An exploratory review of temperament research: Trends and implications for theory and intervention in the fields of developmental psychology and education
Date
2008-05-19T11:07:51Z
Authors
Farbach, Karline Rose
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Abstract
Temperament research has grown exponentially over the past decades. Diverse though the body
of temperament research may be, due to the interest of many fields of study in this construct, fairly
considerable areas of consensus in the understanding of temperament as a psychological
construct has been achieved over the years. In other words, there is general agreement in the field
that the notion that temperament is biological and genetic and that temperament plays a role in
developmental contexts.
A review of recent temperament research (from 1998 to 2005) was done for this study. An
automated search of many databases was conducted, as well as a hand search of well-accredited
journals, mostly from the disciplines of developmental psychology and education. Based on
selected criteria, 102 studies were chosen for review.
The findings of this study, based on an analysis of the selected studies, follow. For example, it
was found that the large majority of the studies selected were methodologically sound. It was also
noted that the various themes elicited from the analysis tended to follow the trends temperament
research was following before 1998, at the beginning of this review. Evidence was also found that
suggested there was a shift from using psychomedical frameworks towards constructivist,
ecosystemic frameworks for underpinning temperament research, which suggests that
contemporary temperament research is more likely to be studied from a developmental stance than
it was a few years ago. The findings from this analysis were applied to issues in temperament
research and practice in the context of developmental psychology and education.
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Keywords
temperament, psychology, development, literature review, education