Chapter 6: Psychosocial Development during the First Three Years

Personality

The relatively consistent blend of

emotions, temperament, thought, and

behavior that makes a person unique.

psychosocial development

From infancy on, personality development is intertwined with social relationships; this combination

0-3

Infants are open to stimulation. They begin to show interest and curiosity, and they smile readily at people.

3-6

Infants can anticipate what is about to happen and experience disappointment when it does not. They show this by becoming angry or acting warily. They smile, coo, and laugh often. This is a time of social

awakening and early reciprocal exchanges between the baby and the caregiver.

6-9

Infants play social games and try to get responses from people. They talk to, touch, and cajole other babies to get them to respond. They express more differentiated emotions, showing joy, fear, anger, and surprise.

9-12

Infants are intensely preoccupied with their principal caregiver, may become afraid of strangers, and act subdued in new situations. By 1 year, they communicate emotions more clearly, showing moods,

ambivalence, and gradations of feeling.

12-18

Toddlers explore their environment, using the people they are most attached to as a secure base. As they master the environment, they become more confident and more eager to assert themselves.

18-36

Toddlers sometimes become anxious because they now realize how much they are separating from their caregivers. They work out their awareness of their limitations in fantasy and in play and by identifying

with adults.

emotions

Subjective reactions to experience that

are associated with physiological and

behavioral changes.

1 month

First Signs of Emotion: During the ________, babies cry when they are unhappy and

become quiet at the sound of a human voice or when they are picked up. They may

smile when their hands are moved together to play pat-a-cake

Crying

Newborns plainly show when they are unhappy. They let out piercing cries, flail

their arms and legs, and stiffen their bodies

is the earliest and most powerful way infants can communicate their needs.

Basic Hunger Cry

Angry Cry

Pain Cry

Frustration Cry

4 patterns of crying

Basic Hunger Cry

a rhythmic cry, which is not always associated with hunger

Angry Cry

a variation of the rhythmic

cry, in which excess air is forced through the vocal cords

Pain Cry

a sudden onset of loud crying without preliminary moaning, sometimes followed by holding the breath

Frustration Cry

two or three drawn-out cries, with no prolonged breath-holding

5 months

By ___________ of age, babies have learned to monitor their caregivers' expressions and if ignored will first cry harder in an attempt to get attention and then stop

crying if their attempt is unsuccessful

Smiling and Laughing

The earliest faint smiles occur spontaneously soon after birth, apparently as a result of subcortical nervous system activity. This frequently appear during periods of REM Sleep

Social smiling

Beginning in the 2nd month, newborn

infants gaze at their parents and smile

at them, signaling positive participation

in the relationship.

anticipatory laughing

anticipatory smiling Infant smiles at an object and then gazes at an adult while still smiling.

Self-conscious emotions

such as embarrassment, empathy, and envy, arise only after children have developed

Self-awareness

the cognitive understanding that they have a recognizable identity, separate and different from the rest of their world. This consciousness of self seems to emerge between 15 and 24 months.

Realization that one's existence and

functioning are separate from those of

other people and things.

Self-evaluative emotions

Emotions, such as pride, shame, and

guilt, that depend on both self-awareness

and knowledge of socially accepted

standards of behavior

Altruistic behavior

Activity intended to help another

person with no expectation of reward.

15-24 months

Embarrassment, envy empathy

2 1/2 to 3 years

Embarrassment, pride, shame, guilt

empathy

Ability to put oneself in another person's

place and feel what the other person

feels.

Mirror neurons

Neurons that fire when a person does

something or observes someone else

doing the same thing.

9 and 12 months of age

collaboration with caregivers in joint

activities, such as a child passing a pair of socks to her mother to help while getting

dressed in the morning. Collaborative activities increase during the 2nd year of life as toddlers become more adept at communication.

Temperament

Characteristic disposition or style of

approaching and reacting to situations

can be defined as an early-appearing, biologically based tendency to respond to the environment in predictable ways.

"easy" children

Children with a generally happy

temperament, regular biological

rhythms, and a readiness to accept

new experiences.

"difficult" children

Children with irritable temperament,

irregular biological rhythms, and intense

emotional responses.

"slow-to-warm-up" children

Children whose temperament is

generally mild but who are hesitant

about accepting new experiences.

goodness of fit

the match between a child's temperament and the environmental demands the child must cope with

Behavioral Inhibition

In longitudinal research with about 500 children starting in

infancy, Jerome Kagan and his colleagues studied an aspect of temperament

Gender

what it means to be male or female

gender-typing

Socialization process by which children,

at an early age, learn appropriate

gender roles.

basic sense of trust vs mistrust

Erikson (1950) argued that at each stage in the life span, we are faced with a challenge

and a complementary risk. As babies, our first challenge involves forming a

Attatchment

is a reciprocal, enduring emotional tie between an infant and a caregiver, each of whom contributes to the quality of the relationship.

