The name is absent

The importance of context

3. The importance of context

3.1. The meaning of context

Ecological models of human development (e.g. Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Lerner, 1986;
Sameroff & MacKenzie, 2003) depict development as occurring within a multilevel
environment such that the family is not the only context that matters for child
development. There are many important contexts in childhood, including the family,
neighbourhoods, pre-schools, schools and peer groups. These contexts matter not only
in that they are channels for the effects of distal factors but also because they are
causal factors in their own right. They have characteristics that impact on proximal
processes and the subsequent experiences of the child. They may in many cases be
driven by distal factors but to ignore the characteristics that matter or to fail to specify
them is to leave a gap in the understanding of the determinants of development.

To give one example, income (a distal factor) impacts on resources in the home (a
characteristic of the family context) which, in turn, impact on educational behaviours
(the proximal process). It may be income that drives the process but the resources are
a non-trivial link in the chain that may be broken or influenced (moderated) by other
factors at any point. Thus, it is the relationships between the elements of our
framework that is paramount. A higher income does not mean that increased familial
resources will be used to buy more books for example, nor that provided books will
be read. It is these interactions that make the ecological model not just a static
description of individual associations but a dynamic perspective on development.

3.1.1 The importance of other contexts

As noted, we focus specifically on the family context. Other contexts interact both
with the family context and so shape the development of the child as well as directly
influencing the experiences of the child. However, these other contexts can be
modelled within this same distal/proximal conceptual structure. For example as
shown in Box 6, the quality or characteristics of neighbourhoods are influenced by
neighbourhood-level distal factors such as the educational level, affluence and social
class of the residents of the neighbourhood.

Distal
neighbourhood
factors

• Income and
poverty

• Education

• Geography

Box 6: Conceptual model for the influences of neighbourhood

<<   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   >>

More intriguing information