Exam 3 PSYC 2400

concepts

general ideas or understandings that can be used to group together object, events, qualities, or abstractions that are similar in some way
*allow us to generalize from prior experience

Perceptual categorization refers to:

grouping together objects with similar appearances
*key element in infant's thinking
-color, size, movement, etc
-often based on parts of object rather than whole (legs, wheels)
*infants form categories of objects in the first months of life (3-4 months)

Infant categorization at 3 months

perceptual categorization: color, size movement
-as infants age and develop, there becomes a mechanism of change
-group cats belonging in a single cateogry, but they can distinguish between dogs and cats

Categorization at 1-2 years

overall shape and function

categorization at 4-5 years

causal understanding: relating features and functions to why they exist

Categories of objects: Toddlers

by 2 years old children increasingly use OVERALL SHAPE (LINGUISTIC SHAPE BIAS)
-also use function to categorize, and use category membership to predict which actions go with type of objects
*don't generalize that all objects make sounds; if given a completely different object, they won't assume it does the same as a rubber ducky (noises)

Categories of Objects: Preschoolers

-4-5 years of age, causal understanding becomes important for children's categorization
-causal description: features have functions
*children given a causal description categorized pictures better than children who were given only a physical description

Category Hierarchies

Superordinate (animals)-\> basic (dog cat)-\> Subordinate (husky, siamese cat)
*basic level category learned first
-objects at this level share many common characteristics, are easy to discriminate from one another

Naive psychology refers to

a commonsense level of understanding oneself and others
*children as young as 3 can have this
-UNDERSTAND THAT BEHAVIOR IS GOVERNED BY BELIEFS AND DESIRES

young children's naive psychology

-infants 1 y.o. can connect desires to behavior (expect experimenter to play with toy they exclaimed over)

2 year old toddlers show evidence of aspects of psychological understanding

intention, joint attention, intersubjectivity

intention

the goal of acting in a certain way

joint attention

2+ people focus deliberately on the same referent

intersubjectivity

the mutual understanding that people share during communication

Theory Of Mind

a well-organized understanding of how the mind works and how it influences behavior
*5 year olds find false belief problems very easy (crayon box example\-- actually has graham crackers in it)

True or False: Children with very different cultural practices nevertheless perform similarly on false-belief tasks

TRUE

How Does Theory of Mind develop?

1. there is a theory of mind module (TOMM), a hypothesized brain mechanism devoted to understanding other human beings
2. interaction with other people are crucial for developing theory of mind
3. general info-processing skills are necessary for children to understand people's minds

There is a theory of mind module, a hypothesized brain mechanism devoted to understanding other human beings

core knowledge

interactions with other people are crucial for developing theory of mind

sociocultural theories

ASD and theory of mind

children with ASD:
-prefer to look at objects over faces
-have trouble with joint attention
-show less distress when others seem distress
-continue to have difficulty solving false-belief tasks even as teens
*may have impaired "MIND READING MECHANISMS"
-interferes with many aspects of social functioning

abstraction

any set of discrete (separated) objects can be counted

order irrelevance

the order in which objects are counted does not impact number of objects

stable order

the count list has a stable order, and must be recited in that order when counting objects
(1,2,3,4,5 NOT 1,5,3,2,4)

one-to-one correspondence

apply a single number label to a single object when counting

cardinality

the last number recited in a count list (when applied to a set) represents the number of objects in the set

successor function

each successive word in the count list refers to a set of size n+1 (relative to the set size referred to by previous \# word in count list)

early number concepts

5 month olds understand numerical equality for sets of 1, 2, and 3 objects or events
(habituated when puppet jumps two times but dishabituated when puppet jumps one or three times)

6 month olds versus 9 month olds in early number concepts

6 month olds discriminate sets with 2:1 ratios (8 vs 4)
9 month olds discriminate sets with 1.5:1 ratios (12 vs 8)

Some representations of number do not require language

-small exact numbers (1, 2, 3)
(monkeys and human infants can track up to 3 objects)
-4 and greater (large approximation numbers) analogue magnitude system: approximates 20ish

Homesigners

-are deaf and do not acquire the spoken language around them
-live in nicaragua: DO NOT interact with each other and have not acquired the Nicaraguan Sign Language
-create gestures to communicate

True or False: a person needs language to develop a concept like eight

TRUE

Typically developing children versus homesigners

normal children: words first then meaning (so they know one, two three words)
homesigners: meaning then words (so they understand what one means, and then find the word one)

Summary of Homesigners

-around when they learn "Four" they induce cardinality principle
-cannot represent large exact numbers without a count list

The debate between nativists and empiricists reflects a fundamental, unresolved question about human nature

Do children form all concepts through the same mechanisms, or do they possess special mechanisms for forming a few particularly important concepts?

