Early Life Experiences and Potential †Free Sample Solution

Question: Explain each of the four components (P-P-C-T) and how they interact to strengthen resilience across the age span of 0 24 years. Identify and include in your discussion one journal article for each component of the bioecological model (P-P-C-T) that demonstrates evidence of how it influences child and youth outcomes. Illustrate your discussion with examples of strengths during childhood that influenced health and well-being outcomes. Answer: The bioecological model is a theoretical model of gene environment interactions in the human development. It was given by Urie BronfenbrennerandStephen J. Ceci. It can be applied to the children and mature adults and it is a lifespan approach to the development. It emphasizes the value of understanding the both side influences from the individuals and the environment. He named the original Bronfenbrenner model as Ecological system theory model (Bronfenbrenner, 2005). With this model he identified the way to understand the development of the individual in context to the environment. He identified four ecological systems as microsystem, mesosystem, macrosystem and ecosystem. He only extended the model than by the addition of the chronosystem which tells how a person and the environment changes with the time. In this the emphasis was made on the processes and the role of the human being. It is known as ProcessPersonContextTime Model and is also the basis of the bioecological model (Urie Bronfenbrenner Morris, 2006). The theory explains the interaction held up between all these four things. In later paragraphs a brief description of PPCT along with examples and literature review are explained in detail. The PPCT concepts are explained below in detail. Process: It is the primary mechanism in the development and is laid with two propositions. The proposition one states that the processes we environment which involves complex progressive and reciprocal interaction between an human individual and the surrounding things like person, objects and symbol that can be said as the environment. Therefore it is required that the interactions should occur regularly with time. This interaction of the biological human with the environment are known as proximal processes. The examples of it are playing with the young ones, child to child activity, reading, learning new activities. The children playing alone or playing with his parents is also a proximal process, as he is gaining some kind of knowledge while playing with his parents (Stewart, 2007). These are said to be the engines of the development that occurs on a regular basis. Proximal processes nature generally varies according to the aspects of the individual and of the context and are both spatial and temporal. The proposition two states that the form, power, content and the direction of all the proximal processes that effects the development varies systematically. This occurs as a joint feature of the developing individual, the environment in which the processes are occurring, including both the immediate and remote; the developmental outcomes nature; social continuity and the changes that occur over the life time and the historical period in which the individual is living. Bronfenbrenner says that both the two propositions are theoretically interdependent and they are subject to empirical testing. Apart from proximal processes, there are distal processes also that have an indirect influence on childs development. These processes includes the familys power to support the child and the interaction with significant other environment to which the child is attached or is a part off like social class, community meetings etc. Person: Bronfenbrenner respected the value of the biological and genetic aspects of the individual. He laid more interest in the personal features and behaviours of an individual in context to social situations. he categorized these characteristics in to three parts: demand, force, and resource. Demand characteristics are known as the personal stimulus features that are in relation to the immediate stimulus to others like colour, age, gender, skin and physical features (Agbenyega, 2010). They are responsible for the initial conversations as they form expectations quickly. The resource characteristics on the other hand not immediately apparent, but however in certain cases they are induced having different level of accuracy as compared to demands. They are associated to the mental and emotional features like that of past experience, intelligence, skill, influences and access to the social and material sources of luxuries like good house, good education, caring parents. The third force charact eristics are the one with difference in temperament, motivation, persistence and likeness. Like for example two boys can have equal resource characteristics like a good house, a good social status, loving parents but there demand characteristics will be always different and their developmental trajectory will also be different like one is motivated to succeed and other is not. In his later writings he tell ones role in changing the context. The changes can be passive like if a person is still living in the same environment as earlier but the reaction and interaction has been low or changed due to hi/her demand characteristics. The change can also be active to most active like the changes in the resource characteristics and force characteristics. Context: It is the best component of the bioecological model and is also the most important of all of them. It is the multiple venues that modify the proximal process and is the environment in which the young one is continuously present, whether it may be social interaction, physical interaction or economic interaction. Like for example in a home meant for care giving if the number of children is less then better and good care can be provided to them which will aid in positive development. Thus as per Bronfenbrenner, the context has four systems microsystem, mesosystem, macrosystem and ecosystem. All these have a indirect influence on the development of the child (Parrila, Ma, Fleming, Rinaldi, 2002). A fifth system name d chronosystem was added later to bring up the value of time as it is associated to the childs development. It involves changes that may internal or that may be external like death or loss of the mother and father. The four systems are explained as below: Microsystem: It is innermost stage and is the one to which the child has a direct contact. This system involves families, friends at school or playschool, day care staff, neighbors etc. It generally comprises the proximal process. It is the most immediate level and lay down a early influence on the mid of young ones. The relation that occurs at this level is bidirectional as the family influences the childs behavior and vice versa (Bergen, 2008).In practicality the process here either proximal or