Topic 1 Development – How did you develop?
Early Brain Development
Key Definitions:
Brain: The organ in your head made up of nerves that processes information and controls behaviour.
Forebrain: The anterior part of the brain, including the hemispheres and the central brain structures.
Midbrain: The middle section of the brain forming part of the central nervous system.
Hindbrain: The lower part of the brain that includes the cerebellum, pons, and medulla oblongata.
Anterior: Directed towards the front, when used in relation to our biology.
Posterior: Directed towards the back, when used in relation to our biology.
Cerebellum: An area of the brain near to the brainstem that controls motor movements (muscle activity).
Medulla Oblongata: Connects the upper brain to the spinal cord and controls automatic responses.
Involuntary Response: A response to a stimulus that occurs without someone making a conscious choice. They are automatic, such as reflexes.
Neural Connections: Links formed by messages passing from one nerve cell (neuron) to another.
Foetal Brain Development Timeline:
At to weeks old, a long tube develops in the foetus's brain, which is divided from the front into three distinct round sections: forebrain, midbrain, and hindbrain. Below the hindbrain is the spinal cord.
By weeks old, the forebrain and hindbrain split further into two cavities each, producing distinct cavities in total. The forebrain divides into an anterior (front) section and a posterior (behind) section. The hindbrain splits through the middle. The midbrain does not divide.
At weeks old, the cerebellum (meaning "little brain") becomes visible in the foetus.
By weeks old, the medulla oblongata (also referred to as the medulla) is fully formed in the hindbrain, positioned in front of the cerebellum. It connects the upper brain structures to the spinal cord and controls automatic, involuntary responses such as breathing, sneezing, heart rate, and blood pressure.
Postnatal Brain Growth and Neural Connections:
By year after birth, the cerebellum grows to its size at birth. This rapid development accounts for the significant acquisition of physical motor skills during infancy. The cerebellum is also involved in processing sensory information and emotional responses such as fear.
From birth to years old, a massive increase in neural connections occurs, with to new connections forming every second. These links enable rapid communication between various functional brain regions.
The brain doubles in overall size during the first year of life and reaches of its adult size by the age of years.
Early neural connections are reinforced through active environmental stimulation and repeated use.
Piaget's Stages of Development and Their Role in Education
Key Definitions:
Cognitive: Thinking, including problem-solving, perceiving, remembering, using language, and reasoning.
Operations: How we reason and think about things.
Object Permanence: Knowing something exists even if it is out of sight.
Symbolic Play: Children play using objects and ideas to represent other objects and ideas.
Egocentrism: Unable to see the world from any other viewpoint but one's own.
Animism: Believing that objects that are not alive can behave as if they are alive.
Centration: Focusing on one feature of a situation and ignoring other relevant features.
Irreversibility: Not understanding that an action can be reversed to return to the original state.
Morality: General principles about what is right and wrong, including good and bad behaviour.
Schema / Schemata: Mental representations of the world based on one's own experiences. The plural form is schemata, although schemas is also widely used.
Piaget's Four Stages of Cognitive Development:
Sensorimotor Stage ( to years):
Infants learn and gather information about their world through sensory experiences and motor movements.
Infants initially live strictly in the present moment without an abstract understanding of time or space.
Learning occurs by linking sensory inputs (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell) directly to physical manipulation of objects (e.g., grasping and sucking).
Development begins with innate reflex actions and progresses toward intentional motor control.
From approximately months old, infants begin repeating chance actions intentionally, such as deliberately dropping an object after first dropping it accidentally.
At approximately months old, infants develop object permanence, learning that objects continue to exist even when hidden from view (e.g., searching for a ball placed under a blanket).
By the end of this stage, the child establishes a sense of self separate from the surrounding environment.
Pre-operational Stage ( to years):
Subdivided into two distinct sub-stages:
The Symbolic Function Sub-stage ( to years): Children begin imitating others and using objects as symbols. Symbolic play develops, where one object represents another (e.g., using a box as a stool or engaging in role play). Language development begins as words act as symbols for objects. Children exhibit egocentrism (viewing the world solely from their own perspective) and animism (believing non-living objects possess lifelike qualities).
