psy i ch.9

Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2006

Child Development

Chapter Nine

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Slide author:

Cynthia K. Shinabarger Reed

Book authors:

Samuel Wood

Ellen G. Wood

Denise Boyd


Chapter Nine Overview

Developmental Psychology: Basic Issues and Methodology

Controversial Issues in Developmental Psychology

Approaches to Studying Developmental Change



Prenatal DevelopmentStages of Prenatal DevelopmentFetal BehaviorNegative Influences on Prenatal

Development



InfancyReflexes and Motor DevelopmentSensory and Perceptual DevelopmentLearningTemperamentAttachmentThe Father-Child Relationship



Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive DevelopmentSchemes: The Foundation of Cognitive

DevelopmentPiaget’s Stages of Cognitive DevelopmentAn Evaluation of Piaget’s Contribution

Other Approaches to Cognitive DevelopmentVygotsky’s Sociocultural ViewThe Information – Processing Approach



Language DevelopmentThe Sequence of Language

DevelopmentTheories of Language DevelopmentLearning to Read



Socialization of the ChildThe Parents’ Role in the

Socialization ProcessPeer RelationshipsTelevision as a Socializing AgentCulture and Child Development


Basic Issues and Methodology

Developmental psychology is the study of how humans grow, develop, and change throughout the life span.



Controversial Issues in Developmental Psychology

• Heredity versus Environment• Are there really stages in development

that differ qualitatively?• To what extent are personal traits stable

over time?



Approaches to Studying Developmental Change

• Longitudinal study: a type of developmental study in which the same group of participants is followed and measured at different ages, over a period of years.

• Cross-sectional study: a less expensive and less time-consuming method in which researchers compare groups of participants of different ages to determine age-related differences in some characteristics.



Approaches to Studying Developmental Change (continued)

• Cohort effect: when certain relevant differences in groups of participants have less to do with the participants’ ages than with the eras in which they grew up.


Prenatal Development

Prenatal development: development from conception to birth.

Stages of Prenatal Development

• Conception: occurs the moment a sperm cell fertilizes the ovum.

• Zygote: the single cell that forms when a sperm and egg unite.



Stages of Prenatal Development (continued)

• Sometimes the zygote divides into two cells, the result of which is identical, or monozygotic, twins.

• There are also times when more than one egg and sperm unite, resulting in fraternal, or dizygotic, twins.



Stages of Prenatal Development Continued

Germinal, embryonic, and fetal stages

• Germinal stage: the 2-week stage when the zygote travels to the uterus and attaches itself to the uterine wall; this is also when rapid cell division occurs.

• Embryonic stage: when the embryo develops all of the systems, organs, and structures of the body. This stage lasts from the beginning of week 3 through week 8.



Stages of Prenatal Development (continued)

Germinal, embryonic, and fetal stages

• Fetal stage: lasts from the end of week 8, when bone cells form, until birth.

• The developing human organism is now called a fetus, and it experiences rapid growth and further development of body structures, organs, and systems.



Fetal Behavior

• Fetal responses to sound are both physical, such as turning the head toward a sound, and neurological.

• Several studies of newborns have shown that they remember sounds to which they were exposed as fetuses.

• Experiments are currently underway in which the cognitive development of children who were systematically exposed to prenatal stimuli is being compared to that of children not so exposed.



Fetal Behavior (continued)

• In one study, babies who were exposed to many hours of classical music prior to birth were found to be more advanced in cognitive development at 6 months of age than infants who were not exposed to the music.

• Stable individual differences are evident during prenatal development.

• Some sex differences appear early in prenatal development as well.



Negative Influences on Prenatal Development

• Maternal illness (a chronic condition such as diabetes, for example), can cause problems that may include retardation or acceleration of fetal growth.

• When the mother suffers from a viral disease such as rubella, chicken pox, or HIV, she may deliver an infant with physical and behavioral abnormalities.



Negative Influences on Prenatal Development (continued)

• Teratogens: viruses and other harmful agents, including drugs, x-rays, and environmental toxins, that can have a negative impact on prenatal development.

• Critical periods: A period that is so important to development that a harmful environmental influence at that time can keep a bodily structure from developing normally or can impair later intellectual or social development.



