PSYC 2235 Chapter 10 (Middle Childhood)

Psychoanalytical theories

Freud: Latency Stage; libido repressed to focus on friendship and social skills

Erikson: industry vs. inferiority; children develop a sense of their own competence (or lack thereof) through success or failure at school and/or other culturally valued activities

- At this stage it is usually the first time they are engaging in activities with peers where they are being evaluated

Trait

A stable pattern of responding to situations (Ex. this person and this type, this person is shy, this person is outgoing)

- Personality traits seem to be fairly stable at this point

- Traits contribute to feelings of competence

Ex. Extroverted may feel more competent in social situations

The big five

A set of five major dimensions of personality, including extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness (vs. irresponsibility), neuroticism (vs. stability, negative emotionality and anxiety) and openness/intellect (conventionality)

- OCEAN

Social-cognitive perspectives

- Bandura suggests that our emotions, traits, and cognitive factors combined constitute the personal component

- Personal, behavioural, and environmental as all influencing one another — reciprocal determinism

- Actions can influence your traits and thoughts

- Might combine and influence our perceptions of our competence, our self-efficacy

Self-concept

All our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, "Who am I?"

- Now expanding to include the psychological self and the valued self

Psychological Self

A person's understanding of their enduring psychological characteristics

- Starting around 6 years old and continuing to grow

- Understanding their own traits

Personality Traits

- By age 6, children can use simple trait descriptors such as "smart" and "nice"

- By 10, they use comparisons, such as "I'm smarter than most kids in my class" or "I'm not as nice as Mike" (Usually use the second version more often, faster than comparing themselves to the group)

- Bias in types of descriptors offered shifts from surface traits to psychological traits during middle childhood (not who they actually are)

Self-efficacy

An individual's belief in his or her capacity to cause an intended event to occur

Develops in part through:

- Social comparison and peer observation (If there's a peer who is similar to you doing something you don't, you'll still think you can do it)

- Encouragement from knowledgeable people that children value and respect

- Real life experiences of success and failure (Biggest influence)

The Valued Self

The extent to which children value themselves isn't necessarily dependent on an accurate view of personality traits or on self-efficacy

Self-esteem

A global evaluation of one's own worth

- First develops at around age 7 or 8 (Prior they think everyone is awesome)

- Fairly stable in short term but less so in long term

Global self-esteem develops at about the same time children's evaluations of their own abilities start becoming more differentiated

- Academics, athletic, appearance (affects the most, how they see themselves and how parents or others see them), social acceptance, friendships, romantic appeal, relationships with parents

- Dividing what stuff they are good at and what they are bad at

Self-esteem is influenced by

- Comparison of self to others (if other people are also bad at something)

- How much a child values various traits (and how well they matches up with the child's strong vs. weak points, if stuff you are good at and it matches what you value, if they match up then they'll have a higher self-esteem)

- Support from valued people in one's life

Cultural influences on self-esteem

- In individualistic cultures, parents help children develop a sense of self-esteem based on the child's own interests and abilities (What makes that child special)

- In collectivist cultures, children are taught to value themselves based on cultural ideals about what a "good" person is (if they adhere to social settings well)

Spiritual self

Spirituality can be conceptualized as a dimension of health measured by the strength of one's connections across four dimensions

Connections to:

- Self

- Others

- Nature

- The transcendent

Among young people, connection to self is often held as the most important dimension (cultivating a sense of meaning, purpose and joy)

Connection to the transcendent is often considered the least important (Belief in a higher power can help children)

Feeling like there's a higher power looking after them can:

- Create positive feelings in a child

- Help them make decisions and cope with adversity

- Make them grateful for the good things in their lives (Associated with morality, empathy, prosocial behaviour and well being)

The child as Psychologist

Children's descriptions of other people shift from surface to psychological as their self-descriptions do (Surface traits originally then using fewer and change to behaviour)

1. Use of behavioural comparisons in describing others increases slightly from age 6 to 8, then decreases ("Suzy shares her snacks")

2. Use of psychological constructs shows a sharp increase at about age 7, and continues to increase throughout middle childhood ("Suzy is generous")

Moral Reasoning

The process of making judgements about the rightness or wrongness of specific acts

- Moving from being self-centred to considering others' perspective and social rules

Moral Realism Stage

The first of Piaget's stages of moral development, in which children believe rules are inflexible (imminent justice)

- Until age of 8

- Once it is set it is set

- Believing you will get punished for something bad (Like Karma)

Moral Relativism Stage

The second of Piaget's stages of moral development, in which children understand that many rules can be changed through social agreement (Playing a game and everyone wants to change it)

- Understand that punishment for a rule violation depends on getting caught

- Understand the relationship between punishment and intentions (People with bad intentions will get harsher punishments)

- Noticing if unfair things happen to them but not for others