Urie Bronfenbrenner
| Urie Bronfenbrenner | |
|---|---|
| Born |
April 29, 1917 Moscow, Russian Republic |
| Died | September 25, 2005 (aged 88) Ithaca, New York, U.S. |
| Nationality | Russian (formerly) American |
| Fields | Developmental psychology |
| Alma mater |
Cornell University Harvard University University of Michigan |
| Known for | Ecological systems theory, co-founder of the Head Start program |
Urie Bronfenbrenner (April 29, 1917 – September 25, 2005) was a Russian-born American developmental psychologist who is most known for his ecological systems theory of child development. His scientific work and his assistance to the United States government helped in the formation of the Head Start program in 1965. Bronfenbrenner's research and his theory was key in changing the perspective of developmental psychology by calling attention to the large number of environmental and societal influences on child development.
Bronfenbrenner was born in Moscow on April 29, 1917. When he was six, his family moved to the United States, first to Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, and then a year later to a rural part of New York state. His father worked as a neuropathologist at a hospital for the developmentally disabled called Letchworth Village, located in Rockland County, N.Y.
Bronfenbrenner received a bachelor's in psychology and music from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, in 1938. He earned a master's in education from Harvard in 1940, and a doctorate in developmental psychology from the University of Michigan in 1942. He entered the U.S. military the day after receiving his doctorate, going on to serve as a psychologist in various military bodies during World War II. After the war, he briefly obtained a job as an assistant chief clinical psychologist for the newly founded VA Clinical Psychology Training Program in Washington D.C. After that, he served as an assistant professor at the University of Michigan for two years, and then moved to Cornell University as an assistant professor in 1948. At Cornell, his research focused on child development and the impact of social forces in this development for the rest of his career.
He was appointed to a federal panel about development in impoverished children around 1964 and 1965, with this panel helping in the creation of Head Start in 1965.
Bronfenbrenner wrote over 300 research papers and 14 books, and achieved the title of Jacob Gould Schurman Professor Emeritus of Human Development at Cornell University. He was married to Liese Price and had six children. He died at his home in Ithaca, New York, on September 25, 2005 at the age of 88, due to complications with diabetes.
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