The Intuitive Thought Sub-stage ( to years): Marks the beginning of basic reasoning. Children ask frequent questions to expand their knowledge. Thinking is limited by centration (focusing on a single feature of a complex situation while ignoring others), lack of conservation (failing to understand that altering an object's appearance does not change its volume, mass, or size), and irreversibility (inability to mentally reverse a physical sequence of events).
Concrete Operational Stage ( to years):
Children apply logical rules and mental strategies to concrete, physical objects (e.g., using counters to solve arithmetic problems), but struggle with abstract concepts such as morality.
Cognitive abilities developed in this stage include:
Seriation: Sorting objects into quantitative order (e.g., size or height order).
Classification: Grouping objects according to shared attributes or visual appearance.
Reversibility: Understanding that mathematical operations and physical actions can be reversed (e.g., if , then ).
Conservation: Recognizing that properties such as quantity, length, or mass remain invariant despite perceptual changes in shape or container.
Decentration: The ability to consider multiple aspects of a situation simultaneously.
Formal Operational Stage ( years):
Thinking expands from controlling concrete objects to manipulating abstract thoughts and hypotheses.
Adolescents can evaluate multiple variables simultaneously (e.g., considering height, age, and gender when describing a person).
Individuals comprehend temporal changes (e.g., understanding how future life choices alter living situations), logical sequences (e.g., transitioning from school to college to employment), and abstract cause-and-effect relationships (e.g., recognizing how alcohol consumption impairs driving and leads to fatal accidents).
Full realization of individual identity separate from others in the real world.
Applications of Piaget's Stages to Education:
Sensorimotor Applications: Classrooms provide rich sensory stimulation (varied textures, bright colors, distinct tastes, smells, and sounds). Music, rhythm, and singing stimulate language acquisition. Mouth exploration is supported to teach shapes and textures.
Pre-operational Applications: Children learn by direct physical interaction ("little scientists") rather than passive observation. Classrooms feature discovery learning with physical models, diagrams, and visual aids, while keeping instructions brief.
Concrete Operational Applications: Teachers structure tasks requiring multi-variable focus and perspective-taking, allowing children to manipulate concrete items to solve problems.
Formal Operational Applications: Students engage in discussions of abstract concepts, complex hypothetical problems, conflicting social roles (e.g., balancing duties as a son vs a friend), and distinct academic disciplines (science vs arts).
Teaching Implications (Robert Slavin, 2005):
Focus on the child's underlying cognitive thinking process rather than simply reaching the correct answer.
Facilitate discovery learning, enabling children to interact freely with their environment.
Acknowledge that children think differently from adults and progress at individualized rates.
Tailor classroom management to individual student developmental stages rather than relying on uniform whole-class instruction.
Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development and the Development of Intelligence
Key Definitions:
Adaptation: Using assimilation and accommodation to make sense of the world.
Assimilation: Incorporating new experiences into existing schemas.
Accommodation: When a schema has to be changed to deal with a new experience.
Equilibrium: When a child's schemas can explain all that they experience; a state of mental balance.
Process of Schema Adaptation and Cognitive Growth:
Intelligence develops through the progressive construction of schemas via adaptation across the four cognitive stages.
Children adapt to new environmental experiences through two mechanisms:
Assimilation: Fitting novel experiences into pre-existing mental schemas (e.g., a child with a schema for flying animals sees an aeroplane and labels it a "bird").
Accommodation: Modifying an existing schema or constructing a new schema when new information conflicts with current mental structures (e.g., recognizing that aeroplanes are non-living metal structures carrying passengers, leading to the creation of a separate "aeroplane" schema).
Equilibrium: A state of cognitive balance achieved when existing schemas successfully explain environmental inputs. Encountering unexplainable experiences creates disequilibrium, driving accommodation until equilibrium is restored.
Strengths of Piaget's Cognitive Theory:
Practical Educational Utility: Informs progressive educational practices, specifically child-centered discovery learning that aligns instruction with developmental stages.
Empirical Heuristic Value: Generated extensive empirical research validating schema construction and developmental stage progression.
