Term
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Definition
| Developmental psychology is concerned with the course and causes of developmental changes over a person’s lifetime. |
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Term
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Definition
Arnold Gesell, an American psychologist, used observations to
support his theory that motor skills develop in a fixed sequence of stages, relatively
independent of the environment. He called this natural growth maturation |
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Term
| How are heredity and the environment correlated and mutually influential? |
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Definition
Nature shapes some characteristics, such as physical size and appearance, so strongly that only extreme environmental conditions can affect them. Nature’s influence on characteristics such as intelligence or personality is not as strong. These complex traits are influenced by genes and many environmental factors as well. It is impossible to identify the separate the influences of nature and nurture because heredity and
environment are correlated and they influence each other. |
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Term
| Piaget's Theory of Development |
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Definition
| Piaget saw the ability to think as growing in a fixed sequence of periods, or stages. A child’s thinking is not quantitatively, but qualitatively different than an adult’s. Each stage of cognitive development builds on previous stages and is a different way of thinking. Children are active thinkers who are always trying to construct more advanced understandings of the world. |
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Term
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Definition
From birth to two years the infant’s mental activity and schemas are confined to
sensory functions and motor skills. Sensorimotor infants cannot think about absent
objects; they can only form schemas of things they can see, hear, or touch. This period
ends when the infant can form mental representations and thus can think about objects
and actions even if they are not visible or occurring in the here-and-now.
Infants do not have object permanence. |
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Term
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Definition
| The infant’s knowledge that an object exists even if it is out of sight |
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Term
| Preoperational Development |
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Definition
From about two to seven, according to Piaget children are in the preoperational
period.
a) During the first half of this period children begin to understand, create, and use
symbols to represent things that are not present. They are able to play “pretend.”
b) During the second half children’s begin to make intuitive guesses about the world
as they try to figure out how things work. But they cannot distinguish between
imagination and reality.
(1) They believe that inanimate objects are alive and have intentions, feelings,
and consciousness—a belief called animism.
(2) They are egocentric; they believe that they way things look to them is also
how those things look to everyone else.
c) Children’s thinking is dominated by what they can see and touch for themselves.
They do not realize that something is the same if its appearance changes. They do
not have conservation |
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Term
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Definition
the ability to recognize that the important properties of a
substance remain constant despite changes in shape or position. |
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Term
| Concrete Operational Stage |
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Definition
Around six or seven, when children develop the ability to conserve number and
amount, they enter the concrete operations stage.
(1) At this stage, children can use simple logic and perform simple mental
manipulations and operations on things. They can sort objects into classes
or series by systematic searching and ordering. They can perform logical
operations, but only on real, concrete objects. |
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Term
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Definition
Around adolescence, children enter the formal operational period, marked by
the ability to think logically about abstract ideas, symbols, and propositions. This period is marked by the ability to engage in hypothetical thinking, including the imagining of logical consequences |
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Term
| Criticism of Piaget's Theory |
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Definition
Research shows that changes from one stage to the next are less consistent and global
than Piaget suggested. Children do not go through sudden, permanent shifts in
thinking, but systematically try out many different solutions to problems and gradually
come to select the best of them. |
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Term
| Information Processing Approach |
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Definition
The information processing approach describes cognitive activities in terms of how people
take information, use it, and remember it. The focus is on gradual quantitative changes in
children’s mental capacities. This research shows that as children get older, their
information-processing skills gradually get better. |
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Term
| How does culture affect children's cognitive development |
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Definition
Social routines (e.g., family dinners, religious services, birthday parties) affect a
child’s growing knowledge of how the world works. Quite early, children form scripts,
mental representations for these activities. Scripts affect children’s knowledge and
understanding of cognitive tasks.
2. Cognitive abilities are also shaped by language. It is harder to understand concepts
about which your language has few words. Language also influences the area of
academic achievement. Korean and Chinese children’s exceptional ability at adding
and subtracting large numbers is due to partly to the clear and explicit way that Asian
languages label numbers between eleven and nineteen. |
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Term
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Definition
| mental representations of social routines |
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Term
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Definition
Temperament is an infant’s individual style and frequency of expressing needs and
emotions, a prelude to its personality. Temperament reflects heredity’s influence, but it
can also be affected by the prenatal environment. |
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Term
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Definition
a) Easy babies, most common, are predictable, react to new situations cheerfully,
and seldom fuss.
b) Difficult babies are irregular and irritable.
c) Slow-to-warm-up babies react warily to new situations but slowly come to enjoy them. |
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Term
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Definition
As they interact with parents and other important figures, infants form deep, loving, close,
and enduring relationships called attachments. |
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Term
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Definition
a) Most infants form a secure attachment to the mother. They use the mother as a
home base. These children tolerate brief separations from mother but are happy
to see her return.
b) Some infants form a type of insecure attachment. Their relationship may be
(1) Avoidant: the infant avoids or ignores the mother when she returns after a
brief separation.
