Development and Learning
DEVELOPMENT
“3 thematic issues” in Dev. Psych:
Nature / Nurture (genes or environment)
Continuous / Discontinuous (gradual dev over time or dev. In stage)
Stability / Change (traits persist, unchanging or traits change as we age)
CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY: ppl of different ages at the same point in time
Adv: inexpensive & quick
Disadv: can be differences due to generational gap
LONGITUDINAL STUDY: studies same ppl over time
Adv: eliminates groups (cohort) differences, lots of detail
Disadv: expensive, time consuming, high dropout rates
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
Prenatal Development:
Teratogens: external agents that can cause abnormal prenatal development (alcohol, drugs, etc)
Illness, mutations, hormones, and environment can impact prenatal dev
Physical Development:
Maturation: natural course of development, occurs no matter what (walking)
Gross movement: large muscles, strength and coordination (walking) – develops first
Fine movement: small muscles, precision and controlled (writing)
Reflexes: innate responses we’re born w/ - that go away w/ time
Rooting – turning of face towards a finger when touched on the cheek (food response
Other reflexes include - sucking, swallowing, grasping, Moro (startle), stepping, Babinski (toes spread when foot touched)
Eyes have the most limited development, takes till 1 year
Visual cliff: babies have to learn depth perception, so they will cross a “cliff”
Critical period (sensitive period) – limited time where something HAS to be developed or it won’t happen (language for humans)
Imprinting: birds believe the first thing they see after hatching is mom
PUBERTY! (sexual maturation bc of hormones)
Primary sex characteristics: necessary structures for reproduction (ovaries, testicles, vagina, penis)
Menarche – 1st period
Spermarche – first release of sperm
Secondary sex characteristics: nonreproductive characteristics that dev during puberty (breasts, hips, deepening of voice, body hair)
Adolescent growth spurt – rapid skeletal and muscular dev.
Frontal lobe continuous dev (not fully developed till 25)
Adulthood – the following level off and then decline:
Mobility, flexibility, reaction time, visual / auditory acuity, fertility
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
JEAN PIAGET’S COGNITIVE DEV.
Schemas –frameworks that organize info
Assimilation: incorporate new info into existing schema Cat is a dog b/c 4 legs.
Accommodation: adjust existing schemas to incorporate new information Cat and dogs = different.
Sensorimotor Stage: Birth to 2 years: focused on exploring their world
Lack (and gain) Object Permanence: Objects when removed from field of view are thought to disappear (peek-a-boo)
Pre-operational Stage: 2 – 7 years: use pretend play and mental symbols
Lack Conservation: recognize that substances remain the same despite changes in shape, length, or position (girls with juice in glasses)
Lack Reversibility: cannot do reverse operations (count out both 4+2 and 2+4)
Are egocentric: inability to distinguish one’s own perspective from another’s – think everyone sees what they see
Lack (and start developing) theory of mind: people’s beliefs, intentions, emotions are their own
Use animism: believe artificial objects have thoughts / feelings
Concrete Operational Stage: 7-11 yrs: use operational thinking, classification, and can think logical in concrete context
Formal Operational Stage: 11-15 yrs: use abstract and idealist thoughts, hypothetical-deductive reasoning
Problems with Piaget’s theory: stages too discrete, dev. differs b/w kids
VYGOTSKY’S THEORY: cognitive development is a social process too, need to interact w/ others
Zone of Proximal Development: gap b/w what a child can do on their own and w/ support. Need scaffolding (teachers)
Crystallized intelligence: fact and prior learning / experiences – increases w/ age
Fluid intelligence: ability to learn new things, reaction times, abstract thinking & quick problem solving – decreases w/ age
Dementia: loss of cognitive function – results in emotional and behavioral changes – ex. Alzheimer’s
LANGUAGE
Language: shared system of symbols that operate by rules and is infinite
Phonemes: smallest unit of sound (ch sound in chat)
Morpheme: smallest unit that caries meaning (-ed means past tense)
Grammar: rules in a language that enable us to communicate
Semantics: set of rules by which we derive meaning (adding –ed makes something past tense)
