Child Development Final

Erikson’s Stage 3

Initiative vs. Guilt

• 6-12 years old

• Adult expectations and children’s drive toward mastery lead children to this psychological conflict

• Children have the desire to make and do things!

• Conflict resolved positively when children develop a sense of competence at useful tasks (industry)

Erikson’s stage 3 continued

• motivation to be productive in addition to play

• Context: school learning, interactions with peers

• In school, children gain adult skills (reading and writing)

• Danger of inadequacy or inferiority = having little confidence in one’s ability to do things well

Morality

An appreciation of standards of conduct based on empathy and social understanding

1. Emotional Component

2. Cognitive Component

3. Behavioral Component

3 components of Morality

1. Emotional Component

   1. Feel empathy, guilt

2. Cognitive Component

   1. social understanding and judgements about right vs. wrong

3. Behavioral Component

   1. Actually doing what’s right

Internalization

Moral development is viewed as a process of internalization

• adopting societal standards for right action as one’s own

Results from a combination of influences within the child and the rearing environment

• Parents discipline

• Child’s age, temperament

• Parents characteristics

Perspectives on Moral Development

• Biological

  • Evolutionary, genetic

• Psychoanalytic

  • Empathy based guilt, Freud

• Social Learning

  • Modeling moral Behavior

• Behaviorist

  • Rewards and punishment

• Cognitive Developmental

  • Children as active thinkers about social rules

Inductive Discipline

• Helps child notice others’ feelings

• point out effects of misbehavior on others

• note others distress

• make clear the child caused the distress (empathy based guilt)

Characteristics of good moral behavior

• Warmth and responsiveness

• Competence and power

• Consistency between words and behavior

Positive Discipline

• Build Mutually respectful bond

• Let child know how to act

• praise mature behavior

Children as active thinkers

• By age 4…

  • Children consider intention in making moral judgements

  • Children can recognize lying vs. truthfulness

  • Children distinguish among

    • Moral imperatives

    • social conventions

    • matters of personal choice

Piaget’s theory of moral development

Heteronomous Morality vs Autonomous Morality

Heteronomous Morality

• 5-10 years old

• View rules as handed down by authorities, permanent, unchangeable, strict obedience

• Judge wrongness by outcomes not intentions

Autonomous Morality

• 10 years +

• Rules are seen as socially agreed on, changeable

• Standard of ideal reciprocity (Golden rule)

• Judge others on outcomes and intentions

Development of Distributive Justice

• Equality: 5-6 years

  • same amount

• Merit: 6-7 years

  • Effort or winning is rewarded

• Benevolence: around 8 years

  • take into account children’s special circumstances

Moral Autonomy

• Ability to think for oneself when deciding between right and wrong, coupled with a desire to act morally that is independent of rewards and punishments

Development of Aggression

• Aggressive acts by age 2

• Proactive or instrumental aggression

  • to get what they want

• Reactive or hostile aggression

  • Angry or defensive, intent to cause harm

3 forms of aggression

1. Physical aggression

   1. punch kick

2. Verbal Aggression

   1. threats, hostile, teasing

3. Relational Aggression

   1. social exclusion, gossip

Gender schema theory

Environmental pressures and children’s cognitions work together to shape a gender-role development

• Actively thinks about gender and if their gender should do something

Gender social learning theory

Promotes gender typed behaviors

Piaget’s theory of development in middle childhood

Concrete operational Stage (7-11 years)

Concrete operational Stage

• Cognitive Achievements

  • Conservation

    • Decentration

      • two attributes in mind at the same time

    • Reversibility

  • Classification

    • group objects based on certain characteristics

  • Seriation

    • Transitive inference

      • some 6 year old’s, most 8 year old’s

Limitations of concrete operational thought

• Operations work best with objects that are concrete

  • Problems with abstract ideas

• Horizontal Decalage

  • Development withing a Piagetian stage, gradual mastery of logical concepts

  • number, length, liquid, mass conservation in that order

Self-Concept in Middle Childhood

Refinement of self concept

• Describe selves in terms of personality traits

• Emphasize competencies

• Frequent social comparisons

  • Judgements of their appearances, abilities, and behavior in relation to others

• Self descriptions now include reference to social groups

Self Esteem in middle childhood

• Preschoolers: very high self esteem

• Middle Childhood: Adjusts to more realistic level

• Why?

