ABSTRACT
Roger Barker is an interesting example of a developmentalist who made substantial contributions to the field by going in some directions that seemed initially to be away from traditional development. He began by being interested in children, how they develop, and what influenced this development. When his initial studies of children and their families in their own natural habitats produced, at best, conflicting results, he started over. Much in the spirit of Barbara McClintock, Nobel Prize winner for her seminal work in genetics, Barker abandoned accepted theory and methods and tried to “let the material tell him” (Keller, 1983, p. 179) how to proceed and what to look for. His discoveries led him to a deeper understanding of factors in the environment that have substantial influences not only on the behavior of children but on all of human behavior as well. He was given the American Psychological Association (APA) Award for Distinguished Scientific Contribution in 1963 for this work. He called his discoveries behavior setting theory. Roger Barker. https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9780203806135/53033083-3e02-48c0-88bf-b3501014f267/content/fig9_1_B.jpg" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> (Courtesy of Phil Schoggen. With permission.)