Nativists differ from empiricists in that nativists believe that children are born with:

a sense of the concept of time

the parent of Liz, a 2 year old are trying to teach her what hammers are. Which of the following actions would be most likely to help her learn this new category?

demonstrating what hammers do

the basic understanding of desires, beliefs, perceptions and emotions is referred to as a theory of

mind

research has suggested that pretend play and sociodramatic play:

contribute to advancements in children's psychological understanding

which of the following groups lists the three objects in subordinate/basic/superordinate order

sedan/car/vehicle

critics of the conclusion that infants understand arithmetic argue that infants instead rely on

subitizing

differences between the counting abilities of preschoolers in China and US appear to indicate

differences in language can affect the rate of development of the ability to count

the development of a theory of mind is most severely impaired for

children with autism

grouping together objects that have similar appearances if referred to as

perceptual categorization

Homesigners (three theories)

Core knowledge: some aspects of number representations seem to be innate
Sociocultural: exact representation of more than 4 requires language
Gene-Environment Interaction: needs to be acquired in a time sensitive period

Which is false?
-the modern notion of IQ has its roots in public education in France
-traditional views of intelligence in the early 1900s focused on the ability to form simple associations
-binet thought the most accurate way to assess children's intelligence was to poll their teachers

binet thought the most accurate way to assess children's intelligence was to poll their teachers

Alfred Binet (1904)

predict individual differences in school performance; id children who needed special attention
-credited with developing Intelligence Quotient (IQ)
-older view was simple skills lead to associations but Binet said theres problem solving, reasoning and judgement

Which is true?
-intelligence is a single entity that is common to all intellectual tasks
-there are two types of intelligence: crystallized and fluid
-intelligence is comprised of numerous mental abilities

all are true

intelligence as a single trait

-each individual possesses a certain amount of g (general intelligence)
-measures of g correlate with:
*indicators of school achievement
*info-processing speed
*speed of neural transmission in the brain
*knowledge of subjects not studied in school

crystallized intelligence

factual knowledge about the world (increases as you get older)

fluid intelligence

the ability to think on the spot to solve problems (declines with age after it peaks in adulthood)

Which is false?
-fluid intelligence is the ability to think on one's feet
-crystallized intelligence is innate (core knowledge)
-measures within each type of knowledge correlate more highly with each other than with measures of the other type of intelligence
-crystallized intelligence increases with age
-fluid intelligence declines slowly after adulthood

crystallized intelligence is innate (core knowledge)

intelligence as numerous processes (8 processes)

remembering, perceiving, planning, comprehending, solving problems, encoding, reasoning, forming concepts

John Carroll's Three stratum theory of intelligence

-combines all the ideas of intelligence; fluid/crystallized, g as a single concept\-- branches out to more specific processes
-integrates all into one single theory

Measuring intelligence

you cannot directly measure it, you have to measure certain aspects of it

Wechsler Intelligence test for children (WISC)

-6 years old and up; most widely used
-gives overall score comprising of 4 tests:
*verbal comprehension (how are a mtn and a river alike)
*perceptual reasoning (take colored blocks and create an overall design)
*working memory (ability to repeat numbers)
*processing/perceptual speed (how quickly can they cross out all the triangles)

Intelligence Quotient

quantitative measure of a child's intelligence to that of other children of the same age
-bell curve
*WISC and Stanford-Binet tests produce IQ scores
-standardized for children of different ages
-advantage\-- IQs at different ages are easy to compare

The normal distribution of the bell curve...

-68% of scores fall within 1 standard deviation of the mean
-95% of scores fall within 2 standard deviations

IQ scores as a predictor of outcomes

-strong predictor of academic, economic, and occupational stress
-IQ is more closely related to later occupational stress than SES, school attended or any other variable study
*motivation, creativity, heath, social skills etc also influence stress

IQ and education interact to affect income

-IQ definitely is impact by education, but even the highest IQ's in High school quintile have the potential of making more than the dumbest from 2 year and 4 year colleges
*you can get a better job with school but doesn't make you smarter

self discipline

the ability to inhibit actions, follow rules, and avoid impulsive reactions GRIT
-predicts 8th graders grades over IQ

practical intelligence

mental abilities not measured on IQ tests
-predicts occupational stress over IQ
-social component

Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences

IQ test isn't good enough to constitute what intelligence is, he proposed different types of intelligences
(ex. spatial, kinesthetic, musical, naturalistic, intra and inter personal)
-evidence: deficits in people with brain injury, child prodigies
-educational application: children learn best if instruction builds on their intellectual strengths
-CAVEAT: children learn best from info in multiple modalities
-emotional regulation is very important, if they can't control themselves, then its disruptive for everyone that's learning

Continuity of IQ scores

-from age 5, scores show continuity
-scores more stable at older ages, kids become more similar to each other over time

Sternberg's Theory of Successful Intelligence

intelligence is: ability to achieve success in life
-relative to personal and cultural standards
-success depends on:
-analytical ability: traditional IQ skills
-practical abilities: reasoning
-creative abilities: application flexibility

TRUE OR FALSE: does schooling improve IQ

true

genetic contributions to intelligence

the genetic contribution to intelligence is greater in older children than younger ones (based on twin studies) because some genetic processes do not impact IQ until later childhood and adolescence (neural activity)
-children increasingly select environments compatible with their own genetically based preferences (if a child likes to read, then they'll go to a place where they can read)

Genotype-Environment Interactions

-children's environment partially influenced by their genotype
-Sandra Scarr: effects of the genotype arise because of passive effects, evocative effects, and active effects

passive effects

overlap between parents' and children's genes

evocative effects

children elicit or influence other people's behavior

active effects

children choose environments they enjoy

HOME

home observation for measurement of the environment: measure of family influences
-IQ scores are positively correlated with the quality of their family environment as measured by the HOME

Does a better home environment cause higher IQ's?

