L08 Cognitive Development
What is qualitative development?
When a person develops, their psychology changes abruptly from one stage to the next.
What is quantitative development?
When a person gradually develops their psychology.
Two opposing schools of thought.
Two main questions that have to do with developmental psychology.
What kind of development happens in stages. What happens continuously?
What are the effects of nature and nurture on development?
Nature and Nurture require each other. Modern perspective.
Nature vs Nurture is genetics vs experience.
What is maturation?
A series of genetically determined biological processes that enable orderly growth.
Different research methods:
What is cross-sectional design?
Study development by comparing participants of different age groups to another at a point in time
Ex. If you compare motor skills of 10yr olds today vs 20 yr olds today
Helps us understand which abilities at different points in life span
More accurate for participants closer in age
Ex. Language acquisition in babies of 10 months vs 22 months
Drawback: Cohort effect, effect or difference due to an age group sharing a common set of life experiences
What is longitudinal design?
Track individuals at different time points and look for differences across timepoints
Ex. Take 20 yrs olds today, track same group over next few decades
Ex. Track 6 month year olds to like 12 months
Advantage: Allow confidence in people changing over time, answer first question (stages vs continual development)
Drawback: Requires a lot of time and resources
Drawback: Attention span of participants, or participants do a pre-mature withdraw (ex. death)
Drawback: Only examines one generation
What is sequential design?
A combo of the two
Tracking multiple age groups across multiple points of time
Ex. Compare motor skills 10 yr to 20 yr olds today, then test same people again in 30 yrs
Allow different age groups to themselves and others over time
Advantage: Ensures changes are due to developmental and not cohort effect
Drawback: Costly, takes a long time
Conclusion: Methods work best when tracking across shorter segments of lifespan. Longer span, worse results.
What is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome?
Challenges: Learning disorders, deformations in facial structure, behavioural issues, small physical stature
What are teratogens?
Has to do with epigenetics
Environmental agents interfere with typical development
Ex. Chemicals in the air, nuclear waste,
Probably when in the womb, similar to fetal alcohol syndrome. ALCOHOL IS A TERATOGEN.
What is object permanence?
Awareness that objects have continued existence even when an object is temporarily out of sight.
Has to do with development of frontal lobe, area that matures the slowest. Has to do with rational planning, decision making, working memory. The area of the brain fastest are the ones that process sensory information, like occipital.
What is social referencing?
A process of relying on facial expressions of others to provide information on how to react to a situation.
What is separation anxiety?
Begins to emerge between 6-8 months
Indication that an infant has formed an attachment to a caregiver (attachment = a strong, enduring bond)
What is imprinting?
When attachment is established early in life
Attachment to first organism it sees
Ex. Taking care of baby duck would lead to the baby duck staying with you for life.
What are the different times of attachment styles?
Secure-attachment: 60% of infants in North-America can be categorized this way
Children with a secure attachment relationship use caregiver as a secure base
When caregiver leaves, children shows minor distress
Insecure-attachment:
Child does not use caregiver as a secure base
Not reassured after separation between them and caregiver
Two kinds:
Insecure avoidant: 15% of kids in North America have this
Child will act distant from caregiver while caregiver present
Sometimes they search for caregiver when caregivers leaves
When caregiver returns, child ignores
All a mask and a facade, when caregiver leaves, child becomes stressed and heart rate rises
Prominent in cultures that emphasize independence (like America)
Insecure ambivalent: 10% of kids in North America have this
Kids do not explore, no matter, by themselves, stay by their caregiver always
When caregiver leaves, kid becomes very upset
Upon reunion, they act ambivalent (run to caregiver, then cry to be picked up, then kick and slap to get down)
Ambivalent is very bipolar
Most prominent in cultures that emphasize interdependence (China, Vietnam, Japan, Korea)
Operation: Ability to mentally manipulate schema.
Ex. Ability to imagine the consequences of an action before you perform an action.
What are schema?
Units of knowledge that represent our experiences and are used to guide how we interpret new information.
What is assimilation?
Using existing schema to interpret new experience
What is accommodation?
Update, revise existing schema to incorporate new experience.
What is Piaget’s Theory?
Two key processes for aligning new knowledge with understanding of the world. See two above (assimilation, accommodation)
What is Sensorimotor Stage?
Differentiates self from objects
Achieves object permanence: realizes that objects continue to exist even when no longer present to the senses
What is Preoperational Period?
Learns to use language and to represent objects with images and words
Classifies objects by a single feature; for example, groups blocks by color (rather than shape or size)
Do not have these abilities of mentally manipulating schema. Do not have conservation. Cannot understand the mass remaining the same. Lack of understanding comes from lack of prefrontal cortex development. Meaning kids cannot overcome impulse, they may break rules often. Rigid thinkers.
What is the Concrete operational stage?
Can think logically about concrete objects
Achieves conservation of number, mass, and weight
What is the Formal operational stage?
Can think logically about abstract propositions
Becomes concerned with the possible as well as the real
What is the language acquisition device?
Built in tool in our brain to learn language. Allows us to pick up language around us. Innate. Allow us to learn our first language.
What are Kohlberg’s Stages of Development?
People progress in stages of moral reasoning:
Preconventional stage
Before 9 yrs old
Tend to focus on self-interests
Avoid punishment and gain reward
Conventional stage
9-12 yrs old
Moral judgements are made based on caring for others and upholding social rules and laws
Post-conventional stage
Where our moral judgements are based on ideals and broad moral principles
What is egocentrism?
Children in preoperational period. Difficulty perceiving situations from another point of view. Difficulty thinking about object or situation perceived by another person.
What is the theory of mind?
Understanding us and other people have minds. Our minds represent the world in different ways. These representations of the world can explain and predict how others will behave.