Block 3 - Developmental psychology - lecture 1 - intro

Question 1

What is the nativist position?

Answer 1

• Descartes, Chomsky, Spelke
• emphasis on innate endowments
• idea that we are pre-programmed

Question 1

What is the empiricist position?

Answer 1

• Locke, Bandura, Gopnik
• emphasis on environmental influence and the role of learning

Question 2

What is the Neuro-constructivist approach?

Answer 2

• Plomin, Karmilodd-Smith
• emphasis on relative contributions of nature and nurture
• believe both are important and that they may have a reciprocal relationship

Question 3

Innate development and the environment?

Answer 3

• studies look at the critical period of infancy to understand what is known and what is learned
• can look at twin studies of MZ twins (100%) and DZ twins (50%) to draw conclusions about the heritability of certain traits

Question 4

What is a critical period?

Answer 4

• when you are more attuned to learning or growth than normal

Question 5

Habituation?

Answer 5

we expect infants to tire of seeing the same sort of thing so we show it until total looking decreases, then change it

Question 6

Preferential looking?

Answer 6

• we show 2 items and expect to see them look more to a target than a distractor
• combined habituation trials with a preferential looking test at the end to see whether they react to novelty

Question 7

Neuroimaging?

Answer 7

• EEG can give us good time-based info about brain activity
• Structural MRI can tell us about brain growth and structure
• FMRI can tell us about activation in regions of the brain with great precision, but require stillness and safety checks (no metal)
• FNIRS allows neural activation without FMRI but less precise