Development

Developmental Psychology - the study of continuity and change across the life span

Prenatal Development

Prenatality - 200 million sperm made the journey from a male, through a woman’s vagina, through her uterus, and onto her fallopian tubes. Of those 200 million, a mere 200 found the correct fallopian tube and got close enough to the egg to fertilize it. Only 1 fertilized it

Zygote - a fertilized egg that contains chromosomes from both a sperm and an egg

• Each human sperm and egg contain 23 chromosomes (the 23rd can either by X or Y) - the egg is always X, but the sperm can be X or Y
• If the egg is pertilized with a Y sperm, the zygote is male XY
• If the egg is pertilized with a X sperm, the zygote is female XX

Germinal Stage - the 2-week period of prenatal development that begins at conception

• In this stage, the zygote divides itself into 2-cells (the division continues…)
  • so the time you were born, you contained trillions of cells
• Zygote migrates back down the fallopian tube to the wall of the uterus
• One half of zygotes don’t make it (male zygotes are less likely)

Embyronic Stage - the period of prenatal development that lasts from the 2nd week until the 8th week

• Cells begin to differentiate
• At 1-inch-long, the embryo has a beating heart and body parts

Fetal Stage - the period of prenatal development that lasts from the 9th week until birth

• Has skeletal muscles making it capable of movement
• Develops a layer of insulating fat beneath its skin
• Myelination - the formation of a fatty sheath around the axons of a neuron

Prenatal Environment

Womb environment has a powerful impact on development

Placenta - organ that physically links the bloodstream of the mother and the embryo/fetus

• Children of mothers that receive insufficient nutrition during pregnancy often have physical and psychological problems
  • Including an increased risk for schizophrenia/antisocial personality
• Womens diet can affect the child’s food preferences
  • Infants tend to like the foods/spices that the mother ate while they were in uterus

Almost anything that the woman is exposed to can pass through the placenta

– Things she eats, drinks, inhales, sniffs, snorts, or rubs on her skin

Teratogens – agents that damage the process of development, such as drugs and viruses

• Include environmental poisons such as lead in the water, paint dust in the air, or mercury in fish

Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) – a developmental disorder that stems from heavy alcohol use by the mother during pregnancy

– Children with FAS have a variety of brain abnormalities and cognitive deficits

Teratogens

• Alcohol (some studies suggest that light drinking does not harm the fetus)
  • There is no consensus on what “light drinking” means
• Tobacco
  • 20% of American mothers admit to smoking during pregnancy
  • Infants are smaller and more likely to have perceptual and attentional problems in childhood
• Secondhand smoke
  • Can lead to reduced birth weight and deficits in attention andlearning

Infancy and Childhood: Motor Development

Infancy – the stage of development that begins at birth and lasts between 18 and 24 months

Motor development - the emergence of the ability to execute physical action

Reflexes - specific patterns of motor response that are triggered by specific patterns of sensory stimulation

• Moro – startle response/reaction
• Walking/stepping – if the soles of their feet touch a flat surface, they will attempt to “walk”
• Rooting – assists the act of breastfeeding
• Palmar grasp – when an object is placed in the infant’s hand and strokes the palm, it is grasped
• Babinski – when the bottom of the foot is touched, the toes move away and the shin curls them down

More sophisticated behaviours follow more general rules

• Cephalocaudal rule – the “top-to-bottom” rule that describes the tendency for motor skills to emerge in sequence from the head to feet
  • Infants can control their heads before their feet
• Proximodistal rule – The “inside-to-outside” rule that describes the tendency for motor skills to emerge in sequence from the center to the periphery
  • Infants can control their trunks before hands and feet

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development

Jean Piaget (1896-1980)

• Saw that children of the same age made the same mistakes
• Suggested that children move through discrete states of cognitive development

Cognitive development - The emergence of the ability to think and understand

Cognitive Development: Sensorimotor Stage

Sensorimotor stage - a stage of development that begins at birth and lasts through infancy in which infants acquire information about the world by sensing it and moving around within it