Weaknesses of Piaget's Cognitive Theory:
Neglect of Socio-Cultural Factors: Failed to assess the impact of social interaction and cultural context. Pierre Dasen (1994) found that Australian Aboriginal children developed conservation skills at a later age than Piaget's Swiss sample, demonstrating cultural variance in cognitive development.
Methodological Subjectivity: Data collection relied heavily on clinical interviews and naturalistic observations, introducing potential researcher bias into data interpretation.
Low Ecological Validity and Task Artificiality: Many experimental tasks were overly abstract or unfamiliar to young children. Studies employing more realistic, familiar settings demonstrated that children achieve cognitive milestones earlier than Piaget claimed.
Dweck's Mindset Theory and the Effects of Learning on Development
Key Definitions:
Mindset: A set of beliefs someone has that guides how someone responds to or interprets a situation.
Ability: What someone can do, such as maths ability or ability to play tennis. Dweck suggests ability can be seen as either fixed and innate or as able to be improved.
Effort: When you try to do better using determination.
Fixed Mindset: Believing your abilities are fixed and unchangeable.
Growth Mindset: Believing practice and effort can improve your abilities.
Core Principles of Mindset Theory:
Mindsets significantly determine educational achievement and long-term personal outcomes.
Fixed Mindset Characteristics:
Ability is viewed as an innate, unchangeable trait determined at birth.
Individuals avoid new challenges for fear of failure or showing lack of ability.
Setbacks are interpreted as evidence of permanent lack of ability, leading to helplessness, reduced effort, and potential depression.
Constructive feedback is ignored because ability is assumed to be unalterable.
Growth Mindset Characteristics:
Ability is viewed as malleable and capable of continuous development through effort, strategy, and practice.
Challenges are embraced as valuable learning opportunities.
Feedback is actively incorporated to refine performance.
Success in others inspires self-improvement.
The Role of Praise in Mindset Formation:
Person / Ability Praise (e.g., "You are very smart"): Leads children to infer that success stems from fixed innate talent. When faced with future difficulty, children conclude they lack the required talent and relinquish effort.
Process / Effort Praise (e.g., "You worked very hard on this task"): Teaches children that achievement is directly linked to effort and strategic persistence, establishing resilience against setbacks.
Teacher Mindsets: Teachers holding a fixed mindset treat student difficulties as permanent deficits, whereas teachers with a growth mindset believe all students can improve with sustained effort and effective instruction.
Empirical Evidence:
Mueller and Dweck (1998): Demonstrated experimentally that praising students' innate ability induced a fixed mindset and impaired performance after failure, whereas praising effort cultivated a growth mindset and sustained task perseverance.
Yeager and Dweck (2012): A intervention study of over students revealed that low-achieving students taught growth mindset strategies demonstrated significantly higher academic performance compared to control groups. Additionally, growth mindset interventions helped adolescents cope better with social exclusion.
Strengths of Mindset Theory:
High practical application for educators and parents to enhance child motivation via process praise.
Offers an empowering, optimistic framework showing that intellectual capabilities are modifiable.
Supported by a combination of experimental studies and naturalistic field research.
Weaknesses of Mindset Theory:
Artificial experimental settings in key studies reduce ecological validity, casting doubt on real-world generalizability.
Focuses blame on the student's individual mindset rather than evaluating systemic issues, such as instruction quality or curriculum design.
Overemphasizes praise dynamics while neglecting non-judgmental, informational feedback (e.g., giving direct structural instructions like "add a conclusion to your essay").
Willingham's Learning Theory and the Effects of Learning on Development
Key Definitions:
Working Memory: Has different parts for processing information coming in from our senses, including visual and sound data, and also involves a decision-making part.
Short-term Memory: Our initial memory store that is temporary and limited.
Rehearse: Repeat information over and over to make it stick.
Long-term Memory: A memory store that holds potentially limitless amounts of information for up to a lifetime.
Motor Skills: Actions that involve muscles and brain processes, resulting in movement.
Decentration: Being able to separate yourself from the world and take different views of a situation, so not being egocentric.
Social Learning: Learning by observing and copying others.
Self-regulation: Limiting and controlling yourself without influence from others.
