Annotated Reading Guide

This guide offers further reading on the questions explored in About Development. Begin with the selection under Start Here, or turn to Going Further for more detailed recommendations. Each reading retains its own References.

Start Here

Choose a topic that interests you; this selection is not a required reading sequence.

Understanding Development

Gottlieb, G. (2007). Probabilistic epigenesis. Developmental Science, 10(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2007.00556.x

How do genes, neural activity, behavior, and environmental conditions contribute to development? This scholarly introduction to probabilistic epigenesis explains why their reciprocal relations matter.

Minelli, A. (2011). Animal development, an open-ended segment of life. Biological Theory, 6, 4–15. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-011-0002-6

Where does development begin and end? This conceptual article places animal development within the wider life cycle and questions some familiar boundaries.

How Living Form Arises

Dolnick, E. (2017). The seeds of life: From Aristotle to da Vinci, from sharks’ teeth to frogs’ pants, the long and strange quest to discover where babies come from. Basic Books.

An accessible popular history of attempts to explain conception. Read it for the historical disputes over eggs, sperm, and whether the organism is already formed at the beginning.

Ainsworth, T. Form vs. matter. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/

A philosophical reference entry on form and matter. A more demanding route into the question of what it means to explain the organization of a living thing.

Newman, S. A., Forgacs, G., & Müller, G. B. (2006). Before programs: The physical origination of multicellular forms. International Journal of Developmental Biology, 50(2–3), 289–299. https://doi.org/10.1387/ijdb.052049sn

How can physical processes contribute to the production of living form? This technical review considers the emergence of multicellular forms before elaborate developmental regulation.

Genes, Developmental Systems, and Evolution

Keller, E. F. (2014). From gene action to reactive genomes. The Journal of Physiology, 592(11), 2423–2429. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2014.270991

A scholarly discussion of what changes when genomes are understood as responsive to cellular conditions. Useful for reconsidering the familiar language of genes acting on development.

Griffiths, P. E., & Hochman, A. (2015). Developmental systems theory. In eLS (pp. 1–7). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470015902.a0003452.pub2

A concise introduction to developmental systems theory and the interdependence of developmental resources. A starting point for the fuller discussions by Oyama below.

Carroll, S. B. (2005). Endless forms most beautiful: The new science of evo devo and the making of the animal kingdom. W. W. Norton & Company. https://wwnorton.com/books/Endless-Forms-Most-Beautiful/

An accessible book introducing evolutionary developmental biology. Read it for the conserved developmental toolkit and its relation to the diversity of animal forms.

Bodies and Brains

Shubin, N. (2008). Your inner fish: A journey into the 3.5-billion-year history of the human body. Pantheon Books.

An accessible book tracing the evolutionary history of the human body. It provides anatomical background for thinking about brains as parts of living bodies with long histories.

Jernigan, T. L., & Stiles, J. (2017). Construction of the human forebrain. WIREs Cognitive Science, 8(1–2), e1409. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcs.1409

A scholarly review of human forebrain development. Read it to follow how brain organization is constructed over development.

Makin, T. R., & Krakauer, J. W. (2023). Against cortical reorganisation. eLife, 12, e84716. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.84716

What does evidence of a changing brain map establish? This critical review examines claims about cortical reorganization and the limits of those interpretations.

Looking Ahead

Marshall, P. J. (2026). Psychology in 2125: A developmental science of living sense-making. Perspectives on Psychological Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916261477319

An essay extending the book’s developmental perspective to the future of psychology, asking what follows when living sense-making becomes central to the discipline.

Going Further

The following recommendations are organized by chapter. The notes explain how each work connects to the chapter’s questions.

1.1 Development: A Wider View

Gottlieb, G. (2007). Probabilistic epigenesis. Developmental Science, 10(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2007.00556.x

How do genes, neural activity, behavior, and environmental conditions contribute to development? Gottlieb’s account of probabilistic epigenesis examines their reciprocal relations. A useful scholarly starting point for the developmental approach taken throughout this book.

