copilaria Flashcards
When is childhood?
From birth to adolescence (sexual maturity)
Infancy: 0-2 yo
Childhood: 2-adol
A time of innocence and play. before serious hard life.
Is childhood a product of society and time?
Yes
In the 17th century there was a different idea of childhood because of:
- decreased life expectancy
- poverty and need for child labour
What is play?
Childhood is a time of play and play is very important for development
Children can learn about how the world works through play
What is Vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory?
Emphasises the role of culture in cognitive development
Imaginary play is important as a cultural tool for cognitive development (through abstract thinking)
Is pretend play a precursor of ToM? (Vygotsky)
ToM is understanding that you have a different perspective to me
Processes required to imagine a banana as a telephone is the same process involved in ToM.
Pretend play emerges just before 2 years of age
this is the precursor to success at false belief
How did Freud see childhood in stages?
Oral (0-1y): the need to feed
Anal (1-3y)
Phallic (3-6y)
Latency (6-adolescence)
Genital (adolescence-death)
what do the psychosexual stages determine
determination of sexual identity
Freud suggested that if a person experiences unresolved conflicts or difficulties during a particular psychosexual stage, they may become fixated at that stage. This fixation can lead to the development of psychological disorders in adulthood.
what are erikson’s psychosocial stages
Trust vs mistrust (0-1y)
Autonomy vs shame and doubt (1-2y)
Initiative vs guild (3-5y)
Industry vs inferiority (6-12y)
Identity vs role confusion (12-19y)
Intimacy vs isolation: 20-40y
Generativity vs stagnation: 40-64y
Integrity vs despair: 65+
what do eriksons psychosocial stages determine
determination of social identity
concentrates on lifespan crisis concerning social identity
fixation at certain stages results in neurosis
what is piaget’s psychology of intelligence
early and middle childhood is a period of concrete operations in which children develop their abilities to think about (imagine) objects
late childhood (formal operations) concerned the development of an ability to think hypothetically, and in the abstract (deductive reasoning)
what are piaget’s stages
sensorimotor period
concrete operations period
formal operations period
what is sensorimotor period
0-2y
intelligence is purely practical (action based)
developing symbolic representations
what is concrete operations period
- preoperational (2-7y) - children recapitulate everything they learnt in the sensorimotor period but in the real of thought rather than action
- concrete operational (7-11y) - develop ability to think logically about objects
- developing logical thought about the environment
what is formal operations period
11+y
intelligence is logical
developing abstract (hypothetical) logical thought
what are the 3 core domains of development
- physical/biological development
- brain, hormones, motor skills - cognitive development
- language, knowledge, reasoning, problem solving - social and emotional development
- relationships, understanding self and others, emotion regulation, friendships, moral understanding
what are the physical changes
body keeps growing
size and shape changes
means child has to continually recalibrate their actions and senses
less need for sleep
hormonal changes at puberty
what are the biological changes
increased myelination
synaptic pruning - losing capacity to differentiate phonemes that are not part of our language
prolonged development of frontal lobes
frontal lobes associated with executive function (planning, inhibition, working memory)
brain is still developing until age 25 with frontal cortex last to mature
what are the cognitive changes
- onset of language: early childhood: language to communicate, vocab and grammar develop
- logical thought (Piaget): early-late childhood: symbolic reasoning (2y), logical reasoning about concrete objects (6-7y), abstract logical reasoning (11-12y)
- executive function: early childhood - adulthood: continued development of STM and executive abilities, related to frontal lobe development
what are the social changes
infancy: babies are almost exclusively reliant on social relationships with their parents
in early childhood they become more interested in peers
why are social groups important
social peer group increasingly important
behavioural genetics research indicates importance of non-shared environments
social groups become complex - likely important influences on socioemotional and cognitive development
what are the methodological difficulties
persuading a 3 year old to take part can be difficult
what are the difficulties with false belief tasks
language limitations: children do not necessarily understand: false belief task
however when the research q is modified to ask where will sally look for ball NOW, then 3 yo pass
what else can affect research on children
attention, hunger, tiredness can affect responses
children make assumptions about what we want
Piaget criticised for leading questions
how can memory impact research
memory limitations can mask children’s abilitites
e.g.
Transitive inference
Line A bigger than B. Line B bigger than C. Is line A bigger than line C?
why is the sample on which we research a problem
Western
Educated
Industrial
Rich
Developed
