CH16: Conclusions

1. Which statement accurately describes the interaction of nature and nurture?

a. Nature does its work before birth, and nurture takes over only after birth.

b. Nature’s influence continues through infancy before giving way to the influence of nurture.

c. Nature and nurture begin interacting on the fetus in the womb, and both continue to shape the individual’s development throughout life.

d. The role that both nature and nurture play in development is often overstated.

c. Nature and nurture begin interacting on the fetus in the womb, and both continue to shape the individual’s development throughout life.

2. Which is an example of the crucial role that timing plays in the potential impact of a teratogen?

a. The diet of a pregnant mother will influence taste preferences that the fetus will exhibit after birth.

b. By age 12 months, infants lose the ability to hear the difference between similar sounds that they do not encounter on a regular basis.

c. A virus will cause damage to the development of a fetus if contracted by the pregnant mother at specific sensitive times during pregnancy.

d. It is more difficult for children older than 11 or 12 years of age to gain competence in a new language than it is for younger children.

c. A virus will cause damage to the development of a fetus if contracted by the pregnant mother at specific sensitive times during pregnancy.

3. The emerging field of epigenetics has helped to explain the ways in which a child’s environment can influence gene expression. Which is an example of this interaction?

a. Children with certain types of brain damage will perform on par with other children on IQ tests up to a certain age but will fall behind after that point.

b. It is more difficult for children older than 11 or 12 years of age to gain competence in a new language than it is for younger children.

c. A child who loses capability in one sense, such as sight, will often compensate with enhanced ability in another sense.

d. The amount of stress that a mother experiences during her child’s infancy can affect that child’s ability to regulate reaction to stress later in life.

d. The amount of stress that a mother experiences during her child’s infancy can affect that child’s ability to regulate reaction to stress later in life.

4. Looking preferences, self-initiated activities, selfsocialization, and even the manner in which infants react to their parents are all examples of

a. the active role children play in their development.

b. the greater influence that nurture plays compared with nature in child development.

c. the ways in which development is discontinuous.

d. the ways in which the sociocultural context shapes development.

a. the active role children play in their development.

5. Which is an example of the theme of the active child?

a. The stability of IQ scores on average tends to increase with age.

b. Stressful maternal experiences, such as a periodic shortage of food at certain points during pregnancy, will influence the future physical development of the child.

c. Children who exhibit preoperational reasoning in some contexts may also exhibit concrete operational reasoning in others.

d. Children who are better able to regulate their emotions tend to be more socially competent and, therefore, elicit more positive reactions from other people than those who are less skilled at emotion regulation.

d. Children who are better able to regulate their emotions tend to be more socially competent and, therefore, elicit more positive reactions from other people than those who are less skilled at emotion regulation.

6. Piaget’s theory of cognitive development, Freud’s theory of psychosexual development, and Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development are all examples of

a. social learning theory.

b. the stage approach to development.

c. theories based on an empiricist perspective of development.

d. theories based on the nativist approach to child development.

b. the stage approach to development.

7. Infants’ attachment to their mothers will more reliably predict their long-term security if there are no significant disruptions in the home environment. This example illustrates

a. the degree to which genetic influence on individual differences tends to decrease over time.

b. how continuity in individual differences is influenced by continuity in the environment.

c. the manner in which sociocultural differences exert influence on cognitive development.

d. the role of domain-specific learning mechanisms in child development.

b. how continuity in individual differences is influenced by continuity in the environment.

8. Which statement accurately expresses a key understanding regarding the continuity and discontinuity of development?

a. Child psychologists today generally believe that, for the vast majority of traits, development occurs in a discontinuous manner.

b. Very few individual differences in psychological properties show stability over time.

c. Contrary to the theories by early behavioral psychologists like Piaget and Erikson, developmental processes rarely show a great deal of continuity.

d. The apparent continuity or discontinuity of a given developmental trait depends on the timescale on which it is considered.

d. The apparent continuity or discontinuity of a given developmental trait depends on the timescale on which it is considered.

9. Before writing an essay, a child first considers what readers already know about the topic. Which of the four general information-processing mechanisms is illustrated by this example?

a. Strategy formation

b. Basic processes

c. Metacognition

d. Content knowledge

c. Metacognition

10. Which statement is not true of the development of a child’s cognitive abilities?

a. A child’s content knowledge in a given area can outweigh an adult’s general intellectual ability.

b. Statistical learning emerges in middle childhood, after the child has begun to understand basic mathematical properties.

c. Understanding basic causal relationships allows children to infer explanations for a wide variety of observations.

d. Knowing multiple strategies for achieving goals helps children adapt to different problems and situations they will face.

b. Statistical learning emerges in middle childhood, after the child has begun to understand basic mathematical properties.

11. Babies who grow up in African tribes that strongly encourage infants’ motor development tend to walk and reach other motor milestones earlier than do infants in the United States. This is an example of the effect of on development.

a. change mechanisms

b. historical change

c. discontinuity

d. the sociocultural context

d. the sociocultural context

12. Which is not a reason why demographic variables such as gender, race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status are particularly useful to child-development researchers?

a. Each of these variables relates directly to a wide variety of other individual differences.

b. These variables tend to remain stable over time.

c. These variables have been shown to reliably predict some future outcomes.

d. These variables tend to be unaffected by environmental factors.

d. These variables tend to be unaffected by environmental factors.

13. Which is an important contribution that Piaget’s theory has made to children’s education?

a. Piaget helped to delineate the interactions between a child’s genes and their environment.

b. Piaget’s theory emphasizes the importance of the child’s active involvement in the learning process.

c. Piaget brought attention to the role that cultural influences play in a child’s learning.

d. Piaget explained cognitive development as a continuous process rather than as a series of stages.

b. Piaget’s theory emphasizes the importance of the child’s active involvement in the learning process.

14. Habituation is a learning process in which a child becomes familiar with a repeated stimulus. This process can motivate the child to seek out new stimulation. Besides illustrating the role of behavioral mechanisms in a child’s development, this example also demonstrates which other theme of child development?

a. The sociocultural context of an individual’s development

b. The role of the active child

c. The discontinuity of change over time

d. The influence of nature over nurture

b. The role of the active child

15. Consider the statement “Individual differences are not randomly distributed.” What is meant by this observation?

a. A child’s performance in one area of development will predict the child’s achievement in another related area.

b. A child’s genotype will always exert a stronger influence on the child’s outcomes than will any environmental factors.

c. Each individual child is different from all other children.

d. A child’s performance on one measure of intelligence will not predict the child’s performance in another.

a. A child’s performance in one area of development will predict the child’s achievement in another related area.