Aristotle

• Goodness of fit: Concerned with fitting child rearing to needs of individual child

• Empiricist View

• Wrote about periods of childhood development

• From 4th Century B.C.

Plato

• Self control and discipline

• Nativist View

• From 4th Century B.C.

Medieval Period

• Preformationism: Humans are preformed at instant creation (homunculus)

• Effects

  • Caused people to view kids as mini-adults

  • Kids worked

Reformation Period

• Puritan Doctrine

  • Kids tainted by original sin

  • Kids born evil and stubborn

• Harsh and strict parenting

• Must become civilized

Enlightenment Period

• John Locke

  • Nurture View

  • Tabula Rasa: Blank Slate

  • Rational Tutoring: First discipline, then increase freedom

  • Believed in rewards and positive attention

• Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  • Noble Savage: Innate goodness

  • Nature View

  • Maximum Freedom

    • Permissive-parenting approach

Industrial Revolution Period

• Social Reform

  • Working condition for kids

  • First Labor Laws

  • First Child Studies

    • Prussia 1839

    • Britain’s Factory Act 1839

    • Earl of Shaftesbury

    • 1938 - First US federal law

Charles Darwin

• Born in 1809, died in 1882

• 1877: Published “A Biological Sketch of an Infant”

  • On son, William, “Dottie”

  • Very Detailed

• Theory of Evolution

  • Influences research on attachment, innate fears, etc

Nature and Nurture

• Nature: Focus on Genetics

• Nurture: Focus on Environments

• Looks at the interaction of both

• Epigenetics: the study of stable changes in gene expression that are mediated by the environment

• Methylation: a biochemical process that reduces expression of a variety of genes and is involved in regulating reactions to stress.

Continuity and Discontinuity

• Continuity: a gradual increase of skills over time

  • ie: A pine tree growing taller and taller

• Discontinuity: a sudden qualitative changes with plateaus

  • ie: caterpillar to cocoon to butterfly

• Stage theories: development occurs in a progression of distinct age-related stages

• Conservation of Liquid Example

  • Discontinuous: ages seem qualitatively different

Mechanisms of Development

• Mediators: one variable contributes to development by way of its effect on another variable

  • Relationship dynamics → quality → mental health in children

• Moderators: one variable influences the impact of another variable on development

  • stress → depression, social support ⬆

Sociocultural Context

• Cross-cultural comparisons

  • Practices that are rare or nonexistent in one culture are common in others

  • Newborns have own room, in other countries babies sleep in parents bed for a few years

• Socioeconomic status: a measure of social class that is based on income and education

  • Kids in US live reasonably comfortable circumstances, but many do not

  • Kids in poorer families do less well than other kids

    • Infancy health problems

    • Less brain surface area

    • More likely to drop out/ teen pregnancy

• Cumulative risk: the accumulation of the socioeconomic disadvantages over years of development which is the biggest obstacle to poor children’s successful development.

Scientific Method

• Steps

  • Choosing a research question to be answered

  • Formatting a hypothesis: testable predictions

  • Developing a method to test hypothesis

  • Use data to draw conclusion

Reliability

• Consistency

• Variability means errors

• Interrater reliability: Two independent observers rate and compare

  • looks for correlation

• Test-retest reliability: testing twice, over time, to see if theres a similar result

Validity

• Accuracy

• Internal validity: effects observed within experiments can be attributed with confidence to the factor that the researcher is testing

  • independent’s variable’s impact

  • too many confounding variables

• External validity: the ability to generalize research findings beyond the particulars of the research in question

  • real world condition

Research Methods

• Clinical Interviews: flexible interview in which researcher obtains full account of participant’s thoughts

  • Benefits: Depth in little time

  • Limitations: Subject to inaccuracy, hard for kids

• Structured Interviews and Questionnaires: Self-report instruments in which each participants is asked the same way.

  • EX: Likard scale (rating from 1 → 5)

  • Benefits: Permits comparison & efficiently collects and scores data

  • Limitations: Social desirability, doesn’t yield as much info as clinical interview, tough for kids

• Naturalistic Observation: Researchers observes in a background setting

  • Benefits: Minimizes presence influence

  • Limitation: Hard to control, occasionally in everyday environment

• Structured Observation: Observed behaviors in a lab

  • Benefits: Equal opportunity to display behavior

  • Limitations: Lack of external validity, observer influence & bias

Correlation Design: Indicates how two variables are related

• Correlation Coefficient

  • Represented by “r” symbol

  • direction and strength

  • +1.00 - -1.00

• Directionality Problem: a correlation does not indicate which variable is the cause and which variable is the effect.

