PSYCH 3

Nature and nurture in development

Evolution

universal behavior, _____ has caused us all to become who we are

Behavior Genetics

Individual differences. These are the way we are different from each other

Nature

Genes

Nurture

the environment

What are the two old view of psychology

Nativist and Empiricist

Nativist Perspective

Human traits are primarily determined by genetics and not the environemtnal influence.

Empiricist Perspective

Human Come with blank canva and we get filled in by the environmental experience to become who we are.

Genotype

Specific genetic makeup any particular person have

Phenotype

Observable characteristics

Polygenic transmission

Most behavior are affected by thousands of genes pairs

Variation, heritable, quality affect survival and reproduction.

What are the three natural selection ingredients?

Proximate cause

“How it behave” Current biological mechanism and current environment affects the cause of the behavior.

Remote or functional cause.

Why is that human share this in common? Evolutionary functional behaviors.

Universality, early emergence, homologues, and design function fit.

What are the four evidence that we know that behavior is evolved?

Universality

Found in every known human culture

Homologues

in closely related species.

Early emergence

Appears in infancy before much learning

Design function fit

the behaviors features matches its proposed function

Convergence of evidence

How can we know that behavior is being evolved?

Evolutionary mismatch and capability

What are the two implication that evolution happened long time ago?

Evolutionary mismatch

An evolved tendency may have been adopted in the ancestral environment but have a poor fit with current environment

2nd implication of capability

A capability that evolved for one reason may now serve new purposes

Naturalistics Fallacy and Deterministic fallacy

Two fallacies to avoid

Naturalistic fallacy

moral. "this is just how human are.This is moral way of surviving.

Deterministic fallacy

Genes lead directly to behavior.

IQ, Personality traits, Attitude, and psychological disorders

Examples of individual differences

Behavioral genetics

Fields of research investigating contribution of both genes and environment to individual differences

Genes and environment

What does the parents provide

Heritability

The proportion of the variation in a traits across a population that is due to genetic variation

Differences among people

What does Heritability describes

Shared (of family-wide) and non-shared environmental factors

What are the two kinds of environmental influence

Shared (or family-wide) environmental factors

Experiences that make individuals within the same family more likely

Non-shared (or child specific) environmental factors

experiences that make individuals within the same family less alike

100%

How many genes are shared by monozygotic twins

50%

How many genes are shared by dizygotic twins

Evidence for some heritability of the outcome

If MZ twin pairs are more similar on some outcome than DZ twin pairs, what does it show?

Tellegen et. al.

A study about twin for DZ and MZ which lived together and some twins lived in a different household. What study is this?

Trait is partially heritable

If the MZ twins reared together and MZ twins reared apart are equally similar on personality traits then what does it say.

Apart and together MZ twins equally similar on personality traits.

What was the results for Tellegen study?

Observing the participants who got adopted, and see which parents are they similar to.

What are the method of adoption studies?

Heston (1966)

What reserach talked about whether schizophrenia is caused by genetics?

The rates of SZ in offspring of SZ mothers who raised their children resulted as probability of 10%.

What was the finding of Heston?

Group 1 had schizophrenia mother and Group 2 had non-schizophrenic mother.

What was the method of Heston?

Adult IQ, Personality traits, Psychological disorders, and attitude

What traits were metioned in the slides that were heritable?

GWAS and polygenic scores

How do we find the genes?

Polygenic scores

Add up tiny effects (genetic code differences, diet, and personality) and estimate the person’s genetic influence or likelihood of developing some health risks

Real but modest prediction

Is the polygenic scores real

GWAS

scan millions of DNA variants in samples of hundred of thousands of people to find the common genes that are commonly seen in a psychological disorders or a certain traits.

non-shared; shared

For personality and IQ, ________ environment has much greater influence than ________.

Religiousness, political attitude, criminal behavior, and depression

There are small shared environemtal effects on:

Evocative effect

We become kind to other at first, they respond with kindness, then you respond back with another kineness. Your first response that you’ve evoked is called what effect?

Selection effect

Environment we selected. You put yourself into another environment that aligns with genes.