Negative Influences on Prenatal Development (continued)

• Fetal alcohol syndrome: a condition, caused by maternal alcohol intake during pregnancy, in which the baby is born mentally retarded, with a small head and facial, organ, and behavioral abnormalities.

• Low birth weight: a baby weighing less than 5.5 pounds.

• Pre-term infant: an infant who is born early, before 38 weeks of gestation.

• Small-for-date infants: infants who have birth weights lower than expected for their gestational age.


Infancy

Reflexes and Motor Development• During the first few days after birth, neonates’

movements are dominated by reflexes.• Neonates: newborn babies up to 1 month old.• Reflexes: inborn, unlearned, automatic

responses to certain environmental stimuli.• Rooting reflex: stroke a baby on the cheek

and the baby will open its mouth and actively search for a nipple.


Infancy

• Reflexes and Motor Development (continued)

• Maturation: each infant’s own genetically determined, biological pattern of development.

• Development proceeds from the center of the body outward.

• Experience may also accelerate motor development.


InfancySensory and Perceptual DevelopmentVision• At birth, an infant’s vision is about 20/600, and it

doesn’t approach the 20/20 level until the child is about 2 years old.

• Newborns focus best on objects about 9 inches away, and they can follow a slowly moving object.

• By 2 to 3 months of age, most infants prefer human faces to other visual images.

• Although newborns prefer colored stimuli to gray ones, they can’t distinguish all of the colors adults normally can until they are about 2 months old.


Infancy

Sensory and Perceptual DevelopmentDepth Perception

• Gibson and Walk designed an apparatus called the visual cliff to measure infants’ ability to perceive depth.

• They concluded that most babies “can discriminate depth as soon as they can crawl.”


Infancy

Sensory and Perceptual Development (continued)

Hearing and Other Senses

• At birth, the newborn’s hearing is much better developed than her or his vision.

• Newborns also prefer their own mother’s voice to that of an unfamiliar female.

• Newborns are able to discriminate among, and show preferences for, certain odors and tastes.

• Newborns are sensitive to pain.


InfancyLearning

• Several types of learning are evident in newborns.

• Habituation: a decrease in response or attention to a stimulus as an infant becomes accustomed to it.

• Using habituation, Swain and others demonstrated that 3-day-old newborns could retain in memory for 24 hours a speech sound that had been presented repeatedly to them the day before.

• Other researchers have demonstrated both classical conditioning and operant conditioning in newborns.


InfancyTemperament• Temperament: a person’s behavioral style or

characteristic way of responding to the environment.

Differences in Temperament• Thomas, Chess, and Birch studied 2- to 3-

month-old infants and followed them into adolescence and adulthood.

• Three general types of temperament emerged from the study: easy, difficult, and slow-to-warm-up.


Infancy

Temperament continued

Differences in temperament (continued)• Easy: had generally pleasant moods, were adaptable,

approached new situations and people positively, and established regular sleeping, eating, and elimination patterns.

• Difficult: had generally unpleasant moods, reacted negatively to new situations and people, were intense in their emotional reactions, and showed irregularity of bodily functions.

• Slow-to-warm-up: tended to withdraw, were slow to adapt, and were prone to negative emotional states.


Infancy

Temperament (continued)

Origins and Significance of Temperamental Differences

• Research indicates that temperament is strongly influenced by heredity.

• Environmental factors, such as parents’ childrearing style, also affect temperament.

• Studies suggest that the various dimensions of temperament can predict behavioral problems that may appear later in childhood or in adolescence.


Infancy

Attachment• Attachment: the strong affectionate bond a

child forms with the mother or primary caregiver.

Attachment in Infant Monkeys• Harry Harlow conducted studies on attachment

in rhesus monkeys.• His studies suggested that physical

nourishment alone is not enough to bind infants to their primary caregivers.


Infancy

Attachment (continued)

Attachment in Infant Monkeys continued

• Harry Harlow found that it was contact comfort – the comfort supplied by bodily contact – rather than nourishment that formed the basis of the infant monkey’s attachment to its mother.

• Harlow concluded that contact comfort might be sufficient for attachment, but something more was required for normal emotional development: active affection and responsiveness.


