ch 9

Module 45; Developmental Issues, Prenatal Development, and the Newborn

• Developmental Psychology

  • A branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social change throughout the life span

    • Nature and Nurture 

      • Nature (Genetic inheritance) vs Nurture (Experience)

    • Continuity and Stages

    • Stability and Change

  • Biological, Psychological, Social interactions/interrelationships 

• Temperament

  • Emotional reactivity and intensity 

• Prenatal Development

  • Zygotes

    • The fertilized egg; it enters a 2 week period of rapid cell division and develops into an embryo

  • Embryo

    • The developing human organism from about 2 weeks after fertilization through the second month

      • Placenta

        • Life link that transfers nutrients and oxygen from the mother to the embryo 

  • Fetus

    • The developing human organism from 9 weeks after conception to birth 

  • Teratogens 

    • (“Monster Maker”) agents such as chemicals, viruses, that can reach the embryo or fetus during prenatal development and cause harm

  • Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)

    • Physical and cognitive abnormalities in children caused by a pregnant woman's heavy drinking 

    • In severe cases, signs include a small, out of proportion head and abnormal facial features 

      • Epigenetic Effect

        • Leaves chemical mark on DNA and abnormally switches genes on and off

• Newborn “reflexes” 

  • Rooting Reflex

    • When something touches their cheek, babies turn towards the touch and naturally open their mouth and bite on it or near it

      • They may suck it, reflexive tongue, swallowing or breathing 

• Habituation

  • Decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimulation. An infants gain familiarity with repeated exposure to a visual stimulus, their interest wanes and they look away sooner

• Visual preference; part of habituation

  • Infants focus on face not on body 

Module 46; Infancy and Childhood: Physical Development

• Maturation

  • Biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience

• Use it or lose it ; pruning process

  • Shuts down unused links and strengthens others

• Back to sleep position

  • Putting babies to sleep on their backs to reduce the risk of a smothering crib death

• Infantile Amnesia

  • The inability to remember early life events, usually from before the age of three or four

• Hippocampus & Frontal Lobes continue to mature until adolescence.

Module 47; Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development

• Cognitive

  • All the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering and communicating

• Piaget concluded, kids reason differently than adults 

• Schemas

  • A concept or framework that organizes and interprets information

• Assimilation

  • Interpreting our new experiences in terms of our schemas

  • Ex; toddler may call any 4 legged animal a dog

• Accommodation

  • Adapting our current understandings (schemas) to incorporate new information

  • Ex; learns dog is too broad and refines the category

• Piaget's 4 Stages

  • Sensorimotor, Preoperational, Concrete Operational, Formal Operation

    • 1. Sensorimotor (birth-2)

      • Infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions and motor activities

        • Looking, hearing, touching, mouthing, grasping 

      • Lack Object Permanence

        • The awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived

    • 2. Preoperational (2-6/7 years)

      • Too young to perform mental operations ; does not comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic

        • But, learns to use language 

      • Symbolic Thinking

        • Represents things with words or objects

• Egocentrism

  • Difficulty to take another POV; 

  • Ex; Do you have a brother, yes Jim. Does Jim have a brother, no

• Theory of Mind

  • Peoples ideas about their own and others mental states; about their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behaviors these may predict

• Curse of Knowledge

  • Overestimate the extent to which others share our opinions and perspectives 

• ASD; Autism Spectrum Disorder

  • A disorder that appears in childhood and is marked by significant deficiencies in communication and social interaction, and by rigidly fixated interests and repetitive behavior

• 3. Concrete Operational(6/7 to 11 years of age)

  • Children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete events

  • Conservation

    • The principle that properties like mass, volume and number remain the same despite changes in form of objects

    • Ex; water poured in cups of different shapes with same amount of water, kids perceive it as more/less water

• 4. Formal Operational Stage (At age 12)

  • People begin to think about abstract concepts 

  • Potential for mature moral reasoning

• Lev Vygotsky

  • Child's zone of proximal development

    • Between what a child can and cannot do

    • Children may develop slowly or quickly based on support and guidance

• Scaffold

  • Temporary support or guidance given to a learner to help them acquire a new skill or complete a task, gradually withdrawing that support as they become more proficient

Module 48; Infancy and Childhood; Social Development

• Stranger Anxiety

  • Fear of strangers that infants display, beginning by about 8 months of age

• The brain, mind and social emotional behavior develop together

• Attachment

  • An emotional tie with another person; shown in young children by seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress on separation

