Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological System Theory and Its Impact on Health and Development: A Case Study of Amy

This case study explores the impact of Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system theory on the health and development of a 14-year-old girl named Amy. It discusses the factors that contribute to her behavior and identifies considerations for human service practitioners when assessing her state.

Human resource
management

Contents
Contents...........................................................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................1
a). Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system theory...........................................................................1
b). Discussion of how the change in one of these ecosystems affect his or her health and
development.................................................................................................................................2
c). Drawing on relevant theoretical perspectives to describe two factors that contribute to the
behavior experience of Amy........................................................................................................2
d). Identification of two considerations that a human services practitioner might consider when
assessing the state of Amy...........................................................................................................3
e). Comparison and contrast to the possible assessment of Amy from a medical and
biopsychosocial model.................................................................................................................4
f). Three human service practice.................................................................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
Health and well-being are important for a person to be productive. A healthy person can work
efficiently and also develop new things and ideas whereas an unhealthy person does not that
productive. In this, both physical and mental health included (Adla, Gallego-Roquelaure &
Calamel, (2019)). This project report includes the use of Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system that
identifies their system. It also includes discussion of how the change in one system creates
impact over health and development. It draws a relevant theoretical perspective to describe two
factors that contribute to the behaviour of Amy. It also identifies the consideration of human
service practitioners to assess the state of Amy.
MAIN BODY
a). Bronfenbrenner’s ecological system theory
Ecological system theory was introduced by American psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner. This
theory explains the impact of social environment over the development of children. It
emphasizes the importance of studying children in a different environment and also it helps to
understand the development of a child. According to this theory, a child can find themselves in
different ecological systems that can be from intimate home to large school systems (Ansari,
Farrukh & Raza, (2021)). It creates influence over the lives of children. According to this theory,
there are different types of external influencers including microsystem, macrosystem,
mesosystem, chronosystem, and ecosystem.
Microsystem: It is the first level of Bronfenbrenner’s theory which consist things that has direct
contact with their child in their immediate environment like school peers, siblings, parents and
teacher. In this system, the relationship is bidirectional in which a child can be influenced
through other people in the environment and also capable for making changes in action and
beliefs of other people. In this, a child’s reaction to an individual in a microsystem can be
dependent on how they treat them. The interaction of a child in the microsystem is personal and
also important in order to support the development of the child (Zaid, Jaaron & Bon, (2018)).
Amy is a 14-year-old child who feels sad as her mom is working full time and also her father
cannot live with him. She also feels sad as she thinks that her father does not live with them
because he considers Amy a pain. She is also teased by her peers in class for her overweight.
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Mesosystem: It is a system that arises with interaction among children and microsystems like
interaction among parents of the child and their teacher, between school peers and siblings. In
this, the microsystem of a person cannot function alone but it is interacted or influence with
others. Amy's parents were called by the teacher in order to meet them about a few incidents
about Amy. This is a meeting that does not include direct influence but creates an impact over
Amy.
Macrosystem: It is one of the important components that includes how culture creates an impact
over the development of a child-like socioeconomic wealth, ethnicity, poverty, status and other
things. Culture can influence the perception and belief of a person about life. It includes
ideologies, status, ethnicity and other things (Ansari, Farrukh & Raza, (2021)). Amy is a child
who live alone as her mother works full day and also her father does not live with her. She thinks
that her father considers her a pain. She also spends her most of time for watching TV and is also
teased by her peers in class for her weight. All these things create a negative impact on her
development of Amy.
b). Discussion of how the change in one of these ecosystems affect his or her health and
development
Microsystem is considered as an important system in Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Systems
Theory which creates the most influential impact on the health and development of a person. It is
a system that consists of members who are close to a person like parents, teachers and peers. In
the case of Amy, her parents, teachers and peers are in direct context with her. Change in these
factors causes a change in her health and development. All these people create a direct influence
over her behaviors of Amy and her ways to work (Gigauri, (2020)). If her parents treat her right
it will cause a good change in her health and also her development. It will allow her to focus on
her studies and prevent her to watch too much TV. A student needs to spend time over physical
activities like for games and other things. It will also help her to communicate with her parents
and allow her to live happily.
c). Drawing on relevant theoretical perspectives to describe two factors that contribute to the
behavior experience of Amy
On basis of theory, a person includes around five systems that contribute for purpose of the
development of behavior of a person. Two factors that mainly impact Amy’s behavior include
her parents. Amy’s father leaves her and does not leave with them. Amy wants to live with her
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parents but she thinks her father considers her a pain. Her mother also works for full time which
does not allow her to spend time with her mother. Amy wants to communicate with someone and