  • Receive feedback from peers and teachers

  • Social Comparisons

Hierarchical Structure of self esteem in middle childhood

1. Academic Competence

   1. Math reading other subjects

2. Social Competence

   1. Relationships with peers

3. Physical/Athletic competence

   1. Team sports running dance

4. Physical appearance

   1. Height weight, facial features

Self Esteem and motivation

• Children with high self esteem and academic motivation make mastery oriented attributions

  • hold an incremental view of ability

  • believe that abilities can be improved by putting in effort and practice

• Other children display learned helplessness

  • Have gotten used to failure and believe it is inevitable

  • Attribute failure to ones own lack of ability

  • attribute success to luck

Parent and Teacher Influences on Achievement related attributions

• Person Praise: emphasizes child’s traits (you’re so strong)

• Process Praise: Emphasizes behavior and effort ( you really spent a lot of time on that!)

Teachers who emphasize learning over grades tend to have mastery oriented students

Development of Peer Sociability

Middle Childhood and Adolescence

• More advanced Theory of Mind and perspective taking

• More peer communication

• More prosocial behavior

• Rough and tumble play

• Dominance hierarchy

  • ordering of group members that predicts who will win when conflict arises

Parental Influences on Peer relations

1. Direct

   1. Arrange informal peer activities

   2. Guidance on how to act towards others

   3. monitoring activities

2. Indirect

   1. Secure attachment

   2. Authoritative parenting

   3. Parent-Child Play

   4. Parent’s own social network

Thinking about Friendship

• Handy playmate (4-7 years)

• Mutual trust and assistance (8-10 years)

• Intimacy, mutual understanding and loyalty (11-15 years)

Selectivity and Stability of friendships

• More selective with age

  • From 4-6 best friends to 1-2 in adolescence

• Remarkably stable at all ages

  • younger children are more dependent on environment

  • middle childhood, 50-70% endure over a school and many for several years

  • Friendships that cut across multiple contexts tend to be the most stable

Interactions between friends

• Compared to non-friends, friends have more

  • positive interactions

  • emotional expression

  • prosocial behavior

  • self disclosure

• Also more disagreement and competition

  • aggressive friends can lead to hostile relationship

Benefits of friendship

• Opportunities to explore self

• Form deep understanding of another

• Foundations for future intimate relationships

• help deal with life stress

• Can improve attitude and school involvement

Peer Acceptance

• Likability

• Extent to which a child is viewed by a group of agemates as a worthy social partner

• SOCIOMETRICS: research techniques that measures children’s social preferences (Peer nomination)

Peer acceptance categories

• Popular: popular prosocial, popular antisocial

• Rejected: Rejected aggressive, rejected withdrawn

• Controversial

• Neglected

Popular – get many positive votes and are well liked

Rejected – get many negative votes (dislked)

Controversal – receive many votes, postive and negative and are liked and disliked

Neglected – seldom mentioned either positively or negatively

Average – receive average number of positive and negative votes

Neglected children tend to be well adjusted

Determinants of peer acceptance

• Popular prosocial

  • Academically and socially competent, solve social problems constructively, friendly

• Popular antisocial

  • Tough kids who defy authority, relationally aggressive, may be athletically skilled “cool”

• Rejected Aggressive

  • Negative social behaviors, high aggression and conflict, impulsive, hyperactive

  • may become bullies

• Rejected withdrawn

  • Passive, socially awkward, socially anxious

  • may become victims

Both types of rejected children are at risk for peer harassment

Bullies

• Most are boys

• physically, relationally aggressive

• high status, powerful, popular

• eventually become disliked

Victims

• Passive when should be active

• Give in to demands

• lack defenders

• inhibited temperament

• physically frail

• overprotected, controlled by parents

Cliques

• Small Groups of 5-7

• good friends

• identified by interests, social status

  • popular vs unpopular

Crowd

• Larger, several cliques

• membership based on reputation, stereotype

Adolescence

• Transitioning between childhood and adulthood

• Puberty occurs in beginning of adolescence

• Length varies among cultures

  • Tribal societies have shorter phase

  • industrialized societies have longer phases

    • early adolescense (11-14)

