Chapter 6 - Cognitive Development In Infancy and Toddlerhood

schemes

organized ways of making sense of the world/experiences

adaptation

building schemes though direct interaction with the environment

assimilation

using current schemes to interpret the external world

accommodation

creating new schemes or adjusting old ones to better capture the environment

organization

linking schemes with others to create a strongly interconnected cognitive system

sensorimotor stage

Piaget’s first stage, spanning the first two years of life

reflective schemes

• birth to 1 month

• circular reactions: repeating chance behaviours

primary circular reactions

• 1-4 months

• simple motor habits centered around the infants own body

secondary circular reactions

• 4-8 months

• imitation of familiar behaviours with interesting effects

coordination of secondary circular reactions

• 8-12 months

• intentional or gal oriented behavior

tertiary circular reactions

• 12-18 months

• exploring objects by acting on them

mental representations

• 18 months - 2 years

• internal depictions of objects or events

intentional/goal oriented behavior

coordinating schemes deliberately to solve simple problems

means-end action sequences

foundation for all problem solving

object permanence

the understanding that objects continue to exist when out of sight

A-not-B search error

continuing to search for an object in its first hiding place even after seeing it moved

mental representation

internal depictions of information that the mind can manipulate:

• images: mental pictures of objects, people, and spaces

• concepts: categories in which similar objects or events are grouped together

internal displacement

finding a toy moved while out of sight

deferred imitation

ability to remember and copy the behavior of models who are not present

• requires representation of a models past behaviour

• used by toddlers to enrich their range of schemes

make believe play

acting out everyday and imaginary activities

violation-of-expectation method

• assesses infants’ knowledge of physical reality based on their attention to expected vs. unexpected events

• some researchers believe it induces only limited, implicit awareness of physical events

Renee Baillargeon’s studies on object permanence

• found evidence that object permanence is present in the first few months of life

• mastery of object permanence is gradual; understanding becomes increasingly complex with experience

inferred imitation

• older infants and toddlers infer others’ intentions and may imitate actions they try to produce

• cornerstones of social understanding and communication

tool use in problem solving emerges…

gradually

• 12 month olds generally require physical link between tool and object

• 18 month olds can emerge in tool use when when an unfamiliar tool and an object they want are spatially separated

symbolic understanding is a…

momentous attainment

• displace reference: realization that words can cue mental images of things not physically present

• emerges in the first year and strengthens in second year

evaluation of sensorimotor stage

• cognitive attainments do not develop in the neat, stepwise fashion that Piaget predicted

• most researchers now believe that infants have some built-in cognitive equipment for making sense of experience

core knowledge perspective

babies are born with core domains of thought that permit a ready grasp of new information:

• infants have inherited foundations of physical, linguistic, physiological and numerical knowledge

• evidence for the core knowledge perspective is inconsistent

Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory

• social and cultural contexts affect the structures of children’s cognitive worlds

• through joint activities with more mature members if society, children learn to think and act in ways that have meaning in their culture

zone of proximal development

range of tasks that a child cannot yet handle alone but can do with the help of more skilled partners

Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development

• Bayley-III: suitable for children between 1 month and 3 ½ years

Three main subjects:

• cognitive scale

• language scale

• motor scale

Two scales depend on parental report:

• social emotional scale

• adaptive behavior scale

Intelligence quotient (IQ)

indicator of the extent to which the raw score (number of items passed) deviates from the typical performance of same-age individuals

standardization

giving the same test to a large representative sample and using results for interpreting scores

normal distribution

bell-shaped distribution of data, in which most scores cluster toward the mean, or average, with progressively fewer falling toward the extremes

Issues with infant and toddler intelligence tests

• most infant tests predict later intelligence poorly

• infant test scores labeled developmental quotients (DQs) rather than IQs, because they do not tap the same dimensions of intelligence measured at older ages

• Bayley-III cognitive and language scales better dovetail with childhood tests and are good predictors of preschool mental test performance

• today, infant tests are largely used for screening: to help identify babies who are likely to have developmental problems

Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME)

• checklist for gathering information about the quality of children’s home lives

• correlational findings must be interpreted cautiously to account for gene-environment correlation

quality of infant and toddler childcare

also affects mental development, though less strongly than parenting

• care should meet standards for developmentally appropriate practice

• individualistic values and weak government regulation and funding affect quality of Canada child care

nativist theory

• according to Chomsky, language is etched into the structure of the human brain

• Language Acquisition Device (LAD): an innate system containing a universal grammar common to all languages

• Broca’s area and Wernike’s area appear to support language production and comprehension, respectively

• infancy is a sensitive period for acquiring grammar

limitations to the nativist perspective

• difficulty in specifying Chomsky’s universal grammar

• certain observations of language development suggest that more experimentation and learning are involved

Interactionist perspective

emphacizes interactions between inner capacities and enviornmental influences

• in a blend of the information-processing view with Chomsky’s nativist perspective, some theorists argue that specific brain structures support higher level language learning

• in the social-interactionist view, an active child strives to communicate, which cues caregivers to provide appropriate language experiences

first speech sounds

• cooing: vowel-like noises (around 2 months)

• babbling: repeated consonant-vowel combinations (around 6 months)

joint attention

child attends to the same object or event as the caregiver

• caregivers’ labeling contributes importantly to early language development

• interactions begin to include give and take around 2-3 months

• at the end of the first year, infants use preverbal gestures to direct adults’ attention

first words

• around 1 year

• build on sensorimotor foundations and on categories children have formed

• toddlers tend to make error in word usage (underextension and overextension)

• speed and accuracy of toddlers comprehension increase dramatically over the second year

the two word utterance phase

• steady increase in rate of producing new words continues through preschool years

• in the second year, children improve in ability to categorize experience, recall words, and grasp others’ social cues to meaning

telegraphic speech

toddlers’ use of high-content words while omitting smaller, less important ones (Ex: “ball” for all spherical objects)

infant directed speech (IDS)

• form of communication consisting of short sentences with high pitched, exaggerated expression, clear pronunciation, distinct pauses between speech segments, clear gestures, and repetition of new words

• preferred by infants over other kinds of adult talk

• builds on joint attention, turn-taking, preverbal gestures