(2) Ambivalent: the infant is upset when the mother leaves, but when she
returns they vacillate between clinging to her and angrily rejecting her.
(3) Disorganized: the infant is inconsistent, disturbed, and disturbing. |
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Term
| Consequences of attachment patterns |
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Definition
Securely attached children have better relationships with their peers in childhood and
adolescence. They require less contact, guidance, and discipline from teachers.
a) Bowlby says that securely attached children develop mental representations or
internal working models of the social world that lead them expect that people will
respond to them in a positive way.
b) An early secure attachment can be undone if the environment deteriorates. |
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Term
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Definition
| Socialization is the process whereby parents try to channel children’s impulses into socially accepted outlets and teach them the skills and rules needed to function in their society. |
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Term
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Definition
Authoritarian parents are strict, punitive, and unsympathetic. They value
obedience from their children and do not encourage independence. They are
detached and seldom praise their children. Children of authoritarian parents tend
to be unfriendly, distrustful, and withdrawn. |
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Term
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Definition
Permissive parents give their children a great deal of freedom with little
discipline. Children of permissive parents tend to be immature, dependent, and unhappy. |
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Term
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Definition
Authoritative parents reason with their children, encourage give and take, set
limits but also remain understanding and encourage independence. Children of
authoritative parents tend to be friendly, cooperative, self-reliant, and socially responsible. |
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Term
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Definition
Uninvolved parents are indifferent to their children. They invest as little time, money, and effort as possible in their children, focusing on their own needs
instead. Children of uninvolved parents are less likely to form secure attachments and more likely to have problems with impulsivity, aggression, and low-selfesteem. |
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Term
| How does culture affect which parenting style parents use? |
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Definition
Parents from cultures influenced by the collectivist tradition in which family and community interests are emphasized over individual goals tend to use more
authoritarian parenting styles. This style of parenting does not seem to have
negative consequences on children from Asian American, Hispanic American, and African American families |
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Term
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Definition
| Friends help children establish their sense of self-worth. |
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Term
| How does popularity affect social development? |
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Definition
Popular children tend to be friendly, assertive, good at communication, and
helpful to others. Especially in early adolescence athletic, arrogant, or aggressive children may also be popular if their behavior is not too extreme. |
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Term
| Important learned social skills |
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Definition
| One of the most basic social skills is the ability to engage in sustained responsive interactions with others—cooperation, sharing, taking turns. A second skill is the ability to detect and correctly interpret other’s emotional signals. A related set of skills involves the ability to feel what another is feeling, empathy, and to respond accordingly. |
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Term
| How do social skills develop? |
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Definition
| Parents can help children develop such skills by encouraging lots of pretend play, positive social behaviors with others, and exploring positive ways to express and deal with their emotions. Children who have been abused by their parents tend to lack these important interactional skills and are more likely to be victimized by their peers. |
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Term
| Self-regulation and how it is developed |
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Definition
Self-regulation is the ability to control one’s emotions and behavior. Children who cannot regulate their emotions tend to experience anxiety and distress and have trouble recovering from stressful events.
Self-regulation is most effectively learned by children who experience
harmonious interactions at home under the guidance of supportive and competent
parents. . |
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Term
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Definition
| Gender roles are general patterns of appearance and behavior associated with being male or female. They appear in all cultures but are more pronounced in some of them. |
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Term
| Biological factors on gender roles |
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Definition
A biological contribution to these male-female differences is supported by several lines of evidence.
a) Studies show differences in anatomy, hormones, and brain organization and
functioning.
b) Gender patterns are consistent across cultures having differing socialization
practices.
c) Research with nonhuman primates finds sex differences that parallel those in
humans.
d) Research in behavior genetics shows that genes exert a moderate influence on
gender typed behaviors. |
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Term
| Environmental Factors on Gender Roles |
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Definition
From birth, boys and girls are treated differently.
a) As infants, girls are played with more gently and talked to more frequently. Toys are often gender specific. Boys tend to receive encouragement to achieve, compete, explore, control their feelings, act independently and assume personal
b) Parents, teachers, and television role models consciously or inadvertently pass on ideas about “appropriate” behaviors for boys and girls and convey information
about gender appropriate interests.
c) Children also pick up gender-appropriate behavior from peers. Peer
reinforcement encourages gender-typical behaviors. |
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Term
| Gender schemas and their effect on children |
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Definition
| Children are influenced by gender schemas, the generalizations develop by children about what toys and activities are appropriate for boys versus girls and what jobs are meant for women versus men. Once children develop gender schemas and know that they themselves are male or female they become “sexist self-socializers” as they work at developing the attributes they view as consistent with their image as a male or female. |
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