Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development,Tufts University, Medford, MA, USA.
Adv Child Dev Behav. 2013;45:1-20.
Relational developmental systems' theories emphasize that any facet of individual structure or function is embodied with other features of the individual and with the characteristics of his or her proximal and distal ecology, including culture and history. Embodiment means that biological, psychological, and behavioral attributes of the person, in fusion with the contexts of human development, have a temporal parameter. Embodiment provides a basis for epigenetics across generations and for epigenetic (qualitative discontinuous) change across ontogeny. We describe how the chapters in this two-volume set present theory and research pertinent to the roles of evolutionary and ontogenetic processes in cognitive, emotional, and behavioral development across the life span. The scholarship presented in these volumes suggests that rigorous, relational developmental theory-predicated research about the plastic, mutually influential relations among individual and ecological processes will enable developmental science to better describe, explain, and optimize the fundamental relational process of human development.
关系发展系统理论强调，个体结构或功能的任何方面都与个体的其他特征以及其近端和远端生态环境（包括文化和历史）的特征融为一体。体现意味着人与发展背景融合的生理、心理和行为特征具有时间参数。体现为跨代的表观遗传学和个体发生过程中的表观遗传（定性不连续）变化提供了基础。我们描述了这两卷集中的章节如何呈现理论和研究，这些理论和研究与进化和个体发生过程在整个生命周期中的认知、情感和行为发展中的作用有关。这些卷中呈现的学术研究表明，关于个体和生态过程之间的可塑、相互影响关系的严格的、关系发展理论预测的研究将使发展科学能够更好地描述、解释和优化人类发展的基本关系过程。
