Support for Young Scholars to Participate in ISSBD PreConference Workshops on Important Topics in Developmental Science, Lusaka, Zambia

International Society For The Study Of Behavioral Development, Ann Arbor MI

Investigators

Abstract

This award will support the travel and participation of at least 12 young scholars (primarily doctoral students but all within 7 years of obtaining a PhD) from the United States in one of three cutting-edge research training workshops on central topics in developmental science held as pre-conference events for the International Society for the Study of Behavioral Development (ISSBD) Biennial Meeting in Lusaka, Zambia. They will be joined in these workshops by many other young scholars from about thirty countries around the world, including many developing countries, especially in Africa. The topics for the training workshops are as follows: (1) Social Change and Human Development, led by Patricia Greenfield, UCLA and Heidi Keller, University of Osnabruck, Germany. These distinguished professors will present the latest thinking about culture, social change, and human development from the fields of anthropology, psychology, and sociology. Participants will have the opportunity in break-out sessions to discuss their research and apply the theories and methods. (2) Introduction to Methodology and Analyses of Longitudinal Data, led by Marcel vanAken, University of Utrecht, the Netherlands and Jaap Dinessen, Humboldt University, Germany. These outstanding researchers are known for their research on methods as well as their expert application of them to developmental data. Development involves change and recent advances in computer technology as well as statistics have yielded powerful new methods to analyze data on individuals in groups such as families sampled repeatedly over time. This workshop will present important methods and will provide opportunities for participants in small groups to use these methods on their own data. (3) Developmental Origins of Aggression from Comparative and Interdisciplinary Perspectives, led by Richard Tremblay, University of Montreal, Canada and Steven Suomi, National Institute for Child Health and Human Development. These eminent scientists will present the latest knowledge about aggression, broadly construed, among humans and other animals including neuroscience, genetic and epigenetic factors, and other individual and group difference factors. As past ISSBD training workshops have demonstrated, the participants form strong bonds with other young scholars that provide a base for pursuing collaborative research, particularly international collaborations, with junior as well as more senior investigators participating in these meetings. The young scholars from past workshops, selected as highly promising, have proceeded to become engaged in rigorous collaborative research that is important to global society because of their exposure to other cultures. The young researchers funded on this grant are expected to become leaders in developmental science that makes a difference globally. This award is being co-funded by the Social, Behavioral, and Economic Directorate's Developmental and Learning Sciences program and the Office of International Science and Engineering's Africa, Near East, and South Asia program.