  • Doesn’t indicate what causes what

• Third Variable Problem: the correlation between two variables may be the result of some third, unspecified variable

Experimental Design: Permits cause and effect inferences

• Random Assignment: assigning participants to one experimental group or another according to chance

• Experimental Control: the ability of the researcher to determine the specific experiences that children in each group encounter during the study

  • Experimental Group: The group that is being tested/ experience of interest

  • Control Group: Group treated identically except that they are not presented the experience of interest

• Independent Variable: Manipulated by researchers

• Dependent Variable: Outcome expected to be influenced by IV

Developmental Research Designs

• Cross-Sectional: Same participants from different age groups tested over some general period of time

  • Benefits: Yields useful data about differences among age groups, quick and easy to administer

  • Limitations: Uninformative about stability of individual differences over time, uninformative about similarities

• Time Lag: Groups are tested at the same age, but at different times

  • Benefits: Addresses the potential effects of time

  • Limitations: Cohort but not directionality problem

• Longitudinal: a set of participants tested at several different ages

  • Benefits: Indicates the degree of stability of individual differences over long periods, reveals individual children’s patterns of children’s patterns of change of long periods of time

  • Limitations: selective attrition, bias sampling, practice effects, cohort effects

• Sequential: Several different age groups over several different age groups

  • Benefits: Combines all, rules out cohort and time

  • Limitations: Takes very long

• Microgenetic: Children observed intensively over a relatively short period while a change is occurring.

  • Benefits: Intensive observation while change is occurring, reveals individual change patterns over short periods in detail

  • Limitations: does not provide info about typical patterns of change over long periods of time, does not yield data regarding change patterns over long periods.

Conception

• Epigenesis: the emergence of new structures and functions during development

  • Widely accepted

  • Contrasts preformationism

  • published by Aristotle

• Gametes: reproductive cells (egg & sperm) that contain only half genetic material of all cells

  • Haploid Cell

• Meiosis: Cell division that produces gametes

  • 23 Chromosomes from Mom and 23 from Dad

  • Occurs from birth for girls, during puberty for boys

• Zygote: fertilized egg cell

  • diploid cell

  • 46 chromosomes in 23 pairs

• Germinal Period: From conception to 2 weeks

  • Blastocyst: inner mass and trophoblast

    • Trophoblast grows into placenta

  • Neural Tube

    • U-shaped grooves move together and fuse to create the neural tube

    • Will develop into the brain

  • Embryonic Disk

    • Forms three cell layers at weeks 3-4

      • Ectoderm: nervous system and skin

      • Mesoderm: muscles, skeletons, circulatory system

      • Endoderm: digestive system, lungs, urinary tract, gland

  • Placenta: a rich network of blood vessels, weighing roughly one pound, that extends into the tissues of the mother’s uterus

    • Semipermeable: permits the exchange of materials carried in the bloodstreams of the fetus and its mother, but prevents the blood of the mother and fetus from mixing

    • Chorion: a membrane that surrounds a developing fetus in conjunction with the amnion

    • Amnion (amnionic sac): the fetal membrane the directly surrounds the fetus

      • protects the baby from the mother’s body, provides nutrients, immunity, waste removal, and gas exchange

• Embryonic Period

  • Mitosis: Cell division

  • Cell migration: the movement of newly formed cells away from their point of origin

    • Neurons deep inside brains travel to outer levels of the developing brain

  • Cell differentiation: Cells start to specialize after mitosis and become distinguished from one another

  • Apoptosis: Cell death

    • Ex: cells in the hand die to make room for fingers

  • Hormonal Influences

    • Sex differentiation

      • Androgens leads to testosterone leads to male genitalia

    • Steroids limit fetal growth and help fetal tissues mature

      • glucocorticoids

      • End of gestation, fetus increase production to mature key organs that are needed outside of the womb

  • Cephalocaudal Development: development takes place at a more rapid pace than later development and that the areas nearer the head develop earlier than those far away

  • Rapid organ growth

    • Weeks 5-8

  • Week by Week breakdown

    • Week 3: Embryo forms three layers, neural tube develops

    • Week 4: Neural tube develops into brain and spinal cord, heart is visible, legs and arm buds are visible

    • Weeks 5-9: Facial features differentiate, rapid brain growth, internal organs form, fingers and toes emerge, sex differentiation

