Infancy and Childhood: Physical Development
Maturation: Biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience (e.g., children stand before walking).
Biological maturation sets the course for development, with nature guiding overall development and experience (nurture) adjusting it.
On the day of birth, a baby has most of the brain cells they will ever have.
The frontal lobe experiences the most rapid growth from ages 3 to 6, enabling rational planning.
Association areas of the brain (associated with thinking, memory, and language) are the last to develop.
Adrenal Hormones: Function to shut down unused neural links to make space for new connections.
Genes help guide motor development; often, twins begin walking almost on the same day.
Maturation also involves rapid development of the cerebellum (at the back of the brain), which creates readiness to walk by 1 year of age.
Caregivers can positively influence motor development through nurturing practices, such as massaging babies.
Infantile Amnesia: The universal inability of adults to recall personal experiences from the first few years of life, typically before the age of three or four.
Cognitive Development
At 5 months old, infants display a level of visual awareness comparable to adults.
Cognition: All the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.
Schemas: A concept or framework that organizes and interprets information.
Assimilation: The process of interpreting new experiences in terms of existing schemas.
Accommodation: The process of adapting current understandings (schemas) to incorporate new information.
Typical Age Range, Stage, and Key Milestones
Birth - 2 years (Sensorimotor Stage):
Infants know the world through their sensory impressions and motor activities.
Lack object permanence (the awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived) until about 8 months.
Infants show longer staring in response to new stimuli and exhibit stranger anxiety.
2 to 6/7 years (Preoperational Stage):
Children learn to use language but do not yet understand concrete logic.
Egocentrism: A child's difficulty in taking another's point of view.
Engagement in pretend play is typical.
7 to 11 years (Concrete Operational Stage):
Children develop mental operations that enable logical thinking about concrete events.
Theory of Mind: Understanding one's own and others' mental states, feelings, perceptions, thoughts, and behaviors these might predict.
Conservation: Understanding that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain constant despite changes in the forms of objects (lack of this concept before age 6).
Understanding mathematical transformations is a key feature.
12 years through adulthood (Formal Operational Stage):
Individuals apply new abstract reasoning tools to their world.
Abstract Logic: Development of reasoning skills that go beyond concrete thought.
Capable of more mature reasoning.
Scaffold: A framework that offers children temporary support as they develop higher levels of thinking.
Zone of Proximal Development: The area between what a child can do alone and what they cannot do alone.
Talking to oneself can help in controlling behavior and emotions, facilitating the mastery of new skills, either audibly or inaudibly.
Children are not passive recipients of knowledge; they construct understanding based on their prior knowledge.
Social Development
Stranger Anxiety: The fear of strangers that infants commonly exhibit, beginning around 8 months of age.
Attachment: An emotional bond between individuals, especially evident in young children seeking closeness to caregivers and showing distress upon separation.
Studies by Harry Harlow and Margaret Harlow on monkeys demonstrate that infant monkeys cling to a cloth mother, viewing her as a secure base, akin to being attached by an invisible elastic band.
Parent-Infant Emotional Communication: Occurs through touch (soothing or arousing).
Critical Period: An optimal time early in an organism's life to be exposed to certain stimuli for normal development.
Example: Ducklings follow the first moving object they see after hatching, typically their mother.
Imprinting: The process by which certain animals form strong attachments during early life, usually difficult to reverse once established.
Note: Imprinting is primarily observed in animals rather than humans.
Instead of imprinting, human children have a sensitive period where exposure to others can foster fondness.
Strange Situation: A research method to observe child-caregiver attachment.
A child is placed in an unfamiliar environment while their caregiver leaves and then returns; the child’s reactions are monitored.
Attachment Styles:
Secure Attachment: Exhibited by infants who explore comfortably in the caregiver’s presence, show temporary distress upon separation, and find solace in reunion.
Insecure Attachment: Classified into two types:
Clinging: Exhibiting anxious attachments.
Avoidant: Resisting closeness with caregivers.
Temperament: A person’s inherent emotional reactivity and intensity.
