Chapter Thirteen

Question 1

What is Developmental Psychology?

Answer 1

The study of physiological and cognitive changes across the lifespan, and how these are affected by culture, circumstance, and experience.

Question 2

Define Socialization?

Answer 2

The process by which children learn the behaviours, attitudes, and expectations required of them by their society or culture.

Question 3

What are some agents that can cross the placenta barrier?

Answer 3

German measles, Xrays/radiation, toxic chemicals, STDs, cigarette smoking, alcohol, and other drugs.

Question 4

Older fathers increase the risk of what if they conceive a child?

Answer 4

Triple the risk for schizophrenia and increase the risk of autism/bipolar.

Question 5

What can happen to the child if either of the parents are teenagers?

Answer 5

Premature/low birth weight.

Question 6

What can German Measles cause?

Answer 6

It affects the eyes, ears, and heart; can lead to deafness. There is a vaccine mothers can get to precent this.

Question 7

What can radiation/mercury/lead cause?

Answer 7

Fetal deformities and cognitive abnormalities.

Question 8

What can STDs cause?

Answer 8

Mental retardation, blindness, physical disorders.

Question 9

What can Cigarette Smoking cause?

Answer 9

Miscarriage/premature birth/low birth weight/abnormal heartbeat/SIDS/asthma/low immune system function.

Question 10

What can Alcohol cause?

Answer 10

Mental retardation, FAS (low birth weight, facial deformities, smaller brain). 1-3/1000 children in Canada are affected.

Question 11

What can Drugs (other than Alcohol) cause?

Answer 11

Impaired cognitive and language abilities.

Question 12

What can Drugs (other than Alcohol) cause?

Answer 12

Impaired cognitive and language abilities.

Question 13

What Physical Abilities do Newborns have?

Answer 13

Rooting, sucking, swallowing, Moro (‘startle’), Babinski (toes), grasp, stepping, blink, sneeze, knee jerk, respond to touch.

Question 14

What is the Grasping Reflex?

Answer 14

Infants are born with the instinct ability to cling to offered touch.

Question 15

What Perceptual Abilities do Newborns have?

Answer 15

Visual Abilities - visual range is about 8 inches, and they can distinguish contrasts, shadows, and edges.
They can hear, touch, and smell.

Question 16

What impact does culture have on maturation?

Answer 16

Many aspects of development depend on cultural customs, such as an infant’s ability to sleep alone. The recommendation that babies sleep on their backs has led to many skipping the crawling stage.

Question 17

Define Contact Comfort.

Answer 17

(Primates) The innate pleasure derived from close physical contact; it is the basis of the infant’s first attachment, and crucial throughout life.

Question 18

What is the Strange Situation Test?

Answer 18

A parent-infant “separation and reunion” procedure that is staged in a laboratory to test the security of a child’s attachment.

Question 19

Define Separation Anxiety.

Answer 19

The distress that most children develop at around 6-8 months of age, when their primary caregivers temporarily leave them with strangers. Usually ends between 2-3 years of age.

Question 20

Define Securely Attached.

Answer 20

A parent-infant relationship in which the baby is secure when the parent is present, distressed by separation, and delighted by reunion.

Question 21

Define Insecurely Attached.

Answer 21

A parent-infant relationship in which the baby clings to the parent, cries at separation, and reacts with anger or apathy to reunion.
Avoidant - treats the caregiver the same as stranger.
Anxious/ambivalent - doesn’t want caregiver to leave, but resists contact with caregiver.

Question 22

At what age does separation anxiety start to disappear?

Answer 22

15 months.

Question 23

What can cause Insecure Attachment?

Answer 23

Abandonment and deprivation in first year or two of life, abusive/neglectful/erratic parenting, genetic predisposition, stressful circumstances in child’s family.

Question 24

What are the stages of Language development?

Answer 24

Acquisition of speech begins in the first few months, they are responsive to pitch, intensity, and sound (parentese is used).
By 4-6 months, they can recognize their names and repetitive words.
By 6 months - 1 year, infants become familiar with sentence structure and start babbling.
End of 1st year, using symbolic gestures.
12 months, label objects with words.
18-24 months ‘telegraphic speech’.
By age six, they have a vocabulary between 8000-14000 words.

Question 25

What does Thinking consist of according to Piaget?

Answer 25

Cognitive development consists of mental adaptations to new observations and experiences.

Question 26

What two forms of Adaptation can occur in regards to cognitive development?

Answer 26

Assimilation (assimilating or absorbing new information into existing cognitive structures) and Accommodation (accommodating or modifying existing cognitive structures in response to experience and new information).

Question 27

What are the four stages of Piaget’s Stages of Development?

Answer 27

1. Sensorimotor
2. Preoperational
3. Concrete Operational
4. Formal Operational

Question 28

What occurs in the Sensorimotor Stage?

Answer 28

Birth-2 years; coordinated sensory information with bodily movements. Concrete objects.
Object permanence develops in the first year.

Question 29

What occurs in the Preoperational Stage?

Answer 29

2-7 years. Focused on the limitations of child’s thinking; that they lack the cognitive abilities for abstract principles, mental operations (if I’m your sister, you must be my brother), and were egocentric.
Can’t grasp conservation (juice amount doesn’t change regardless of glass size; conservation of substance and of number).

