Chapter 1 Flashcards
Human Development
Focuses on the scientific study of the systematic processes of change and stability in people
Developmentalist
Look at ways in which people change from conception through maturity
Physical Development
Growth of the body, brain, sensory capacities, motor skills and health
Cognitive Development
Learning, attention, memory, language, thinking, reasoning and creativity
Psychosocial Development
Pattern of change in emotions, personality and social relationships
Heredity
Inborn traits or characteristics inherited from the biological parents
Environment
The world outside the self, beginning in the womb, and learning that comes from experience
Maturation
Unfolding of a natural sequence of physical changes and behavior patterns
Nature = _______
Heredity
Nurture = _______
Environment
What are some environmental factors?
Family, neighborhood, SES, race, culture
Socio-Economic Status
Combination of economic and social factors describing an individual or family, including: income, education, and occupation
Poverty-related risks that increase chance of negative outcomes include:
Emotional and behavioral problems
Cognitive and school performance
Parents’ emotional state and home environment
Living in neighborhoods with large unemployment contributes to potential lack of social support
Strengths and resilience factors in poor neighborhoods include:
Parents feeling close with children
Attend church and feel safe at home and school
Eat meals together
Risk factors
conditions that increase the likelihood of a negative developmental outcome
______ in global economy leads to ________ in poverty
Increase, decrease
Normative
Characteristic of an event that occurs in a similar way for most people in a group
Normative age graded-influences
Timing of biological events is predictable within a normal range
Normative history graded influences
Significant events that shape behavior and attitudes of a historical generation
Historical generation
Group of people who experience the event at a formative time in their lives (ex: WWII children have strong social bond to each other)
Cohort
Group of people born at the same time
Nonnormative
Characteristic of an unusual event that happens to a particular person or a typical event that happens at an unusual time of life (typical events at a typical times: puberty at 30; atypical events: birth defect, winning the lottery)
Imprinting
Konrad Lorenz - distinctive form of learning in which, during a critical period in early development, a young animal forms an attachment to the first moving object it sees (usually mother)
Result of a predisposition toward learning - nervous system is ready to acquire information
Critical period
Specific time when an event (or its absence) has a specific impact on development - if a necessary event doesn’t occur during a critical period of maturation, normal development will not occur
Plasticity
range of modifiability of performance
Sensitive period
Developmental timing when child is particularly responsive to certain experiences
