Understanding peace and war: A review of developmental psychology research

Author(s): Oppenheimer, L.

Journal/Book: Develop Rev. 1998; 18: 525 B St, Ste 1900, San Diego, CA 92101-4495. Academic Press Inc Jnl-Comp Subscriptions. 353-389.

Abstract: Over the past decades the number of studies dealing with the developing understanding of peace and war among children and adolescents has considerably increased. No coherent overview is available despite this increase. The purpose of this review is to address this absence and to offer a systematic discussion of early and contemporary studies. Besides the absence of a coherent review, most studies fail to offer a theoretical framework for the interpretation and examination of the developing understanding of peace and war. In the discussion of the literature it is shown that there is no overall consensus about the meaning of peace and war. For instance, children and adolescents in different cultural settings (i.e., geographically different areas or countries) are reported to differ in the development of the meanings they attach to peace and war. Early and contemporary studies offer ample evidence, not only for a dependency of thr findings on employed measurement procedures and designs, but also for the apparent presence of a multitude of variables which affect the development of the understanding of peace and war. In all early and in most contemporary studies, age and gender are the major explanatory variables for the observed variations. In more recent studies indications are presented for a structural relationship between the understanding of interpersonal relationships and the understanding of peace, in particular. The influence of other variables such as social institutions and socialization agents on the development of this understanding appears to be primarily theoretically discussed, but rarely empirically supported.

Note: Article Hakvoort I, Univ Gothenburg, Dept Educ & Educ Res, Box 300, SE-40530 Gothenburg, SWEDEN

Keyword(s): CHILDRENS; CONFLICT; COGNITION; ATTITUDES

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