Soaring Above the Clouds, Delving the Ocean’s Depths

This article was originally the presidential address for the 2010 annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association. It offers three orienting ideas drawn from across human development, neuroscience, cognition, and cultural psychology, as well as studies of biological systems: (1) the intertwining of culture and biology in human development, (2) adaptation through multiple pathways, and (3) interdependence across levels of context. The author argues that these orienting ideas provide warrants for a dynamic view of human learning and development, rooted in both human biology and culture. Implications for research and practice are discussed.