The Impact of Context in Bronfenbrenner's PPCT Model: An Analysis

This essay explores the significant role of 'context' within Bronfenbrenner's PPCT model of human development, emphasizing the influence of the macrosystem, which includes an individual's culture, economy, and political environment. It highlights how individuals are often passive subjects to these contextual effects, such as governmental policies and cultural norms, which can significantly impact their physiological, cognitive, and emotional development. The essay concludes that despite lacking direct control over the macrosystem, these contexts exert a powerful influence on an individual's overall development, shaping their experiences and outcomes.

Running head: CONTEXT IN THE PPCT MODEL
CONTEXT IN THE PPCT MODEL
Name of the Student:
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1CONTEXT IN THE PPCT MODEL
Introduction
While the components of ‘person’, ‘process’ and ‘time’ hold equally powerful
implications upon an individual’s development, the concept of ‘context’ has been emphasised
with greater detail in Bronfenbrenner’s PPCT model (Tudgeet al. 2016).
Discussion
The macrosystem consists of an individual’s culture, economy or political scenario in
which he or she belongs to, but is otherwise passive or lack control over the proceedings of
the same (Ashiabi and O’Neal 2015).
This means that, an individual may not have a hand in implementing governmental
decisions on implementing the Affordable Healthcare Act or its repeal, but will definitely be
financially influenced by it and may encounter physiological and cognitive hindrances or
benefits to cognitive development, further affecting future life stage development (Eriksson,
Ghazinourand Hammarström 2018).Macrosystem also consists of the complexities prevalent
in an individual’s culture. So while an indigenous child may not be involved in the
formulation of traditional cultural values, being exposed to cultural beliefs and historical
notions on belonging to a community oppressed by mainstream society may negatively
hinder development and result in feelings of fear, mistrust and distress in the child when
attempting to adjust to non-indigenous settings (Perron 2017). Hence, the role of context or
the macrosystem is evident in the above scenarios of politics and culture, against which an
individual has no influential power and merely plays a passive subjects to these contextual
effects (Payiret al. 2017).

2CONTEXT IN THE PPCT MODEL
Conclusion
Hence, it can be concluded that despite being a passive, powerless member of the
macrosystem, contexts of politics and culture, prevalent in the same, exert significant impacts
upon an individual’s development.
Total Word Count: 259

3CONTEXT IN THE PPCT MODEL
References
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Eriksson, M., Ghazinour, M. and Hammarström, A., 2018. Different uses of
Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory in public mental health research: what is their value for
guiding public mental health policy and practice?.Social Theory & Health, 16(4), pp.414-433.
Payir, A., Liang, Y., Merçon-Vargas, E.A. and Tudge, J.R., 2017. The Importance of Urie
Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Theory for Early Childhood Education. In Theories of Early
Childhood Education (pp. 45-57). Routledge.
Perron, N.C., 2017. Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory. College Student
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Tudge, J.R., Payir, A., Merçon‐Vargas, E., Cao, H., Liang, Y., Li, J. and O'Brien, L., 2016.
Still misused after all these years? A reevaluation of the uses of Bronfenbrenner's
bioecological theory of human development. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 8(4),
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