Infancy


The Development of Attachment in Humans• The primary caregiver holds, strokes, and talks

to the baby and responds to the baby’s needs.• In turn, the baby gazes at, listens to, and

moves in synchrony with the caregiver’s voice.• The infant’s attachment to the mother develops

over time and is usually quite strong by age 6 to 8 months.


Infancy


The Development of Attachment in Humans continued

• John Bowlby believes that attachment behavior serves the evolutionary function of protecting the infant from danger.

• Separation anxiety: The fear and distress shown by toddlers when their parent leaves, occurring from 8 to 24 months and reaching a peak between 12 and 18 months.


Infancy


The Development of Attachment in Humans continued

• Stranger anxiety: a fear of strangers common in infants at about 6 months and increasing in intensity until about 12 months, and then declining in the second year.

• Stranger anxiety is greater in an unfamiliar setting, when the parent is not close at hand, and when a stranger abruptly approaches or touches the child.

• Interestingly, stranger anxiety is not directed at unfamiliar children until age 19 to 30 months.


Infancy


Ainsworth’s Attachment Categories• Secure attachment: infants show distress on

separation from mother and happiness when mother returns; use mother as a safe base for exploration.

• Avoidant attachment: infants do not show distress when mother leaves and are indifferent when mother returns.


Infancy


Ainsworth’s Attachment Categories continued• Resistant attachment: infants may cling to mother

before she leaves and show anger when mother returns; may push mother away, do not explore environment when mother is present; difficult to comfort when upset.

• Avoidant attachment: infants may show distress when mother leaves and alternate between happiness, indifference, and anger when mother returns; often look away from mother or look at her with expressionless face.


Infancy


Origins and Significance of Attachment Differences• Some studies show that depression in the mother is

related to insecure attachment.• Researchers have studied infant-caregiver attachment

in foster families.• In these settings, the primary factor affecting

attachment seems to be the age of the infant at the time of placement in a foster home.

• In childhood and adolescence, securely attached infants are likely to be more socially competent than less securely attached infants.


Infancy

The Father – Child Relationship• Children whose fathers exhibit antisocial behavior,

such as deceitfulness and aggression, are more likely to demonstrate such behavior themselves.

• Children who experience regular interaction with their fathers tend to have higher IQs and to do better in social situations and at coping with frustration than children lacking such interactions.

• Positive father – son relationships are also associated with parenting behavior by sons when they have children of their own.


Infancy

Father – Child Relationship (continued)• Because the effects of fathers on development are

generally positive, father absence is associated with many undesirable developmental outcomes.

• The presence or absence of the father may affect development because mothers and fathers interact differently with infants and children.

• Some developmentalists believe that fathers are more supportive than mothers of children’s confidence and identity development.

• Ideally, children need both sets of influences.


Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

Schemes: The Foundation of Cognitive Development

• Organization: Piaget’s term for the mental process that uses specific experiences to make inferences that can be generalized to new experiences.

• Schemes: plans of action to be used in a similar circumstance.

• Assimilation: the mental process by which new objects, events, experiences, or information are incorporated into existing schemes.



Schemes: The Foundation of Cognitive Development (continued)

• Equilibration: the mental process that motivates us to keep our schemes in balance with the realities of the environment.

• Accommodation: the mental process of modifying existing schemes and creating new ones to incorporate new objects, events, experiences, and information.



Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

The Sensorimotor Stage• Sensorimotor stage: Piaget’s first stage of

cognitive development (ages birth to 2 years), in which infants gain an understanding of the world through their senses and their motor activites.

• Object permanence: the realization that objects continue to exist even when they are out of sight.



Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development (continued)

The Preoperational Stage• Preoperational stage: Piaget’s second stage of

cognitive development (ages 2 to 6 years), characterized by rapid development of language and thinking governed by perception rather than logic.

• Egocentrism: a belief in children that everyone sees what they see, thinks what they think, and feels as they feel.

• Animistic thinking: the belief that inanimate objects are alive.




The Preoperational Stage continued• Centration: the tendency to focus on only one

dimension of a stimulus.• Because of egocentrism and centration,

children in this stage have problems understanding any activity that is governed by rules.