Karmiloff-Smith, A. (1998). Development itself is the key to understanding developmental disorders. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 2(10), 389–398. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1364-6613(98)01230-3

Uses developmental disorders to show why an explanation needs to follow how capacities develop, rather than treating the mature outcome as the starting point.

Witherington, D. C., & Boom, J. (2019). Conceptualizing the dynamics of development in the 21st century: Process, (inter)action, and complexity. Human Development, 63(3–4), 147–152. https://doi.org/10.1159/000504097

A brief conceptual introduction to process, interaction, and complexity. Useful for thinking about what an explanation must account for when new forms of organization emerge.

1.2 The Big Picture of Development

Marshall, P. J. (2014). Beyond different levels: Embodiment and the developmental system. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 929. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00929

A discussion of why different kinds of explanation should not be seen as separate levels, and of how organization and process are related in a developmental system.

1.3 Life Cycles and the Direction of Development

Minelli, A. (2011). Animal development, an open-ended segment of life. Biological Theory, 6, 4–15. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-011-0002-6

Examines development within the wider life cycle and questions where its beginning and end should be placed.

Overton, W. F. (2010). Life-span development: Concepts and issues. In W. F. Overton (Ed.), The handbook of life-span development: Volume 1. Cognition, biology, and methods (pp. 1–29). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470880166.hlsd001001

A substantial theoretical chapter on what counts as developmental change and how it can be explained across the life span. A more demanding next step for readers interested in the conceptual framework behind the discussion.

1.4 The Origins of Multicellular Development

Marshall, P. J., Houser, T. M., & Weiss, S. M. (2021). The shared origins of embodiment and development. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, 15, 726403. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnsys.2021.726403

Connects the origins of multicellular development with embodiment, bringing together two questions often treated separately.

How could multicellular forms arise before the evolution of elaborate developmental regulation? This technical review examines how physical properties and processes can contribute to the production of form. Read it alongside the examples in the chapter.

2.1 Made or Given?

Dolnick, E. (2017). The seeds of life: From Aristotle to da Vinci, from sharks’ teeth to frogs’ pants, the long and strange quest to discover where babies come from. Basic Books.

An accessible popular history of attempts to understand conception, including the disputes over eggs, sperm, and preformation. A good starting point for readers who want the historical story behind the chapter.

2.2 The Riddle of Form and Matter

Ainsworth, T. Form vs. matter. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/

A philosophical reference entry on hylomorphism: the view that things are understood in terms of form and matter. Use it to pursue the conceptual questions raised in the chapter; its detailed treatment goes beyond an introductory overview.

Lennox, J. G. Aristotle’s biology. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-biology/

Places form, function, and explanation within Aristotle’s study of living things. Useful for readers who want to understand how the form–matter question connects with his biological investigations.

2.3 DNA as a Developmental Resource

Keller, E. F. (2014). From gene action to reactive genomes. The Journal of Physiology, 592(11), 2423–2429. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2014.270991

Reconsiders the language of gene action and what changes when genomes are understood through their responsiveness to cellular conditions.

Pigliucci, M. (2010). Genotype–phenotype mapping and the end of the “genes as blueprint” metaphor. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 365(1540), 557–566. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2009.0241

A discussion of why the blueprint metaphor breaks down when genotype–phenotype relations are understood as developmental processes.

2.4 Developmental Systems Theory

Griffiths, P. E., & Hochman, A. (2015). Developmental systems theory. In eLS (pp. 1–7). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470015902.a0003452.pub2

A concise scholarly overview of developmental systems theory: what counts as a developmental resource, how resources depend on one another, and what is inherited across generations. Start here before moving to Oyama’s longer treatment.

Oyama, S. (2000). The ontogeny of information: Developmental systems and evolution (2nd ed.). Duke University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822380665

A sustained examination of the assumption that developmental information is already present in genes or environments. This demanding theoretical book develops the argument in much greater depth than the chapter or the overview by Griffiths and Hochman.

Greenberg, G. (2016). Zing-Yang Kuo (Part 1). The Behavioral Neuroscientist and Comparative Psychologist. https://www.apadivisions.org/division-6/publications/newsletters/neuroscientist/2016/12/kuo-part-1

A concise account of Kuo’s challenge to instinct explanations, including the cat-and-rat experiments and their developmental implications.

