Child Psychology: A Contemporary View Point

by Ross D. Parke, Mary Gauvain

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.

Genres: Psychology, Parenting, Science, Nonfiction

720 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1975

Reviews

[Ryan Lang · Rating 3 out of 5]

This textbook provides a good basic overview of early human development, though I find the author takes a bit too much privilege in interpreting certain studies and facts, while providing often baseless (non-cited) and unnecessary vamp on supposed implications of the sections. I also dislike how much focus is put into detailing the huge number of different studies that have come up with similar but slightly different results on topics, even if the differences are only in name. For example, the number of different growth models at each stage of life is daunting and unnecessary, especially considering that virtually no time is spent covering the conceptual, foundational, and historical aspects of this field of psychology.

I've read two other developmental psychology books and prefer both heavily over this one.