Narrow assessments misrepresent development and misguide policy: comment on Steinberg, Cauffman, Woolard, Graham, and Banich (2009).
Am Psychol
; 64(7): 595-600; discussion 601-4, 2009 Oct.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-19824746
ABSTRACT
Intellectual and psychosocial functioning develop along complex learning pathways. Steinberg, Cauffman, Woolard, Graham, and Banich (see record 2009-18110-001) measured these two classes of abilities with narrow, biased assessments that captured only a segment of each pathway and created misleading age patterns based on ceiling and floor effects. It is a simple matter to shift the assessments to produce the opposite pattern, with cognitive abilities appearing to develop well into adulthood and psychosocial abilities appearing to stop developing at age 16. Their measures also lacked a realistic connection to the lived behaviors of adolescents, abstracting too far from messy realities and thus lacking ecological validity and the nuanced portrait that the authors called for. A drastically different approach to assessing development is required that (a) includes the full age-related range of relevant abilities instead of a truncated set and (b) examines the variability and contextual dependence of abilities relevant to the topics of murder and abortion.
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Desenvolvimento do Adolescente
Limite:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Child
/
Humans
Idioma:
En
Ano de publicação:
2009
Tipo de documento:
Article