ap psych c11--developmental psychology

developmental psychology research methods

• cross sectional research uses participants of different ages to compare how things change over lifespan

  • limitation: different cultural norms for each generation

• longitudinal research: tracking one group of participants over time as they grow up

prenatal influences

• genetics

• teratogens: harmful chemicals or agents that pass through the placenta, like alcohol, cocaine, and heroin

reflexes babies have

• rooting: when touched on the cheek, a baby will turn and try to put that object into their mouth

• sucking: sucking on objects placed in mouth

• grasping: babies try to grasp objects if they are put on their feet or hands

• moro: babies will fling their limbs out and quickly retract them when scared

• Babinski: a baby will spread his toes when his foot is stroked

newborns senses

• babies can hear even before birth and have very poor vision when they are born, shown during visual cliff experiments

• our motor skills differ from person to person, but all people develop them (unless they have developmental difficulties)

  • we all have gross motor skills like walking, moving, climbing, etc.

gender and development in babies: biopsychological theory VS social-cognitive theory

• biopsychological theory looks at the “nature” or differences between boys and girls. one is that female brains have larger corpus callosums and therefore have different communication and coordination than males

• social-cognitive theory looks at how society influences what gender is and how different genders should act

an intro to stage theories

• some people think that our psychological development is discontinuous (grows more during some periods etc.)

  • zone of proximal development states that a child’s zone of proximal development is the range of tasks they can do without help and the ones they need help with

• stage theories are discontinuous theories of development

8 stages of erik erikson’s sychosocial stage theory

• trust vs. mistrust: trusting the world around them because they are being taken care of

• autonomy vs. shame and doubt: having self-control and controlling emotional reactions

• initiative vs. guilt: being curious and asking questions vs. being shut down

• industry vs. inferiority: being as good as our classmates in our first school setting vs. not

• identity vs. role confusion: adolescents need to find an identity and social group that works for them so they don’t have an identity crisis later on

• intimacy vs. isolation: work-relationship balance

• generativity vs. stagnation: looking at our life path and seizing control as we grow up

• integrity vs. despair: looking back on our accomplishments or feeling regret when we are old

imaginary audience

• thinking everyone is watching you when they really aren’t

an intro to the cognitive development (jean p.) model

• jean piaget realized in his theory of cognitive development that children view the world through schemata (cognitive rules we use to interpret the world) and incorporate experiences into existing schemata through assimilation

• we then go through the cycle of schemata creation, assimilation, and accommodation as we develop

• ex: i see lizards at the zoo my whole life. i then think that lizards are animals that only belong at a zoo. then one of my friends tells me she has a pet lizard (accommodation)

four stages to the model (sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational

sensorimotor stage

• sensorimotor stage (birth—two): babies start developing schemata through senses, create object permanence (objects exist even when out of babies’ frame of sight)

preoperational stage

• preoperational stage (two—seven): children start using mental symbols to represent real world objects, creating their ability to use language. children are egocentric because they cannot see another perspective to things. children may be able to imagine what others are thinking (pretend play, called the theory of mind as well)

concrete operational stage

• concrete operational stage (eight—twelve): start developing concepts of conservation, the realization that properties of objects remain the same even when their shapes change

concepts of conservation—volume

concepts of conservation—area

concepts of conservation—number

formal operational stage

• formal operational stage (twelve—adulthood):

  • ability for abstract reasoning (being able to come up with solutions without having real-world examples)

  • a way to test this ^^ is through hypothetical thinking. a child cannot answer the question “what would you look like if there was no light on your planet” and stuff like that

  • develop metacognition, or thinking about how we think, which forms a personal fable (we are unique from everyone else)

phonemes

• phonemes are smallest units in language —> create morphemes, which are small units of meaningful sounds—> form words that are spoken in a particular syntax (order) —> combination of words in phrases and sentences is semantics → meaning

how to we acquire language

• babies have babbling stage where they experiment with phonemes, meaning they can basically produce any phoneme from any language

• babies began the holophrastic, or one-word stage, then progress to the two word stage (telegraphic speech)

  • syntax is absent and sometimes children misapply grammar rules, which is called overgeneralization or overregularization

• children can rapidly learn language as children because they are born with the ability to learn it, and there is a critical period for when we can develop language in this way

attachment theory

• focused on attachment parenting (relationship b/t caregiver and child and how it affects development). two parts

  • contact comfort—we need contact with caregivers to feel safe and nurtured, it can affect our temperament, or the way we handle emotions

  • secure attachment aspect studied different babies and how they reacted to new situations based on their attachment levels

    • secure attachment infants: explored new situation confidently, got sad when parents left and came to them when they returned

    • avoidant attachment infants: did not care when parents left, explored, and did not come to them when they returned

    • anxious/ambivalent/resistant/insecure attachments: showed separation anxiety but did not go to parents

ecological systems theory (pg 103)

5 interrelated systems influence our development:

-microsystem: direct interactions b/t child and surroundings

-mesosystem: our microsystems are not isolated (parents and children talk, but so do children and teachers, and so do parents and teachers and children)

-exosystem: indirect influences on the child’s development

-macrosystem: influences of the cultures a child is immersed in will influence development

-chronosystem: times of transition or change that occur over the chronology or timeline of a child’s life (ex: puberty)

different parenting styles

• authoritarian: strict standards, strict punishments, not much explanation for punishment

• permissive: unclear guidelines, meaning sometimes strict and sometimes not

• authoritative: rationale of rules is discussed, praise offered, strict but in a good way (most effective style)