PSY of Childhood Development EXAM 2

How does the dynamic systems perspective explain how motor development occurs?

Motor development results from the continuous interaction of biological abilities, environmental influences, and the child's experiences, causing new skills to emerge over time. This process involves both gross and fine motor skills, where children learn to coordinate their movements through practice and exploration.

The two mechanisms of change according to Dynamic Systems Theory?

• Differentiation – Children gradually develop more specialized and complex behaviors from simpler ones.

• Integration – Different skills and abilities are combined and coordinated into more organized patterns of behavior.

Reflexes

Built in responses that are automatic and involuntary, characterized by specific stimuli and motor output. They play a crucial role in early development and help infants interact with their environment.

Babinski Reflex

A reflexive action where the toes fan out when the sole of the foot is stroked, indicating neurological development in infants.

Grasping Reflex

A reflex where an infant automatically closes their hand around any object that touches their palm, demonstrating early motor control and development.

Moro Reflex

(startle)

develops by 32 weeks of gestation and disappears at the sixth month of age. It is a response to a sudden loss of support and involves three distinct components:^[1]

1. spreading out the arms (abduction)

2. pulling the arms in (adduction)

3. crying (usually)

It is distinct from the startle response.^[2] Unlike the startle response, the Moro reflex does not decrease with repeated stimulation.^[3]

Rooting reflex

An infant reflex in which touching the cheek causes the baby to turn toward the touch and open their mouth, helping them locate food.

Stepping Reflex

A newborn's automatic movement in which they make stepping motions when held upright with their feet touching a flat surface. This reflex disappears after a few months and is a precursor to later walking.

• typically disappears around 2 months of age as babies gain weight faster than their leg strength develops.

• reappears later as voluntary walking movements, usually around 8-12 months, when the muscles, nervous system, balance, and coordination have developed enough to support real walking.

Sucking reflex

A newborn's automatic reflex to suck when something touches the roof of their mouth. This reflex helps the baby feed and obtain nourishment.

Typical sequence of gross motor milestones in infancy

Infants generally progress from lifting their head → rolling over → sitting unsupported → crawling → pulling up to stand → walking.

Cephalocaudal Development

Development occurs from the head downward. Infants gain control of their head and neck before their trunk, legs, and feet.

How does cephalocaudal development explain motor milestones?

Babies can lift and control their head before they can sit, crawl, stand, or walk because motor control develops from the head down to the rest of the body.

Proximodistal Development

Development occurs from the center of the body outward. Infants gain control of their torso and arms before their hands and fingers.

How does proximodistal development explain motor milestones?

Babies develop control of their shoulders and arms before developing fine motor control in their hands and fingers, allowing them to later grasp and manipulate objects.

What is the difference between cephalocaudal and proximodistal development?

In one development proceeds from head to toe in the other development proceeds from center to outward parts of the body.

How cultural caregiving practices influence motor development

Some cultures actively encourage motor skills through exercises, massage, stretching, or supported sitting, while others allow infants to develop skills more independently. These practices can influence when certain motor milestones are reached.

Karasik et al. (2015)

Study that found five-month-olds from different cultures differed in sitting proficiency and the amount of time they spent sitting, suggesting that cultural practices shape motor experiences.

Fine motor skills

Small, precise movements involving the hands, fingers, wrists, and eyes.

Palmar grasp

Grasping an object using the entire hand

Pincer grasp

Grasping an object using the thumb and index finger

Fine motor skills contribution to learning

Support object exploration, writing, drawing, and other activities important for cognitive development

Developmental cascade?

An early skill or experience that triggers changes that affect later development across multiple domains.

How could early motor competence create a developmental cascade?

Better motor skills → greater exploration → more learning opportunities → stronger cognitive and academic outcomes later in life.

What does reaching do for infants and toddlers?

Allows infants to actively explore and learn about objects

What does sitting do for infants and toddlers?

Frees the hands for exploration and improves interaction with the environment

What does crawling do for infants and toddlers?

Increases independent exploration and spatial learning

What does walking do for infants and toddlers

Expands access to people, objects, and places, creating new learning opportunities.

Sticky Mittens Study ( Sommerville et al. (2005) )

Infants who had Sticky Mittens experience were better able to understand that another person's reaching behavior was goal-directed

Purpose of Karen Adolph's gaps and slopes studies

To examine how infants and toddlers judge whether it is safe to cross gaps and slopes

What did Adolph's studies show

Children must learn affordances for each new motor skill and do not automatically transfer knowledge from one skill (e.g., crawling) to another (e.g., walking).

Scale error

An attempt to perform an action with an object that is far too small (e.g., trying to sit in a toy chair).

At what age do children commonly make scale errors?

Around 18-30 months

Why do children make scale errors?

They may fail to consider the mismatch between their body size and the object's size

What is sensation?

Detection of sensory information from the environment

What is perception?

Interpretation and organization of sensory information

What is habituation?

A decrease in attention to a repeatedly presented stimulus.

What is the preferential looking technique?

Measuring infants' visual preferences by determining which stimulus they look at longer.

What is the high-amplitude sucking (pacifier) paradigm?

