Bronfenbrenner doesn’t focus on “stages” but rather on the layers of environment that influence a child. He argues that you cannot understand a person’s development without looking at the systems they inhabit.
- Microsystem: The immediate environment (family, school, peers).
- Mesosystem: Connections between microsystems (e.g., how a parent’s relationship with a teacher affects the child).
- Exosystem: Indirect environments (e.g., a parent’s workplace stress affecting the home life).
- Macrosystem: The broader culture, laws, and social values.
- Chronosystem: The dimension of time (e.g., the timing of a divorce or a historical event).