Flashcards for Developmental Psychology All Chapters

Flashcards for Developmental Psychology lecture notes, focusing on vocabulary and key concepts.

Developmental Psychology

Deals with behavioral changes within persons across the lifespan, differences between and similarities among persons in the nature of these changes.

Normative Development

Important developmental changes linked to a certain age, but biological age is never responsible for changes.

Variability

Changes that are more or less reversible.

Cross-sectional designs

Studying groups of individuals of different ages at one point in time to measure inter-individual differences.

Longitudinal designs

Studying one group of individuals over a longer time period to measure intra-individual change.

Cohort

Any group that shares having experienced the same cultural environment and historical events.

Cohort effects

Differences in developmentally relevant variables that arise from non-age-related factors to which each birth cohort was exposed.

Time of measurement effects

Effects of historical events and trends occurring when the data is being collected on observed results.

Report by proxy

Assessment by someone other than the individual, such as a parent or caregiver.

Age stereotype threat

Occurs when participants' results are affected by negative stereotypes associated with their age group.

Multidimensional and Multidisciplinary

Development is influenced by multiple factors and requires a multidisciplinary approach.

Multidisciplinary

Human development must be seen in a multidisciplinary way involving biologists, neuroscientists, historians, economists, and sociologists.

Multidirectionality

Development is not a universal process leading in one direction; different capacities show different patterns of change over time.

Gain-loss dynamic

Development always consists of the joint occurrence of gain (growth) and loss (decline).

Plasticity and constraints

Vulnerable individuals are most vulnerable in aversive environments but may also benefit more in positive environments.

Historical embeddedness

Age-related development is strongly shaped by prevailing socio-cultural conditions of a historical period.

Contextual development influences

Environmental factors influence development.

Nature-nurture interactions

The interplay between genetic predispositions and environmental influences.

Gene-environment interactions

People with different genes are affected differently by environmental influences.

Passive genotype-environment correlation

Association between a child's inherited genotype and the environment in which they were raised.

Evocative genotype-environment correlation

Association between genetically programmed behavior and others' reactions to that behavior.

Active genotype-environment correlation

Association between an individual's genetic tendencies and the environmental niches that they actively select.

Epigenetics

Gene expression can be changed by environmental influences across the lifespan.

Erikson's Psychosocial Development Theory

Personality develops throughout the lifespan and is influenced by ego, society, and history, divided into 8 stages each with a conflict.

Learning Theories: Traditional Behaviorism

Learning associations through classical conditioning (Watson) and operant conditioning (Skinner).

Social-cognitive learning theory of Bandura

Humans learn through observational learning and modeling.

Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Model

Identifies file environmental systems that influence development.

Vygotsky's Socio-Cultural Theory

Children actively develop intellectually by interacting with their sociocultural environment.

Zone of Proximal Development

Gap between the child's ability to solve a problem on its own and the potential development they can make with help.

Scaffolding

Degree of support adapted to child's level of ability, reduced gradually.

Social Clock Model (Neugarten)

Shared societal expectations for task fulfillment at certain ages.

Selection-Optimisation-Compensation Model

Psychological and behavioral processes in adapting to age-related losses and maintaining performance.

Socioemotional Selectivity Theory (Carstensen)

Emotionally meaningful goals are prioritized as time horizons shorten.

Positivity effect

Older adults pay more attention to, better remember, and prioritize positive information.

Prenatal Development

Fastest growth happens here and is determined by biological factors and influenced by environment, basis for further development.

Germinal phase

Development of zygote into blastocyst, nesting in uterine wall.

Embryonic phase

Formation of organs (including heart), organogenesis.

Fetal phase

Growth of the embryo and refinement of structures.

Cephalocaudal principle

Growth from top to bottom.

Proximodistal principle

Growth from in-to outside.

Orthogenic principle

Growth from mass to specific/undifferentiated to differentiated.

Endoderm, mesoderm, ectoderm

The inside of the blastocyst develops into three layers.

Teratogens

Harmful influences on the unborn child (infectious diseases, medications, drugs, environmental toxins, nutritional deficiencies, maternal stress).

Hebb's Law

Neurons that fire together wire together, repetition important for learning.

Brain lateralization

Brain development determined by biofactors, influenced by environment.

Sensation

Product of the interaction between information and sensory receptors.

Perception

interpretation of sensory information

Presbycusis

Age-related hearing loss.

Piaget's theory of cognitive development

Universal fixed order of phases, child actively contributes to own knowledge formation discontinuous development.

