Ch. 5 Flashcards
Childhood substages: Piaget (2-7yrs)
Preoperational stage: development of symbolic thought marked by irreversibility, contraption, and egocentrism
Childhood substages: Erikson (2nd and 3rd yrs)
autonomy vs. shame and doubt: can I do things myself or must I always rely on others?
Childhood substages: Freud
anal stage: pleasure focuses on bowel and bladder elimination; coping with demands for control
Childhood substages: Kohlberg
naive reward orientation: right and wrong is determined by what is rewarded.
early childhood
age 3 through kindergarten
middle childhood
elementary school
what sets us apart from other animals?
- ability to take another person’s perspective
- mind reading skill (begins w/ joint attention)
- language
- memory
principles of physical growth
- cephalocaudal sequence: bodies elongate and lengthen
- mass to specific sequence: physical abilities become more coordinated and precise
two types of physical skills
- gross motor skills: large muscle movement
2. fine motor skills: small coordinated movement
cerebral cortex
takes more than two full decades to mature
myelin sheath
fatty neural cover - grows into our twenties
synaptogenesis
the process of making billions of connections between neurons
frontal lobes
the area at the uppermost front of the brain, responsible for reasoning and planning our actions
slow growing frontal lobes
- frontal lobe development is on a delayed timetable
- as they mature throughout childhood and adolescence, our ability to think through, inhibit, and plan our actions gradually improves
selected motor skill milestones: at age 2
- picks up small objects w/ thumb and forefinger, feeds self w/ spoon
- walks unassisted
- rolls or flings ball
selected motor skill milestones: at age 3
- prints name
- walks w/o support
- tosses ball overhead w/ bent elbows
selected motor skill milestones: at age 4
- cuts paper; approximates circle
selected motor skill milestones: at age 6
- copies two short words
- hops on each food, still holding on
- catches and controls 10 inch ball with arms in front of body
main threat to growth and motor skills
- lack of food
- impairs gross and fine motor skills
- compromises the development of the bones, muscles, and brain
- undernutrition is the top ranking 21st century global physical threat
- APA 2017 causes depression
Childhood obesity
- monitored in the US by National Health and Nutrition Study (NHANES)
- assessed by BMI = ratio of weight to height
- overweight
> at or over the 85% for the norms - obesity
> BMI at or above the 95th percentile compared to US norms
Global epidemic
- demographics differ within and between developed and developing worlds
- obesity in the developed world:
> children from low income families
> in US, more prevalent among latino and African American children - obesity in the developing world:
> most prevalent in cities and among affluent boys and girls
“obesogenic” factors
- working parents w/ less time to prepare nutrition, sit down meals- very important in 2017
- oversized portions of foods: restaurant foods, large servings, and caloric content - supersize it and “he man dinners for kids”
- low cost, calorie dense food preferences
- lack of exercise; bidirectional effect (when children feel bad about their big clumsy bodies they withdraw from physical activity)
- healthy food costs more (CDC 2017)
epidemics epigenetic:
research
- obesity is partly epigenetic, pre-birth root
- events in womb and at birth may create obesity linked DNA changes
- rapid weight gain during infancy and early childhood is stronger predictor of later obesity; outweighs genetics predisposition
- fat cell development to age five and eat to maintain lifelong
obesity: Barriers to living a successful life
- within and between culture variations
- classic study in US demonstrated prejudiced attitudes toward obese peers by age 3 (pitrou and others)
- less harsh attitudes in some other cultures
- parental attitudes may affect unhealthy eating and obesity
- research shows fat is not beautiful, it is a killer. high rates of suicide and suicide ideation, borderline personality disorder, depression, and major health factors leading to death (ex: stroke)
- growing up, children do not like fat children. they get invited to less parties, last chosen or not chosen for class activity teams, and sports
limiting overweight
- provide education for pregnant women, not dieting
- limit excessive feeding during 1st year of life
- understand limiting intake is difficult for overweight children
- provide obesity control that are not perceived as insulting or damaging to child’s self esteem
Jean Piaget & Theory of Cognitive Dev.
intellectual development occurs
- physical action on world
- inner timetable and they will learn when cognitively ready
- children explore and learn on their own when provided ample materials
- thought evolves in stages through universal processes
Preoperational thinking
in Piaget’s theory, the type of cognition characteristic of children aged 2 to 7, marked by an inability to step back from one’s immediate perceptions and think conceptually.