distal are mainly the family atmosphere or home care atmosphere, parenting pattern, social and economic status. The children aged between 0 to 5 years has parenting the crucial proximal process and in case there stay in day cares then that is the proximal process. Mesosystem: It is second level and has microsystem in it. Its focus is on the connection among two or more than two systems like home, play mates school. Like for example the house of the child can be reason of something happening at the school and vice versa. Specifically it can be said that the parents and the school staff environment on the development of a child together makes up a mesosystem. Other places like religious gatherings act as a distal process as they provide the support to the family and the child. Exosystem: It the third level. This does not involves a direct contact with the system but affects the development. It consists of both the microsystem and mesosystem. It also affects the wellbeing of the ones who are in contact with the child. The decisions and policy that are done at a wide level also indirectly influence the child. Like for example the parent workstation and the duration also influences the development of child and are proximal process. Like in some cases a parent who is not attending or meeting the teachers would have low interaction and would adversely effect the development of the child. The school policy meant for a certain religion or ethnic back ground also influences the development of the child. Macrosystem: The outer level is the macrosystem. It influences all the inner layers of the ecosystem. The features of the macrosystem that influence all the other layers are cultural characters, political issues, economic issues (Dowling et al, 2006). Like for example a culture that ha many divorces leads to a single parent child and would affect the child development and also affects the income and the opportunity that are available to the child. Likewise if the parents are form two different countries and live in another country, may have problems with language, lifestyle. This in turns make the life of child unstable and adversely affects the development. Time: This particular concept is about the aspects like chronological age, time duration and the nature of the periodicity. The succession of an event has different degree of influence in the individual. This influence decreases as the time increases. Some events like shifting to a new place, parents sickness, parents divorce can have a harmful impact on the children lives as compared to elders (Voydanoff, 2005). Moving on to the effects on the development of child when all or one of the PPCT components are adversely affecting the child. In some case the proximal or the distal processes cause a adverse or a negative effect on the childs mind and the development. In such cases resilience strategies are to be applied. Resilience is the positive adaptation in the situations when the personal, family or environment difficulties are extremely high that leads to the impairment of the individuals cognitive and functional abilities. There are three kinds of resilience. One is when the individual is not succumb to the adversities in spite of high risk. Second is developing up coping strategy in circumstances of high stress. Third is the individuals who have suffered high trauma. A research was performed to find up the resilience strategies (Malindi, 2011). According to it resilience can be proposed by following these: Strategies for the 0 to4 years Proper maternal nutrition Avoidance of maternal smoking Support to mothers from family and husband Adequate family income High quality education Proper child nutrition Healthy relations between all the members of the family Strategies for middle childhood 5 to 13 years: Classes to provide cultural and community behavior A link between school and home to develop confidence and engagement. Healthy school experiences Healthy relationship between child and teacher and parent and teachers. Developing skills for performing all the tasks Structured and time bound routines daily. Attachment to the relatives or significant others. Provision of breakfast and after school clubs. Participation in decision making and problem solving Strategies for 13 to 19 years High social support and social network (Theron). Presence of one parent who supports unconditionally. A guide or person who is not a family member. Positive and good experiences from school It can be seen that these strategies are related to the PPCT model. If these strategies are followed appropriately at each stage or level of PPCT, then the child development would be enhanced (Woo, 2005). These strategies are to be linked up in the proximal and distal processes to provide full development. Like high support is demanded from all sides to an individual in an adolescent stage through both the proximal and distal processes. Summing up, it can be said that the bioecological theory highlights the stages of the child development and provides with a way to enhance the development of the child at each stage. It tells all about how the environment and family are related and associated to the child directly or indirectly and what impact they put on the child by the activities performed by them solitary or with the individuals. Researches are performed and still going to further enhance the model and aids in childs full development. References Agbenyega, J. (2010) The Australian early development index, who does it measure: Piaget or Vygotskys child? Australian Journal of Early Childhood, 34 (2), 31-38. Bronfenbrenner, U. (2005).Making human beings human: Bioecological perspectives on human development. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications Ltd. pp.315. Bergen, D. (2008).Human development: traditional and contemporary theories. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. p.220. Dowling, E., Osborne, E. (2006). The Family and the School: A Joint Systems Approach to Problems with Children: Second Edition. London: Karnac Books. Malindi, M.J., Theron, L.C., Venter, A. (2011).Understanding youth resilience: findings and results from the International Pathways to Resilience project. Parrila, R. K., Ma, X, Fleming, D., Rinaldi, C. (2002). Development of Prosocial Skills. (Final report), Applied Research Branch, Strategic Policy, Human Resources Development Canada. Stewart, E. B. (2007). Individual and school structural effects on African American high school students academic achievement. High School Journal, 91, 16 34. Urie Bronfenbrenner Morris, P.A. (2006). "The bioecological model of human development".Handbook of Child Psychology(John Wiley Sons, Inc.)1: 793828. Voydanoff, P. (2005). Social integration, work-family conflict and facilitation, and job and marital quality. Journal of Marriage and Family, 67,666 679. Theron, L.C.Bouncing back!How parents, peers andprofessionals enable young people towardsresilience.