• Children actively explore environments with their eyes, mouths and fingers (this allows them to construct)

Schemas - theorues about the way the world works

• Assimilation - the process by which infants apply their schemas in novel situations
• Accommodation - the process by which infants revise their schemas in light of new information

Object permanence - the belief that objects continue to exist even when they are not visible (in the first months of life, infants act as though objects no longer exist when they can’t see them)

Cognitive Development: Preoperational Stage

Childhood - the period that begins at about 18-24 months and lasts until 11-14 years

Concrete Operational Stages

• Preoperational stage – the stage of cognitive development that begins at about 2 years and ends at about 6 years, during which children develop a preliminary understanding of the physical world
• Concrete operational stage – the stage of cognitive development that begins at about 6 years and ends at about 11 years, during which children learn how various actions or “operation” can affect or transform “concrete” objects

Conservation – the notion that the quantitative properties of an objects are invariant despite changes in the object’s appearance

• Preoperational children don’t grasp conservation
• Concrete operational children do grasp conservation

Cognitive Development: Formal Operational Stage

Formal operational stage – the final stage of cognitive development that begins around the age of 11, during which children learn to reason about abstract concepts

• The ability to generate, consider, reason about, or mentally “operate on” abstract objects is the hallmark of formal operations

Social Development

Harlow (1958)

• Socially isolated rhesus monkeys for the first 6 months of their lives
• Developed a variety of behavioral problems
  • Compulsively rocked back and forth while biting themselves, avoided contact with new monkeys
• Put monkeys in a cage with two “artificial mothers”
  • One made of wired that dispensed food
  • Another that was made of terrycloth dispensed no food
• Found that the monkeys spent most of their time clinging to the terrycloth mother
  • Only went to the other mother for food

Attatchment

Konrad Lorenz

• Discovered that new hatchlings will faithfully follow the first moving object to which they are exposed
  • If that object is a human being or a tennis ball, the hatchling will ignore its mother and follow that object instead
• Nature designed birds so that the first moving object they saw was imprinted on their brains as “the thing I’m always supposed to stay near”

John Bowlby

• Fascinated by Lorenz’s work
• Goslings have webbed feet and furry hands that allow them to stay close to caregivers
  • Humans are helpless in comparison
• When an infant cries, gurgles, coos, makes eye contact, or smiles, adults reflexively move towards them
• Bowlby posited that this is why infants are designed to emit these signals

Attachment – the emotional bond that forms between newborns and their primary

caregivers

Ainsworth (1978) – developed a way to measure attachment

Strange situation – a behavioral test used to determine a child’s attachment style

• Involves bringing a child and their primary caregiver to a laboratory room and staging a series of episodes
  • In one of these episodes, the primary caregiver briefly leaves the room and returns
  • Psychologist then studies the infant’s reaction
  • Reactions tend to fall into one of four patterns known as attachment styles

Secure attachment style (60% of American infants)

• When the caregiver leaves - Infant may or may not be distressed
• When the caregiver returns
  • Non-distressed infants will acknowledge her with a glance or greeting
  • Distressed infants will go to her and be calmed by her presence

Avoidant attachment style (20% of American infants)

• When the caregiver leaves - Infant will not be distressed
• When the caregiver returns - Infant will not acknowledge her

Ambivalent attachment style (15% of American infants)

• When the caregiver leaves - Infant will be distressed
• When the caregiver returns - The infant will rebuff her, refusing any attempt at calming while arching his or her back and squirming to get away

Disorganized attachment style (5% of American infants)

• Infants show no consistent pattern of response to their caregiver’s leaving and returning

Do attachment styles have any influence on development? (In short, yes!)

