Human Growth and Development - Softcover

Beckett, Chris

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0761972498 ISBN 13: 9780761972495

Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd, 2002

Synopsis

This textbook provides a student-friendly introduction to social and psychological human development across the lifespan. The author presents the key theories and empirical evidence about the way people grow and change over the lifespan, relating theoretical ideas to practice. The book uses examples based on real situations and invites the reader to measure ideas against their own experience and intuitions. It contains a wealth of material, presented with a strong focus on clarity and explanation.

 

About this title

About the Author

Chris Beckett qualified as a social worker in the 1980s, and worked in the field for 18 years, first as a social worker and then as a manager, latterly as the manager of a children and families social work team.  Like most social workers who qualified at that time, he started out as a ‘generic’ social worker, working with a range of service users including children and families, old people, and people with mental health problems and disabilities, but his predominant area of work was with children and families.

He moved into academic social work in 2000, working first at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge and then at the University of East Anglia in Norwich.  In addition to his social work text books, he has published academic articles on a variety of topics including the use of military language in social work, the importance of realism as an ethical principle, and statistics from Sweden about child abuse, following the legal ban there on corporal punishment.  His main research area, however, has been decision-making in court proceedings about children, and decision-making about children more generally.

Chris has a parallel career as a writer of literary science fiction. (More information about his fiction can be found at www.chris-beckett.com.)  He won the Edge Hill Short Fiction prize for his story collection, The Turing Test, and the Arthur C. Clarke award for his novel Dark Eden.   He is now a full-time writer.     His view is that ‘academic’ and ‘creative’ writing have more in common than might at first sight appear: in both cases the author begins with a jumble of ideas that seem to him to be in some way linked together, and attempts, in large part by a combination of intuition and trial and error, to impose some shape and structure.

Chris has three adult children, and lives in Cambridge with his wife Maggie and sundry animals.

 

Review

"An excellent text. Engages the reader and presents seminal theory in an easy to grasp format which I have found invaluable when teaching undergraduate nursing students." - Maureen Campbell, School of Nursing and Midwifery, University of Dundee

"This second edition provides a wide-ranging and insightful analysis to psycho-social development across the lifespan. Highly recommended." Dawn Judd, Senior Lecturer in Social Work, University of Central Lancashire

"One of the great strengths of Beckett′s writing is that his style is accessible to new undergraduates and he makes sure that complex material is summarised in a way that enables students to understand difficult issues." - Jacqueline Hughes, University of Huddersfield

"This is an excellent read. An impressive array of theoretical underpinnings applied to contemporary practice. Indeed a recommended read for students across the health and social care professions." - Michelle Davies, Academic Leader-Inter-Professional Practice (Social Work & Youth Work), University of Wales, Newport

"This book is a pleasure to read...the book will helpfully guide students at a range of levels to understand the critical stages of Human Development and apply theory to practice." - Mohammed Jakhara, Assistant Head of Subject, Applied Social & Community Studies, University of Derby

About this edition

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0761972498
• ISBN 13: 9780761972495
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 242