Schema

Building blocks of knowledge.

Assimilation

Existing schema is used in a new situation.

Accommodation

When the existing schema doesn't work, it needs to be changed to deal with a new situation.

Equilibration

Balance between assimilation and accommodation.

Sensorimotor phase

Learning about the world via senses and motor skills.

Object permanence

Understanding that objects exist even when out of sight.

Pre-operational phase

The young child learns to use symbols and language.

Concrete-operational phase

Realistic understanding of the world, logic reasoning but only in concrete situations.

Formal-operational phase

From concrete operations to formal operations, hypothetical and abstract thinking.

Post-Formal thought

Suggested as stage after formal operational phase, more complex way of thinking.

Executive functions

Prefrontal cortex controls higher cognitive functions (EFs).

Shifting

Two task sets, task is to switch between those.

Shift cost

Difference between shift and non-shift trials.

Speed-accuracy trade off

Slowing down to enhance accuracy.

Metacognition

Consciousness of one's own cognitive processes.

Short-term memory

Ability to retain information for up to 30 seconds without rehearsal.

Working Memory

Active short-term storage, systems that keep things in mind while performing complex tasks.

Procedural Memory

Implicit memory develops earlier in infancy (skills and habits).

Semantic memory

Growth during childhood as a function of exposure to information, environmental context, acculturation, social status, schooling.

Episodic memory

Development starts with hippocampus maturation; substantial improvements across second year.

Memory Strategies

Use of mental activities to improve processing of information.

Cognitive Reserve

Differences in cognitive processes as a function of lifetime intellectual activities and environmental factors; explain differential susceptibility to functional impairment/cognitive decline.

Skinner (nurture approach)

Learn to speak through being reinforced for producing sounds.

Chomsky's theory

People have an inborn language acquisition device .

Crying

increases infant parent bond.Caregivers can read/learn to read the type and severity of a cry.

Overextension

Too broad use of a verbal category. Call animals are dog.

Underextension

Too narrow use of a verbal category (only one grandpa is a grandpa).

Overregulation

Overgeneralising global rules about past tense/plural.

Metalinguistic awareness

Understanding of sentence structure (syntax), concept and definition of words (semantics), how language is affected by context (pragmatics).

Bilingualism benefits

More positive outcomes for Cognitive development, Language development

Intelligence

Ability to solve problems and to adapt and learn from experiences.

IQ Protective factor

1/19 strong predictor for academic performance and people's development · High IQ is a consistent protective factor

Criticism IQ tests: Culture

Western IQ tests : Focus on Cognitive skills, Western context.

Cummulative deficit hypothesis

Accumulated deficits of low IQ.Children of highest and lowest Ses backgronds on average separated by 6IQ

Anticipation effects of unemployment

Change in self-esteem and life satisfaction before, but not after employment.

Effect of marriage on wellbeing

Robust evidence : manage status is linked to better health and subjective well-being. Stronger effects for men than for women

Emotions

Feeling states, often caused by an event, includes multiple components.

Emotion regulation

All processes by which we influence which emotions we have, when we have them, and how we experience and express them.

Mirror learning.

Infants learn and trained to show happy faces mae often Also emotion socialization

Social referencing

Imitation of parents' emotions and decision tool for how to behave in new situations.

Emotional management in adulthood

Effort to create lifestyles that are emotionally satisfying, predictable, and manageable by making many decisions.

Emotiions in older age

Detect and feel negative emotions but they control the amount of time spent focusing on negative emotions .Positivity bias (or negativity avoidance):

Positivity bias

A form of selective attention : Relatively more attention and better memory for positive information.

Emotional management

Time horizons become shater-goals change : Focus on goals that are realized during the very pursuit of the goal itself : meaning , satisfaction

Kohlberg's-Preconventional Morality

Person operates according to Will I be punished or rewarded mentality (typical for age 13)

Conventional

Person's morality centers on the need to obey society's rules (most 15-16yr/adults)

Postconventional

Person has a personal moral code that transcends society's whes (few people achieve

Moral behavior Bandura-

A personal understanding of own internal moral compass

Treachy of Mind (ToM)

Ability to form ideas thearies about the mental wold of yourself and of others and to explain behaviour in terms of mental states.

Attention

Following pointing finger hands/gaze Building block for shared knowledge/experience if develops later, maybe autism

Pretend Play

First simple pretend paly is critical indicator of other cognitive development milestones