Developmental Psychology: Biological Perspectives on Human Development

Ethology definition

the study of the evolutionary significant behaviors of a species in its natural surroundings

Ethology principles/concepts

• looks at the biological and evolutionary blueprints for animal behavior

• places humans into a broad context: the animal world and our distant past

Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection

• nature ruthlessly selects certain characteristics because they lead to survival

• as a result of this selection, species change and sometimes differentiated into subspecies

• proposed that intelligence and other behaviors, as well as physical structures, were products of evolution

  • of they increased the chances of survival to the age of reproduction, they were retained; if they did not, they disappeared

Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen

• these two created the discipline, Ethology, and won the Nobel Prize

• imprinting research: a rapid, irreversible, and innate learning process occurring during a critical early period

  • demonstrated with young geese imprinting on him, following him as their parent

Developmental psychology was receptive to

ethology because

developmentalists have a tradition of naturalistic observations of children and consideration of the biological basis of development

John Bowlby

Sociobiology

• the study of the biological basis of all social behavior

• criticized for its deterministic, reductionist, and socially conservative stances

Evolutionary psychology

studies how the mind has been shaped by natural selection to solve problems of adaptation faced by our hunting and gathering ancestors

Ethology is characterized by four basic concepts:

1. Species-Specific Innate behavior

2. An Evolutionary Perspective — Phylogenetic change (change in a species over generations), NOT Ontogenetic change

3. Learning predispositions (species differ in which aspects of their behavior are modifiable)

4. Methodology: Naturalistic observation and Laboratory experiment

John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth pioneered the…

Infant-caretaker attachment theory

Human nature definition

humans as social animals with certain species-specific characteristics

what do ethologists think of nature vs. nurture?

they are intertwined, believe in both

neurological development

the development of the nervous system refering to the process that generate, shape, and reshape the nervous system of animals, from the earliest stages of embryonic development to adulthood

what are the two components of the nervous system?

the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system

Central Nervous System

coordinates what we sense with what we do (senses and actions)

• the brain and the spinal cord

Peripheral Nervous System

carries information from receptor cells to the CNS and carries directions to various body parts (messenger system)

neurons

nerve cells provide the means through which the nervous system (NS) transmits and coordinates info

sensory neurons

carry incoming info from receptor cells

interneurons

receive info from sensory neurons and integrate and interpret info from multiple locations

motor neurons

send messages (decisions) to different body parts for action

soma

cell body that contains the cell’s nucleus and is responsible for the cell’s general health and well being

dendrites

branch-like structures that receive messages from other neurons

axon

a long, arm-like structure that transmits info to additional neurons

terminal buttons

the end of the axon which contain certain chemical substances

myelin sheath

a white, fatty substance that covers the axon

where are neurons located? CNS or PNS?

peripheral nervous system because it carries info from receptor cells to the CNS

threshold of excitation

when a neuron’s dendrites are stimulated by other cells, the dendrites become electrically charged, reaching a certain level (threshold), the neuron fires, sending electrical impulse along its axon to the terminal buttons

neurotransmitters

when an electrical impulse moves down a neuron’s axon, it signals the terminal buttons to release chemicals known as

synapses

the branching ends of a neuron’s axon reach out to, but don’t quite touch, the dendrites of other neurons

electrical impulse

transmission of info within a neuron

chemical impulse

transmission of info from one neuron to another

glial cells

• provide nutrition

• tend to infections and injuries

• clean up unwanted garbage in the brain