Human Developmental Science in the Perspective of Metatheory

Human developmental science is not limited to expressing hypotheses, theorizing and empretical investigation. Metatheories of this science, also, affect result interpretation, and educational applications. The study aimed to examine human developmental science in the light of its existing metatheories. Proportion between metatheories and theories which is the basis for educational policies and instructional applications is one of the requirements for optimal human development. Thus, we used descriptive-analytical method to explain different kinds of human developmental metatheories including split metatheory and processrelational metatheory. Split metatheory depicts the world as aggregates of dichotomous polarities, but process-relational metatheory depicts the world as systems of dynamic, changing and reciprocal part-whole relations. In processrelational metatheory, polarities interpenetrate each other and each pole defines and is defined by the other. Moreover, within this metatheory, the whole is an organized system of parts; each part is defined by its relations to other parts and to the whole. Thus, the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts, but it is different from them. New advancements in developmental science reduced the 300-year-old influence of this metatheory through Cartesian split anomalies, and replaced it with processrelational metatheory.