Chapter 5: Cognitive Development in Infancy and Toddlerhood

Question 1

Schemas

Answer 1

An understanding of how things are, not necessarily correct

Question 2

Assimilation

Answer 2

Adapting schemas by including more information (learning all four legged animals are dogs from having a pet dog)

Question 3

Accomodation

Answer 3

Adapting schemas by separating information (learning by seeing a cat that not all four legged animals are dogs)

Question 4

Cognitive equilibrium and disequilibrium

Answer 4

When we don’t find new information to challenge schemas, the world is the way we know it

Question 5

Sensorimotor substages

Answer 5

1. Reflexes (birth - 1 month) - grasping
2. Primary Circular Reactions (1-4 months)
3. Secondary circular reaction (4-8 months) - repeating actions because they like how it feels
4. Coordination of secondary circular reactions (8-12 months) - intentional behavior
5. Tertiary circular reactions (12-18 months) - experiment with environment
6. Mental representation (18-24 months)

Question 6

Three methods for evaluating sensorimotor reasoning

Answer 6

Violation of expectation tasks, A not B tasks, deferred imitation tasks

Question 7

Violation of expectation tasks

Answer 7

Mental representation capacities of very young infants, train isn’t stopped by the block covered by the screen, may happen sooner than 8 months

Question 8

A not B tasks

Answer 8

Tests object permanence, motor skills, inhibition, and controlling attention. The baby understands the toy is under one mat, but once another mat was introduced the baby became confused.

Question 9

Deferred imitation tasks

Answer 9

Imitation of facial expressions, unique actions, replicate something when asked. The infant needs memory ability to complete this.

Question 10

Three types of memory and examples

Answer 10

• Sensory (touch, sight, hearing)
• Working memory (used to decide action, attention)
• Long-term memory

Question 11

How is information encoded into memory?

Answer 11

Incoming information –> sensory memory –> working/active memory –> encoding –> long-term memory

Question 12

Attention

Answer 12

Ability to direct awareness. We have the skill early on, but gain the ability to control it as we age.

Question 13

How is attention measured in infants?

Answer 13

Preferential looking procedures

Question 14

Memory

Answer 14

Recall of visual and auditory stimuli for neonates, recall of motor activities for infants. Familiar contexts and emotional engagement affect memory. At three months you can hold stimuli for a day.

Question 15

Categorization

Answer 15

Infants create conceptual categories based on perceived function, behavior, and perceptual similarity. This includes learning that toys are not food.

Question 16

How do screens and online media affect learning?

Answer 16

Online immersion more common in the present. Educational baby videos are less effective as there is a transfer deficit and lack of direct interaction.

Question 17

Bayley-III testing approach to intelligence

Answer 17

Five scales for infant and parent responses (language, adaptive behavior, motor control, socioemotional, etc). They are variable and do not relate to intelligence score.

Question 18

Poverty rates for infants

Answer 18

40% of infants are growing up in poverty. There is a ethnic disparity towards black, Hispanic, and native american families.

Question 19

T/F: Infants are less affected by actual money, and more by a lack of resources

Answer 19

true

Question 20

Progression of language development

Answer 20

Early preferences for speech sounds, prelinguistic communication, first words, learning words/semantic growth, two-word utterances.

Question 21

Prelinguistic communication

Answer 21

Cooing at three months where the infant makes single sounds. Babbling at six months where the ambient language begins to impact vocalization.

Question 22

First words

Answer 22

Infants use holophrases and can understand more words than they can say.

Question 23

Semantic growth

Answer 23

Fast mapping involves receiving info and quickly internalizing words. There is a naming/vocabulary explosion. The infant undergoes under and over-extension.

Question 24

Two-word utterances

Answer 24

Telegraphic speech, grammatical learning, awareness of communicative purpose of speech.

Question 25

Language development in bilingual children

Answer 25

Bilingual children experience slower development in each individual language, but have the same overall vocabulary size as a monolingual infant.