Question 30

What occurs in the Concrete Operations Stage?

Answer 30

7-12 years, children’s thinking is still grounded in concrete experiences but now they can understand conservation, reversibility, mental operations, and cause and effect.

Question 31

What occurs in the Formal Operations Stage?

Answer 31

12 years to adulthood. Ability for abstract reasoning; understanding that ideas can be compared and classified. Reasoning about situations not personally experiences, thinking about the future, searching systematically for situations to problems.

Question 32

What are some problems with Piaget’s Theory?

Answer 32

The stages are not as clear cut, children can understand more, preschoolers are not completely egocentric, cognitive development depends on the child’s education and culture, overestimation of the cognitive skills of many adults.

Question 33

What is Vygotsky’s Theory on Thinking?

Answer 33

Sociocultural influence on children’s cognitive development; adults play a role through constant guiding and teaching. Private speech - once children acquire language and rules of culture, they begin to talk to themselves to direct their own behaviour - first speech is spoken out loud, and then internalized and silent.
“Family Systems Theory”, collaborate in learning (assisted performance and individual performance).

Question 34

What is Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Reasoning?

Answer 34

1. Preconventional Level (Punishment and obedience; instrumental relativism)
2. Conventional Level (good boy-nice girl, society-maintaining)
3. Postconventional Level (social contract, universal ethical principles)

Question 35

What are criticisms of Kohlberg’s Theory?

Answer 35

It tends to overlook educational and cultural influences (cultural differences not reflected in theory), moral reasoning in often inconsistent across situations; connection between moral reasoning and moral behaviour is often indirect.

Question 36

What is Moral Behaviour?

Answer 36

The ability, in addition to cognitively understanding right from wrong, for children to behave morally based on the development of moral emotions such as shame, guilt, and empathy.
Techniques used by parents include power assertion and induction.

Question 37

What is Power Assertion?

Answer 37

Moral Behaviour technique, parent uses punishment and authority to correct child’s misbehaviour. Users tend to be authoritarian. The ability to self-regulate can be delayed with this technique.

Question 38

What is Induction?

Answer 38

Moral Behaviour technique, parent appeals to child’s own resources, abilities, sense of responsibility, and feelings for others in correcting misbehaviour. Users tend to be authoritative.

Question 39

Define Gender Identity.

Answer 39

The fundamental sense of being male or female; it is independent of whether the person conforms to social and cultural rules of gender.

Question 40

Define Gender Typing.

Answer 40

Process by which children learn the abilities, interests, personality traits, and behaviours associated with being masculine or feminine in their culture.

Question 41

What are some influences on gender development?

Answer 41

Biological factors (hormones, genes, brain organization), cognitive factors (gender schemas - a mental network of knowledge, beliefs, metaphors, and expectations about what it means to be male or female), learning factors (reinforced by others), and gender typing (which at a young age has little to do with adult behaviour).

Question 42

Which gender tends to have higher self-esteem?

Answer 42

Males.

Question 43

What is Adolescence?

Answer 43

The period of life from puberty to adulthood.

Question 44

What is Puberty?

Answer 44

The age at which a person becomes capable of sexual reproduction.

Question 45

What is Menarche?

Answer 45

A girl’s first menstrual period.

Question 46

What is Spermarche?

Answer 46

A boy’s first ejaculation (nocturnal emission).

Question 47

Early versus late onset puberty: males.

Answer 47

Early maturing boys have more positive views of their bodies and are more likely to smoke, binge drink, and break the law.

Question 48

Early versus late onset puberty: females.

Answer 48

Early maturing females are usually socially popular but also regarded by peer group as precocious and sexually active. They are more likely to fight with parents, drop out of school and have a negative body image.

Question 49

What are Erikson’s Eight Stages of Life?

Answer 49

1. Trust vs. Mistrust [Infancy (0-1 year)]
2. Autonomy vs. Shame and doubt [Toddler (1-2 years)]
3. Initiative vs. Guilt [Preschool (3-5 years)]
4. Industry vs. Inferiority [Elementary School (6-12 years)]
5. Identity vs. Role confusion [Adolescence (13-19 years)]
6. Intimacy vs. Isolation [Young adulthood (20-40 years)]
7. Generativity vs. Stagnation [Middle adulthood (40-65 years)]
8. Integrity vs. Despair [Late adulthood (65 and older)]

Question 50

What is Emerging Adulthood?

Answer 50

(18-25) Phase of life distinctly different from adolescence and adulthood; in some ways and adult, in others not.

Question 51

What is The Middle Years?

Answer 51

(35-65) Perceived by many experiencing it as the prime of live.
Menopause.

Question 52

What is Old Age?

Answer 52

When some types of thinking changes, and others stay the same. Fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence.

Question 53

What is Fluid Intelligence?

Answer 53

The capacity for deductive reasoning and the ability to use new information to solve problems, it is relatively independent of education and tends to decline in old age.

Question 54

What is Crystallized Intelligence?

Answer 54

Cognitive skills and specific knowledge of information acquired over a lifetime; it depends heavily on education and tends to remain stable over the lifetime.