Developing Through the Lifespan (1) - Vocabulary

Question 1

A branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social development throughout the life span.

Answer 1

Developmental Psychology

Question 2

The fertilized egg; it enters a 2-week period of rapid cell division and
develops into an embryo.

Answer 2

Zygote

Question 3

The developing human organism from about 2 weeks after fertilization
through the second month.

Answer 3

Embryo

Question 4

The developing human organism from 9 weeks after conception to birth.

Answer 4

Fetus

Question 5

Agents, such as chemicals and viruses, that can reach the embryo or fetus during prenatal development and cause harm

Answer 5

Teratogens

Question 6

Physical and cognitive abnormalities in children caused by a pregnant woman’s heavy drinking. In severe cases, signs include a small, out-of-proportion head and abnormal facial features.

Answer 6

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)

Question 7

Decreasing responsiveness with repeated s0mula0on. As infants
gain familiarity with repeated exposure to a stimulus, their interest wanes and they look away sooner.

Answer 7

Habituation

Question 8

Biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior,
relatively uninfluenced by experience.

Answer 8

Maturation

Question 9

All the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.

Answer 9

Cognition

Question 10

A concept or framework that organizes and interprets information.

Answer 10

Schema

Question 11

Interpreting our new experiences in terms of our existing schemas.

Answer 11

Assimilation

Question 12

Adapting our current understandings (schemas) to incorporate
new information.

Answer 12

Accommodation

Question 13

In Piaget’s theory, the stage (from birth to nearly 2 years of
age) at which infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions and motor activities.

Answer 13

Sensorimotor Stage

Question 14

The awareness that things continue to exist even when not
perceived.

Answer 14

Object Permanence

Question 15

In Piaget’s theory, the stage (from about 2 to 6 or 7 years
of age) at which a child learns to use language but does not yet comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic.

Answer 15

Preoperational Stage

Question 16

The principle (which Piaget believed to be a part of concrete
operational reasoning) that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects.

Answer 16

Conservation

Question 17

In Piaget’s theory, the preoperational child’s difficulty taking another’s point of view.

Answer 17

Egocentrism

Question 18

In Piaget’s theory, the stage of cognitive development (from about 7 to 11 years of age) at which children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete events.

Answer 18

Concrete Operational Stage

Question 19

In Piaget’s theory, the stage of cognitive development (normally beginning about age 12) at which people begin to think logically about abstract concepts.

Answer 19

Formal Operational Stage

Question 20

People’s ideas about their own and others’ mental states—about
their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behaviors these might predict.

Answer 20

Theory of Mind

Question 21

The fear of strangers that infants commonly display, beginning
by about 8 months of age.

Answer 21

Stranger Anxiety

Question 21

An emotional tie with others; shown in young children by their
seeking closeness to caregivers and showing distress on separation.

Answer 21

Attachment