AP Psych Unit 3: Development and Learning

Unit 3 (3.1 to 3.2b & 3.4 to 3.6b)

Developmental Psychology

Studies physical, cognitive, and social change throughout life.

End of History Illusion

• Underestimates how much they’ll change in the future.

• This cognitive bias leads individuals to believe that their current preferences and beliefs will remain stable over time.

Zygote

Fertilized Egg

Teratogens

Agents (chemicals and viruses) that can harm embryo or fetus during prenatal development

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)

Causes physical and cognitive issues in kids due to mother drinking

Habituation

Decreased response with repeated stimulation

Maturation

• Process of biological growth

• Sets basic course of development (Nature) but experience adjusts it (nurture)

Synaptic Pruning

Shuts down unused neural links

Critical Period

Optimal period to learn skills early in life

Infantile Amnesia

Inability of adults to remember memories before the ages of 3 and 4

Adolescence

Transition period from child to adult

Death-Deferral Phenomenon

People postpone / “hold onto life” until after a big event or holiday

Cross Sectional Study

Research that compares people of different ages at the same point in time.

Longitudinal Study

Research that follows and retests the same people over time.

Cognition

Mental activities associated with thinking, remembering, and communication

Assimilation

Interpreting information based on already existing schemas

Accommodation

Adapting our schemas to incorporate new information

1. Sensorimotor Stage

• Birth - 2 years

• Piaget

• Babies understand words through senses and actions (ex. looking, grasping, touching, mouthing)

Object Permanence

Awareness that objects continue to exist when perceived (ex. peekaboo)

2. Preoperational Stage

• 6 - 7 years

• Piaget

• Represent things with words and images, but too young to perform mental operations

• Engage in Parallel Play

Theory of Conservation

• The quantity stays the same when when the shape changes

• Kids do not understand this before the age of 6

Parallel Play

Play next to other kids but does not try to influence others / oblivious to friend’s actions and more focused on their own play

Egocentric

• Difficulty perceiving things from someone else’s perspective. Kids assume you see what they see.

• Less egocentric by age 7

Animism

Kids think that inatament objects are alive / have feelings (ex. treating stuffed animals nicely)

3. Concrete Operational Stage

• 7 - 11 years

• Can perform mental operations and think logically (able to comprehend math problems and conservation)

4. .Formal Operational Stage

• 12 - Adulthood

• Able to think logically and abstractly

• Potential for moral reasoning and abstract knowledge

Scaffold

Framework that offers kids temporary support as they develop

Zone of Proximal Development

What a child can and can’t do

Theory of Mind

• People’s idea’s about their own and other’s beliefs

• At age 3 and 4½, kids realize that ither kids and people may hold false beliefs

Personal Fable

• Usually teens develop this

• They are unique and what happens to most people won’t happen to them

Prospective Memory

Memory for doing things in the future

Jonathan Haidt

• Morals are rooted in Moral Intuitions aka “Quick gut feelings”

• Out mind makes moral judgements quickly and automatically

• Feelings of disgust or illation trigger moral reasoning

Noam Chomsky

• Argued that language us an unlearned human trait aka we are born with the ability to learn language (Language Acquisition Device)

• Later said that we are born with Universal Grammar (UG)

Phonemes

Smallest distinctive sound unit (that -→ th, a, t)

Morphemes

Smallest language units that carry meaning (ex. readers has 3 → read, er, s)

Grammar

Set of language rules that enable communication

Universal Grammar (UG)

Predisposition in humans that allows us to learn grammar

Receptive Language

A child’s ability to understand what is said to them and about them

Productive Language

Ability to produce words

Babbling Stage

• Starts at 4 months

• At 10 months, their babbling starts to imitate the parent’s language

One Word Stage

Understand that sounds have meaning and start to use sounds (one word) to communicate

Two Word Stage

• Happens around 2 years old

• Uses 2 word sentences (ex. me go, more cookie)

Telegraphic Stage

• Around 24 and 30 months

• Children begin to use short, simple sentences that include only essential words (ex. include "Car go," "Papa tired," or "hand wash")

Aphasia

Impairment of language that is usually the result of damage in the Broca or Wernicke Area

Broca’s Area

• Frontal Lobe

• Controls speaking

Wernicke’s Area

• Temporal Lobe

• Understanding language

Linguistic Determinism

• Proposed by Benjamin Lee Whorf

• Believed that language determines the way we think

• Very extreme theory

Linguistic Relativism

• Our words influence our thinking

• Imagine how to reach your goals

• Less extreme

Ecological Systems Theory

• Proposed by Bronfenbrenner

• Different environments affect our cognitive, social, and biological development

  • Microsystem: The immediate environment, such as family, peers, or school 

  • Mesosystem: The relationships between the microsystems, such as how a child's family and school interact 

  • Exosystem: Indirect influences, such as a parent's boss who may influence how the parent interacts with their child 

  • Macrosystem: The culture of an individual, such as their ethnicity, socioeconomic status, or the society they live in 

  • Chronosystem: The dimension of time, including life transitions like divorce

Self Concept

• Understanding / evaluation of who we are

  • 15 - 18 months, kids recognize themselves in the mirror

  • By school age, they can describe their traits

  • By 8 - 10 years, their self image is stable

Social Identity

• Apart of Self Concept

• Comes from a person’s group membership

Emerging Adulthood

• 18 - mid 20s

• When young adults are not fully independent

• Mostly seen in western cultures

Social Clock

Preferred timing for major life events