Child development Ch. 5

sensorimotor stage

birth to 24 months. early cognitive development is grounded in motor development. children begin to interact with their environment. ability to organize and coordinate sensations with physical movements. leads to cognitive development

simple reflexes (0-1 month)

learn about the world through basic actions (sucking, grasping, looking, and listening)

first habits and body-oriented circular reactions (1-4 months)

learn how to integrate separate actions into single activities and repeat them if it interests them. grasp an object and suck on it and stare at an object and touch it repeatedly.

object-oriented circular reactions (4-8 months)

repeat activities they enjoy, even beyond their own bodies. move a rattle in various ways to get different responses. uses various vocalizations to get parents’ attention or see how people respond

goal directed behavior (8-12 months)

use behavior or sense to get what they want. moving a toy out of the way to reach another toy.

Object permanence (working memory 8-12 months)

learn that things continue to exist even though they cannot be seen.

mini experiments (12-18 months)

do things intentionally to see the consequences. throwing a cup on the floor repeatedly

mental representation (symbolic thought 18-24 months)

can remember or imagine where objects might be that they cannot see. can remember and repeat words heard days earlier. can use simple problem-solving strategies

deferred imitation

can imitate acts of people who are no longer present. pretend they are driving

vygotskys sociocultural theory of cognitive development

agrees with piaget that children learn about the world through their physical interactions with it. vygotsky looked at children developing through social interactions before looking into individual learning, which piaget observed

children are

social beings who live in the context of others who are helping them to learn

cognitive skills

emerge from social interactions with more competent members of society (parents, teachers, other adults)

key to understanding development

observable behavior and stimuli in the environment. if we know the stimuli, we can predict the behavior

behavioral perspective development does not happen in stages

continuous change. quantitative, not new skills but rather advancing skills.

nurture

more important to development than nature

information processing theories

how our mind takes in, retains/stores, and retrieves information. mirrors the development in computers and electronic processing of data

information processing

not a staged theory. cognition does not just build upon itself in each stage, but rather it can proceed quickly in certain areas and more slowly in others. encode - retain - retrieve

sensory memory

initial, momentary storage of info that lasts only an instant. does not appear to change much with development

short term or working memory

info is stored for 15-25 seconds according to its meaning. shows steady increases in middle childhood.

long term memory

info is stored relatively permanently, though it may be hard to retrieve.

autobiographical memory

personally meaningful events

infantile amnesia before age 3

generally, we dont have memory before 3. some refer to this as a memory dump. we do not have the cognition to keep memories before this age.

general knowledge

knows generally what happened in different locations or situations

event knowledge

knowledge of what happened during a specific event

paralinguistic communication

sounds, facial expressions, gestures, imitation, and other nonlinguistic means

cooing (2 months)

vowel-like sounds. ooo ahh

babbling (4-6 months)

speech-like sounds with no meaning. consonant and vowel. dah and bah

comprehension vs production

comprehension precedes production. comprehension outpaces production

babbling to talking

infants start to learn that speech has meaning and refers to objects or actions

1 year olds

speak about 1-5 words but know about 50 words

2 year olds

can generally use about 200 words

first words

spoken between 12 and 13 months

holophrases

one word utterances that mean a whole phrase or sentence

culture

has an affect on the type of first words spoken

nouns as first words

english speaking infants

verbs as first words

chinese speaking infants

underextentension

applying a label to a smaller set of objects than it actually refers to

overextension

using a word in a broader context than is appropriate

first sentences

18 months. infants begin linking words together to convey a single thought. usually consist of 2 word phrases

telegraphic speech

18-24 months. combine individual words to create two-word sentences. utilize only content words.

nativist approach (nature)

genetically determined, innate mechanism that directs language development. language emerges automatically with maturation. no teaching, training, or reinforcement is necessary

learning theory (nurture)

language is acquired by the laws of conditioning and reinforcement. when kids produce language, they get a positive reaction from their parents. increases likelihood of making same sound again

interactionist approach

combines learning theory and the nativist approach. language develops from a combination of genetically determined predispositions and environmental experiences that help teach infants language

speak in infant-directed speech

higher pitched than normal. range and intonation is more varied