The Relation Between Environment and Psychological Development: Unpacking Vygotsky’s Influential Concept of Perezhivanie

<p>In recent decades, Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory (VST) has become particularly influential in the fields of education and educational psychology. <em>Perezhivanie</em> is an important concept in VST that stipulates a relative influence of environment on a person’s psychological development depending on their age or stage of development. However, <em>perezhivanie</em> has been differentially interpreted and applied in previous literature to suit the purposes of domain-specific research. The lack of a comprehensive theoretical understanding of the concept can undermine research findings and their implications for educational practices. Drawing on a content analysis of Vygotsky’s key texts on <em>perezhivanie</em>, this paper provides a much-needed theoretical discussion that unpacks comprehensively the theoretical content of perezhivanie and the methodological principles guiding its application. The findings revealed that conceptually, <em>perezhivanie</em> can be defined as: (a) a theoretical relation between an individual and their environment, (b) an abstract experience of or attitude towards a life situation and (c) a concrete lived experience of an event within that situation. Four major discernible components of an individual’s <em>perezhivanie</em> include the environmental factor, personal characteristics mobilised, refraction prism and psychological influences. Five key methodological principles were conceived to assist the employment of <em>perezhivanie</em> in educational/psychological research: (1) utilising a <em>perezhivanie</em> as a unit of analysis, (2) analysing <em>perezhivanie</em> at different levels, (3) accounting for the perspective of the individual involved, (4) constructing the refraction prism and (5) determining the major personal characteristics mobilised in the <em>perezhivanie</em>. Implications for educational and research practices are then discussed.</p>