Dear ISSBD Member,

Welcome to new and old members! I write to you as the new ISSBD President for the period of 2022–2026. It is with deep gratitude and appreciation that I assume this position, and I wish to thank you wholeheartedly for your trust in me and your dedication to the ISSBD.
In this letter, it is my intention to share my vision and priorities as ISSBD President for the next four years. I welcome your feedback on anything that matters to you. I am planning to write regular presidential newsletters that will be posted on our new website, and I invite you to comment on them. To do so, please sign up for my global office hours, join one of our global townhalls, or email me at tina.malti@utoronto.ca. I will make sure to answer.

Historically, the ISSBD has been committed to supporting research that facilitates a deepened understanding and improvement of positive human development across the lifespan in diverse contexts around the world. Although we currently live in a world that is vulnerable to factors that threaten positive developmental outcomes (e.g., war, famine, social injustice, climate change), a shared sense of humanity, emotional bonding, and deep interpersonal respect remains possible. It is this push-and-pull between positive and negative intrapersonal, interpersonal, intra-cultural, and inter-cultural factors that makes the study of lifespan development both a challenge and a worthwhile joy. It is my belief that a global developmental science can make substantive contributions to reinventing the meaning of the human journey in a new, shared world. We are well equipped as a science and as a scientific society to generate new answers to the timeless and universally relevant question of how we become human. To be clear, this question is fundamental, enduring, and nontrivial. It involves a deep, multifaceted analysis of how we can become the best versions of ourselves, and how to nurture this process in optimal and sustainable ways. This is foundational for a multidisciplinary, global developmental science to contribute to the preservation and enhancement of humankind.

Uniting Developmental Scientists in a Science that Cares

As developmental scientists and practitioners, we can make substantial contributions to humankind through a science that cares. A science that cares genuinely reflects the African philosophy of “Ubuntu”, or the notion that one cannot exist as a human without others. The construct speaks to the significance of human interconnectedness, of living in harmony with others, and of a universal, global citizenship. For ISBBD, this construct unites our membership and urges developmental scientists to work collaboratively through research reflecting multiple disciplines, perspectives, and regions.

Inclusivity matters in a science that cares: Our organization is rich in diversity of disciplines, perspectives, and members. This diversity creates a unique opportunity to provide an inclusive framework for the study and enhancement of human development. Inclusivity is also a personal matter for me. My father, an immigrant from Palestine to Germany, taught me acceptance of others despite their differences. This genuinely empathic outlook has helped me become more aware of similarities between myself and others, and to find a common good. Similarly, we as an organization can contribute to a global agenda of peacefulness and collaboration through a developmental science that reflects reverence for all others.

It is my hope that our multidisciplinary, collaborative, diverse, and global network of developmentalists can contribute to a caring science. The ISSBD committees and I will work closely together to implement this vision through our strategic planning process, and I invite you to join one of our town halls to provide feedback on this process. I am passionate to implement this vision through three substantive priorities: People, places, and practices.

Nurturing People

The first priority for ISSBD is to nurture people. I would like to ensure that all of our members receive the support they need to flourish. This includes the provision of funding, training, and networking opportunities. It is especially important for our society to listen carefully to voices that have not been heard, to observe perspectives that have remained invisible, and to allow ourselves to be touched by realities that have appeared distant. For example, we will focus closely on nurturing the careers of young developmental scientists and majority world researchers. Consequently, the ISSBD will continue to offer the ISSBD Early Career Fellow Program and the ISSBD Developing Country Fellowship Program. It is also my intention to help create new opportunities for our members to encourage a global developmental science. For example, there will be new opportunities for early career scholars to conduct collaborative research, as well as opportunities for all members to translate research-based information into practice and policy recommendations. I intend for these new initiatives and incentives to bring members from different countries and disciplines together through exciting collaborative research projects. I invite you to visit our new ISSBD website for more information on such initiatives.

Nurturing Places

The second priority for ISSBD is to nurture places. I aim for this to be accomplished through the implementation of developmental research, training, and networking opportunities across diverse regions of the world. Since 1969, we have hosted biennial meetings around the world, and we will continue this tradition. Our Regional Representatives (now in over 30 countries) will promote active local engagement by hosting interdisciplinary workshops with the aim of making real impacts in regional communities. ISSBD will extend these activities by creating synergies between regional activities and our global organization through networking events and social media connections. For example, we will regularly host webinars and virtual meetings to build, grow, and maintain a thriving global community of developmental scientists. I invite you to approach me with ideas for local, regional, and virtual meeting activities.

Nurturing Practices

The third priority for ISSBD is to nurture practices. We are committed to advancing developmental science and its caring application and translation into global policy. Our research has generated rich knowledge on cognitive, emotional, biological, and behavioural human capacities, age-related change, and mechanisms of growth. We increasingly understand commonality and specificity in human developmental processes. It is now our responsibility to apply this knowledge through practices and to use it to inform global policy. The ISSBD will facilitate these processes. We will encourage connections with local researchers and communities through our regional representatives, and we will help build and optimize capacity through training opportunities, mentorship, and the creation of research–practice partnerships. We will also engage in the translation of developmental science into global policy so that the leading developmental research of our members is equally accessible to leaders and families in need around the world. To facilitate these goals, I intend to create two new committees. The first will build on our tradition of enhancing human capacity, both globally and particularly in the majority world. The second committee will develop an agenda to facilitate our connections to international policy organizations with shared mandates (e.g., UNESCO, UNICEF). It is my hope that we can find new ways for our developmental scientists to make real-world impacts through connections to practice and global policy. Again, I invite you to share any ideas you may have.

How to Make It Happen

How can we, as a research society, make a sustainable impact? The three substantive priorities of people, places, and practices reflects a collective commitment to a global developmental science that cares about humankind and that translates this care into action.
I will work with all my capacity to find and offer resources to support you, your wonderful research, and its translation into practice and policy. I hope many of you choose to join me in reinventing us as we move forward. As individuals and as an organization, I think that we can remain strong, hopeful, and able to care for others and the natural world through our developmental science if we remember that there are always people, places, and practices that care for and nurture us throughout life. It is my goal that being part of the ISSBD brings you closer to this realization.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once said, “Seize this very moment! What you can do or think you can do, begin it.” Why not begin in-place together through working collaboratively with the members and committees of the ISSBD?

Warmest wishes,

Schedule coming soon