Which theorist is associated with ecological systems theory?

• A. Darwin
• B. Kohlberg
• C. Gottlieb
• D. Bronfenbrenner

Answer: (D)

Ecological systems theory explains how a child’s development is shaped by multiple, interacting environmental layers—from immediate relationships to broad cultural context—over time. Urie Bronfenbrenner is the scholar who formulated this model, outlining concentric systems such as the immediate microsystem (family, peers), the connections between those relationships in the mesosystem, the broader exosystem (settings that affect the child indirectly), the macrosystem (cultural values and laws), and the chronosystem (changes over time). This framework helps counselors consider how school, family, neighborhood, and policy context all influence a student’s development and behavior.

Darwin is known for evolution by natural selection, Kohlberg for stages of moral development, and Gottlieb contributes to a developmental systems perspective but not the canonical ecological systems framework Bronfenbrenner established.