Child Development - Lecture Three Flashcards
Cognitive Development
Criticism One
Babies don’t seem to start with nothing
- Space and objects
The Visual Cliff
The Effect of Occlusion
Understanding Support
Object Permanence
The Visual Cliff
Children appear to be able to perceive depth around the time they can crawl, some pre-crawling infants may be able to discriminate between the two sides of the ‘cliff’
The Effect of Occlusion
Habitation procedure- children prefer to pay attention to new and weird things, they then become accustomed to it, however, the moment something else new and weird happens they pay attention to it again
Understanding of Support
Develops gradually by 6 months
Object permanence
With the A not B effect, the children don’t actually believe the object is in location A however they have trouble overriding the motor habit
- Number and Mathematical Reasoning
Piaget said that infants had no concept of number and couldn’t conserve number until they were around 6-years-old but even 6 month-olds show some understanding of number
- Social Cognition
Newborn babies would rather look at faces than scrambled faces
Intentions
Social Cognition at 3-weeks-old
Infants will attempt to imitate facial expressions
Social Cognition at 9-months-old
Infant looks in the direction of their mother’s gaze, this teaches them that other people have different perceptions
Intentions
Infants of 6-months-old appear to understand actions in terms of intended goals
Criticism Two
Cognitive development an all-or-nothing phenomenon
- Numerical Skills in Preschoolers
Counting
Numerical reasoning
Counting
Even when they don’t use the right numbers, toddlers understand what counting is all about
Numerical reasoning
Children younger than 6 can generally conserve number if the task is relevant
- Social Cognition in Preschoolers
Egocentrism
Theory of Mind
Others’ likes and dislikes
True and false belief
Egocentrism
Piaget thought that children were geocentric until they were around 7-years-old but even 3- and 4-year-olds can ‘pass’ a diorama task if it’s relevant
At 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 children will turn a book around so an adult can see it and bend down when talking to younger children and children under 1-year will turn to see what their mother is looking at
Theory of Mind
A group of skills relating to the understanding of the existence of other people’s minds (their intentions, beliefs, likes and dislikes, perspectives, etc.), this allows us to be effective in social situations
Others’ likes and dislikes
Broccoli vs crackers study where 18-month-olds gave the experimenter what she liked and the 14-month-olds have the experimenter what they liked
True and false belief
One aspect of theory of mind, on average 4-year-olds pass and 3-year-olds don’t