Gene-environment correlations

People’s genetic background are associated with the environments they experience

Behavioral genetics

_____shape our personalities, IQ, attitudes, and likelihood of psychological disorders

Cognitive Development

The study of development of general skills like memory, reasoning, and problem solving

Stage model and domain general model

What are the models in piaget’s model

Stage model

A model from piaget that has a radical reordanization of thinking from one stage to next, followed by stability within

Confound

Third variable.

0.5-0.7

What are the heritability between Adult IQ?

0.4-0.5

What are the heritability between Personality traits?

schizophrenia, autism, and ADHD

What are the high heritable of psychological disorder (0.7 and up)?

anxiety, depression, antisocial, and personality disorders

What are the moderate level heritability of psychological disorder (0.3 to 0.5)?

0.3-0.4

What is the heritability of social attitudes and religiousness (after 20 yrs old)?

Nearly all traits are heritable

What does the heritability of all traits say? (adult IQ, personality traits, religiousness, and psychological disorders)

Polygenic scores

You as individual are scanned and they are comparing your scan with thousands of other general genes to estimate the person’s genetic propensity for a trait.

Non-shared environment

For personality and IQ, which environment has greater influence?

Religiousness, political attitude, criminal behavior, and depression

There are small shared environmental effects on which behaviors?

Gene-environment correlations

People’s genetic background are associated with environment they experience

Schema

Organized pattern of thoughts and action

Domain general model

Child is constructing logical tools and representational ability that apply to all domain of cognition. What is this mode.

Assimilation

New experience are incorated into existing knowledge (schema). Your new information follows the old information, so it fits into your schema. What is this cognitive change called?

Accommodation

When new information changes the existing knowledge (schemas)

They move to new stage

What is the importance of repeating accomodation and changing their underlying schemas in Piagets model

Constructivist

Children are biologically prepared to learn and they do so through the environment. Mashed thinking of both nativist and empiricist.

Sensorimotor stage

Ages 0-2 yrs with constant exploration through senses and motor behaviors. Thought and action are virtually identical. Profound egocentrism. Before langauges emerges, children can’t conceptualize or think abstractly about the world. They lack on object permanence. What is this stage called?

Object permanence

A concept that sensorimotor stage kids in Piaget model lacks. The belief that object exist even when they are out of view.

Preoperational stage

Piaget stage from 2-7 years old. Object permanence is firmly established. Symbolic thought develops (i.e. language, words, and images). They still can’t understand the other perspectives. They have centration and egocentrism.

Egocentrism

an inability to see a situation from another’s perspective.

Centration

Focus on one single perceptual feature (your perceptual feature) of an object without considering other relevant features.

Concrete operational stage

Piagets stage that are from 7-12 years old. They no longer have egocentric. They can perform reversible mental operation on representation of physical object. They also have operations and conservation.

Operations

Mental action that can be used to manipulate, transform, and then return an object to its original state.

Conservations

Basic properties of an object or situation remain stable even though superficial properties may be changed.

Formal operational stage

Have hypothetico-deductive reasoning, propositional thought, and able to apply operations to hypothetical and abstract ideas and situation. Usually 12+ years.

Conservation

What are the example that kids within the age of 7-12 struggled to understand that same amount of juice has been poured in the same cup?

Hypothetico-deductive reasoning (scientific thoughts)

Form hypotheses and prediction about situation, deduce testable inferences or conclusion about situation, and test multiple variable to see if inferences are confirmed.

Partially. The sequence of stages are replicates across culture. But no, because children are not at the same stage for all their skills. Change is often continuous rather than abrupt. Also, timing and endpoint vary across culture. Children can also grasp some of the concept that Piaget says they cannot do; such as, object permanence for 0-2 years old. piaget did not recognize that cognitive and brain development fcontinue across the lifespan.

At the end of the Piagets model, was he right?

3-5months

What are the youngest infants that shows awareness of object permanences by timing their duration of stare?

Subcortical reward circuits involving dopamine

What circuits mature rapidly in adolescnece

Underlies decision

making, risking behavior, and planning

20s

When does the prefrontal cortex continues developing well?

Infants are born with some existing capacities to understand the world and drive to learn much more. Environment provides input necessary for learning to take place.

Why is the cogtnitive development is the great example of nature and nurture?