The Concrete Operations Stage• Concrete operations stage: Piaget’s third

stage of cognitive development (ages 6 to 11 or 12 years), during which children gradually construct schemes that allow them to decenter their thinking – that is ,to attend to two or more dimensions of a stimulus at the same time.




The Concrete Operations Stage continued• Reversibility: the fact that when only the

appearance of a substance has been changed, it can be returned to its original state.

• Conservation: the concept that a given quantity of matter remains the same despite rearrangement or change in its appearance, as long as nothing is added or taken away.


Piaget’s Conservation TasksCopyright © Allyn & Bacon 2006

•




The Formal Operational Stage• Formal operations stage: Piaget’s fourth and

final stage (ages 11 or 12 years and beyond), characterized by the ability to apply logical thinking to abstract problems and hypothetical situations.




The Formal Operational Stage continued

• Because of their ability to construct an imaginary reality that is linked to present reality, adolescents exhibit types of thinking that are virtually nonexistent in younger children.

• Teenagers display a type of thinking Piaget called naïve idealism.




The Formal Operational Stage continued

• Imaginary audience: admirers that exist only in the teenager’s imagination.

• Personal fable: a teenager's exaggerated sense of their own uniqueness.



An Evaluation of Piaget’s Contribution• Today’s developmental psychologists point out that

Piaget relied on observation and on the interview technique, which depended on verbal responses.

• Newer techniques requiring nonverbal responses have shown that infants and young children are more competent than Piaget proposed.

• Few developmental psychologists believe that cognitive development takes place in the general stage-like fashion proposed by Piaget.



An Evaluation of Piaget’s Contribution (continued)

• Cross-cultural studies have verified the sequence of cognitive development, but they have also revealed differences in the rate of such development.

• Another criticism comes from research showing that formal operational thought is not universal.


Other Approaches to Cognitive Development

Vygotsky’s Sociocultural View• Lev Vygotsky believed spontaneous language

behaviors exhibited by children were important to the process of cognitive development.

• He maintained that human infants come equipped with basic skills such as perception, the ability to pay attention, and certain capacities of memory not unlike those of many other animal species.



Vygotsky’s Sociocultural View (continued)• Vygotsky believed that talking to oneself –

private speech – is a key component in cognitive development.

• He saw a strong connection among social experience, speech, and cognitive development.

• Vygotsky also maintained that a child’s readiness to learn resides within a zone of proximal development.



Vygotsky’s Sociocultural View (continued)

• Zone of proximal development: a range of cognitive tasks that the child cannot yet perform alone but can learn to perform with the instruction, help, and guidance of a parent, teacher, or more advanced peer.

• Scaffolding: help in which a teacher or parent adjusts the quality and degree of instruction and guidance to fit the child’s present level of ability or performance.



The Information – Processing Approach• The information – processing approach

sees the human mind as a system that functions like a computer.

• Psychologists who use this approach view cognitive development as a gradual process through which specific information – processing skills are acquired, rather than a series of cognitive “leaps,” as Piaget’s stage theory suggests.



The Information – Processing Approach (continued)

Processing Speed• Robert Kail found that information – processing

speed increases dramatically as children move from infancy through childhood.

• This increase in speed is evident in a number of tasks, including perceptual-motor tasks such as responding quickly to a stimulus.

• Increased processing speed is associated with improved memory.



Information-Processing Approach (continued)Memory

• Short-term memory develops dramatically during an infant’s first year.

• Children increasingly use strategies for improving memory as they mature cognitively.

• One universal strategy for holding information in short-term memory is rehearsal, or mentally repeating information over and over.



Information-Processing Approach continued

Memory (continued)

• Organization: a very practical strategy for storing information in such a way that it can be retrieved without difficulty.

• Elaboration: a strategy that requires creating relationships or connections between items that are to be remembered, but have no inherent connection.



Information – Processing Approach (continued)

Metacognition• Theory of mind: a fundamental developmental

task for children is coming to understand how people may differ greatly in what they know and what they believe.

• Metacognition: the process of thinking about how you or others think.

• Development of theory of mind and metacognition is related to children’s language skills.


Language Development

The Sequence of Language Development• The process begins in the early weeks of life with

cooing.• Babbling: the vocalization of phonemes, the basic

units of sound in any language, which begins at about 6 months.

