The experience of cultural and historical analysis of the emotional-personal development of children in different social and historical situations

Abstract

The article presents the experience of describing and comparative cultural and historical analysis of the development of children in different historical conditions: the period of the crisis of 1992-2000 and the stabilization period 2012-2015. The research involved a qualitative analysis of objective historical and socio-demographic data, material living conditions for families, employment of parents, available resources, etc.; researching the structure of families. Along with the data listed, the analysis used the results of interviews with parents, as well as long-term observations in children institutions. On the basis of a comparative analysis of two groups of families with children of senior preschool age from Moscow 1992-1993 birth (24 families) and 2006-2008 birth (31 families) were studied: 1) features and differences in cultural and historical conditions; 2) features of mental development of children; 3) qualitative relations between the conditions of development and the character of the mental development of the children's groups under study. It is shown that cultural and historical conditions do not simply affect the features of the development of the child, but become the organizing point of mental development and naturally incorporate themselves into its structure. This type of research introduces the problems of developmental psychology and children's clinical psychology into a wider range of studies of the development of society and culture; problems of age psychology and children's clinical psychology appear in the context of the range of problems of historical human development, the connection and gaps of generations, accelerating historical time, social heterogeneity and expanding cultural spaces within which development is organized.