Concrete operational thinking
in Piaget’s framework, the type of cognition characteristic of children aged 8 to 11, marked by the ability to reason about the world in a more logical, adult way
Piaget’s stages: stage 1 (birth to 2 years)
sensorimotor period: coordination of sensory input and motor responses; development of object permanence
- coordinate sense w/ motor output
- sucking and mouth is critical
Piaget’s stages: stage 2 (2 to 7 years)
preoperational stage: development of symbolic thought marked by irreversibility, centration, and egocentrism.
Piaget’s stages: stage 3 (7 to 11 years)
concrete operational period: mental operations applied to concrete events; mastery of conservation, hierarchical classification
Piaget’s stages: stage 4 (age 11 through adulthood)
formal operational period: mental operations applied to abstract ideas; logical, systematic thinking
Conservation
knowledge that the amount of a given substance remains the same despite changes in its shape or form
preop children and conservation:
- reversibility inability
- centering inability
Reversibility
the concrete operational child’s knowledge that a specific change in the way a given substance looks can be reversed.
Centering
the preoperational child’s tendency to fix on the most visually striking feature of a substance and not take other dimensions into account.
Decentering
the concrete operational child’s ability to look at several dimensions of an object or substance.
preop children and class inclusion:
- reversibility inability
Class inclusion
the understanding that a general category can encompass several subordinate elements.
Identity constancy
in Piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s inability to grasp that a person’s core “self” stays the same despite changes in external appearance
Animism
in Piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s belief that inanimate objects are alive
Artificialism
in Piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s belief that human beings make everything in nature.
Egocentrism
in piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s inability to understand that other people have different points of view from their own.
Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934, born same year as Piaget, died of tuberculosis in late 30’s)
- emphasized language as front and center of everything learned
Inner speech
repeating information silently or “out loud” in order to regulate behavior or to master cognitive challenges
- young children speak “out loud” to monitor their behavior
zone of proximal development
the gap between a child’s ability to solve a problem totally on his own and his potential knowledge if taught by a more accomplished person
scaffolding
teaching a child new skills by entering his zone of ZPD tailoring the teaching to a child’s competence level
Bidirectional learning
partnering learning
Vygotsky’s Theory
- interpersonal processes, the role of society, and instruction are critical to cognition development
- development is collaborative endeavor
- people (influential adults and others) cause cognitive growth
Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934)
bio: Russian, jewish, communist, believed in Marx
interests: education, literature, literary criticism, wanted to know how to stimulate thinking
overall orientation: look at interpersonal processes and the role of society in cognition
basic ideas: we develop intellectually through social interactions, development is a collaborative endeavor, people cause cognitive growth
implications for education: instruction is critical to development. teachers should sensitively intervene within each child’s zone of proximal development
Jean Piaget (1896-1980)
bio: swiss, middle class family
basic interests: biology, mollusks, wanted to trace the evolution of thought in stages
overall orientation: look for universal developmental processes
basic ideas: we develop intellectually through physically acting on the world, development takes place on our own timetable, when we are internally ready, we reach a higher level of cognitive development
implications for education: provide ample materials to let children explore and learn on their own
Cognitive development: information-processing perspective
- focuses on specific skills such as the development of memory, concentration, and the ability to inhibit and control actions
- proposes mental growth occurs gradually, not in stages
- attempts to decode the “processing steps” involved in thinking
Information processing perspective
older children: rehearse information, selectively attend, manage inhibition
working memory
- holds many bits of information
- keeps information in awareness; we either process information or discard it
- executive processor: allows us to focus on important material to prepare for permanent storage
- memory bin capacity expands between ages 2-7
- allows for new understanding at around 7-8 (concrete operations)
Executive functions
- any frontal lobe ability that allows inhabitation of responses and intellectual planning and thinking
> rehearsal
> selective attention
> inhibition - executive functions improve gradually over many years
interventions