    • Middle adolescence (14-16)

    • Late adolescence (16-18)

Puberty

Biological events that lead to an adult body and sexual maturity

Adolescent Brain development: Prefrontal cortex

• Prefrontal cortex development

  • the governor of thought and action

  • prefrontal cortex becomes a more effective executive (managing and integrating brain areas)

  • Executive function is still developing

    • tasks requiring inhibition, planning, future orientation

Greater linkage between cerebral hemispheres and better communication between other brain areas

Adolescent risk taking development

• Neurons are more responsive to excitatory neurotransmitters as a result of puberty

  • drive for novel experiences

  • react strongly to stressful events

  • experience pleasurable stimuli more intensely

  • sensitive to social stimuli (peer pressure)

• Changes in the brains social/emotional network outpace development of the cognitive-control network which leads to increased risk taking

  • drugs, reckless driving, unprotected sex,

Adolescent Sleep Development

• Changes in the brain regulation of sleep timing

  • Increased neural sensitivity to evening light, circadian delay, stay up later

  • stay up later but can’t sleep in because of HS start times

  • Sleep deprivation

    • Sluggish cognitive performance

    • anxiety, irritability, depressed mood

    • Lower academic performance

How much sleep do teens need?

9 hours

sleep rebound on weekends leads to difficulty falling asleep on sunday which makes the cycle worse

Piaget’s Formal Operational Stage

• Abstract thought

• 11+ years old

• Hypothetico Deductive Reasoning

  • Deductive hypotheses from a general theory

  • Pendulum problem

• Propositional thought

  • Evaluating the logic of verbal propositions

  • if… then…

Consequences of abstract and egocentric though for teens

Self conscious and self focusing

• Imaginary audience (everyone ins watching me)

• Personal Fable

  • nobody knows what this is like

Adolescent cognitive development: Information Processing

Cognitive gains

• More selective attention

• inhibition improves

• strategies more effective for encoding and retrieval

• knowledge increases

• metacognition and problem solving improves

• cognitive self regulation improves (Redirecting, thinking, monitoring, evaluation)

• Working memory increases

• processing speed increases

From cliques to dating

• Boys and girls cliques come together

• mixed sex cliques hang out

• groups of several couples forms and spend time together

• individual couples

Changes in dating during adolescence

• Goals change throughout adolescence

  • Early: recreation, group activities, shallow intimacy

  • Gradually look for more intimacy

• Relations with parents, friends contribute to internal working models for dating

The Identity puzzle Erikson stage

Identity vs. role confusion

• adolescence is the time when individuals must initiate the process of identity formation, attempting to resolve their identity in both the personal and social spheres in order to form an adult identity

Four stages of adolescent identity formation proposed by Marcia

Emerging adulthood stage of development

• New transitional developmental period from the late teens to the mis 20s (18-25)

• Jeffrey Arnett (2011) defines this stage by 5 features

1. Feeling in between

2. identity exploration

3. Self Focused

4. Instability

5. Possibilities

How has the cultural change and variation contributed to emerging adulthood?

• Higher education delays financial independence and career commitment

• Gains in life expectancy in prosperous nations → less pressure on young people’s labor → more time for moratorium

• Strong association with SES and higher education

Brain Development in Emerging Adulthood

• Further brain development in the prefrontal cortex

  • Fine tuning of neural networks

  • planning, reasoning, decision making

• Further connections between prefrontal cortex and other brain regions

• Further experience-dependent brain growth as a result of specialized work/ education experiences

Piaget’s Postformal Thought

• Cognitive development beyond formal operations

• College students encounter new ideas, freedoms, opportunities that combine with personal effort to promote thinking that is increasingly…

  • Rational flexible

  • practical

  • accepting of uncertainties

  • variable across situations

• Adolescent thinking is more idealistic

Cognitive changes “Epistemic Cognition

• William Perry (1981) work on students reflections on knowing

  • students thinking about how they arrived at certain knowledge (facts, belief)

• Gradual transition

1. Dualistic thinking

2. Relativistic thinking

3. Commitment within relativistic thinking

Erikson’s Intimacy vs. Isolation

• Young adults (19-40) have need to form intimate, loving relationships with other people

