Chapter 4: Infant physical, sensory and perceptual development Flashcards
What is the purpose of synaptogenesis and synaptic pruning?
-synaptogenesis is the creation of synapses and synaptic pruning makes the brain more efficient
What happens to myelin’s in the first 2 years? What does it help explain? (2)
-rapid myelination during the first two years
-an explanation for developmental changes
What are adaptive reflexes? What is a type of adaptive reflexes? (2)
-they help the infant survive, things like sucking
Rooting reflex: infant turns its head toward a touch on the cheekW
What are primitive reflexes?
-controlled by primitive parts of the brain and disappear in infancy
What are two types of primitive reflexes?
-moro startle and baninski
What is the moro startle reflex?
-infant arches and throws its arms and legs out and brings them back in
What is the babinski reflex?
-if the sole of the foot is stroked, the toes fan out
Describe sleep and wakefulness in infants,.
-infants move through different states of consciousness, but sleep a lot of the time
Discuss crying for babies
-baby’s have different cries for different needs and prompt attention to crying in the first 3 months is related to less crying later
What is colic?
-inconsolable bouts of crying for more than 3 hours a day
What does the acquisition of motor skills depend on?
-brain development and changes in other body systems (like bones increasing in size etc)
What are the three types of motor skills discussed for infants? (3)
-locomotor skills
-non-locomotor skills
-manipulative skills
What are locomotor skills?
-getting around, crawling
What are non-locomotor skills?
-controlling the body such as head movements
What are manipulative skills?
-use of hands and fingers
What are developmental milestones?
-they are nearly universal, age-related events like walking, being able to move their head
While different babies will reach developmental milestones at different times, what is seen universally across babies?
-all children usually follow the same sequence despite variations in timing (we are seeing maturation, like a biological aspect)
What is a baby’s least developed sense at birth? Discuss this (2)
-vision
-less visual acuity and more trouble with visible tracking, do not see colour very well until 4-5 months
What is visual acuity?
-how well someone can see details at particular distance
What is visual tracking?
-following moving objects
Why do infants need visual stimulation early in life?
-there are critical times when an infant needs a specific quality of visual stimulation in order to develop normal perception
What is a sleeper effect when it comes to visual stimulation for infants?
-when early experience is lacking, visual capability fails to develop normally many years later
How well do infants hear? Touch and taste? (2)
-they hear largely as well as adults do
-touch and taste is also good
What are the three different research techniques they use to study infants? (3)
-preference technique
-habituation/dishabituation
-operant conditioning
What is the preference technique?
-which of two repeated pictures does a baby look at longer? if the time is uneven, they prefer one
What is the habituation/dishabituation technique?
-showing a picture for a little bit of time until the baby gets bored, then showing a picture with a slight change, if the baby doesn’t seem to care then they don’t notice but if they do look at it they seem to care
What is the operant conditioning technique?
-lets say you play a tone and then give them a reward for turning their head, you do it enough. Then if you play a different tone, you can see if the baby can tell the difference between the two tones
Based on the techniques previously discussed for researching baby’s, what have they found for what baby’s like looking at?
-they initially scan for light-dark contrasts and edges as well as objects moving
Describe the three stages discussed for baby’s depth perception. (3)
Kinetic cues (by 3 months)
-objects move more when they are near
Binocular cues (4 months)
-using cues from two eyes; the closer the object the more the view from each eye differs
Monocular/pictorial cues (5-7 months):
-interposition, one object partially hides another
Can infants discriminate sounds in a language? Describe this. (2)
-yes they can
-it begins to fade at 6 months for unheard sounds though
Can newborns discriminate their mothers voice from another woman?
-yes
What is intermodal perception?
-senses work together to form a single perception