Syntax: rules for combining words into sentences (white house vs casa blanca)
Cooing stage: produces vowels sounds
Babbling stage: start to create phonemes w/ constants
One-word stage: used to try and communicate wants
Telegraphic speech (two word stage): further communication
Overregularization: grammar mistake- children over use certain morphemes (I go-ed to the park)
SOCIOEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Temperament: patterns of emotional reactions in babies – impacts attachment
Easy, difficult, slow to warm up
“Monkey experiments”: discovered that contact comfort is more important than feeding (monkeys fed on wire or cloth mothers). Monkeys raised in isolation couldn’t socialize
Attachment: strange situation paradigm (children left alone in a room w/ a stranger, then reunited w/ mom – determines your attachment style
Utilizes idea of separation anxiety: during late sensorimotor stage kids are fearful of ppl they don’t know or being left alone
Secure attachment (60% of infants): upset when mom leaves, easily calmed on return. Tend to be more stable adults
Avoidant insecure (20% infants): actively avoids mom, doesn’t care when she leaves – adults have distant relationships and fail to communicate
Anxious insecure (10% infants): actively avoids mom, freaks out when she leaves – jealous relationships and clingy
Disorganized insecure(5%): confused, fearful, dazed – result of abuse
Parenting styles- influenced by culture
Authoritarian: rules & obedience, “my way or the highway” – kids lack initiative in college, low self-esteem
Permissive: kids do whatever – no rules – kids lack initiative in college – high self-esteem
Authoritative: give and take w/ kids – kids become socially competent and reliable – best type - high self-esteem and initiative
Peer relationships w/ time
Children engage w/ play
Parallel play – play side by side w/o interacting – turns into pretend play
Adolescents rely on peers
Imaginary audience: believe others are constantly watching them (related to egocentrism)
Turns into Personal fable – belief you are special / unique / invincible
Adulthood – culture impacts when major life events should occur – some allow a transition bw adolescence and adulthood
Social clock – shared (cultural) expectation of age-appropriate behavior (when to get married, have kids, etc)
Gender roles: expected behaviors (norms) for men/women due to cultural influence
ERIKSON’S SOCIOEMOTINAL DEV. : each stage represents a crisis that must be resolved, results in competence or weakness
Trust vs Mistrust (birth – 18 months): if needs are met infants dev basic trust
Autonomy vs shame & doubt (1 -3 yrs): learn to exercise their will (I WANT TO DO IT – pours milk)
Initiative vs guilt (3-6 yrs): learn to initiate tasks and carry out plans, also be creative (WHY kid)
Industry vs inferiority (6 yrs to puberty): learn what you’re good or accomplished at (school / sports success)
Identity vs role confusion: (adolescence thru 20s): refine a sense of self by testing roles and forming an identity
Intimacy vs isolation: (20s—40s): form close relationships and gain capacity for love
Generativity vs stagnation: (40s-60s): discover sense of contributing to the world, thru family & work
Integrity vs despair: (60s and up): reflect on your life, feel satisfaction or failure
MARCIA’S IDENTITY THEORY:
Diffusion: no commitment, no exploration, no idea who they are (no idea of a major – not even thinking on it)
Foreclosure: premature commitment w/ no exploration (I’ll be a lawyer bc my parents say so)
Moratorium: actively seeking an identity, no commitment though (trying lots of clubs to see what sticks)
Identity Achievement: committed sense of self, desire to accomplish and contribute (picked a major after careful consideration)
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs): stressful / traumatic events during childhood – impact relationships and health
Abuse, divorce, mental illness
ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS THEORY:
Microsystem – immediate environment w/ daily interaction (family, friends, teachers)
Mesosystem – relationships bw microsystem (interaction bw parents and teachers / school)
Exosystem – environment you’re not directly a part of that still impacts you (government policies, parent’s job)
Macrosystem – societal and cultural influences (customs, norms, traditions)
Chronosystem – life stage and historical events (economic recession, environmental changes)
LEARNING