• By about 1 year of age, babies have restricted the sounds they utter to those that fit the language they are learning.

• Sometime during the second year, infants begin to use words to communicate.

• Holophrases: single words that function as whole sentences.



The Sequence of Language Development (continued)

• Once children know about 50 words, they stop using holophrases and start combining words into two-word sentences.

• Overextension: the act of using a word, on the basis of some shared feature, to apply to a broader range of objects than appropriate.

• Underextension: the failure to apply a word to other members of the class to which it applies.




• Children’s language advances considerably between 2 and 3 years of age as they begin to use sentences of three or more words, which linguists call telegraphic speech.

• Telegraphic speech: short sentences that follow a strict word order and contain only essential content words.

• Telegraphic speech reflects the child’s understanding of syntax – the rules governing how words are ordered in a sentence.




• After age 3, children experience a phase linguists refer to as the grammar explosion, meaning that they acquire the grammatical rules of language very rapidly.

• Overregularization: the act of inappropriately applying the grammatical rules for forming plurals and past tenses to irregular nouns and verbs.



Theories of Language Development

Learning theory• Some believe that children acquire vocabulary and

sentence construction mainly through imitation.• B.F. Skinner asserted that language is shaped

through reinforcement.• Imitation cannot account for patterns of speech such

as telegraphic speech or for systematic errors such as overregularization.

• There are also problems with reinforcement as an explanation for language acquisition.



Theories of Language Development continued

Nativist position

• The nativist view asserts that the language learning process is an inborn characteristic of all members of the human species.

• For the nativist, the only environmental factor that is required for language development is the presence of language.

• Neither instruction nor reinforcement is necessary.



Theories of Language Development (continued)

Nativist position (continued)• Noam Chomsky maintains that the brain

contains a language acquisition device (LAD), which enables children to sort the stream of speech they hear in the environment in ways that allow them to discover grammar rules.

• He also suggests that the LAD determines the sequence of language development.



Theories of Language Development (continued)

Nature and Nurture: An Interactionist Perspective• The interactionist perspective acknowledges the

importance of both learning and an inborn capacity for acquiring language.

• Motherese: highly simplified speech with shorter phrases and sentences and simpler vocabulary, which is uttered slowly, at a high pitch, and with exaggerated intonation and much repetition.

• Reading to children and with them also supports language development.



Learning to Read• Phonological awareness: knowledge about a

language’s sounds and how they are represented as letters.

• Children who have good phonological awareness skills in their first language learn to read more easily even if reading instruction takes place in an entirely new language.

• Children seem to learn phonological awareness skills through word play.



Learning to Read (continued)• Once children have mastered the basic symbol-

sound decoding process, they become better readers by learning about root words, suffixes, and prefixes.

• Teachers also facilitate the development of reading comprehension by helping children learn skills such as identifying the main idea of a passage or story.

• At every stage in the process, children benefit from exposure to good stories, both those they read on their own and those that are read to them by parents and teachers.


Socialization of the Child

• Socialization: the process of learning socially acceptable behaviors, attitudes, and values.

Parents’ Role in the Socialization Process• To be effective, socialization must ultimately

result in children coming to regulate their own behavior.

• Diane Baumrind studied the continuum of parental control and identified three parenting styles: authoritarian, authoritative, and permissive.


Socialization of the ChildParents’ Role in the Socialization Process

(continued)

Authoritarian Parents• Authoritarian parents: parents who make arbitrary

rules, expect unquestioned obedience from their children, punish misbehavior (often physically), and value obedience to authority.

• Diane Baumrind found preschool children disciplined in this manner to be withdrawn, anxious, and unhappy.

• Parents’ failure to provide a rationale for rules makes it hard for children to see any reason for following them.



Parents’ Role in the Socialization Process (continued)

Authoritative Parents• Authoritative parents: parents who set high but

realistic standards, reason with the child, enforce limits, and encourage open communication and independence.

• Knowing why the rules are necessary makes it easier for children to internalize and follow rules, whether in the presence of their parents or not.

• The positive effects of authoritative parenting have been found across all ethnic groups in the United States.