Nature: Explanations of behaviour that focus on biological factors (genes, innate structures).
Nurture: Explanations of behaviour that focus on environmental factors (experiences, upbringing).
Core Tenets of Willingham's Learning Theory:
Factual Knowledge Precedes Skill: High-level cognitive skills (e.g., problem-solving, critical reasoning) depend entirely on pre-existing domain-specific factual knowledge. Retained facts free up processing capacity within working memory, allowing cognitive resources to focus on complex decision-making.
Practice and Effort for Automaticity:
Information enters short-term memory and requires rehearsal to transfer to long-term memory.
Material stored in long-term memory must be systematically reviewed and practiced to prevent decay.
Extensive practice renders fundamental skills (e.g., reading fluency) automatic, freeing working memory space to acquire new, complex competencies.
Developmental Strategies Proposed by Willingham:
Cognitive Development:
Structure tasks that require deliberate effort but remain within the student's current capacity.
Account for natural daily fluctuations in student cognitive performance.
Evaluate whether student failure stems from a lack of task comprehension rather than developmental incapacity.
Physical Development (Motor Skills):
Identify necessary muscle movement sequences and execute them in correct spatial-temporal order.
Practice motor sequences repeatedly until muscle execution becomes automatic.
Apply conscious effort to incrementally increase task difficulty (e.g., systematically raising the height bar in jumping practice).
Social Development:
Nurture perspective-taking early. Willingham contends that perspective-taking emerges as early as months (disagreeing with Piaget's initial claim of age ).
Model prosocial behaviors to promote social learning through observational imitation.
Minimize classroom environment triggers to reduce impulsive behavior, redirecting energy toward focused learning.
Foster self-regulation, which is shaped by both genetic temperament (nature) and supportive parental environments (nurture).
Implement delayed gratification strategies to develop student self-control.
Strengths of Willingham's Theory:
Direct, highly practical applications across classroom instruction, physical skill training, and behavioral management.
Supported by empirical findings in cognitive neuroscience and developmental psychology (e.g., Repacholi and Gopnik, 1997).
Integrates findings from working memory models, neuroscience, and social learning.
Weaknesses of Willingham's Theory:
Fails to accommodate individual genetic differences in learning strategies despite acknowledging that traits like impulsivity and self-regulation are partially inherited.
Lacks a single unified theoretical model, operating instead as a composite of distinct cognitive science principles.
Study 1: Piaget and Inhelder (1956) 'Three Mountains' Task
Background and Aims:
Rooted in Piaget's cognitive theory regarding pre-operational egocentrism vs concrete operational decentration.
Aim 1: To investigate the extent to which children of different ages can take another person's visual perspective.
Aim 2: To evaluate children's overall capacity to coordinate multiple spatial perspectives simultaneously.
Participants:
Total sample: children across four distinct age groups:
Age to years:
Age to years:
Age to years:
Age to years:
Children under years old were excluded due to task difficulty.
Experimental Apparatus:
A three-dimensional mountain model constructed from paper and card, measuring at the base and ranging from to in height.
Smallest Mountain: Green, featuring a small house on top and a winding pathway.
Middle Mountain: Brown, featuring a red cross on top and a stream flowing down.
Largest Mountain: Grey, featuring a snow-capped peak.
photographs depicting the model from various distinct angles around the perimeter.
visual card cutouts matching the colors and dimensions of the three mountains.
A featureless wooden doll measuring in height.
Procedure and Questioning Formats:
1) Cardboard Arrangement: Children arranged the three card shapes to represent the model as seen from their own viewpoint and as seen from the doll's position.
2) Photo Selection: Children selected a photograph from the options that represented their own view and the view visible to the doll from various positions.
3) Doll Positioning: The child was shown a photograph and instructed to position the doll to match the perspective shown in the photo.
Results:
Pre-operational Stage ( to years):
Children consistently selected photos or arranged cards representing their own physical perspective, even when asked to show the doll's perspective.
Inability to place the doll in a position matching a pre-selected photograph.
Displayed strong spatial egocentrism.
Transition Period ( to years):
Children began understanding that different viewing locations yield different perspectives, but performance remained inconsistent.