• Fetal Period

  • Week by Week breakdown

    • Week 10-12: Heart develops basic adult structures, spine and ribs develop, brain forms major divisions

    • Week 13-24: Lower body growth accelerates, external genitalia, body develops hairy outer covering, basic facial expressions, fetal movements felt

    • Weeks 25-38: Triples in size, brain and lungs fully developed at 28 weeks, visual and auditory systems work, fetus can learn and behaviors emerge

  • Vernix: a white, creamy film covering the skin of the fetus

    • Provides immune, temperature control, and moisturization, protects from amniotic fluid

  • Lanugo: Fine, soft, hair on the skin of the baby

    • protects from amniotic fluid

  • Age of viability: Between 22-26 weeks where a fetus can survive if born early

  • Last 3rd of 1st trimester: baby can kick, suck thumb, swallow

  • Habitation: a decrease in response to repeated or continued stimulation

  • Dishabituation: a perceptible change occurs, it becomes interesting again

Hazards to Prenatal Development

• Critical Period: When a particular type of growth must happen

• Sensitive Period: When a certain type of development is most likely to happen but may happen later

• Teratogens: A potentially harmful agent

  • Dose-response relation: the greater the fetus’s exposure to a potential teratogen, the more likely it is that the fetus will suffer damage and the more severe any damage is likely to be

  • Sleeper Effects: The impact of a given agent may not be apparent for many years

    • DES Example: Diethylstibestrol (DES) used to prevent miscarriage doesn’t effect babies but theres elivated risk of cervicle and testicular cancer in adolescence and adulthood

• Antidepressent Effects

  • Can help reduce postpartum depression

  • Inconclusive if its bad for fetus

• Smoking Effects

  • Fewer breathing movement while smoking

  • Metabolize cancer causing agents

  • Low birth weight

  • Limb malformation

  • SIDS

  • ADHD

  • Low IQ

  • Cancer

  • Critical period: 4-6 Weeks

• Alcohol Effects

  • Growth Stunts

  • Mental Stunts

  • Low birth weight

  • ADHD

  • Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder

    • Facial characteristics

    • Intellectual disabilities

    • Attention Problems

    • Hyperactivity

  • Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS): A suddent death of a baby younger than age 1 that does not have a known cause.

• Maternal Age

  • Mothers 15 and Under

    • 3-4x more likely to die before their first birthday

  • Geratric Pregnancy: 35 or older

    • Risk for autism and chromosomal disorders

• Effects of Malnutrition

  • Effects growth of fetal brain

  • Lack of Folic Acid

    • Spinal Bifida

    • Neural tube defects

  • Premature brain

  • Attention issues

• Effects of Rubella

  • Major malformations

  • Deafness

  • Blindness

  • Intellectual Disabilities

• Effects of STIs

  • Cytomegalovirus (CMV): Type of herpes

    • Central nervous system damage

    • Hearing loss

    • Blindness

    • Death

  • Damages fetal CNS

  • HIV

    • Can be passed onto kid through birth and breast milk

• Effects of Infections

  • Zika: a mosquito borne viral infection

    • Can cause microcephaly which makes a babies head smaller than expected

    • hearing loss

    • vision loss due to seizures

    • intellectual disability

    • First trimestor of pregnancy

  • Paracites

    • tocoplasmosis

  • Leads to an increased chance in schizophrenia

Birth

• Corticotrophin-Releasing Hormone: Truggers release of other hormoes to start birth process

  • Estrogen

  • Oxytocin

  • Cortisol

• Childbirth Approaches

  • Shared Goals: Safeguarding health of mother and child, social integration of child

  • Differences: Public vs. Private event, Home vs. Hospital, Standing vs. Laying

• APGAR Scale

  • Goal: To see if extra medical care or emergency care right after a babies birth

  • A - Appearnace

    • Blue = 0

    • Pink body, blue arms & legs = 1

    • Pink = 2

  • P - Pulse

    • No heartbeat = 0

    • <100 bpm = 1

    • 100-140 bpm = 2

  • G - Grimace

    • No reflex = 0

    • Weak reflex = 1

    • Strong reflex = 2

  • A - Activity

    • Limp = 0

    • Weak arm/leg movement = 1

    • Strong arm/leg movement = 2

  • R - Respiration

    • No breaking for 60 seconds = 0

    • Irregular shallow breathing = 1

    • Strong breathing & crying = 2

  • Predicitve ability

    • A score of 7+ is good and means no intervention is needed, any less there may be issues and intervention may be needed