Behaviorist perspective is focused on learning – (change in behavior through experience). Measures observable behavior, and usually ignores the mind
CLASSICAL CONDITIONING: explains involuntary behvs and emotions
Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS): causes response w/o needing to be learned (food)
Unconditioned Response (UCR): response that naturally occurs w/o training (salivate)
Conditioned Stimulus (CS): thing that now brings about a response (bell)
Conditioned Response (CR): response after conditioning, follows a CS (salivate)
Contiguity: Timing of the pairing, NS/CS must be presented .5-1 sec BEFORE the US
Acquisition: process of learning the response pairing
Extinction: previously conditioned response dies out over time
Spontaneous Recovery: After a period of time the CR comes back out of nowhere
Generalization: CR to like stimuli (similar sounding bell)
Discrimination: CR to ONLY the CS (only drool to that one bell, no others)
Higher order conditioning: when the original CS is paired with 2nd thing – and becomes a new CS (drool to squeaky cabinet / can opener)
Conditioned taste aversion (one-trial learning)- Innate predispositions can allow classical conditioning to occur in one trial (food poisoning) – due to biological preparedness – predisposed to react to dangerous biological threats
Habituation – get used to a regular stimulus and stop responding (startle less to a loud noise w/ time)
Emotional conditioning – emotions can be conditioned in humans (little Albert experiment) lead to behavioral treatments for fear (counterconditioning)
OPERANT CONDITIONING: explains voluntary behavior resulting from consequences
LAW OF EFFECT Behaviors followed by pos. outcomes are strengthened, neg. outcomes weaken a behavior (cat in the puzzle box)
PRINCIPLES OF OPERANT COND:
Pos. Reinforcement: Add something nice to increase a behavior (gold star for turning in HW)
Neg. Reinforcement: Take away something bad/annoying to increase a behavior (put on seatbelt to take away annoying car signal)
Primary Reinforcers: innately satisfying (food and water)
Secondary Reinforcers: everything else (stickers, high-fives)
Token Reinforcer: type of secondary- can be exchanged for other stuff (game tokens or money)
Pos. Punishment: Add something bad to decrease a behavior (spanking)
Neg. Punishment: Take away something good to decrease a behavior (take away car keys)
Punishment temporarily changes behv., doesn’t tell you what to do – ineffective
Operant conditioning extinguishes like classical conditioning
Shaping: use successive approximations to train behavior (reward closer and closer desired behaviors to teach a response – rat basketball)
Continuous Reinforcement schedule: Receive reward for every response
Partial Reinforcement schedule: vary how often the response is given – strengthens responses and takes longer to extinguish
Fixed Ratio schedule: Reward every X number of response (every 10 envelopes stuffed get $$)
Fixed Interval schedule: Reward every X amount of time passed (every 2 weeks get a paycheck)
Variable Ratio schedule: Rewarded after a random number of responses (slot machine
Variable Interval schedule: Rewarded after a random amount of time has passed (BeReal app)
Variable schedules are most resistant to extinction (how long will you keep playing a slot machine before you think it's broken?)
Ratio schedules lead to the highest response rates (bc you are in control of your reward)
Learned Helplessness – no matter what you do you never get a positive outcome so you just give up (word scrambles, depression models)
Instinctive drift – can only teach animals behaviors they already do, also will return to original behaviors w/ time
Superstitious behaviors – operantly conditioned through partial reinforcement & coincidence – pigeons hopping on one foot to get food
MISC LEARNING TYPES
SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY – learning through observation
Modeling Behaviors: Children model (imitate) behaviors. Study used BoBo dolls to demonstrate. The more similar the model is the better you learn.
Vicarious conditioning: form of observational learning, watch another get a consequence and learn - don’t do that!
Latent learning– learning is hidden until useful (rats in maze get reinforced half way through, performance improved
Create Cognitive maps – mental representation of an area, allows navigation if blocked (firefighters taught this)
Insight learning– some learning is through simple intuition (chimps with crates to get bananas) – aha! moment
