Abstract
International collaborative research has the potential to advance developmental psychology in important ways. When basic science is conducted only in high-income, Western countries, the experiences of children and youth in these countries end up defining what is known about development. Young people adapt to the circumstances in which they live, so to understand development fully, research must be conducted in the range of cultural contexts in which development occurs. International collaborations, collecting data in a wide range of countries, and incorporating diverse cultural perspectives are central to this effort. This article outlines seven recommendations for researchers conducting collaborative international research on child and youth development. The recommendations address conceptual and methodological issues (avoiding a deficit perspective, rethinking ideas about standard or so-called “normative” development patterns, considering relations between age and development, and attending to comparability of samples and measures) and issues related to researchers themselves (collaborating with scholars and community members from other cultures, being strategic with potential collaborators and research participants, and communicating in person).
Impact and Implications
This article provides recommendations for international collaborations that are important for advancing understanding of global issues concerning child and youth development in diverse contexts around the world. Child and youth development is at the core of a number of the Sustainable Development Goals (e.g., SDG 3: health and well-being and SDG 4: inclusive and quality education) and affected by others (e.g., SDG 1: no poverty). The recommendations for international research partnerships (also reflected in SDG 17 on knowledge sharing) advanced in this article are relevant for building capacity, sharing sound conceptual frameworks, and designing best practices to implement programs and policies to realize the SDGs.
References
(2015). Decolonizing psychological science: Introduction to the special thematic section. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 3, 213–238. 10.5964/jspp.v3i1.564
(2008). The neglected 95%: Why American psychology needs to become less American. American Psychologist, 63, 602–614. 10.1037/0003-066X.63.7.602
Berry, J. W.Poortinga, Y. H.Pandey, J.Dasen, P. R.Saraswathi, T. S.Segall, M. H.Kagitcibasi, C. (Eds.). (1997). Handbook of cross-cultural psychology (2nd ed., Vol. 1–3). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
(2006). Cross-cultural psychology: Research and applications (2nd ed.). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
(2017). Steps to overcome the North–South divide in research relevant to climate change policy and practice. Nature Climate Change, 7, 21–27. 10.1038/nclimate3163
(2012). Cultural approaches to parenting. Parenting: Science and Practice, 12, 212–221. 10.1080/15295192.2012.683359
Bornstein, M. H. (Ed.). (2010). The handbook of cultural developmental science. New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.
Britto, P. R.Engle, P. L.Super, C. M. (Eds.). (2013). Handbook of early childhood development research and its impact on global policy. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199922994.001.0001
(2004). Maternal expressed emotion predicts children’s antisocial behavior problems: Using monozygotic-twin differences to identify environmental effects on behavioral development. Developmental Psychology, 40, 149–161. 10.1037/0012-1649.40.2.149
(1994). Beyond parental control and authoritarian parenting style: Understanding Chinese parenting through the cultural notion of training. Child Development, 65, 1111–1119. 10.2307/1131308
(2010).
Parenting of young immigrant Chinese children: Challenges facing their social emotional and intellectual development . In E. L. GrigorenkoR. Takanishi (Eds.), Immigration, diversity, and education (pp. 225–241). New York, NY: Routledge.(2015). Understanding Chinese immigrant and European American mothers’ expressions of warmth. Developmental Psychology, 51, 1802–1811. 10.1037/a0039855
(2010). Resilience under conditions of extreme stress: A multilevel perspective. World Psychiatry, 9, 145–154. 10.1002/j.2051-5545.2010.tb00297.x
(1996). Cultural psychology: A once and future discipline. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
(2010).
Cognition . In M. H. Bornstein (Ed.), Handbook of cultural developmental science (pp. 127–142). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.(2014). Narrative inquiry: A dynamic approach. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
(2016). A relational theory of human development in the 21st century crisis of violence and displacement. Human Development, 59, 128–151. 10.1159/000448230
(2000). Cross-cultural views on human development in the third millennium. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 24, 428–434. 10.1080/016502500750037973
(2015). Investigation of the cross-national equivalence of a measurement of early child development. Child Indicators Research, 8, 471–489. 10.1007/s12187-014-9249-3
(2010). Developing multiple language versions of instruments for intercultural research. Child Development Perspectives, 4, 19–24. 10.1111/j.1750-8606.2009.00111.x
(1992). Might efforts to increase birthweight in undernourished women do more harm than good? Lancet, 340, 1021–1023. 10.1016/0140-6736(92)93022-F
(2011). Applying the cultural approach to cognitive development. Journal of Cognition and Development, 12, 121–133. 10.1080/15248372.2011.563481
Geissler, P. W.Molyneux, C. (Eds.). (2011). Evidence, ethos and experiment: The anthropology and history of medical research in Africa. Oxford, United Kingdom: Berghahn. 10.26530/OAPEN_478050
(2006). Popular concerns about medical research projects in sub-Saharan Africa – A critical voice in debates about medical research ethics. Tropical Medicine and International Health, 11, 975–982. 10.1111/j.1365-3156.2006.01682.x
(1970). East is a big bird. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
(1977).
