Chapter 1

Question 1

Developmental Psychology?

Answer 1

Scientific study of changes across human lifespan. Usually from the prenatal period to early, but sometimes middle and late, adulthood.

Question 2

Periods of Development

Answer 2

Prenatal Period
 -Conception to birth
Infancy and toddler-hood
 -birth to 2 years.
Early Childhood
 - 2 to 6 years
Middle Childhood
 - 6 to 11 years
Adolescence
 - 11 to 20 years.

Question 3

Domains of Development

Answer 3

Physical
Cognitive
Emotional
Social

Question 4

What are Gametes?

Answer 4

One of two sex cells, egg or sperm, that fuse together during fertilization.

Question 5

What is adaptation?

Answer 5

A trait that is designed and preserved by natural selection. This trait offers a reproductive advantage in the environment where is it made.

Question 6

Species - Typical Environment?

Answer 6

The environment that provides the features that the genome needs or “expects” in order to develop.

Question 7

Continuous development?

Answer 7

Cumulative adding on of similar activities

Question 8

Discontinuous development?

Answer 8

New ways of understanding and responding that emerge at specific times.

Question 9

Development from different theoretical perspectives?

Answer 9

Cognitive (info processing)
Sociocultural (culture)
Environmental (learning
Evolutionary (evolved design)

Question 10

What is the evolutionary perspective of humans?

Answer 10

Humans are the product of 1000 years of natural selection

Question 11

How is “evolutionary” not the same as “genetic”

Answer 11

• natural selection reduces genetic variability.
• Adaptation means that everyone has the same genes for design
• Does not look for genetic differences

Question 12

How do adaptations operate withing the environment?

Answer 12

Adaptations are designed for the environment in which they are evolved.

Question 13

What is the EEA?

Answer 13

EEA : Environment of Evolutionary Adaptiveness

It is the condition under which our ancestors lived, and to which or morphological and psychological features are adapted.

What i think: Ancestors —> (what has been adapted) —-> now

Question 14

What is generative entrenchment?

Answer 14

A phenomenon that slows the evolution of “developmental” processes.

IMO?: it is an IDEA that development becomes unable to evolve in radically different ways.

Question 15

Baby Biography?

Answer 15

Developed by Charles Darwin.

-Describes the activities of an individual baby.

Question 16

Normative approach?

Answer 16

Study of development in which “norms” or averages are computed over a large population which is then compared to individual development.

Question 17

Piaget’s theory of cognitive development

Answer 17

• Piaget described children’s development through stages.
• This predicted that children attained a certain set of cognitive skills at a certain stage.
• Thought that children were limited to their skills which belonged to a certain stage until they reached the next stage, which enabled a whole new set of cognitive skills for them.

Question 18

Genetic Epistemology From Piaget?

Answer 18

Piaget describes this as the process of cognitive development from birth through late adolescence.

Question 19

Dialectical process?

Answer 19

Process of shared problem- solving.

Question 20

Zone of Proximal Development?

Answer 20

The tasks a child can complete with and without adult support.

Question 21

Evolutionary Psychology is?

Answer 21

An approach to the study of psychology which holds that:
- The knowledge about the process of evolution and the way our ancestors lived during out evolutionary history will help us in understanding the function and design of the human mind.

Question 22

Evolution Psychology’s contribution to Developmental?

Answer 22

• Promotes research that is consistent with what is known about evolution by natural selection.
• It provides guidance in terms of hypothesis testing.

Question 23

Developmental Psychology contribution to Evolutionary?

Answer 23

• Provides insight into how adults come into being
• Allows an opportunity to examine how changes in the environment during development lead to changes in the adult.
• Buffers evolutionary psychologists from accusations of “genetic determinism.
  (Most likely not going to remember this point)
• Allows them to study non-adult adaptations.

Question 24

Darwin’s Thingy for the evolution of complex adaptive traits.
(NOT SURE IF YOU NEED TO KNOW THIS AS IT IS QUITE LONG. QUITE LONG INDEED. :l)

Answer 24

• Natural species have enough “potential fertility”
• Populations tend to remain more or less stable
• Natural resources, such as food, water and shelter are limited
• Struggle to acquire resources and survive. Winners of this can obviously survive.
• Variability in the population traits.
• Success in this struggle is not random. There are advantages to some.
• Over many generations of natural selection, individuals become better and better suited to their environment.