard to honor their parents and hard work will pay off in the form of great academic success. Indigenous psychology helps explain why certain pressures which might be viewed as 'negative' --…

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Another theory, that of transactional or dynamic systems models helps explain why certain individuals living within the same cultural context may respond better or worse to certain types of education. " Transactional models emphasize the bidirectional effects between individuals and cultural contexts and underscore the impact of accumulated exposure to physical and social environments on development" (Tsethlikai 2011: 194). Individuals consciously or unconsciously select what cultural influences to which they will respond.

Transactional models help explain why children of indigenous parents, even though they are technically immersed in American as well as native culture, perform considerably worse than their Caucasian counterparts on certain components of intelligence tests. Despite evidence to eradicate bias, there is still often a strong priority given to crystallized intelligence, which favors children of higher socio-economic backgrounds. This leaves "American Indian and Alaska Native children typically doing well on performance test items and performing poorly on verbal items" (Tsethlikai 2011: 194). For example, the components of intelligence tests designed to measure working memory capacity use reading span tests although native children perform much better on memory tests which were less verbally oriented (Tsethlikai 2011: 200).

Like the indigenous model, transactional models stress the culturally-bound nature of constructions such as intelligence. Transactional models focus more on technical aspects of how different components of the development of 'intelligence' evolve differently within cultures vs. The broader-based assessment of values in indigenous models. Indigenous models question whether there is something like 'intelligence' that can be understood cross-culturally at all, given the fact different societies
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