• Those who have not developed a sense of identity may retreat or have trouble forming lasting intimate or romantic relationships

Romantic Relationships (General Trends)

• Longer lasting than adolescence

• Involved greater trust, support, commitment, emotional closeness

• May take time to forge a committed relationship

• By age 25 nearly all people are sexually active

• Emerging adults have more sexual partners than adults in their 30s

• Partner similarity, good communication, and a secure internal working model of attachment predict happy, lasting relationships

Romantic relationships in College

Uncommitted sexual encounters, hookups, friends with benefits

• two thirds report at least one hook up

• ¼ report 10+

• Associated with other risk taking behaviors (drugs alcohol, unprotected sex)

Romantic relationships: Dating, cohabitation, Marriage

• More that 1/3 of single adults use dating websites

  • 2nd most common way of meeting a partner, behind being introduced through friends

  • Prolonged computer mediated communication can lead to “idealizing” and disappointment face-to-face

• Cohabitation in the preferred “mode of entry” into a committed relationship for 70% of romantic partners under age 30

• Committed partners report more satisfying sexual encounters than single people

• Married couples are on average, more financially stable, and more physically and mentally healthy than unmarried individuals

Work Life

Emerging adults’ work experiences increasingly focus on preparation for adult work roles

Construct a “dream”

• Men: a career (independent achiever)

• Women: Career and marriage and concerns about combining work and family responsibilities

What helps emerging adults meet their goals?

• relationships with mentors

• quality of higher education

  • many colleges are not rigorous enough to support success in the work world

Religious and spiritual development

• In emerging adulthood, attendance at religious services drops to its lowest level of the lifespan

  • less pressure form parents

  • question own beliefs

  • identity development

• Many begin to construct their own individualized faith

• As with adolescents, emerging adults who are religious or spiritual, tend to be better adjusted

  • Less depression/anxiety

  • higher self esteem

  • more community service

  • less risky behavior

50% of U.S. young people remain stable in their religious commitment (or lack thereof) from adolescence into emerging adulthood

Of the small number of individuals who increase in religosity during emerging adulthood, most are women, hispanic, and african american

Risk and resilience in emerging adulthood

Risks

• Lack of direction

• High anxiety

• loneliness

• risky behaviors

• social disengagement

• academic problems

Resilience

• Cognitive attributes

  • planning, decision making

  • academic achievement

• Emotional and social attributes

  • self esteem

  • conflict resolution skills

  • emotional self regulation

• Social Supports

  • Parents, friends, teachers, mentors

Erikson’s Theory

1. Trust vs. Mistrust

   1. Age: Birth–1 year

   2. Conflict: Can I rely on others to meet my needs?

   3. Key idea: Consistent, responsive caregiving leads to trust; inconsistent care leads to mistrust.

   4. Outcome: Hope

2. Autonomy vs. shame and doubt

   1. Age: 1–3 years

   2. Conflict: Can I do things on my own?

   3. Key idea: Toddlers seek independence (walking, toilet training). Support leads to autonomy; overcontrol leads to shame/doubt.

   4. Outcome: Will

3. Initiative vs. Guilt

   1. Age: 3–6 years (early childhood)

   2. Conflict: Can I take initiative and plan activities?

   3. Key idea: Encouragement of play and leadership fosters initiative; criticism leads to guilt.

   4. Outcome: Purpose

4. Industry vs inferiority

   1. Age: 6–11 years (middle childhood)

   2. Conflict: Am I competent?

   3. Key idea: Success in school and tasks leads to industry; repeated failure leads to inferiority.

   4. Outcome: Competence

5. Identity vs confusion

   1. Age: Adolescence (≈12–18)

   2. Conflict: Who am I?

   3. Key idea: Teens explore values, beliefs, and goals. Successful exploration leads to identity; lack of exploration leads to role confusion.

