Chapter 4 Flashcards
Greek for joint. A fertilized egg.
Zygote
The branch of psychology concerned with physical, cognitive, and social change throughout the lifespan.
Developmental psychology
Developing prenatal organism between 2 weeks to 2 months after conception.
Embryo
The developing prenatal human from 9 weeks to birth
Fetus
Poisons, drugs, viruses, or substances that cross the mothers placenta to the developing baby that can harm it
Teratogens
Abnormalities that heavy drinking by the pregnant woman may cause in the developing child.
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
Newborns tendency when stroked to orient toward touch in search of nipple
Rooting reflex
Used to study infant cognition. Is the decreasing responsiveness to a stimulus that is repeatedly presented.
Habituation
Refers to the biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior and are relatively uninfluenced by experience or other environmental factors.
Maturation
*Mental concepts and frameworks formed that organize and interpret information
*Schemas
Refers to changing an existing schema to incorporate new information that cannot be assimilated
Accommodation
Refers to interpreting a new experience in terms of an existing schema
Assimilation
Refers to all mental processes associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.
Cognition
This stage lasts from birth to age 2. Infants gain knowledge of the world through their senses and motor activities
Sensorimotor Stage
Develops during the sensorimotor stage, is the awareness that things do not cease to exist when not percieved
Object permanence
This stage lasts from 2-7 years old. Language development is rapid, but child is unable to understand the mental operations of concrete logic
Preoperational stage
Properties like number, volume, and mass remain constant despite changes of object forms. Acquired during concrete operational stage
Conservation
Difficulty that preoperational children have in considering another’s viewpoint. Self centered.
Egocentrism
Our ideas about our own and others thoughts, feelings, and perceptions, and the behaviors these might predict constitute this
Theory of mind
A disorder in childhood marked by deficiencies in communications, social interaction, and theory of mind
Autism
Lasting from 6-11, children can think logically about concrete events and objects
Concrete operational stage
Begins at 12. People begin to think logically about abstract concepts.
Formal operational stage
The fear of strangers that infants begin to display at 8 months of age
Stranger anxiety
An emotional tie with another person, distress at separation
Attachment
Limited time shortly after birth during which an organism must be exposed to certain experiences or influences if it is to develop properly
Critical period
The process by which certain animals form attachments during a limited critical period early in life.
Imprinting
A sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy - infants think this if caregiving needs are met
Basic trust
A persons sense of identity and personal worth
Self - concept
Life stage from puberty to independent adulthood.
Adolescence
The earliest period of adolescence - now capable of reproduction
Puberty
Bodily structures for reproduction
Primary sex characteristics
No reproductive sexual characteristics, breasts, body hair, deep voices
Secondary sex characteristics
The first menstrual period
Menarche
Ones sense of self
Identity
Ability to establish close, loving relationships
Intimacy
When menstruation stops in the late four ties early fifties. Signals end of reproduction years.
Menopause
A progressive and irreversible brain disorder caused by deterioration of neurons that produce ach. Loss of memory, reasoning, physical functioning.
Alzheimer’s
People of different ages compared to each other
Cross sectional study
The same people are tested and retested over a period of years
Longitudinal study
Refers to aspects of intellectual ability, such as vocabulary and general knowledge, that reflect accumulated learning. Increases with age
Crystallized intelligence
Refers to a persons ability to reason speedily and abstractly. Declines with age.
Fluid intelligence
Refers to culturally preferred timing of social events, like leaving home, marrying, having kids, and retiring.
Social clock
Developmental psychologist who is best known for studying the cognitive development in children using careful observation. 4 stage theory.
Jean Piaget
best known for his maternal-separation, dependency needs, and social isolation experiments on rhesus monkeys, which manifested the importance of care-giving and companionship in social and cognitive development.
Harry Harlow
known for her work in early emotional attachment with the Strange Situation design, as well as her work in the development of attachment theory.
Mary Ainsworth
Children with this know that adults are reliable and will trust people. Get over it when mother leaves, seek contact when she comes back, comforted
Secure attachment
Children with this have learned that adults are not reliable, and do not trust easily. Children cry more often, when mother returns they hardly react.
Insecure attachment
An optimal period shortly after birth when an organism’s exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produces proper development.
Familiarity
He described the development of moral reasoning
Kohlberg
During this stage of character development, children obey either to avoid punishment or to gain concrete rewards (before age 9)
Preconvential Morality
By this stage of character development, children uphold laws and social rules simply because they are laws and rules
Conventional Morality
By young adulthood, people begin to affirm their own agreed upon rights or follows what one personally perceives as basic ethical principles. (15-16 yrs old)
Post-conventional Morality
He created an 8 stage theory that helped explain development from birth to death.
(psychological development)
Erik Erikson