State of Arousal

• States: Level of Arousal and engagements ranges from deep sleep to intense activity

  • Quiet Sleep: 8 hours

  • Active Sleep: 8 hours

  • Alert Awake: 2 ½ hours

  • Active Awake: 2 ½ hours

  • Drowsing: 1 hour

  • Crying: 2 hours

• Sleeping

  • Newborns sleep twice as much as adults

  • 50% of sleep in newborns, declines by 20% by age 3 through 5

  • REM vs. Non-REM sleep

    • REM (Rapid eye movement)

      • Active sleep: Quick, jerky eye movements (myoclonic twitching)

      • Stimulation leads to central nervous system growth

      • Dreaming

    • Non-REM sleep

      • Deep Sleep: absense of motor activity

      • Slower brain waves, breathing and heart rate

  • Techniques

    • Graduated Extinction: parents slowly increased their delays in responding to their infant crying

      • no effects on infant stress

    • Extinction: putting a baby in their crib fully awake and allowing them to fuss or cry until they falls asleep — without help from the parent

      • decreases in nocturnal wakefulness

• Crying

  • Why Infants Cry

    • Communication, hungry, temperature change, noise, pain

  • Adult responsiveness

    • Physiological arousal and psychological disconmfort

    • Effects the periacueductal grey of the midbrain

  • What to do when infants cry

    • 1st - Feeding

    • 2nd - Rocking, swaddling, pacifier, gentle rhythmic motion, massage

    • 3rd - let baby cry it out for a short period

  • Parental Responsiveness

    • Ethological perspective: responsiveness means needs are met

      • parent teaches ways to communicate

    • Behaviorist perspective: consistent responding reinforces crying responses

    • Developmental perspective: crying is normal and babies are independent of parental responsiveness

      • Heightened at 3 months and in the evening

  • Colic: Crying for no apparent reason during the first few months of life

    • Causes unknown

    • May be caused by allergic responses

    • 1 in 10 infants have colic

    • Ends by 3 month

• Low birth weight: Infants who weigh less than 5 ½ pounds

  • Causes: prematurity, teratogens, pollution, multiple births

  • Long term outcomes: Neurosensory deficits, frequent illness, lower IQ scores, lower educational achievement

• Prematurity: A baby born at 35 weeks or earlier after conceptions

  • Causes: Pollution

• Small for Gestational Age: Weighing substancially less than normal at either preterm or full-term for their gestational age based on weeks since conception

• Skin to skin contact: A baby is laid directly on mothers’ bare chest after birth, both of them covered in a warm blanket and left for at least an hour after the first feed

• Kangaroo care: Caregivers act as incubators to help maintain infants’ skin temperature and to promote breast-feeding

Genotype: inherited genetic material

Phenotype: the observable expression of the genotype, including both body characterisitcs and behavior

Chromosomes: long threatlike molecules made up of two twisted strands of DNA

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid): the carrier of all the biochemical instructions involved in the formation and functioning of an organism

Genes: the basic unit of heredity in all living theme

Alleles: Two or more different forms of genes

• Homozygous: Two dominant or two recessive gene

• Heterozygous: Two different alleles—one dominant and the other recessive

Regulator Genes: Genes that control the activity of other genes

• Turns on and off genes

• If one is inactivated, another one is turned on

Patterns of Inheritance: Transmission of genetic material from parent to offspring

• Dominant Recessive: Heterozygous conditions, influence of only once allele

  • Domiant allele affects phenotype

  • Reccesive allele has no effect, unless paired with another reccesive allele

  • Carriers: Heterozygous individuals who can pass recessive traits to offspring

  • Recessive Gene Disorders

    • Phenylketonuria (PKU): a disorder on chromosome 12 that comes from both parents who cannot metabolize phenylalanine. This causes impared brain development and intellecutal disabilities.

