Читать книгу The Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Social Development - Группа авторов - Страница 68

Lance Workman, Sandie Taylor, and Jerome H. Barkow

The academic subfield of developmental psychology can be traced back to the writings of Charles Darwin. Given, however, that Darwin never applied his theory of evolution by natural selection to child development, this might seem a bold and curious claim to make. In fact, while Darwin made no mention of child development in the Origin of Species (1859), 5 years prior to his death in 1877 he published a Biographical Sketch of an Infant in the burgeoning journal Mind. This article provided a detailed description of the early development of his first son William Erasmus and, without mentioning natural selection, suggested that early human social development had parallels with developmental patterns in other social species. In particular, Darwin saw parallels with puppies and kittens in William’s prosocial attempts to engage others in play. In a Biographical Sketch Darwin also stated that the study of child development should be undertaken as a serious scientific enterprise that he hoped others would follow up. Given that by 1877, Darwin was arguably the most eminent figure in the world of science, this call did not go unheeded and numerous other studies of child development were published in quick succession. By the end of the 19th century developmental psychology was regarded as a well‐respected field of scientific endeavor.

In this chapter we provide a broadly chronological account of the relationship between evolutionary theory and considerations of human social development. We first examine the contribution of major theorists from Darwin to modern day evolutionary developmental psychologists. We then consider some current concerns and speculate about future developments.