2.5 Evolution and Development

Laland, K. N., Uller, T., Feldman, M. W., Sterelny, K., Müller, G. B., Moczek, A., Jablonka, E., Odling-Smee, J., Wray, G. A., Hoekstra, H. E., Futuyma, D. J., Lenski, R. E., Mackay, T. F. C., Schluter, D., & Strassmann, J. E. (2014). Does evolutionary theory need a rethink? Nature, 514, 161–164. https://doi.org/10.1038/514161a

A short exchange on whether developmental plasticity, niche construction, non-genetic inheritance, and related findings call for a substantial rethinking of evolutionary theory.

An accessible introduction to evolutionary developmental biology and the conserved developmental toolkit discussed in this reading.

3.1 The Evolution of Bodies and Brains

Shubin, N. (2008). Your inner fish: A journey into the 3.5-billion-year history of the human body. Pantheon Books.

An accessible book about the evolutionary history of the human body. Start here for the anatomical background to the chapter’s discussion of how bodies and nervous systems evolved together.

Arendt, D. (2021). Elementary nervous systems. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 376(1821), 20200347. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2020.0347

Examines elementary nervous systems, providing a starting point for thinking about neural evolution within living bodies.

Liebeskind, B. J., Hillis, D. M., & Zakon, H. H. (2011). Evolution of sodium channels predates the origin of nervous systems in animals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108(22), 9154–9159. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1106363108

Evidence that sodium channels preceded nervous systems. Useful for considering how neural functions draw on capacities with a longer evolutionary history.

3.2 Brain, Body, World

Jernigan, T. L., & Stiles, J. (2017). Construction of the human forebrain. WIREs Cognitive Science, 8(1–2), e1409. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcs.1409

A scholarly review of how the human forebrain develops. Useful for following the processes through which brain organization is constructed and for placing the chapter’s specific examples in a wider developmental context.

Ackman, J. B., Burbridge, T. J., & Crair, M. C. (2012). Retinal waves coordinate patterned activity throughout the developing visual system. Nature, 490, 219–225. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11529

A primary research paper on how patterned retinal activity coordinates activity across the developing visual system. Read it for a concrete investigation of the developmental activity discussed in the chapter.

Lumen Learning. (n.d.). Embryonic development. In Anatomy and Physiology II. https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-ap2/chapter/embryonic-development/

Background resource: an introductory textbook account of early embryonic development, useful for reviewing the anatomical sequence and terminology used in the chapter.

Radiopaedia. Brodmann areas. https://radiopaedia.org/articles/brodmann-areas

Background resource: a reference for locating and identifying Brodmann areas. Useful when following anatomical descriptions; the map itself does not explain how cortical organization develops.

3.3 Plasticity and Constraint

Mehring, C., Akselrod, M., Bashford, L., Mace, M., Choi, H., Blüher, M., Buschhoff, A.-S., Pistohl, T., Salomon, R., Cheah, A., Blanke, O., Serino, A., & Burdet, E. (2019). Augmented manipulation ability in humans with six-fingered hands. Nature Communications, 10, 2401. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-10306-w

The six-fingered-hand study discussed in the reading: a concrete case for considering bodily variation, skilled action, and brain organization together.

Makin, T. R., & Krakauer, J. W. (2023). Against cortical reorganisation. eLife, 12, e84716. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.84716

A critical examination of cortical reorganization claims. Read alongside the empirical studies to consider what changes in a brain map do and do not establish.

Coda: The View From Where We Are

Marshall, P. J. (2026). Psychology in 2125: A developmental science of living sense-making. Perspectives on Psychological Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916261477319

Extends the book’s argument to psychology as a discipline. Read it to consider how taking development, embodiment, and living sense-making seriously could change psychology’s questions and explanations.

Oyama, S., Griffiths, P. E., & Gray, R. D. (Eds.). (2001). Cycles of contingency: Developmental systems and evolution. MIT Press.

A collection that extends developmental systems thinking across questions about development, inheritance, and evolution.