Understanding sibling concepts: A developmental study of kin terms in Zinacantecan . In P. R. Dasen (Ed.), Piagetian psychology: Cross-cultural contributions (pp. 335–338). New York, NY: Gardner.(2006). Culturally adapted mental health interventions: A meta-analytic review. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, and Practice, 43, 531–548. 10.1037/0033-3204.43.4.531
(2010). The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33, 61–83. 10.1017/S0140525X0999152X
Hewlett, B. S.Lamb, M. E. (Eds.). (2005). Hunter-gatherer childhoods: Evolutionary, developmental and cultural perspectives. New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.
(2009). Relations among parental acceptance and control and children’s social adjustment in Chinese American and European American families. Journal of Family Psychology, 23, 321–330. 10.1037/a0015812
(1983).
Understanding Micronesian navigation . In D. GentnerA. L. Stevens (Eds.), Mental models (pp. 191–225). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.(2017, March). Observing teachers’ practices with MELE in Indonesia: Why, what, and what next? Paper presented at the Comparative and International Education Society conference, Atlanta, GA.
(1983). European ‘lag’ in the development of an economic concept: A study in Zimbabwe. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 1, 113–120. 10.1111/j.2044-835X.1983.tb00549.x
(2014). On the drivers of international collaboration: The impact of informal communication, motivation, and research resources. Science and Public Policy, 41, 520–531. 10.1093/scipol/sct079
(2013). Deconstructing the myth of the “tiger mother”: An introduction to the special issue on tiger parenting, Asian-heritage families, and child/adolescent well-being. Asian American Journal of Psychology, 4, 1–6. 10.1037/a0032136
(2015). Places and postures: A cross-cultural comparison of sitting in 5-month-olds. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 46, 1023–1038. 10.1177/0022022115593803
(2011). Maternal and paternal parenting styles associated with relational aggression in children and adolescents: A conceptual analysis and meta-analytic review. Developmental Review, 31, 240–278. 10.1016/j.dr.2011.08.001
(2000). History and future of development in cross-cultural psychology. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 31, 52–62. 10.1177/0022022100031001005
(1977).
Papua New Guinea and Piaget: An eight-year study . In P. R. Dasen (Ed.), Piagetian psychology: Cross-cultural contributions (pp. 169–202). New York, NY: Gardner.(2010). Introduction to the special section: Measurement equivalence in child development research. Child Development Perspectives, 4, 1–4. 10.1111/j.1750-8606.2009.00108.x
(2017).
Achieving positive development for youth globally: How far have we come and what is yet needed . In A. C. PetersenS. H. KollerF. Motti-StefanidiS. Verma (Eds.), Positive youth development in global contexts of social and economic change (pp. 301–310). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.(2008). The anthropology of childhood: Cherubs, chattel, changelings. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
Lansford, J. E.Banati, P. (Eds.). (2018). Handbook of adolescent development research and its impact on global policy. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/oso/9780190847128.001.0001
(2016). How international research on parenting advances understanding of child development. Child Development Perspectives, 10, 202–207. 10.1111/cdep.12186
(1977). Cognitive consequences of traditional apprenticeship training in West Africa. Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 8, 177–180. 10.1525/aeq.1977.8.3.05x1512d
(2013).
Resilience and positive youth development: A relational developmental systems model . In S. GoldsteinR. Brooks (Eds.), Handbook of resilience in children (pp. 293–308). Boston, MA: Springer. 10.1007/978-1-4614-3661-4_17(2011).
Concepts and theories of human development . In M. H. BornsteinM. E. Lamb (Eds.), Developmental science: An advanced textbook (pp. 3–49). New York, NY: Psychology Press.(2010). Culture and the home-field disadvantage. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 5, 708–713. 10.1177/1745691610388772
(2017). Adaptation during a great economic recession: A cohort study of Greek and immigrant youth. Child Development, 88, 1139–1155. 10.1111/cdev.12878
(2009).
