11: Cognitive Development Flashcards
Newborns
Newly born infants
Infancy
The period from birth up to around about the second year of life
Childhood
The stage of development that begins at about 18-24 months and last until adolescence
Adolescence
The period of development that begins with the onset of sexual maturity (about 11-14 years of age) and last until the beginning of adulthood (18-21)
Developmental Psychology
The study of continuity and change across the life span
Nature Versus Nurture
The naive distinction about whether development is genetically determined or dependent on the environment
Human Genome Project
Where scientists set out to identify all the human genes
Canalization
The idea of development as constrained epigenesis
Prenatal Size
Ends with birth, but it begins at conception
Zygote
A single cell that contains chromosomes from both a sperm and an egg
Germinal Stage
The two-week period that begins at conception
Embryonic Stage
Period that lasts from the second week until about the eighth week
Blastocyst
Cluster ball of embryonic cells
Embryonic Disk
Three-layered flattened surface that emerges from the blastocyst
Endoderm
Embryonic disk layer that goes on to form the internal organs
Mesoderm
Embryonic disk layer that goes on to form the skeletal muscles
Ectoderm
Embryonic disk layer that goes on to form the skin and nervous system
Fetal Stage
The period that lasts from the ninth week until birth
Neural Tube
The cylindrical structure of the embryonic central nervous system
Neurogenesis
The formation of neural cells
Teratogens
Agents that damage the process of development
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
A developmental disorder that stems from heavy alcohol use by the mother during pregnancy
Prosody
The rhythm of speech
Generative Processes
Those that lead to the formation of new structures
Arborization
Process where the cell axon lengthens and grows increasing dendritic branches
Synaptogenesis
The increase in the number of synaptic junctions where cells communication through the activity of neurotransmitters
Myelination
The formation of a fatty sheath around the axons of a brain cell
Synaptic Pruning
The process where synaptic connections die off
Plasticity
The capacity for the brain to be moulded by experience
Experience-Expectant Plasticity
Much of the neural organisation is largely pre-specified, waiting for input from the environment
Experience-Dependant Plasticity
Much of the neural organisation is not pre-specified and depends on input from the environment
Sensitive Periods of Development
Relatively specific times when appropriate environmental input is expected
Quantitative Change
The amount of quantity of change
Qualitative Change
The type of quality of change
Milestone
An important demarcating event on the path of development
Stage Theories
Theories that advocate development as a fundamental reorganisation of the underlying mechanisms
Longitudinal Research
Experimental designs based on a representative sample of children who are then studied repeatedly over time
Cross-Sectional Research
Experimental designs based on groups of children who represent a cross-section of the population
Repeated Measure
Several data points are collected from the same individual
Cohort Bias
Anomalies that are predominant in one group that distort comparison between groups
Clinical Method of Studying Children
Manipulating the situation to see how the child’s behaviour changes in a reliable manner
Visual Preference Paradigm
Technique that uses difference in duration of looking to infer pattern discrimination
Preference for Novelty Paradigm
Following habituation, organisms prefer to attend to novel stimulation
Violation of Expectancy Paradigm (VOE)
Where the anticipated outcome is deliberately contravened
Structured Interview
A consistent set of questions about a topic under consideration
Visual Acuity
The level of finest visual detail that can be resolved
Visual Scanning
The ability to selectively move one’s eyes around the environment
Visual Contrast
Areas of greatest brightness relative to darkness
Mental Representations
Patterns of neuronal activity that refer to aspects of the external worlds
Crossmodal Perception
The capacity to detect correspondences of different features in the world from different sensory modalities
Motor Development
The emergence of the ability to execute physical actions such as reaching, grasping, crawling and walking
Reflexes
Specific patterns of motor response that are triggered by specific patterns of sensory stimulation
Stereopsis
The perception of depth by combining the images from each eye
Visual Cliff
A platform with a shallow drop on one side and a steep cliff on the other
Universal
Every child in every culture goes through the same stages
Invariant
Every child goes through the same sequence in the same order at roughly the same time
Maturation
Biologically constrained change
Sensorimotor Stage
A stage of development that begins at birth and lasts through infancy
Assimilation
When infants apply their schemas in novel situations
Accommodation
When infants revise their schemas in light of new information
Object Permanence
The idea that objects continue to exist even when they are not visible
Limited Competence
An inability to understand what needs to be done to solve the task
Limited Performance
An inability to execute the necessary actions to solve the task
Preoperational Stage
Stage of development that begins at about 2 years and ends at about 6 years
Concrete Operational Stage
Stage of development that begins at about 6 years and ends at about 11 years
Conservation
The notion that the quantitative properties of an object are invariant despite changes in the object’s appearance
Appearance-Reality Distinction
The appreciation that looks can be deceiving
Formal Operational Stage
The stage of development that beings around the age of 11 and lasts through adulthood
Executive Functions
Mental operations that enable use to coordinate our thoughts and behaviours
Inhibition
The ability to suppress intrusive thoughts and behaviours
Deferred Imitation Paradigm
Where the infant imitates an event demonstrated some time earlier
Causal Reasoning
When we infer that events happening close together in time and space are linked in some causal way
Intuitive Theories
Rudimentary frameworks that are not explicitly taught and explain related aspects of the world
Psychological Essentialism
The belief that things in nature, and in particular living things, are what they are because of some inner property or essence
Puberty
Bodily changes associated with sexual maturity
Primary Sex Characteristics
Bodily structures that are directly involved in reproduction
Secondary Sex Characteristics
Bodily structures that change dramatically with sexual maturity but are not directly involved in reproduction
Adulthood
The stage of development that begins around 18-21 years and ends at death
