Positive adult development intersects social and behavioral science.

Abstract

This special issue of the Behavioral Development Bulletin is dedicated to applications of adult development (AD) research in various social science disciplines. Positive adult development (PAD) research has experienced a considerable differentiation since its Piagetian beginnings in the last quarter of the 20th century. It has gained increasing influence, especially in developmental and educational psychology. At the same time, despite considerable epistemological benefits, it is not yet incorporated as a valuable complement to dominant social science perspectives on socioeconomic, cultural, and political life. Applications to date, however, indicate how AD perspectives can shed light on otherwise neglected dimensions. Due to PAD’s constructivist and mostly content-free structuralist approaches it is transportable to interdisciplinary research in many different contexts. This issue of the Behavioral Development Bulletin therefore asks how AD perspectives can • make valuable contributions to addressing real world challenges by offering more comprehensive understandings and interpretations of complex problems; • suggest paradigmatic theoretical innovation to the social sciences; and • gain deeper incorporation in behavioral economic, sociological, social, psychological, and political science contexts. Although having invited both theoretical and empirical contributions to PAD research, the emphasis of this issue is on empirical applications, with a special focus on social science disciplines other than psychology. Also, by featuring papers that review how AD approaches have been received and used in other social science disciplines, the issue presents a very rich and broad panorama of how PAD perspectives have been and can be used in various areas of the social sciences. We hope that it provides inspiration to both developmentalists and other social scientists in view of discussing and showing how AD perspectives can make a difference in traditional social science disciplines through its specific theoretical and epistemological perspectives, thus building bridges between fields.