• X-Linked: a recessive gene carried on the X chromosome

  • Males more likely to be afftected (colorblindness and hemophilia)

• Codominance: Both alleles in a heterozygous combination are expressed

• Mutation: Sudden, permanent change in a DNA segment

• Polygenic Inheritance: Genes that individually exert a small effect

  • Traits show gradations

Chromosomal and Gene Anomalies: Errors in cell division can result in zygotes with extra or missing chromosomes or genes

• Chromosomal

  • Down Syndrome

  • XYY Syndrome

  • Klinefelter Syndrome (XXY)

  • Triple X Syndrome

  • Turner Syndrome (X0)

• Gene

  • Williams syndrome

Norm of Reaction: All phenotypes can theoretically result from a given genotype in relation to all the environment in which it can survive/develop

Genetic-Environment Interaction: Inherited vulnerability and specific environmental conditions are needed to produce a disorder

• Also known as the Diathesis-Stress Model

• EX: PKU

  • High Phenmylaline Foods vs. Low Phenmylaline Foods

Reciprocal Gene-Envrionement: Those with a genetic predisposition for a disorder may also have a genetic tendency to create environmental risk factors that promote the disorder

Behavior Genetics

• Heritability: Extent to which variability in a particular behavior in a population

  • 0.0 to 1.0; higher number, greater heritability

  • Population not individual

• Shared Environmental Factors: what family members have in common

• Nonshared Environmental Factors: what is distinct among family members

• Research Designs

  • Family Study: Determines whether phenotypic traits are correlated with the degree to which people are genetically related

    • Parents and Children

    • Identical and Fraternal twins

    • Non-twin siblings or adpotive family members

  • Twin Study: Compares correlation for identical (monozygotic or MZ) twins with those for same-sex fraternal (dizygotic or DZ) twins.

    • Chorionicty: difference in the degree of placental sharing

  • Adoption study: Examines whether adopted children’s scores on a given measure are correlated more highly with those of their biological parents and siblings or with those of their adoptive parents and siblings

Neuron: Cells of the nervous system

• Cell Body: the basic biological material that keeps the neuron functioning

• Dendrites: fibers that recieve input from other cells and conduct it toward the cell body in the form of elelctrical impulses

  • Spines: tiny protrusions from dendrites, which form functional contacts with neighboring axons of other neurons

• Axon: a fiber that conducts electronically signals away from the cell body to connections with other neurons

  • Terminal Buttons: found at the end of the axon, below the myelin sheath, and are responsible for sending the signal on to other neurons

• Synapse: microscopic junctions between the axon terminal of one neuron and the dendritic branches of another

Development of Neurons

• Neurogenesis: proliferation of neurons through cell division

• Synaptic pruning: Unstimulated neurons leads to loss of synapses

• Glial Cells: Cells in the nervous system which form a myelin sheath around certain axons

  • Form myelin sheath

  • Neural stem and progenitor cells during prenatal brain development

  • Protect the brain when injured by multiplying

• Myelianation: increase in brain size

Cerebral Cortex

• Fronal Lobe

  • Primary Motor Cortex

  • Premotor Area

  • Motor Speech Area (Broca’s Area)

  • Prefrontal Area

• Temporal Lobe

  • Primary Auditory Cortex

  • Auditory Association Area

  • Sensory Speech Area (Wernick’s Area)

• Parietal Lobe

  • Primary Somatic Sensory Cortex

  • Taste Area

• Occiputal Lobe

  • Visual Assosiation Area

  • Visual Cortex

• Lateralization

  • Two seperate halves of cerebral cortex

  • Communicate through corpus callosum

  • Specialized for different modes of processing

  • Left: Controls right side of body, verbal abilities, positive emotion

  • Right: Controls left side of body, spatial abilities, negative emotion

• Plasticity: Capacity of brain to be changed by experience

  • Experience-Expectant: The role of ordinary experiences in shaping brain development and learning

    • Depends on timing during sensitive periods when brain is especially sensitive to certain stimuli

  • Experience-Dependent: When neural connections are created and reorganized throughout life as a result of experiences

    • Not depending on timing

Nutrition and Growth

• Secular Trends: marked changed in physical development that have occured over generations

  • Better nutrition over time

  • Mentrating Earler

• Food Neophobia: young children’s unwillingness to eat unfamailar foods

  • Treat it through slow food exposure to a variety of foods on a repeated basis

• Undernutrition: not getting enough to eat

  • Marasmus: Little calories and nutrition

  • Kwashiorkor: Enough calories, but little nutrition

  • Undernutrition → lower immunity → increased risk of disease → infectious diseased → increased energy need → undernutrition

• Failure to Thrive: a condition in which infants become malnourished and fail to grow or gain weight

  • Organic: Medical cause

  • Non-Organic: inability to produce breast milk, lack of affection, lack of stimulation

