Child Psychology: A Contemporary View Point

This classic text once again provides a compelling topically-organized introduction to child development. Parke et al incorporate multiple perspectives in exploring the processes of child development. With recurring pedagogical features to ensure students see the interrelatedness of chapters and concepts and the chronological development of children, the authors have also taken care to further their student-friendly presentation by shortening the text in this edition. This has been accomplished without cutting the book’s highly-regarded child psychopathology chapter.

Mary Gauvain is a Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Riverside. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association and past secretary/treasurer of Division 7 (Developmental Psychology) of APA. She is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the Society for Research in Child Development. Gauvain is currently an associate editor of Child Development and on the editorial board of the journals Child Development Perspectives and Cognitive Development. She is the author of The Social Context of Cognitive Development and coauthor of Readings on the Development of Children (with Michael Cole). She is well known for her research on cognitive development, in particular, for her research on social and cultural contributions to the development of planning skills and spatial thinking. Gauvain obtained her M.A. degree in sociology of education from Stanford University and her Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Utah. She has held postdoctoral positions in developmental psychology at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and the Oregon Social Learning Center. Her current research focuses on the ecology of children's everyday lives, including how experiences in the family and cultural community provide opportunities for the development of cognitive skills.

Ross D. Parke is Distinguished Professor of Psychology and director of the Center for Family Studies at the University of California, Riverside. He is past president of the Society for Research in Child Development and of Division 7, the Development Psychology Division, of the American Psychological Association, and in 1995, he received the G. Stanley Hall award from this APA division. Parke was elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1997. He has served as editor of both the Journal of Family Psychology and Developmental Psychology and as associate editor of Child Development. Parke is the author of Fatherhood, coauthor of Throwaway Dads (with Armin Brott), and coeditor of Family-Peer Relationships: In Search of the Linkages (with Gary Ladd), Children in Time and Place(with Glen Elder and John Modell), and Exploring Family Relationships With Other Social Contexts (with Sheppard Kellam). Parke's research has focused on early social relationships in infancy and childhood. He obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and is well know for his early work on the effects of punishment, aggression, and child abuse and for his work on the father's role in infancy and early childhood. Parke's current work focuses on the links between family and peer social systems, ethnic variations in families, and the effects of the new reproductive technologies on families.