Module 1: Characteristics of Development

Lifespan Development is the study of factors that influence consistency and transformation from conception to death

Development is bidirectional, plastic and multidimensional

Adolescence was a 19th – 20th century phenomenon. compulsory schooling mid 1800s separate juvenile courts/prisons Australia 1889

Emerging Adulthood is a 21st century western phenomenon (18 to 25 years)

Developmental Influences: Cultural, historical and social

• Normative age-graded influences: similar biological influences for individuals at same age – e.g. puberty
• Normative history-graded influences: why people born at the same time (cohort) tend to be similar-impact on a generation
• Non-normative life events: unique occurrences that impact on the individual, independent of the historical period

Psychoanalytic: Freud

• People move through a series of stages where they confront conflicts between biological drives & social expectations
• Psychosexual stages of development & how 3 parts of personality (id, ego & super-ego) become integrated through these stages
• Freud was the first person to emphasise the importance of the parent-child relationship on development

Psychoanalytic: Erikson

• Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory saw development as continuing throughout the lifespan. Erikson theorised that there is fundamental psychosocial conflict at each stage

Learning/Behaviourist Development Theories

Traditional Behaviourism are the theories developed by Pavlov, with classical conditioning, Watson with “little Albert”, and Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Theory

Social Learning Theory

• Bundara’s Social Learning Theory focusses on the influence of modelling and observational learning.

Cognitive Development Theories

• Piaget: Rather than reinforcement, children develop through brain maturation & manipulation, exploration of environment
• Information-processing theories: views development similarly to computer model – how info is attended to, encoded, stored & decoded
• Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory: development is socially mediated, varies across culture

Evolutionary Theories

• Lorenz examined adaptive values of behaviour, through his studies on imprinting
• Bowlby applied ethnological theory to understanding caregiver-child relationship

epigenesis: bidirectional influences of heredity and environment (including person’s own behaviour) on development

Major Development Periods

Prenatal: Conception to birth, where a one celled organism becomes a baby

Infancy: Birth to 2 years, with dramatic changes to brain and body

Early childhood: 2-6 years, motor skills, thought and language are refined and expanded

Middle Childhood: 6-11, brain develops to understand self, think logically and develop friendships

Adolescence: 11-18, abstract thought and establishing autonomy away from family

Early Adulthood: 18-40, pursuit of lifestyle - work and family

middle adulthood: 40-65, height of career and life - a developing awareness of mortality

Late Adulthood: 65-death, reflect on life, and adapt to ailing body

Genetic and environmental factors combine in intricate ways

Phenotypes: Observable characteristics of an individual, such as hair colour, height blood type

Genotype: Unique sequence of DNA - refers to two alleles am individual inherited for a particular gene

All cells within human body contain a necleus, aside from red blood cells.

Cells are the smallest unit that can live on its own. Cells make up all living organisms and tissues of the body.

Nucleus: the structure in a cell that contains chromosomes

Chromosomes: thread - like structures that contains specific instructions. Chromosomes are made up of a chemical substance called deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, and proteins.

A gene is a segment of DNA along the length of the
chromosome.

New individuals are created when two special cells called gametes, or sex cells—the sperm and ovum—combine. 22 of the 23 pairs of chromosomes are matching pairs, called autosomes (meaning not sex chromosomes). The twenty-third pair consists of sex chromosomes. Gametes are formed through a cell division process called meiosis, which halves the number of chromosomes normally present in body cells. When sperm and ovum unite at conception, the resulting cell, called a zygote

fraternal, or dizygotic, twins, the most common type of multiple offspring, resulting from the release and fertilization of two ova. Sometimes a zygote that has started to duplicate separates into two clusters of cells that develop into two individuals. These are called identical, or monozygotic, twins because they have the same genetic makeup

Homozygous: having identical alleles for a single trait. The child will display inherited trait

Heterozygous: Having differing alleles for a single trait.

The relationship between alleles inform Phenotype

The most common interaction between alleles is a dominant/recessive relationship. An allele of a gene is said to be dominant when it effectively overrules the other (recessive) allele.

Incomplete-dominance pattern is a form of Gene interaction in which both alleles of a gene at a locus are partially expressed, often resulting in an intermediate or different phenotype.

X-linked recessive inheritance refers to genetic conditions associated with mutations in genes on the X chromosome. A male carrying such a mutation will be affected, because he carries only one X chromosome. A female carrying a mutation in one gene, with a normal gene on the other X chromosome, is generally unaffected.

genomic imprinting, alleles are imprinted, or chemically marked through regulatory processes within the genome, in such a way that one pair member (either the mother’s or the father’s) is activated, regardless of its makeup. it is the process by which only one copy of a gene in an individual (either from their mother or their father) is expressed, while the other copy is suppressed.

mutation, a sudden but permanent change in a segment of DNA