Concrete Operational Stage ( to years / to years):
Children successfully understood that the doll possessed a distinct visual perspective when placed in different locations.
By age to , children demonstrated full coordination of spatial perspectives, accurately accounting for visual occlusion (e.g., a larger mountain blocking the view of a smaller mountain).
Conclusions:
Children under years old are egocentric, unable to mentally construct perspectives outside their immediate view.
Decentration and perspective coordination develop during the concrete operational stage ( to years).
Provides empirical support for Piaget's stage theory of cognitive development.
Strengths of the Study:
Collected rich, detailed qualitative data, including direct observation transcripts of individual errors and reasoning processes.
Implemented high experimental control (standardized mountain model, identical questions, uniform doll placement) allowing precise comparisons.
High reliability demonstrated through repeated trials using varied testing formats (photos, cards, doll positioning).
Weaknesses and Counter-Evidence:
Stage transitions in the data were gradual rather than discrete, weakening the argument for rigid developmental stages.
Low ecological validity due to task complexity and abstract mountain models:
Helen Borke (1975): Adapted the procedure using a Sesame Street character (Grover) on a rotating turntable model. Found that -year-olds correctly identified Grover's viewpoint of the time and -year-olds succeeded of the time, proving Piaget's task was overly complex rather than children being egocentric.
Betty Repacholi and Alison Gopnik (1997): Tested -month-old and -month-old infants using snack choices (crackers vs broccoli). When an experimenter expressed pleasure for broccoli and disgust for crackers, -month-olds offered the experimenter crackers (their own preference), whereas -month-olds offered broccoli (the experimenter's preference). Proved non-egocentric perspective-taking occurs as early as months.
Study 2: Gunderson et al. (2013) Parent Praise Study
Key Definitions:
Framework: A basic understanding of ideas and facts that is used when making decisions.
Person Praise: Someone praises the individual rather than what they are doing.
Process Praise: Someone praises what is being done, not the individual.
Entity Theory / Motivational Framework: A belief that behaviour or ability results from a person's nature.
Incremental Theory / Motivational Framework: A belief that effort drives behaviour and ability, which can change.
Ecological Validity: The extent to which the findings still explain the behaviour in real life situations.
Ethics: Moral principles about how someone should behave in a society.
Debrief: After an investigation, participants are given full disclosure of the study.
Generalisability: The extent to which the results of a study represent the whole population, not just the sample used.
Background and Aims:
Built upon Dweck's mindset theory to determine if experimental findings on praise apply to naturalistic parent-child home interactions.
Aim 1: Investigate whether parental praise in natural home environments influences children's long-term motivational frameworks.
Aim 2: Determine if parents give girls less process praise and more person praise than boys.
Aim 3: Test if early parent process praise predicts incremental beliefs (effort drives ability) and person praise predicts entity beliefs (fixed ability) years later.
Participants:
Sample: parent-child dyads ( boys, girls) recruited in Chicago.
Gender Breakdown: Boys = , Girls = .
Ethnicity Breakdown: White, African-American, Hispanic, Multiracial.
Procedure:
Double-Blind Naturalistic Observation: Participants were informed the study investigated child language development to prevent observation bias.
Dyads were videotaped in their homes going about typical daily routines across three -minute sessions at child ages , , and months.
Follow-Up Assessment: years later (child ages to years), children completed two standardized questionnaires assessing motivational frameworks:
items measuring beliefs regarding the nature of intelligence.
items measuring beliefs regarding socio-moral actions (what makes people "good" or "bad").
Results:
Overall Praise Frequency: Praise constituted of total parent utterances.
Praise Categories:
Process Praise: of all praise ( of total parent utterances).
Person Praise: of all praise ( of total parent utterances).
Other Praise: of all praise ( of total parent utterances).
Gender Disparities: Boys received significantly higher process praise than girls ( of praise for boys was process praise vs for girls).
Correlations with Motivational Frameworks:
Early process praise positively correlated with incremental frameworks at age to ().
Process praise correlated with incremental intelligence frameworks () and socio-moral frameworks ().
Process praise across observation ages consistently predicted incremental frameworks: \,months (), \,months (), \,months ().