Some babies are naturally easier or more difficult after birth, and parenting styles correlate with children's behaviors.
Intervention programs can enhance parental sensitivity and infant security in attachment.
Father’s emotional involvement is equally essential as the mother’s.
Children's separation anxiety peaks around 13 months, illustrating how our capacity for love grows.
Basic Trust: According to Erik Erikson, a sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy, formed during infancy through appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers.
Individuals with secure relationships with their parents are more likely to enjoy secure friendships throughout life.
Anxious Attachment: Characterized by a craving for acceptance but vigilance for potential rejection.
Avoidant Attachment: People feeling discomfort in intimacy and employ avoidance strategies to maintain distance.
Consequences of Attachment:
When children lack healthy attachments with at least one adult, they typically have lower intelligence scores, reduced brain development, and increased rates of behavioral issues such as ADHD.
Affluent children face a higher risk of substance abuse, eating disorders, and depression.
Harlow's monkeys, even with an artificial mother figure, demonstrated a lack of mating capability and abusive tendencies towards their offspring later in life.
Of the female monkeys abused by their mothers, 9 out of 16 became abusive mothers themselves.
Children exposed to severe early trauma show lasting effects on brain development.
Low serotonin levels are associated with aggressive behavior in teens and adults who have experienced abuse.
Abused children have increased risks for health issues, psychological disorders, and criminal behavior.
Individuals with a genetic predisposition—like a gene variant linked to stress hormone production—face greater depression risks when they endure abuse.
Self-Concept: Represents all our thoughts and feelings about ourselves in response to the question, "Who am I?"
Children as young as 18 months develop schemas regarding their self-identity (e.g., perception of how their face should look).
Parenting Styles
Authoritarian: Imposes strict rules and expectations with little room for flexibility.
Permissive: Laissez-faire approach; few demands, minimal limitations, and little punishment.
Negligent: Uninvolved; neither demanding nor responsive, lacking close relationships with their children.
Authoritative: Sets rules but also encourages open discussion and flexibility, leading to democratic parenting styles.
Parenting styles can be influenced significantly by cultural context.
Adolescence
Adolescence: The transitional phase from childhood to adulthood, covering the period from puberty to independence.
Teenagers experience a strong desire for social acceptance while often feeling disconnected.
Puberty: The period of sexual maturation during which individuals become capable of reproduction.
Boys who experience early puberty often become more independent and self-assured.
Girls facing early maturation may encounter challenges, including anxiety and depression.
Modern trends indicate girls are reaching puberty faster, attributed to dietary chemicals, increased stress, and body fat increase.
Secure attachments to mothers can serve as a protective buffer against these challenges.
Neuronal Changes:
Selective Pruning: A process where unused neurons and connections are eliminated.
The growth of myelin around neurons enhances communication between different brain regions.
Development of the frontal lobe occurs later, impacting decision-making.
Teens often weigh benefits more heavily, sometimes underestimating risks.
Formal Operations: The application of new abstract reasoning tools to interpret the surrounding world.
Levels of Morality (Lawrence Kohlberg)
Preconventional Morality (before age 9): Individuals interpret actions in terms of self-interest; they obey rules to avoid punishment.
Example: “If you save your dying wife, you’ll be a hero.”
Conventional Morality (early adolescence): The maintenance of social order and approval through adherence to laws and rules.
Example: “If you steal the drug for her, everyone will think you’re a criminal.”
Postconventional Morality (adolescence and beyond): Actions reflect basic rights and self-defined ethical principles.
Example: “People have a right to live.”
Emotional Drivers in Moral Judgment: The desire to punish wrongdoing is often driven more by emotional reactions and outrage than by reason or logic.
Moral Action and Attitudes: Engaging in moral actions can reinforce moral attitudes, highlighting the influence of the environment on ethical behavior.
Delayed Gratification: The ability to forgo smaller immediate rewards for larger future rewards is essential for academic and social success.
In a study conducted by Walter Mischel, children were given a choice between one marshmallow now or two once he returned shortly.
Those with the self-control to delay gratification often achieve higher college completion rates and incomes, and encounter fewer addiction-related problems.