• Harlow

  • Monkey and robotic mother, which would the monkey go towards

    • Wire with bottle; food

    • Actual monkey looking figure; warmth

• Critical Period

  • An optimal period early in life of an organism when exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produces normal development

• Imprinting

  • Process by which certain animals form strong attachments during an early life critical period

  • Ex; Konrad and Ducks; everywhere Konrad went, the ducks went

• Sensitive Period

  • A specific developmental window where a person is most receptive to learning certain skills or acquiring knowledge

• Mere exposure

  • people prefer things they are familiar with

• Mary Ainsworth

  • Study the interactions between infants and their parents, and the difference between those interactions and the interactions between the same infants and strangers.

    • Strange situation experiment

  • Secure Attachment

    • Style of relating to others that's characterized by trust, emotional connection, and safety

    • mothers

  • Insecure Attachment

    • Marked by anxiety or avoidance of trusting relationships

    • Ex; strangers

• Basic Trust

  • Erikson and his wife

  • A sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy; said to be formed during infancy by appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers

• Self Concept

  • All our thoughts, and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, who am I?

• Parenting Styles

  • Authoritarian; impose rules and expect obedience

  • Permissive; parents submit to their children's desires, may few demands, use little punishment 

  • Authoritative; demanding and responsive . Exert rules and control, but still explain these rules 

Module 49; Gender Development

• Gender

  • Biological, and social traits/characteristics

• Sex

  • Biological traits that define male/female

• Aggression

  • Any physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt or destroy

• Gender role

  • A set of expected behaviors for males or females

• Role

  • A set of expectations (norms) about a social position, defining how those in the position ought to behave

• Gender Identity

  • Our sense of being male or female

• Social learning theory

  • The theory we learn social behavior by observing and imitating and by being rewarded or punished 

• Gender typing

  • The acquisition of a traditional feminine or masculine role

• Gender Schema

  • Framework that organizes boy-girl characteristics

• Transgender

  • An umbrella term describing people whose gender identity or expression differs from that associated with their birth sex

Module 52; Adolescence: Social Development and Emerging Adulthood

• Identity 

  • Erikson

  • Adolescents task to solidify a sense of self by testing and integrating various roles 

• Social Identity

  • The “We” aspect of our self concept; the part of our answer to WHO AM I, that comes from our group memberships

• Erikson's stages of psychosocial development

• Intimacy

  • Ability to form close, loving, relationships, a primary developmental stage in late adolescence, early adulthood

• Emerging Adulthood

  • For some in modern cultures, a period from the late teens to mid twenties, bridging the gap between adolescent dependence and full independence and responsible adulthood

Module 53; Sexual Development

• X-Chromosome

  • The sex chromosome in men and women. Females have 2, males have 1. An X chromosome from each parent produces a female child

• Y Chromosome

  • The sex chromosome found ONLY in men. When paired with an X chromosome from the mother, it produces a male child

• Testosterone

  • Most important of male sex hormones. Males and females have it, but additional testosterone in males stimulates the growth of the male sex organs in the fetus and the development of the male sex characteristics during puberty

• Puberty

  • The period of sexual maturation during which a person becomes capable of reproducing 

• Primary sex characteristics

  • Body structures (ovaries, testes, and external genitalia) that make sexual reproduction possible

• Secondary sex characteristics

  • Nonreproductive sexual traits such as female breasts and hips, male voice quality and body hair

• Menarche

  • The first menstrual period

• AIDS (Acquired immune deficiency syndrome)

  • A life threatening sexually transmitted infection caused by HIV. AIDS depletes the immune system, leaving the person vulnerable to infections

• Sexual Orientation

  • An enduring sexual attraction toward members of either one's own sex (homosexual) or the other sex (heterosexual) or both (bisexual)

  • Genetic Influences on these

    • Family studies, twin studies, fruit fly studies, prenatal influences

Module 54; Adulthood: Physical, Cognitive and Social Development

• Menopause

  • The time of natural cessation of menstruation; also refers to biological changes a woman experiences as her ability to reproduce declines

• Neurocognitive disorder

  • Dementia

• Cross sectional study

  • A study in which people of different ages are studied/compared to one another

• Longitudinal study

  • Research in which the same people are restudied and retested over a long period

• Social Clock

  • The culturally preferred timing of social events such as marriage, parenthood and retirement