Pattern Emergence and Pattern Transition in Microdevelopmental Variation: Evidence of Complex Dynamics of Developmental Processes

Abstract: An important but challenging task is to understand microdevelopmental varia-tions in learning and developmental processes—how patterns of performance change over short time periods with growing skill and knowledge or with failure to learn. This study analyzed microdevelopmental variations in learning a basic computing skill. Based on 119 microdevelopmental episodes of 30 students learning a computer program in four sessions over one semester, we used both microdevelopmental trajectories for describing each in-dividual’s variations in performance and a dynamic systems approach for interpreting pat-tern emergence and pattern transition of these variations. The results of the study suggest that each individual’s variations of microdevelopment are pervasive and complex, show-ing three basic patterns of microdevelopmental variation—unstable, fluctuating, and sta-ble—and four basic trends in change of microdevelopment variation—disorganization, re-gression, improvement, and stabilization. These basic patterns and trends provide a dynamic picture of developmental processes as pattern emergence and pattern transition in variation rather than as a ladder-like linear progression