ABSTRACT
What are the advantages to organizing and building knowledge about behavior around the concept of developmental psychology? The case for a developmental approach to the study of behavior is similar to the arguments developed in other sciences for using:
knowledge about sociocultural history to better understand present political events;
knowledge about paleontology to understand the nature of current world geography;
knowledge about the length and frequency (life history) of cigarette smoking to predict the probability of adult lung cancer;
knowledge about past stock market trends to predict next year's stock market situation and the value of a given portfolio;
knowledge from archaeology to develop a fuller understanding of modern civilization; and
knowledge about the summer climate in California to predict the quality and taste of California's fall wines.