- in early childhood, children often
> do not remember without considerable prompting
> struggle with inhibiting strong prepotent impulses - in middle childhood, children prosper from
> active instruction in study skills such as rehearsal and selective attention strategies
> scaffolding organizational strategies
> promotion of selective attention
> adult understanding that multitasking is problematic
rehearsal
a learning strategy in which people repeat information to embed it in memory
selective attention
a learning strategy in which people manage their awareness so as to attend only to what is relevant and to filter out unneeded information
Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
characteristics:
- excessive restlessness
- easily distracted
- difficulties focusing
- usually diagnosed in elementary school
- most often diagnosed in boys
- more often diagnosed in the US
- affects 1 in 9 or 10 girls and boys
- biological triggers: prenatal maternal smoking, breathing problems at birth
other ideas about ADHD:
- results from a lower than normal output of dopamine
- caused by the delayed maturation of the frontal lobes
- impairments in lower brain centers are to blame
- neuropsychologists have linked symptoms to everything from smaller brain volume to structural abnormalities in specific cortical regions
helping children with ADHD
- well known treatment: psycho-stimulant medications
> best when used with reinforcement for appropriate behavior - foster best person-environment fit
> provide non distracting environment that demands selective attention (ex: homework)
Developing speech
during early childhood, language explores:
- by age 2, children begin to put together words
> phonemes: individual word sounds of language
> morphemes: basic meaning units of language
> “mean length of utterance” (MLU): average number of morphemes in sentences
> syntax: system of grammatical rules in a particular language
- semantics: understanding word meanings
> about 10,000 words at age 6
> vocabulary continues to grow throughout life
- over regularization:
> puts irregular “casts” and “plurals” into regular form
- over/underextension:
> applies verbal labels too broadly/narrowly
challenges on the language pathway
- phonemes: has trouble forming sounds
- morphemes: uses few meaning units per sentence
- syntax (grammar): makes mistakes in applying rules for forming sentences
- over/underextension: applies verbal labels too broadly/narrowly
- overregularization: puts irregular pasts and plurals into regular forms
- semantics: has problems understanding word meanings
social cognitive skills
autobiographical memory: recollections of events and experiences that make up one’s life history
> scaffolded through past-talk conversations
- becomes more elaborate as children move from preschool to elementary school
- use experiences to connect with others
theory of mind
- understanding that other people have different beliefs and perspectives from one’s own
- emerges about age 4-5
- typical in western cultures
“false belief” studies
- “mean monkey” exercise
- studies proved Piaget’s belief’s about preoperational egocentrism had flaws
differences in dev. of theory of mind
early dev. of theory of mind: having older siblings, advanced intellectual dev., bilingual preschoolers
later dev. of theory of mind: frontal lobe damage, autism “mind blindness”
Autism Spectrum Disorders - DSM5
- according to the new DSM-5 criteria, autism diagnosis guidelines include two criteria domains:
- social interaction domain (including language and social communication deficits)
- repetitive or restrictive behaviors
- most children previously diagnosed with autistic disorder, Asperger’s disorder, pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS), or childhood disintegrative disorder are now diagnosed under the single title of ASD
- to receive an ASD diagnosis, a child must also present with these symptoms during early childhood, and the symptoms must impair everyday function
- the DMS-5 guidelines have sparked concern that the new ASD diagnosis will exclude many individuals with Asperger’s disorder and PDD-NOS. recent study reported that the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria can correctly diagnose most ASD cases, including those previously diagnosed with Asperger’s disorder or PDD-NOS as well as exclude individuals with closely related disorders that do not fall on the autism spectrum
- causes: may have genetic causes and environmental risk factors
- treatments: applied behavioral analysis (CBT)
ASDs
- routinely appear in early childhood and persist, wreaking lifelong havoc
- deteriorating executive functions, poor social understanding, worsening vocational adjustment
- rare, affecting 1 in every 88 children in the US
- several times more common in boys than girls
- run in families, may partly have genetic causes
- environmental factors: air pollution, maternal abusive relationships, having a premature birth
- older parents are at higher risk of having a child with this condition
- medications are not effective with basic autistic symptoms, although they can make better the challenging behaviors and emotional distress the disease produces