• Securely attached infants do better than children who are not securely attached on many measures
  • Psychological well-being
  • Academic achievement
  • Quality of relationships

Moral Development

Lawrence Kohlberg (1958)

• Posited that moral reasoning proceeds through three basic stages
• Based this position on people’s responses to a series of dilemma’s
  • The most popular is the Heinz dilemma

Preconventional stage – a stage of moral development in which the morality of an action is primarily determined by its consequences for the actor

• Most children are in this stage
• Immoral actions are simply those for which one is punished
  • The appropriate resolution to any moral dilemma is to choose the behavior with the least likelihood of punishment
• Children based their moral judgment of Heinz on the relative costs of one decision
  • “It would be bad if he got blamed for his wife’s death”
  • “It would be bad if he went to jail for stealing”

Conventional stage – a stage of moral development in which the morality of an action is primarily determined by the extent to which it conforms to social rules

• They would argue that Heinz must weigh the dishonor he will bring upon himself and his family by
  • Stealing (i.e., breaking the law)
  • Allowing his wife to die (i.e., failing to fulfill a duty)
• Immoral actions are those for which one is condemned

Postconventional stage – a stage of moral development in which the morality of an action is determined by a set of general principles that reflect core values

• These could include the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness
• When a behavior violates these principles, it is immoral
• If the law requires these principles to be violated, then it should be disobeyed

Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development

Erik Erikson (1959)

• Characterized each stage of life by the major task confronting the individual at that stage

Each stage of development has a

• Key conflict
• Challenge or crises
  • Can be resolved either positively or negatively

Oral-sensory stage – birth to 12-18 months

• Key event - Feeding
• Crisis - Trust vs. mistrust
• Positive resolution - Child develops a belief that the environment can be counted on to meet his or her basic physiological and social needs

Muscular-anal stage – 18 months to 3 years

• Key event - Toilet training
• Crisis - Autonomy vs. shame/doubt
• Positive resolution - Child learns what he or she can control and develops a sense of free will and corresponding sense of regret and sorrow for inappropriate use of self-control

Locomotor stage – 3 to 6 years

• Key event - Independence
• Crisis - Initiative vs. guilt
• Positive resolution - Child learns to begin action, to explore, to imagine, and to feel remorse for actions

Latency stage – 6 to 12 years

• Key event - School
• Crisis - Industry vs. inferiority
• Positive resolution - Child learns to do things well or correctly in comparison to a standard or to others

Adolescence – 12 to 18 years

• Key event - Peer relationships
• Crisis - Identity vs. role confusion
• Positive resolution - Adolescent develops a sense of self in relationships to others and to own internal thoughts and desires

Young adulthood – 19 to 40 years

• Key event - Love relationships
• Crisis - Intimacy vs. isolation
• Positive resolution - Person develops the ability to give and receive love; begins to make long-term commitment to relationships

Middle adulthood – 40 to 65 years

• Key event - Parenting
• Crisis - Generativity vs. stagnation
• Positive resolution - Person develops interest in guiding the development of the next generation

Maturity – 65 to death

• Key event - Reflection on and acceptance of one’s life
• Crisis - Ego integrity vs. despair
• Positive resolution - Person develops a sense of acceptance of life as it was lived and the importance of the people and relationships that the individual developed over the life span

Keubler-Ross

Elisabeth Kuebler-Ross (1926-2004)

• Published book On Death and Dying in 1969
• Posited that there were 5 discrete stages of death and dying
• Originally based on her observations of people suffering from terminal illnesses

1. Denial

1. The reality of loss is hard to face
2. The person is trying to sort out the reality or magnitude of his/her situation
3. Begins to develop a false, preferable reality
   2. Anger

1. The person recognizes that denial cannot continue
2. Anger could be with the self, others, or at a higher power
3. Especially to those who are close to them
   3. Bargaining

1. Involves the hope that the individual can somehow undo or avoid a cause of grief
2. Usually the negotiation for an extended life is made with a higher power in exchange for a reformed lifestyle
3. Can’t move into acceptance yet, but acknowledge that it can’t be undone
   4. Depression

1. “I’m so sad, why bother with anything?”
2. “I’m going to die soon, so what’s the point?”
3. “I miss my loved one, why go on?”

• This is the beginning of a form of acceptance

1. Acceptance

1. “It’s going to be ok”
2. “I can’t fight it, I may as well prepare for it”

• Individuals begin to come to terms with their mortality or inevitable future, or that of a loved one, or other tragic event