Reflexes: Innate, fixed responses to particular stimulation

• Functions of reflexes

  • Survival or evolutionarily adaptive function

  • Important for feeding or endearing newborn to caregivers

  • Developmet of motor skills

• Survival Reflexes: Stay with infant into development

• Primitive Reflexes: Relfexes that disapear over time

• Abnormal reflexes signal damage to the cerebral cortex

• Types of Reflexes

  • Eyeblinking: Light or noise stimulous causes babies to quickly close eyes

    • Survival

  • Rooting: Stroking cheek near corner of mouth leads to head turning towards stimulus

    • Primitive - 3 weeks

  • Sucking: Place finger in infant’s mouth leads to sucking rhythmically

    • Primitive - 4 Months

  • Swimming: Place infant face down in water leads to paddles/kicks in swimming motion

    • Primitive - 4 to 6 Months

  • Moro: Hold infant on back and let head drop leads to embracing motion

    • Primitive - 6 Months

  • Palmar Grasp: Place finger in infant’s hand and press leads to grab of finger

    • Primitive - 3 to 4 Months

  • Tonic Neck: Baby’s head to one side while on back leads to fencing position

    • Primitive - 4 Months

  • Stepping: Hold infant under arms and permit feet to touch leads to stepping position

    • Primitive - 2 Months depending on weight

  • Babinski: Stroke sole of foot from toe toward heel leads to toes fanning out and curling as foot twists in

Motor Development

• Cephalcocaudal Trend: Development proceeds from head to tail

• Proximodistal Trend: Development proceeds from center of body outward

• Cultural Factors

  • Suharan Africa - Limb manipulation though singing, bounching, stretching, and positive affect to make the baby stronger

• Early Theories

  • Believed infants’ motor development is governed by brain maturation

• Current Theories

  • Dynamic Systems Approach: Motor development as resulting from confluence of:

    • Development of nervous system

    • Movement capacities (increases in strength, posture control, balance, and perceptual skills)

    • Goal in mind (motivation)

    • Environmental supports

Gross Motor Development

• Sit, head steady - 4 months

• Sit, unsupported - 7 months

• Pull to stand - 10 months

• Stand alone - 14 months

• Walk well - 15 months

• Walk backward - 17 months

• Run - 20 months

• Jump up - 29 months

Fine Motor Development

• Reaching

  • Pre-Reaching Movements: Clumsy swiping movements by newborns toward general vicinity of objects they see

  • Stable Reaching (7 months): when infants sit independently

• Grasping

  • Ulnar Grasp (3 to 4 Months): Pressing fingers against palm

  • Pincer Grasp (9 months): Well-coordinated use of thumb and forefinger

Habitiation and Recovery

• Habitation: A gradual reduction in the strength of a response due to repeated or continued stimulation

  • Highly adaptive

  • Varies in infants

  • Bilingual babies have enhanved sensitivity to certain features of communication such as tone of voice

Statistical Learning

• Certain events and objects appear at the same time and place

  • EX: Recognizing a Mom’s voice and face

• Newborns look at this in music, action, speech, etc.

• Avaliable at birth

• Prefer variability over patterns that are very complex

Classical Conditioning: a form of learning that consists of associating an initially neutral stimulus with a stimulus that always evokes a particular relexive response

• Unconditioned stimulus (UCS): reliably elciits an unleaderned response

• Unconditioned stimulus response (UCR): the response from the UCS

• Conditioned Stimulus (CS): an initally neutral stimulus

• Conditioned Response (CR): the original reflexive response becomes a learned behavior triggered by exposure to the CS

• EX: A baby’s mouth makes contact with a bottle eliciting the sucking reflex and the infant experiences satisfaction. Now, the baby with begin the sucking reflex when it sees a bottle.

  • The bottle in the infant’s mouth: UCS

  • Sucking reflex: UCR

  • The bottle: CS

  • Anticipatory sucking movements: CR

• Little Albert

  • A baby wasn’t scared of white rats until it was paired with loud noises. Then, the baby became scared of white rats

Operant Conditioning: Learning the relation between your behavior and the consequences that result from it

• Reinforcement: Increase the occurence of a response

• Punishment: decrease the occurence of a response

• Positive reinforcement: a reward that reliably follows a behavior and increases the likelihood that the behavior will be repeated

• Context dependent: Infants memory for operant responses is context dependent (must be tested in same setting

  • Improves after 9 months when baby becomes context free

Imitation: Learning by copying the behavior of another person

• Functions

  • Allows infants to explore their social world

  • Allows adults to reinforce desirable behaviors

  • Facilitates parent-child attachment

• Meltzoff Study

  • Infants as young as two days old easily imitate adult facial expressions