also wants to play with someone but due to her mother's full day job, it is difficult for her to find
the time. She also thinks her father considers her a pain which also creates an impact over the
mentality of a person.
Another factor that creates an impact over Amy is her peers. Her classmate teases her for being
overweight which creates an impact over her mental ability. Students require support from their
teachers and classmate as it will allow them to adjust with them. It is also important in order to
learn various new things from them (Liu, Qingqing & Liu (2021)). Amy does not adjust to her
classmate as they tease her. She also does not able to focus in class which creates a negative
impact over her studies. It also creates a problem of shortage of attendance in class. Due to all
such reasons, her teacher calls her parent in order to inform them about such activities of Amy.
d). Identification of two considerations that a human services practitioner might consider when
assessing the state of Amy
As a human resource practitioner, I will consider various things while assessing the health of
state of a person. These considerations will help me to understand the stage of Amy and her
behavior. It will also help me to understand the reason behind this behavior of a person. Some of
the considerations considered by a person are mentioned below:
Family background: Family background is one of the important components which will help a
person to understand the family of a person. It also helps to understand the impact over the
behavior of the parent of a child. Amy is a 14 Year child whose father does not live with her
mother. Her father also does not take care of her and instead considers her a pain. The actions of
her father forced Amy to understand herself as a pain to his father. She does not live in a normal
family as there is no one at her home with whom she can communicate, so she watches TV all
day long (Macke & Genari, (2019)). Her mother who is lives with her but still shoe does not
have enough time to spend with her. This makes her lonely. I will consider this factor as it will
allow me to understand state of Amy while she is at home.
Social relationship: It is another component that also creates an impact on the mental stage of a
person. A person who is socially active with other people is happier in compare to a person who
lives alone. Amy is a person who lives alone at home and goes to school where her peer teases
her about her weight. These things overstressed her and does not allow her to focus over her
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studies. She is also involved in verbal as well as physical aggression in school which is not
acceptable. Due to all these things, her attendance in school is also short and they need to
manage it.
e). Comparison and contrast to the possible assessment of Amy from a medical and
biopsychosocial model
The biopsychosocial model is a model that was introduced by George Engel in the year 1977 that
will help them to understand the medical position of a person. It consists different factors like
social, psychological and biological factors. All these factors to create an impact over the
psychological stage of a person. In case of Amy, social factors create a serious impact on the
state of a person. Social and environmental factors are those factors in which patients develop
(Rana & Sharma, (2019)). It can be useful and supportive or harmful and stressful for purpose of
improvement of the condition of patients. In this, data can be divided through different
components like social environment, work, previous intervention, relationship with partners,
housing or living situation. This model helps to understand her relationship with her parents and
peers that cause serious impact and make her distressed. Due to this, Amy does not focus over
her work and also cannot attend classes. Although she also suspended from school due to her
behavior.
f). Three human service practice
A human service practice is one that is adopted by a person in order to help others. There are
different types of human service practices that can be adopted in this situation which will helps
Amy and her parents to overcome these problems. It is important for Amy’s parents to overcome
of these problems and also for providing solutions. Some of these human resource practices
adopted by me is mentioned below:
 Counseling for mental and emotional problems can be adopted by a person for purpose of
understanding the problem faced by the patient. In this, human service providers can
understand the problem of Amy and also communicate with them.
 Providing emotional support to the patient as Amy is facing problems and isolate herself.
It creates a negative impact over her mental health. The human service provider also
needs to provide emotional support to patients by communicating with them and also
with convincing the patient to trust them (Soltis, Brass & Lepak, (2018)).
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 Solutions are also provided by human reservice providers as it will help Amy and Her
parent to solve the problem and allow Amy to work over her state of mind. Her parent
should spend time with her and also motivate her to play outdoor games which will
improve both her mental and physical health.
CONCLUSION
From above mentioned project report, it can be concluded that health and well-being is important
for a person. There are different types of problems faced by a person that create influence their
mental state. It is important for a person to communicate with their family members as it allows
them to get emotional support which is required by an individual.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Adla, L., Gallego-Roquelaure, V., & Calamel, L. (2019). Human resource management and
innovation in SMEs. Personnel Review.
Ansari, N. Y., Farrukh, M., & Raza, A. (2021). Green human resource management and
employees pro‐environmental behaviours: Examining the underlying
mechanism. Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, 28(1),
229-238.
Gigauri, I. (2020). Influence of Covid-19 crisis on human resource management and companies’
response: the expert study. International Journal of Management Science and Business
Administration, 6(6), 15-24.
Liu, P., Qingqing, W., & Liu, W. (2021). Enterprise human resource management platform based
on FPGA and data mining. Microprocessors and Microsystems, 80, 103330.
Macke, J., & Genari, D. (2019). Systematic literature review on sustainable human resource
management. Journal of cleaner production, 208, 806-815.
Rana, G., & Sharma, R. (2019). Emerging human resource management practices in Industry
4.0. Strategic HR Review.
Soltis, S. M., Brass, D. J., & Lepak, D. P. (2018). Social resource management: Integrating
social network theory and human resource management. Academy of Management
Annals, 12(2), 537-573.
Zaid, A. A., Jaaron, A. A., & Bon, A. T. (2018). The impact of green human resource
management and green supply chain management practices on sustainable performance:
An empirical study. Journal of cleaner production, 204, 965-979.
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