Conceptual Prerequisites for an Understanding of Stability-Change and Continuity-Discontinuity

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Abstract
Divergent understandings of the nature of development result from incompatible philosophical assumptions or world views. One perspective maintains that reality is best represented as stable and fixed, and as a consequence development or change is understood as a function of antecedent causes. A second perspective maintains that reality is best represented as active and changing, and as a consequence the course of development does not permit antecedent causal explanation. Implications for the investigation and explanation of development are discussed. A major implication of the determining influence of the two world views involves the continuity-discontinuity issue, i.e., the issue of the appearance of novelty during the course of development and the explanation of novelty. The stability perspective asserts a strict continuity in that it allows for no gaps in antecedent-consequent causal sequences. The activity and change perspective permits discontinuity.