PSYC 2332 Exam 1

biological perspective

development is determined primarily by biological forces.

Gesell's maturational theory - emphasizes development as a natural unfolding of a biological plan. discarded because it said nothing about impact of environment

ethological theory - emphasizes that children's and parent's behavior has adapted to meet specific environmental changes. example: clinging and crying = adaptive for infants, because they elicit caregiving from adults

critical period - time in development when a specific type of learning can take place; before or after the critical period, the same learning is difficult or even impossible. Ex of Lorenz's chicks imprinting on him and following him bc they imprint on a moving object within a day of hatching

The Psychodynamic Perspective

Freud created first psychodynamic theory, which holds that development is largely determined by how well people resolve conflicts they face at different ages.

Id

a reservoir of primitive instincts and drives

ego

the practical, rational component of personality

superego

the moral agent in a child's personality

Erikson's psychosocial theory (psychodynamic perspective)

Embraced Freud's idea of conflict, but he emphasized the psychological and social aspects of conflict rather than the biological & physical aspects

theory says that development consists of a sequence of stages, each defined by a unique crisis or challenges posed by the formation of trust, autonomy, initiative, industry, and identity

The Learning Perspective

endorses Locke's view that infant mind=blank slate. Watson=first theorist to apply this approach to child dev.

Skinner: operant conditioning, in which the consequences of a behavior determine whether a behavior is repeated

positive reinforcement

Increasing behaviors by presenting positive stimuli, such as food. A positive reinforcer is any stimulus that, when presented after a response, strengthens the response. (ex: chocolate, gold stars, or paychecks)

negative reinforcement

rewards people by taking away unpleasant things (clean your room and you won't have to do dishes later)

punishment

a consequence that decreases the future likelihood of the behavior that it follows. suppresses behavior by either adding something aversive or taking away something pleasant

observational learning or imitation

children learn much simply by watching those around them

Bandura's social cognitive theory (learning perspective)

(learning perspective) Bandura based his social cognitive theory on this more complex view of reward, punishment, and imitation. Bandura calls this theory cognitive because he believes that children are actively trying to understand what goes on in their world; the theory is "social" because, along with reinforcement and punishment, what other people do is an important source of info about the world.

self-efficacy

Bandura: argued that experience gives children a sense of self-efficacy, beliefs about their own abilities and talents

The Cognitive-Developmental Perspective

focuses on how children think and on how their thinking changes as they grow.

Piaget proposed best known of these theories

Piaget

argued that, as children try to comprehend their world, they act like scientists in creating theories that organize what they know about objects and people

stage: age characteristics

sensorimotor birth-2 yrs infant's knowledge about the world=based on senses and motor skills

preoperational 2 to 6 years children learn how to use symbols such as words and numbers to represent aspects of the world but relates to the world only thru his or her perspective

concrete operational. 7-11 years child understands & applies logical operations to experiences, provided the experiences are focused on the here & now.

formal operational adolesence&beyond. adults think abstractly, speculate on hypothetical situations, and reasons deductively about what may be possible

The Contextual Perspective

the theory that considers the relationship between individuals and their physical, cognitive, personality, and social worlds

culture

in the contextual perspective, all these people and institutions fit together to form a person's culture - the knowledge, attitudes, and behavior associated with a group of people

Lev Vygotsky

focused on ways that adults convey to children the beliefs, customs, and skills of their culture

active-passive child issue

are children simply at the mercy of the environment (passive child), or do children actively influence their own development through their own unique individual characteristics (active child)?

nature-nurture issue

How do biology (nature) and environment (nurture) shape a child's development?

continuity

early development is related to later development but not perfectly

nature and nurture

development is always jointly influenced by heredity and environment

active children

children influence their own development

connections

development in different domains is connected

Links between different domains of development

Child-development researchers usually examine different domains or areas of development, such as physical growth, cognition, language, personality, and social relationships. Development in different domains is always intertwined

Aristotle

thought schools and parents were responsible for teaching, but that too much discipline would stifle creativity

Plato

believed children were born with knowledge of concrete objects

Locke

believed humans were born a tabula rosa, or a blank slate. Thought that parents should instruct, reward, and discipline young children gradually relaxing their authority as they grow

Rousseau

believed that newborns are endowed with a sense of justice and morality that naturally unfolds as the children grow. Like Plato, he believed that children begin their developmental journeys well prepared with a stockpile of knowledge

continuity-discontinuity issue

the continuity-discontinuity issue is really about the "relatedness" of development: are early aspects of development consistently related to later aspects?

systematic observation

involves watching children and carefully recording what they do or say. 2 forms of systematic observation are common: naturalistic observation and structured observation

naturalistic observation

children are observed as they behave spontaneously in a real-life situation

weakness: difficult to use w/ behaviors that are rare or typically occur in private settings

variables

factors that can take on a different value. Researchers keep track of what a child does by beforehand deciding on which variables to record

structured observation

the researcher creates a setting likely to elicit the behavior of interest (ex: an investigator using a naturalistic observation to study children's responses to emergencies wouldn't make much progress bc emergencies don't occur at predetermined times and locations. However, using structured observation, an investigator might stage an emergency)

weakness: may be invalid if the structured setting distorts the behavior

sampling behavior w/ tasks

when investigators can't observe a behavior directly, an alternative is to create tasks that sample the behavior of interest. For ex, to measure, memory, researchers might use a digit span task.