Strange Situation

is a classic, laboratory-based technique designed to assess attachment patterns

between an infant and an adult

Laboratory technique used to study

infant attachment.

secure attachment

the most common category, into

which about 60 to 75 percent of low-risk North American babies fall

avoidant, ambivalent or resistant

two forms of anxious, or insecure, attachment:

secure attatchment

are flexible and resilient in the face

of stress. They sometimes cry when a caregiver leaves, but they quickly

obtain the comfort they need once the caregiver returns.

an infant is quickly and

effectively able to obtain comfort from

an attachment figure in the face of

distress.

avoidant attachment

Pattern in which an infant rarely cries

when separated from the primary

caregiver and avoids contact on his or

her return.

ambivalent (resistant) attatchment

Pattern in which an infant becomes anxious before the primary caregiver leaves, is extremely upset during his or her absence, and both seeks and resists contact on his or her return. generally anxious even before the caregiver leaves, sometimes approaching the caregiver for comfort when the stranger looks at or approaches them for interaction.

disorganized-disoriented attachment

pattern in which an infant, after

separation from the primary caregiver,

shows contradictory, repetitious, or

misdirected behaviors on his or her

return.

stranger anxiety

Wariness of strange people and places,

shown by some infants during the

second half of the 1st year.

separation anxiety

Distress shown by someone, typically

an infant, when a familiar caregiver

leaves.

Mutual Regulation

process by which infant and caregiver communicate emotional states to each other and respond appropriately

Mutual Regulation

Infants are communicating beings; they have a strong drive to interact with others.

The ability of both infant and caregiver to respond appropriately and sensitively to

each other's mental and emotional states is known as

Social referencing

When babies look at their caregivers on encountering an ambiguous event, they are

engaging in ______________, seeking emotional information to guide behavior. In social referencing, one person forms an understanding of how to act in an ambiguous, confusing, or unfamiliar situation by seeking and interpreting another person's perception of it.

self-concept

Sense of self; descriptive and

evaluative mental picture of one's

abilities and traits.

15 and 18 months

This early perceptual discrimination

may be the foundation of the conceptual self-awareness that

develops between ____and ____months

4 and 10 months

Between ___ and ___ months,

when infants learn to reach, grasp, and make things happen, they experience a sense of personal agency

self-coherence

the sense of being a physical whole with

boundaries separate from the rest of the world. These developments occur in interaction with caregivers in games such as peekaboo, in which the infant becomes increasingly aware of the difference between self and other

self-awareness

conscious knowledge of

the self as a distinct, identifiable being—builds on this dawning of perceptual distinction between self and otherself

autonomy versus shame and doubt

Erikson's second stage in psychosocial

development, in which children achieve

a balance between self-determination

and control by others.

Socialization

is the process by which children develop habits, skills, values, and motives

that make them responsible, productive members of society.

Development of habits, skills, values,

and motives shared by responsible,

productive members of a society.

Internalization

During socialization, process by which

children accept societal standards of

conduct as their own.

self-regulation

A child's independent control of

behavior to conform to understood

social expectations

conscience

Internal standards of behavior, which

usually control one's conduct and

produce emotional discomfort when

violated.

situational compliance

Kochanska's term for obedience of a

parent's orders only in the presence of

signs of ongoing parental control.

committed compliance

Kochanska's term for wholehearted

obedience of a parent's orders without

reminders or lapses.

receptive cooperation

Kochanska's term for eager willingness to cooperate harmoniously with a parent in daily interactions, including routines, chores, hygiene, and play. is a child's eager willingness to cooperate harmoniously with a parent, not only in disciplinary situations, but also in a variety of daily interactions, including routines, chores, hygiene, and play

structural characteristics

such as staff training and the ratio of children to caregivers

process characteristics

such as the warmth,

sensitivity, and responsiveness of caregivers and the developmental appropriateness of

activities. Structural quality and process quality may be related

physical abuse

Action taken deliberately to endanger

another person, involving potential

bodily injury

neglect

Failure to meet a dependent's basic

needs.

sexual abuse

Physically or psychologically harmful

sexual activity or any sexual activity

involving a child and an older person.

emotional maltreatment

Rejection, terrorization, isolation,

exploitation, degradation, ridicule, or

failure to provide emotional support,

love, and affection; or other action or

inaction that may cause behavioral,

cognitive, emotional, or mental

disorders.

non-organic failure to thrive

Slowed or arrested physical growth with

no known medical cause, accompanied

by poor developmental and emotional

functioning.

shaken baby syndrome

Form of maltreatment in which shaking

an infant or toddler can cause brain

damage, paralysis, or death.