Ecological Engagement: Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Method to Study Human Development

This book presents the method developed by Dr. Silvia Helena Koller and her students and collaborators to apply Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Theory of Human Development to empirical studies with children and adolescents. Although Bronfenbrenner's theory, in different stages of development, has been widely cited by several researchers, surprisingly little has been written about the theory itself, its evolution or about the methods that should be used to test it. This book fills this gap by presenting both an overview of Bronfenbrenner’s theory and a method to apply it to empirical research, the Ecological Engagement method.

The book also shows how this method can be applied in practice by bringing together a series of research reports of studies carried out in different regions of Brazil and in Angola that used the Ecological Engagement method to study children and adolescent development in different contexts, such as street situation, sexual exploitation, institutional reception, family reintegration, school and emergency and disasters, among others.

Ecological Engagement – Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Method to Study Human Development will be a valuable tool for psychologists and other social scientists interested in child and adolescent development looking for a solid an innovative methodology that allows researchers to directly interact with their research subjects in their own social contexts in order to fully understand their problems and issues.  

“The methodology of Ecological Engagement, that is explained and richly empirically illustrated in this book, is a singularly significant extension of [Urie Bronfenbrenner’s] bioecological model.  Indeed, in my view it is a brilliant empirical instantiation of the PPCT component of the model. (…) Ecological Engagement methodology is the scientific means through which Urie’s legacy can be furthered.” – Excerpt from the Foreword to the International Edition by Dr. Richard M. Lerner, director of the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development, Tufts University

Silvia Helena Koller is Full Professor and Chair of the Center for Psychological Studies of At-Risk Populations in the Department of Psychology at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil, and Extraordinary Professor at North West University, in Vanderbijlpark, South Africa. She was also a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Graduate School of Education and a Visiting Scientist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health between 2016 and 2017. Dr. Koller has focused her investigations on at-risk populations based on a bioecological theoretical perspective, having developed the Ecological Engagement method to apply Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Theory of Human Developed to empirical studies of child and adolescent development. She has lectured at different universities around the world, such as North-West University (South Africa), University of Zurich (Switzerland), Harvard University, UIUC, UNL, UNC, and ASU (USA), Universidad del Valle, Universidad Nacionalde Colombia, Pontificia Universidad Católica Javeriana, and Universidad de Baranquilla (Colombia), Universidad San Marco, Pontificia Universidad Católica, Universidad Autónoma, and Universidad de Chiclayo (Peru), Pontificia Universidad Católica (Chile), among others, and has advised and mentored many students who are now important researchers in Brazil, Colombia, Portugal and the USA.

Simone dos Santos Paludo is Associate Professor in the Department of Education and Behavioral Sciences at the Federal University of Rio Grande, Rio Grande, Brazil, where she coordinates the local branch of the Center for Psychological Studies of At-Risk Populations. She holds a PhD in Psychology from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul and her main research interests are violations of child, adolescent and youth rights, violence against women, positive development, moral emotions and resilience.   

Normanda Araujo de Morais is Full Professor in the Graduate Programin Psychology at the University of Fortaleza, Fortaleza, Brazil, where she coordinates the Laboratory of Complex Systems Studies: Couples, Family and Community. Dr. Morais holds a PhD in Psychology from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul and her main research interests are human development in contexts of social vulnerability, children and adolescents living in the streets, family and community resilience, positive psychology and families formed by same sex couples.