   4. Outcome: Fidelity

6. Intimacy vs isolation

   1. Age: Young adulthood (≈18–25/30)

   2. Conflict: Can I form close relationships?

   3. Key idea: Ability to form deep, committed relationships results in intimacy; failure leads to isolation.

   4. Outcome: Love

Piaget’s Stages

1. Sensorimotor stage

   1. 0-2

   2. explore through senses and motor actions

2. Preoperational

   1. 2-7

   2. Symbolic thought: Use of words, images, pretend play

   3. Egocentrism: Difficulty seeing others’ perspectives

   4. Centration: Focus on one aspect of a situation

   5. Animistic thinking: Belief that inanimate objects have lifelike qualities

   6. Irreversibility: Cannot mentally reverse actions

3. Concrete Operational

   1. 7-11

   2. Conservation: Understanding quantity remains the same despite changes in appearance

   3. Decentration: Focus on multiple aspects of a problem

   4. Reversibility: Can mentally undo actions

   5. Classification: Ability to group objects into categories

   6. Seriation: Ordering objects by size or number

   7. Passing inclusion tasks

4. Formal Operational

   1. 11+

   2. Abstract thought: Thinking beyond concrete objects

   3. Hypothetico-deductive reasoning: Formulating and testing hypotheses

   4. Propositional thought: Evaluating logic of statements without real-world reference

   5. Scientific reasoning

   6. Pendulum problem: Systematic testing of variables

5. Post operational

Which of the following is a cognitive limitation for children in Piaget’s stage of Concrete Operations?

inability to think abstractly

Maria sees the boys playing dodgeball at recess and thinks to herself, "I'm not going to play dodgeball because I'm not a boy and only the boys play dodgeball at recess." Maria is demonstrating _____________ when she decides not to play.

gender schema theory

One explanation for why concrete operational children pass conservation tasks is that they display

decentered thinking

In Erikson's fourth stage, children have a desire to be productive and to use their new skills of reading and writing that they are learning in school. They are driven to "make things and do things" well. This middle childhood stage of Erikson's theory is called __________ vs. Inferiority.

Industry

A child who believes that students who read the most independent reading books should get more prizes from the treasure box than students who read fewer books is in the MERIT stage of distributive justice.

True

James feels guilty after stealing a dollar from his mother's purse. The guilt that James feels is considered which component of morality?

emotional

Many children are taught to have good manners at the dinner table, to hold doors for others, and to respect their elders. These standards are examples of

Social Conventions

Aidan shoved Billy on the playground at daycare because Billy said he wasn't good at kickball. Which form of aggression did Aidan display?

hostile

Self-concept in middle childhood often includes the social groups to which children belong (sports teams, clubs, scouting groups etc.).

True

Which of the following is NOT a true statement about peer relationships during middle childhood?

Kids in middle childhood are in the "handy playmate" stage of friendship.

Abstract thought

• Ability to think about ideas and concepts that are not physically present

• Goes beyond concrete objects and experiences

• Examples:

  • Thinking about justice, freedom, love

  • Solving algebraic equations (e.g., x + 3 = 7)

• Contrast: Children in earlier stages need concrete, visible objects

Hypothetico Deductive reasoning

• Ability to generate hypotheses and systematically test them

• Thinking logically about “what could be” rather than just “what is”

• Involves:

  1. Forming a hypothesis

  2. Testing one variable at a time

  3. Drawing logical conclusions

• This is a hallmark of formal operational thinking

Pendulum Problem

• Classic task used by Piaget to test hypothetico-deductive reasoning

• Task: Determine what makes a pendulum swing faster or slower

• Possible variables:

  • Length of the string

  • Weight of the object

  • Height of release

• Correct approach: Change one variable at a time

• Finding: Adolescents (formal operational stage) systematically test variables; younger children try random combinations

Propositional thought

• Ability to evaluate the logic of a statement without needing real-world confirmation

• Focuses on whether a statement is logically valid, not whether it is true in reality

• Example:

  • “If dogs are purple and purple things fly, then dogs can fly.”

  • Even though it’s unrealistic, the logic is correct

• Emerges in the formal operational stage

4 Revolutions

1. Technology revolution

   1. manufacturing economy → knowledge economy

2. Sexual Revolution

   1. birth control has broken the link between sexuality and marriage and parenthood

3. Women’s Movement

   1. Women are in college just as much as men

   2. changed how women thought about their lives

   3. delay marriage, progress in career

4. Youth Movement

   1. Adulthood is less a status of responsibility

   2. Adulthood is diminished, young people prolonged their youth