Cross-cultural study of children’s learning and socialization: A short history . In D. F. LancyJ. BockS. Gaskins (Eds.), Anthropological perspectives on learning in childhood (pp. 35–63). Lanham, MD: Alta Mira Press.. (2018). About ICWA. Retrieved from https://www.nicwa.org/about-icwa/
(2017). The persistent sampling bias in developmental psychology: A call to action. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 162, 31–38. 10.1016/j.jecp.2017.04.017
(2010). Global software development and collaboration: Barriers and solutions. ACM Inroads, 1, 66–78. 10.1145/1835428.1835445
(2015). International Development and Early Learning Assessment technical working paper. Save The Children. Retrieved from https://idela-network.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/IDELA-technical-working-paper_Q4-2015.pdf
(2016). Integration of basic controversies in cross-cultural psychology. Psychology and Developing Societies, 28, 161–182. 10.1177/0971333616657169
(2016). Girls’ and boys’ labor and household chores in low- and middle-income countries. In M. H. Bornstein, D. L. Putnick, J. E. Lansford, K. Deater-Deckard, & R. H. Bradley (issue authors), Gender in low- and middle-income countries, Monograph of the Society for Research in Child Development, 81(1), pp. 104–122. 10.1111/mono.12228
(2017). Measuring child development and learning. European Journal of Education: Research, Development and Policy, 52, 511–522.
(2014). Validation, finalization and adoption of the East Asia-Pacific Early Child Development Scales (EAP-ECDS). New York, NY: UNICEF.
(2003). The cultural nature of human development. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
(2005). Parental acceptance-rejection: Theory, methods, cross-cultural evidence, and implications. Ethos, 33, 299–334.
(1981). Body parts as numerals: A developmental analysis of enumeration among a village population in Papua New Guinea. Child Development, 52, 306–316. 10.2307/1129244
(1979).
Modes of thinking and ways of speaking: Culture and logic reconsidered . In R. O. Freedle (Ed.), New directions in discourse processing (pp. 223–243). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.(1966). The influence of culture on visual perception. Oxford, United Kingdom: Bobbs-Merrill.
(1979). Culture’s influence on behavior. London, United Kingdom: Methuen.
(2011). Social responsibility as a dimension of intelligence and as an educational goal: Insights from programmatic research in an African society. Child Development Perspectives, 5, 126–133. 10.1111/j.1750-8606.2011.00167.x
(2013). Street girls and their fight for survival across four developing countries. Psychological Studies, 58, 365–373. 10.1007/s12646-013-0226-6
(2006).
The cultural psychology of development: One mind, many mentalities . In W. DamonR. M. Lerner (Eds.), Handbook of child psychology (6th ed., pp. 716–792). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.(2011). The balance between on-line and in-person interactions: Methods for the development of digital humanities collaboration. Digital Studies/Le champ numérique. Advance online publication. 10.16995/dscn.259
(1986). The developmental niche: A conceptualization at the interface of child and culture. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 9, 545–569. 10.1177/016502548600900409
Triandis, H. C.Brislin, R. W. (Eds.). (1980). Handbook of cross-cultural psychology. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
(2010).
Methodology . In M. H. Bornstein (Ed.), Handbook of cultural developmental science (pp. 21–37). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis.(2000). Methodological issues in psychological research on culture. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 31, 33–51. 10.1177/0022022100031001004
(2017). Optimizing development following disasters and traumatic experiences among children, adolescents, and adults: Useful frameworks and promising research directions. ISSBD Bulletin, 1, 3–6.
(2011). A cross-cultural view to the study of resilience among street children. ISSBD Bulletin, 1, 11–14.
(2001). Global, national, and local approaches to mental health: Examples from India. Tropical Medicine and International Health, 6, 4–23. 10.1046/j.1365-3156.2001.00670.x
(1975).
The problem of the packaged variable . In K. F. ReigelJ. A. Meacham (Eds.),The developing individual in a changing world : Vol. 1. Historical and cultural issues (pp. 303–309). The Hague, the Netherlands: Mouton.(2014). Parental factors associated with depression and anxiety in young people: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of Affective Disorders, 156, 8–23. 10.1016/j.jad.2013.11.007
