UNIT 3

schema

a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information.

assimilation

interpreting our new experiences in terms of our existing schemas.

accommodation (in developmental psychology)

in developmental psychology, adapting our current schemas (understandings) to incorporate new information.

sensorimotor stage

in Piaget’s theory, the stage (from birth to nearly 2 years of age) at which infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions and motor activities.

object permanence

the awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived.

preoperational stage

in Piaget’s theory, the stage (from about 2 to 6 or 7 years of age) at which a child learns to use language but does not yet comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic.

conservation

the principle (which Piaget believed to be a part of concrete operational reasoning) that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects.

egocentrism

in Piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s difficulty taking another’s point of view.

concrete operational stage

in Piaget’s theory, the stage of cognitive development (from about 7 to 11 years of age) at which children can perform the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete (actual, physical) events.

formal operational stage

in Piaget’s theory, the stage of cognitive development (normally beginning about age 12) at which people begin to think logically about abstract concepts.

scaffold

in Vygotsky’s theory, a framework that offers children temporary support as they develop higher levels of thinking.

theory of mind

people’s ideas about their own and others’ mental states — about their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behaviors these might predict.

language

our agreed-upon systems of spoken, written, or signed words, and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning.

phoneme

in a language, the smallest distinctive sound unit.

morpheme

in a language, the smallest unit that carries meaning; may be a word or a part of a word (such as a prefix).

grammar

in a language, a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others. Semantics is the language’s set of rules for deriving meaning from sounds, and syntax is its set of rules for combining words into grammatically sensible sentences.

universal grammar (UG)

humans’ innate predisposition to understand the principles and rules that govern grammar in all languages.

babbling stage

the stage in speech development, beginning around 4 months, during which an infant spontaneously utters various sounds that are not all related to the household language.

one-word stage

the stage in speech development, from about age 1 to 2, during which a child speaks mostly in single words.

two-word stage

the stage in speech development, beginning about age 2, during which a child speaks mostly in two-word sentences.

telegraphic speech

the early speech stage in which a child speaks like a telegram —“go car”— using mostly nouns and verbs.

aphasia

impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere damage either to Broca’s area (impairing speaking) or to Wernicke’s area (impairing understanding).

Broca’s area

a frontal lobe brain area, usually in the left hemisphere, that helps control language expression by directing the muscle movements involved in speech.

Wernicke’s area

a brain area, usually in the left temporal lobe, involved in language comprehension and expression.

linguistic determinism

Whorf’s hypothesis that language determines the way we think.

linguistic relativism

the idea that language influences the way we think.

ecological systems theory

a theory of the social environment’s influence on human development, using five nested systems (microsystem; mesosystem; exosystem; macrosystem; chronosystem) ranging from direct to indirect influences.

stranger anxiety

the fear of strangers that infants commonly display, beginning by about 8 months of age.

attachment

an emotional tie with others; shown in young children by their seeking closeness to caregivers and showing distress on separation.

imprinting

the process by which certain animals form strong attachments during early life.

strange situation

a procedure for studying child-caregiver attachment; a child is placed in an unfamiliar environment while their caregiver leaves and then returns, and the child’s reactions are observed.

secure attachment

demonstrated by infants who comfortably explore environments in the presence of their caregiver, show only temporary distress when the caregiver leaves, and find comfort in the caregiver’s return.

insecure attachment

demonstrated by infants who display a clinging, anxious attachment; an avoidant attachment that resists closeness; or a disorganized attachment with no consistent behavior when separated from or reunited with caregivers.

temperament

a person’s characteristic emotional reactivity and intensity.

basic trust

according to Erik Erikson, a sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy; said to be formed during infancy by appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers.

self-concept

all our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, “Who am I?”

identity

our sense of self; according to Erikson, the adolescent’s task is to solidify a sense of self by testing and integrating various roles.

social identity

the “we” aspect of our self-concept; the part of our answer to “Who am I?” that comes from our group memberships.

intimacy

in Erikson’s theory, the ability to form close, loving relationships; a primary developmental task in young adulthood.

emerging adulthood

a period from about age 18 to the mid-twenties, when many persons in prosperous Western cultures are no longer adolescents but have not yet achieved full independence as adults.

social clock

the culturally preferred timing of social events such as marriage, parenthood, and retirement.