Chapter 5 Key Terms Flashcards
Piaget’s first stage of development, in which infants use info from their senses and motor actions to learn about the world
sensorimotor stage
Piaget’s phrase to describe a baby’s simple repetitive actions in substage 2 of the sensorimotor stage, organized around the baby’s own body
primary circular reactions
repetitive actions in substage 3 of the sensorimotor period, oriented around external objects
secondary circular reactions
purposeful behavior carried out in pursuit of a specific goal
means-end behavior
the deliberate experimentation with variations of previous actions that occurs in substage 5 of the sensorimotor period
tertiary circular reactions
the understanding that objects continue to exist when they can’t be seen
object permanence
substage 4 infants’ tendency to look for an object in the place where it was last seen (position A) rather than in the place to which they have seen a researcher move it (position B)
A-not-B error
imitation that occurs in the absence of the model who first demonstrated it
deferred imitation
an infant’s understanding of the nature of objects and how they behave
object concept
a research strategy in which researchers move an object in one way after having taught an infant to expect it to move in another
violation of expectations method
organization of experiences into expectancies, called schemas, that enable infants to distinguish between familiar and unfamiliar stimuli
schematic learning
the repetitive vocalizing of consonant-vowel combinations by an infant
babbling
an innate language processor, theorized by Chomsky, that contains the basic grammatical structure of all human language
language acquisition device (LAD)
theorists who argue that language development is a subprocess of general cognitive development and is influenced by both internal and external factors
interactionists
the simplified, higher-pitch speech that adults use with infants and young children
infant-directed speech (IDS)
making repetitive vowel sounds, particularly the uuu sound
cooing
comprehension of spoken language
receptive language
the ability to use sounds, signs, or symbols to communicate meaning
expressive language
combinations of gestures and single words that convey more meaning than just the word alone
holophrases
the period when toddlers experience rapid vocabulary growth, typically beginning between 16 and 24 months
naming explosion
simple two-word sentences that usually include a noun and a verb
telegraphic speech
additions to words that change their meaning (e.g. the s in toys, the ed in waited)
inflections
the ability to take in information and use it to adapt to the environment
intelligence
the best known and most widely used test of infant intelligence
Bayley Scales of Infant Development