WE CAN'T TELL

Why can't we tell?

The HOME is rarely used with adoptive families, correlations between HOME and IQ are lower for adoptive children than for biological children
-a child's home environment is alos affected by parent's genetic makeup

Cahan and Cahan

CHildren only slightly older but who had a year more schooling did better on parts of an IQ test
*IQ and achievement test scores rise during the academic year and drop during the summer

The Flynn Effect

average IQ scores have risen over past 70 years in many countries due to nutrition, health care, and access to education
-effect mostly seen in lower IQ groups

Environmental Risk Scale

features of the environment that put children at risk for lower IQ
-low SES, 4+ children, maternal anxiety
-scores on ERS: negatively correlated with IQ
-stable over time
-related to changes in the child's IQ over time

Interventions to improve IQ:

sometimes show initial gains in IQ that are lost after the program ends

Carolina Abecedarian Project

-6 months to 5 years of age
-very rigorous, 5 days a week, 50 weeks out of a year, day care type program with education intervention
-parent education: nutrition, health care, child development

Positive effects of the Carolina Abecedarian Project did not include

-lower morbidity rates for participants
(but it did include: gains in IQ that lasted after the program ended, benefits to the mothers of children that participated, more positive mother-child interactions at home)

Results of abcedarian project

-at 21 years, treatment IQ\> control IQ
-lower rates of special education, being held back, arrest
-positive effects on moms (esp teen moms)
-no effects for kids with college grad moms

Language (sign or spoken) is both species-specific and species-universal, reading is:

species-specific

phonemic awareness

ability to id component sounds with spoken words (birth until beginning of first grade)

phonological recoding skills

the ability to translate letters into sounds and to blend the sounds into words (sounding out) first and second graders

reading development

-most middle income children learn the names of letters of the alphabet before they enter school
-no causal relationship between early mastery of letter names and reading achievement (but positively correlated)
-phonemic awareness is both correlated with later reading achievement and a cause of it

Phonemic Awareness

-understanding that words have parts (syllables)
-knowledge of individual sounds in words

Words are identified in 2 main ways

phonological recoding
visually based retrieval

Dyslexia is most strongly linked to

problems with phonological processing

Based on research, whose IQ score would reflect the strongest contribution of their genes

Tom, age 15 (every other age was younger)

Dr. Knowit is a well-known scientist. If you were to categorize his intelligence based on Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences, which type of intelligence would you expect Dr. Knowit to score high in?

logical

Greater math achievement comes from:

understanding math concepts

How many components does Gardner include in his multiple intelligence theory?

8

If Roger, a student in elementary school, is very good at doing puzzles, identifying which object doesn't belong, and thinking on the spot, he is showing a high type of what kind of intelligence?

fluid intelligence

Jan takes an IQ test at ages 7 and 9. Mike takes an IQ test at ages 5 and 9. Mark takes an IQ test at ages 7 and 10. Jane takes an IQ test at ages 5 and 8. Which child's IQ scores are most likely to be more positively correlated?

Jan\-- ages are closer together

Mr. and Mrs. Goal have two children, Tony and Trina. Both kids have soccer games on Saturday morning. Both parents want to attend the games but cannot be in two places at once. Mr. Goal thinks about the problem and eventually comes up with a solution—attending one child's game this week and the other child's next week. According to Sternberg's theory of successful intelligence, Mr. Goal is using:

practical abilities

Mr. and Mrs. Novel want to do everything possible to foster little Tina's pre-reading skills so that she will later be in the highest reading group in her class. What pre-reading skill should they work on developing?

phonemic awareness

Resilient children usually have parents who:

-are responsive to their needs.
-provide safe play areas.
-provide their child with a variety of learning materials.
\***All of these answers are characteristic of parents of resilient children.

Summer vacation! Everyone at Bass Elementary School is looking forward to a break. The children are ready for summer fun activities—swimming, baseball, and summer camp. What will most likely happen to math achievement test scores over the summer?

scores will decrease

Which factor is NOT associated with increases over time in a child's IQ?

being friends with popular kids

Which is NOT one of Thurstone's primary mental abilities?

comprehension

Which is NOT related to a child's IQ?

-level of emotional support
-family income
-inadequate diet
\***All of these answers is related to a child's IQ.