Permissive Parents• Permissive parents: parents who make few rules or

demands and usually do not enforce those that are made.

• They allow children to make their own decisions and control their own behavior.

• Children raised in this manner are the most immature, impulsive and dependent, and seem to have less self-control and be less self-reliant.




Neglecting Parents

• Neglecting parents: parents who are permissive and are not involved in their children’s lives.

• Infants of neglecting parents are more likely than others to be insecurely attached and continue to experience difficulties in social relationships throughout childhood and into their adult years.



Peer Relationships• Infants begin to show an interest in each other at a

very young age.• Friendships begin to develop by 3 or 4 years, and

relationships with peers become increasingly important.

• By middle childhood, friendships tend to be based on mutual trust, and membership in a peer group is central to a child’s happiness.

• The peer group serves a socializing function by providing models of behavior, dress, and language.



Peer Relationships (continued)

• Physical attractiveness is a major factor in peer acceptance even in children as young as 3 to 5 years, although it seems to be more important for girls than for boys.

• Low acceptance by peers is an important predictor of later mental health problems.



Peer Relationships (continued)

• Most often excluded from the peer group are neglected children, who are shy and withdrawn, and rejected children, who typically exhibit aggressive and inappropriate behavior and who are likely to start fights.

• Children abused at home tend to be unpopular with their classmates, who typically view them as aggressive and uncooperative.



Television as a Socializing Agent• Surveys indicate that parents are keenly aware

of the potentially damaging effects of television, especially violent programs, on their children’s development.

• Literally thousands of studies suggest that TV violence leads to aggressive behavior in children and teenagers.

• Other studies show that excessive TV viewing is linked to childhood obesity.



Television as a Socializing Agent (continued)• The socializing effect of television begins

before that of schools, religious institutions, and peers.

• Singer and Singer suggest that such programming can lead to a shortened attention span.

• Television can be an effective educational medium.



Culture and Child Development• Urie Bronfenbrenner proposes that the environment in

which a child grows up is a system of interactive, layered contexts of development.

• Microsystems: at the core of the system; includes settings in which the child has personal experience.

• Exosystems: includes contexts that the child does not experience directly but that affect the child because of their influences on microsystems.

• Macrosystem: includes all aspects of the larger culture.



Culture and Child Development (continued)

• The ideas and institutions of the macrosystem filter down to the child through the exosystems and microsystems.

• The microsystem may ultimately determine whether a culture’s beliefs and practices regarding education will reach the individual child.

• The values and decisions associated with each level of Bronfenbrenner’s system have a strong and lasting impact on children’s development.


Review of Learning Objectives

Developmental Psychology: Basic Issues and Methodology

1. What three issues are frequently debated among developmental psychologists?

2. What methods do developmental psychologists use to investigate age-related changes?




1. What happens in each of the three stages of prenatal development?

2. What have scientists learned about fetal behavior in recent years?

3. What are some negative influences on prenatal development, and when is their impact greatest?



Infancy

1. How do the motor behaviors of a newborn compare to those of an older infant?

2. What are the sensory and perceptual abilities of a newborn?

3. What types of learning occur in infancy?

4. What is temperament, and what are the three temperament types identified by Thomas, Chess, and Birch?



Infancy (continued)

5. What did the research of Harlow, Bowlby, and Ainsworth reveal about the process of infant – caregiver attachment?

6. How do fathers affect children’s development?




1. How did Piaget use the concepts of schemes, assimilation, and accommodation to explain cognitive development?

2. What occurs during each of Piaget’s stages of cognitive development?

3. What are some important criticisms of Piaget’s work?




1. In Vygotsky’s view, how do private speech and scaffolding contribute to cognitive development?

2. What three cognitive abilities have information-processing researchers studied extensively?




1. What is the sequence of language development from babbling through the acquisition of grammatical rules?

2. How do learning theory and the nativist position explain the acquisition of language?

3. What is phonological awareness, and why is it important?



Socialization of the Child1. What are the three parenting styles identified

by Baumrind, and which does she find most affective?

2. How do peers contribute to the socialization process?

3. What are some of the positive and negative affects of television?

4. How does Bronfenbrenner explain the influence of culture on children’s development?

psy i ch.9

Health & Medicine