A method that uses changes in sucking rate to determine whether infants detect differences between stimuli.

What is the violation-of-expectancy paradigm?

A method in which infants look longer at events that violate their expectations.

Visual Acuity

The sharpness or clarity of vision.

How is visual acuity measured in infants?

Typically through looking preferences and visual discrimination tasks

What do infants prefer to look at?

Faces, biological motion, patterns, and high-contrast stimuli.

What does the visual cliff test measure?

Depth perception

Perceptual Narrowing

Becoming more specialized in perceiving familiar stimuli while losing sensitivity to less familiar stimuli.

Can training influence perceptual narrowing?

Yes, continued exposure to stimuli can maintain discrimination abilities

Intermodal perception?

Combining information from multiple senses into a single perception

What did the pacifier study with newborns demonstrate?

Infants can match information obtained through touch with visual information.

How does Piaget's theory reflect the active child theme?

Children actively construct their own knowledge through interaction with the environment.

Constructivism

The idea that children build knowledge through experience

Assimilation

Interpreting new information using existing schemas

Accommodation

Modifying existing schemas when new information does not fit

Equilibration

Maintaining a balance between assimilation and accommodation

Object Permanence

Understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be seen

A-not-B error

Searching for an object in its old hiding place after watching it be moved elsewhere

Deferred imitation

the ability to observe an action or sequence of actions and then reproduce it after a delay of minutes, hours, or even days, rather than immediately

Symbolic Representation

Using symbols, words, or images to represent objects or ideas

Animism

Giving lifelike qualities to inanimate objects

Egocentrism

Difficulty understanding another person's perspective

task measuring egocentrism

The Three Mountains Task

Three Limitations of Piaget Theory

• Animism

• Centration

• Egocentrism

Centration

Focusing on one aspect of a situation while ignoring others.

Task measuring centration

Conservation tasks (liquid, number, and mass).

Main accomplishment of the Concrete Operational Stage

Logical thinking about concrete events and successful conservation.

Main accomplishment of the Formal Operational Stage

Abstract and hypothetical thinking.

Limitations of Sensorimotor stage

Thinking is tied to sensory and motor experiences, mental representation is limited, and infants often make the A-not-B error.

Limitations of Preoperational stage

Egocentrism, centration, failure of conservation, animism, and illogical/intuitive thinking.

Limitations of Concrete Operational Stage

Children can think logically about concrete situations but struggle with abstract and hypothetical thinking.

Limitations of Formal Operational Stage

Adolescent egocentrism, imaginary audience, personal fable, and inconsistent use of abstract reasoning. ( plus not all adults reach this stage)

Zone of Proximal Development

The gap between what a child can do alone and what they can do with help: Vygotsky

Scaffolding

Support that helps a child complete a task within the ZPD.

Private speech

Talking to oneself to guide behavior and thinking

Private Speech’s contribution to self-regulation

It helps children plan, monitor, and control their behavior

How did Vygotsky's view of language differ from Piaget's?

Vygotsky viewed language as a major driver of cognitive development, while Piaget viewed it as reflecting cognitive development

Core-knowledge theories

Theories proposing that infants are born with specialized knowledge systems important for survival

areas included in Spelke's core-knowledge systems

Objects, numbers, spatial relationships, and people.

Wynn (1992)

Found that Infants appear to have an early understanding of number through the violation of expectation paradigm

information-processing approach

A theory that views cognition as a process of encoding, storing, and retrieving information.

Does information processing view development as continuous or discontinuous?

Continuous

What happens to processing speed and capacity with age?

Both increase.

What are the three memory processes?

Encoding, storage, and retrieval.

sensory memory

A very brief storage system for sensory information.

short-term memory

Temporary storage with limited capacity

long-term memory

Relatively permanent storage of information

working memory

The ability to hold and manipulate information simultaneously

Mobile study by Rovee-Collier

Infants learned that kicking a ribbon attached to a mobile would make the mobile move, finding that infants have memory abilities much earlier than they were previously believed to

infantile amnesia

Adults' inability to remember events from the first few years of life.

selective attention

Focusing on relevant information while ignoring distractions

divided attention

Attending to multiple tasks simultaneously

sustained attention

Maintaining focus over time

What is executive attention

Managing attention to achieve a goal

joint attention

Shared focus on the same object or event between two people.

Why is joint attention important?

It supports language learning, social development, and learning from others.

Executive function

Mental skills used to control behavior and accomplish goals.

What are the three main components of executive function?

Working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility.

What brain area is most associated with executive function?

The prefrontal cortex.

What outcomes are associated with strong executive function skills?

Better academic achievement, social competence, and self-regulation.

What is the Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS) task?

A task that measures cognitive flexibility by asking children to sort cards according to one rule (e.g., color) and then switch to a different rule (e.g., shape).

What does the DCCS task measure?

Executive function, specifically cognitive flexibility and inhibitory control.

How do preschoolers typically perform on the DCCS task?

Many 3-year-olds can follow the initial sorting rule but struggle to switch to the new

What is the post-switch rule in the DCCS task?

After sorting by one dimension (such as color), children must sort the cards using a new dimension (such as shape).