Chapter 2 Flashcards
What is a Theory?
A logical system of concepts Helps explain observations
Contributes to development of body of knowledge
Three questions to ask:
Which phenomena is the theory trying to explain?
What assumptions does the theory make?
What does the theory predict?
The Theory of Evolution
Darwin emphasized adaptive value of behavior and physical characteristics to specific environments:
Natural selection
Fitness, or reproductive success Adaptation
Inclusive fitness
Ethology
Studies the survival value of unique adaptive behavior and its evolutionary history
Evolutionary psychology
Studies long-term historical origins of behavior
Evolutionary theory highlights three phases of the life span:
Healthy growth and development leading up to the reproductive period
Success in mating and the conception of offspring
Parenting offspring to survive and bear their own offspring
Psychoanalytic Theory (Slide 1 of 4) Children move through a series of stages:
Confront conflicts between biological drives and social expectations
Healthy personality development
Determined by how parents manage child’s early sexual and aggressive drives
Focuses on how individuals resolve conflicts between drives
Psychoanalytic Theory (Slide 2 of 4) Freud believed that all behavior is
-motivated
Unconscious
Stores powerful, primitive motives
-Drives, or libido
Sexual and aggressive forces that desire to be satisfied
-Id, ego, and superego
Three Stages of development
Oral Anal Phallic Latency Genital
The psychoanalytic approach recognizes:
The tension between interpersonal and intrapsychic demands help shape personality
The influences of childhood experiences on adult behavior
The importance of motives, emotions, and fantasies
The role of sexual impulses during childhood
Cognition
The process of organizing and making meaning of experience
Two cognitive developmental theories
Piaget’s cognitive developmental theory
Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory
Basic Concepts in Piaget’s Theory
Equilibrium Schemes Operations Assimilation Accommodation
Four stages of cognitive development:
Sensorimotor Stage (0-18 months)
Preoperational Stage (18 months-6 years) Concrete Operational Stage (7-11 years)
Enables scientific reasoning
Formal Operational Stage (11 years on)
Knowledge is created through active engagement Novelty promotes cognitive development
Vygotsky’s Concepts of Cognitive Development
Vygotsky is an interactionist
Human development can only be understood within a social-historical framework
-Cognitive development is a socially mediated process
-Zone of proximal development
-Range of tasks that the child cannot handle alone
Can accomplish with help of adults, more skilled peers
Theories of learning empathizes
- Learning via observation and imitation
- Role of modeling
- Learning via vicarious reinforcement
- Social cognition rather than a social learning approach
Cognitive Behaviorism
-Study of thoughts, ideas, and -memories that influence behavior
- Edward Tolman
Learner develops a cognitive map
-Mental representation of the learning environment
Cultural Theory (Slide 1 of 3) Emphasizes:
-Meaning, or the behavior shared by a group of people
- An individual’s psychological experiences are shaped through:
- Cultural
- pathways
- Cultural determinism
- Enculturation
Implications for human development
- Culture and biological development
- interact Determine how each period of life is experienced
- Links to the psychosocial approach
- All cultures must be able to adapt to changes in economic, environmental, and intercultural conditions to survive
Social Role Theory (Slide 1 of 2)
Process of socialization and personality development
Via the individual’s participation in increasingly diverse and complex social roles
Three elements of concern:
- Role enactment
- Social roles
- Role expectations
Four dimensions of social roles:
Number of roles
Intensity of role involvement
Amount of time the role demands Degree of structure or flexibility
Social Role Theory – Implications for Human Development
Social roles:
Provide consistency to life experiences
Prompt new learning
Personal relationships and social groups help contribute to one’s social identity
Social Role Theory – Links to Psychosocial Theory
-Socialization takes place via role relationships
Reciprocity in roles is closely linked to concept of interdependence of people at each psychosocial stage
Systems Theory (Slide 1 of 2)
-Systems are characterized by relationships among component parts
- The whole is more than the sum of its parts
- An open system
- Adaptive self-organization
- Components and the whole are always in tension
Ecological system
Urie Bronfenbrenner argues that individuals develop within a multilayered system of relationships
Microsystem Mesosystem Exosystem Macrosystem Chronosystem
Developmental Systems Theory
Emphasizes the ongoing interaction across many levels of the human organism (genetic to behavioral)
Focuses on:
The individual in the setting
Plasticity, both in the individual, and in an environmental context
Systems Theory – Implications for Human Development
- The family system is maintained by patterns of communication
- Interdependence
- Change in one family member is accompanied by changes in others
- Interventions at any level of the environment can affect development
Systems Theory – Links to Psychosocial Theory
- System and psychosocial theories both suggest that development requires analysis of the person within context
- Systems theory predicts that change:
- Is not patterned
- Occurs through adaptive self-regulation and self- organization
- Psychosocial theory proposes that change is patterned
Case Study – Jack Manasky and His Daughter Marilyn (Slide 1 of 2)
-What defense mechanisms might Jack be using?
How might the differences in Jack and Marilyn’s “cultures” affect their cognitive reasoning?
How might Marilyn use social learning techniques to modify her father’s coffee-drinking behavior?
Case Study – Jack Manasky and His Daughter Marilyn (Slide 2 of 2)
Reflections
What cultural norms for the relationship of an adult daughter and an aging father are at play?
What reciprocal roles do you see between Jack and Marilyn?
What feedback mechanisms encourage or discourage certain behaviors between Jack and Marilyn?
Case Study – Jack Manasky and His Daughter Marilyn (Slide 2 of 2)
Reflections
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Your Perspective
What theories do you find most relevant to your current stage of development, and why?
Evolutionary theory Psychoanalytic theory
Cognitive developmental theories Theories of learning
Cultural theory
Social role theory
Systems theory
