Based on postmodern and critical theories, this article presents an alternative framework–-the Transformational Integrative Multidimensional Evolutionary (TIME) model–-to understand human behavior and development. It acknowledges that while people may have common needs and life tasks, their definition of these tasks and their ability to accomplish them varies at different phases of their lives due to cultural, religious, historical, and structural factors. This framework neither rejects nor replaces existing theories as they are taught in social work curricula. Instead, it revises often unchallenged certainties about the life cycle, including the notion that development occurs only within certain stages and specific “normal” patterns, and corrects the tendency to categorize human behavior and isolate it from its sociocultural and historical context.
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