weakness: task might not accurately measure the behavior of interest. May be invalid if the task doesn't sample behavior as it occurs naturally (ex asking kids to judge emotions from photos might not be valid cuz it underestimates what kids do in real life)

self-reports

children's answers to questions about the topic of interest

problem: response bias, where children answer incorrectly b/c some responses may be more socially acceptable than others, and kids are more likely to select those than more socially unacceptable answers

physiological measures

measuring children's physiological responses. HR often slows down when children are paying attention to something interesting.

reliable

a measure is reliable if the results are consistent over time

valid

a measure is valid if it really measures what researchers think it measures

populations

researchers are usually interested in broad groups of children called populations. virtually all studies include only a sample of children, a subset of the population

sample

virtually all studies include only a sample of children, a subset of the population

general designs for research

having formulated a hypothesis, identified variables, and selected a method to collect data on the topic or behavior of interest, researchers must then choose an overall conceptual approach called a research design

correlational study

investigators look at relations between variables as they exist naturally in the world

ex: a researcher wants to test the idea that smarter children have more friends. To test this claim, the researcher would measure 2 variables for each child: the # of friends the child has & the child's intelligence

correlation coefficient

the results of a correlational study are usually expressed as a correlation coefficient, abbreviated r, which stands for the direction and strength of a relation between 2 variables. Correlations can range from -1.0 to +1.

When r equals 0...

2 variables are completely unrelated. Ex: Children's intelligence is unrelated to the number of friends they have

When r is greater than 0...

scores are related positively. Ex: children who are smart have more friends than children who aren't smart. That is, greater intelligence is associated with having more friends.

When r is less than 0....

scores are related, but inversely. Ex: Children who are smart tend to have fewer friends than children who are not as smart. That is, greater intelligence is associated with having fewer friends.

strength of a relation

the strength of a relation is measured by how much the correlation differs from 0, either positively or negatively

experiment

in an experiment, an investigator systematically varies the factors thought to cause a particular behavior. The factor that is varied is called the independent variable; the behavior that is measured is called the dependent variable

experimental design

manipulates independent and dependent variables

strengths: control of variables allows conclusions about cause and effect

weaknesses: work is often lab based, which can be artificial

field experiment

an experimental study

the researcher manipulates independent variables in a natural setting so that the results are more likely to be representative of behavior in real-world settings

quasi-experiment

experimental study

typically involves examining the impact of an independent variable by using groups that were not created with random assignment

Designs for studying age related change

longitudinal

cross-sectional

longitudinal-sequential

longitudinal design

the same individuals are observed or tested repeatedly at different points in their lives

microgenetic study

in a special type of longitudinal design known as a microgenetic study, children are tested repeatedly over a span of days or weeks, typically with the aim of observing change directly as it occurs

problems with longitudinal designs

practice effects: when children are given the same test many times, they may become "test-wise"

selective attrition: some children may drop out bc they move away. others may lose interest and choose not to continue. constancy of the sample over the course of the research can be problematic

cohort effects: when children in a longitudinal study are observed over a period of several years, the developmental change may be specific to a specific generation of people (a cohort)

cross-sectional design

developmental changes are identified by testing children of different ages at one point in their development.

cohort effects=still a problem

weakness: no info about continuity

longitudinal-sequential studies

different sequences of children are tested longitudinally

strengths: provides info about continuity and researchers can determine the presence of practice or cohort effects

weaknesses: provides less info about continuity than a full-fledged longitudinal design and is more time consuming than a cross-sectional design

meta-analysis

a procedure for statistically combining the results of many different research studies

ex: meta-analysis of whether adopted kids had poor self esteem showed that they don't

chromosomes

each egg and sperm cell contains 23 chromosomes, tiny structures in the nucleus that contain genetic material. when a sperm penetrates an egg, their chromosomes combine to produce 23 pairs of chromosomes

in vitro fertilization

involves mixing sperm and egg together in a laboratory dish and then placing several fertilized eggs in a woman's uterus.

autosomes

the first 22 pairs of chromosomes are called autosomes; and the shromosomes in each pair are about the same size. THE 23RD PAIR DETERMINES THE SEX OF THE CHILD; HENCE, THESE TWO ARE KNOWN AS THE SEX CHROMOSOMES

DNA

each chromosome consists of one molecule of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA).

genotype

the complete set of genes makes up a person's heredity and is known as a person's genotype

phenotype

genetic instructions and environmental influences produces phenotype, which is a person's physical, behavioral, and psychological features

alleles

genes come in different forms that are known as alleles.

homozygous

sometimes the alleles in a pair of chromosomes are the same, which makes them HOMOZYGOUS