The 54th annual meeting of the Jean Piaget Society will be held in Belgrade, Serbia
May 29-May 31, 2025
“Rethinking context as process when studying human development: Implications for theory, practice, and policy”
Conference Theme
The JPS 2025 conference theme revisits the premise shared by most modern scholars that human development is always contextualized. While context has increasingly been incorporated into developmental science, it has been viewed causally in many studies, as an external variable that stands apart from the developing person. However, the context is more than this. Many studies have begun conceptualizing context more dynamically with participants in interaction actively and reflexively shaping context as much as context shapes interactions. The 2025 JPS conference aims to revisit existing considerations of context as external settings or arenas of development (e.g., home, school, neighborhood as contexts of development) by conceptualizing context as a complex dynamic reality that undergoes changes including those produced when humans interact. Individuals are not only growing into but also moving through ever changing bio-socio-cultural environments. They are actively constructing context dynamically in the flow of everyday interaction via their perceptions, surprises, responses, interpretations, collective and individual imagination, and initiatives. The 2025 conference will examine these dynamic processes and their relationship to human development. Keynote lectures and invited symposiums will include researchers who will provide a platform for reflecting and discussing different conceptualizations of context in human development. The conference also will consider how revised conceptualizations of human development and contextualization play a role not only in theories of human development, but also influence how we conduct our studies. Additionally, we intend to put forward a need for revising relationships between research, practice, and policy.
Conference Focus
This dynamic process view of contextualization allows us to move beyond traditional views of studying context as external and static, and help deepen our understanding of the ways individuals and groups actively and holistically engage in meaning making at multiple levels of analysis as they interact with others. The conference also will consider how revised conceptualizations of human development and contextualization play a role not only in theories of human development, but also influence how we conduct our studies. Additionally, we intend to put forward a need for revising relationships between research, practice, and policy. We will discuss ways the dynamic relationships between theory, practice and policy are not uni-directional but tri-directional. By deeply acknowledging the accepted interdependencies between developing humans and changing contexts, the hope is to increase our capacity to contribute in more nuanced ways to the future of development and education in the face of the challenges of the Anthropocene.
The conference venue will be The University of Belgrade located in the capital of Serbia
The JPS 2025 conference will take place at the University of Belgrade, Department of Psychology. The conference will be hosted by the Department of Psychology that is part of the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade. The Faculty of Philosophy was founded in 1838 and is the oldest and most prominent institution of higher education in Serbia. The premises of the Faculty of Philosophy are in the very center of Belgrade, in the main pedestrian area. Serbia’s capital Belgrade is known as “the Gate of the Balkans” and “the Doors to Central Europe.” and is one of Europe’s oldest cities and is the capital of Serbian culture, education, and science.
Organized by Aleksandar Baucal, Nancy Budwig, and Anne-Nelly Perret-Clermont
Ivana Stepanović Ilić, Ksenija Krstić, Smiljana Jošić, Local Organizers
Aleksander Baucal
Professor in Developmental and Educational Psychology, University of Belgrade, Serbia
Nancy Budwig
Professor in the Department of Psychology, Clark University, United States
Anne-Nelly Perret-Clermont
Professor Emerita Institute of Psychology and Education, University of Neuchâtel, Switzerland
Submission Deadline is January 6th , 2025.
Acceptance decisions will be available in February 2025. Provisional scheduling of accepted submissions will be available in early March 2025. The full program will be available in Guidebook by April 15 th , 2025. Presenters of all accepted submissions (i.e., first authors) must be registered for the conference by May 1 st , 2025, to be included in the final program.