Early person praise did not correlate with entity frameworks ().
Conclusions:
Parent process praise in early childhood predicts incremental motivational frameworks years later.
Parents use process praise significantly more with boys than with girls, leading boys to hold stronger incremental beliefs.
Early person praise does not actively generate entity frameworks, meaning hypotheses were only partially supported.
Strengths of the Study:
High ecological validity: Naturalistic observation conducted in the participants' home environments during routine activities.
Double-blind design prevented researcher coding bias and participant demand characteristics.
Confirms laboratory experimental findings within real-world parent-child settings.
Weaknesses of the Study:
Ethical deception: Participants were misled regarding the true purpose of the study.
Potential reactivity/Hawthorne effect: Presence of video cameras may have altered natural parental praise styles.
Low generalisability: Small sample size () restricted to Chicago, limiting application to wider populations.
Issues and Debates: The Development of Morality
Key Definitions:
Morals: Standards of right and wrong behaviour that can differ between cultures and can depend on the situation.
Moral Development: Children's growing understanding about right and wrong.
Heteronomous: Rules put into place by others.
Autonomous: Rules can be decided by the individual person.
Norms: Society's values and customs, which a person in that society would be governed by.
Nativist Theories: Theories that view morality as part of human nature.
Piaget's (1932) Theory of Moral Development:
Heteronomous Stage ( to years):
Rules are viewed as unchangeable and imposed by external authority figures (parents, teachers).
Focus is placed strictly on the physical consequences of actions rather than intent.
Breaking rules strictly results in punishment (e.g., breaking cups accidentally is judged as worse than breaking cup intentionally).
Autonomous Stage ( years):
Rules are understood as social agreements established by mutual consent that can be altered if beneficial.
Focus shifts to evaluating the intentions behind an action (e.g., an action resulting in bad consequences is judged acceptable if intentions were good).
Kohlberg's (1958) Theory of Moral Reasoning:
Level 1: Pre-Conventional Morality (Aged up to ~ years):
Stage 1 (Obedience and Punishment): Rules are fixed; goodness or badness evaluated strictly by consequences and punishment avoidance.
Stage 2 (Individualism and Exchange): Right action defined by self-interest and reciprocal benefit ("what's in it for me").
Level 2: Conventional Morality (Most adolescents and adults):
Stage 3 (Good Interpersonal Relationships): Moral reasoning guided by social expectations, desire for approval, and wanting to be liked.
Stage 4 (Maintaining Social Order): Moral duty defined by obeying legal authority, upholding rules, and preserving social order.
Level 3: Post-Conventional Morality (~ of adults):
Stage 5 (Social Contract and Individual Rights): Laws viewed as social contracts rather than rigid dictates; values individual rights and democratic consensus.
Stage 6 (Universal Principles): Moral reasoning based on self-chosen, abstract, universal ethical principles (e.g., human rights, justice) that supersede specific written laws.
Weaknesses of Piaget's and Kohlberg's Moral Theories:
Low ecological validity due to artificial moral dilemma stories (e.g., Heinz's dilemma) that lacked real-life consequences.
Gender Bias (Carol Gilligan, 1977): Criticized Kohlberg's male-only sample. Gilligan asserted males favor a justice/rights-oriented morality, whereas females favor a caring/responsibility-oriented morality.
Damon (1999) on Developing a Moral Self:
Synthesizes nativist (nature) perspectives with environmental (nurture) social influences.
Nature Evidence: Universal capacity for empathy present in early infancy.
Nurture Evidence: Moral identity shaped by social environments, parenting styles (e.g., Diana Baumrind), and consistent institutional messaging.
Developmental Progression of Empathy (Damon, 1999):
Early Infancy: Global empathy; infants experience distress in response to others' pain but confuse others' distress with their own.
Aged to years: Infants recognize others are distressed and experience genuine distress themselves, but lack knowledge of effective helpful actions.
Early Childhood: Children realize others possess distinct internal states and reactions, enabling targeted helpful responses.
Aged to years: Empathy extends beyond immediate situations to abstract, systemic distress (e.g., poverty, chronic illness, disability).