Developmental Flashcards
Cognition
The mental processes by which we acquire information and use it
Cross-sectional study
Studying participants across different age ranges simultaneously
What was Piaget first to experimentally study?
Genetic epistemology - intellectual growth
Piaget’s antidote to behaviourism?
Constructivist theory - children are active and construct knowledge of the world - important to have rich environment
Equilibrium - cognitive development
Minds tend to equilibrium - Disequilibria stimulates activity and encourages growth
Schemas
Patterns of thought or action that outline what the world is like
How are schemas developed? (2)
Organisation - existing schemas help build new ones - reflexes become visually-directed
Adaptation - assimilation and accomodation
What is meant by assimilation and adaptation (schemas)?
Interpreting incoming information using existing schemas and modifying existing schemas to account for new experiences
Stage theory of development
Unbypassed stages that represent qualitatively different levels of functioning
What are piaget’s stages of cognitive development?
Sensorimotor (0-2), preoperation (2-6), concrete operational (7-12) and formal operational (12+)
6 substages of sensorimotor stage
Simple reflexes
Primary circular reactions
Secondary circular reactions
Coordination of secondary circular reactions
Tertiary circular reactions
Beginning of representational thought
Substage 1
Reflexes - innate - 0-1 months
Substage 2
Primary circular reactions - repetitive - 1-4 months
Substage 3
Secondary circular reactions - more aware of events beyond their body - 4-8 months
Substage 4
Coordination of secondary circular reactions - truly planned behaviour/problem solving - 8-12 months
Substage 5
Tertiary circular reactions - trial and error exploratory schemas - 12-18 months
Substage 6
Beginning of representational thought - problem solving occurs internally - 18-24 months
Deferred imitation
Ability to reproduce behaviour of someone absent - development of mental imagery
When is object permanence developed?
Throughout the sensorimotor stage - achieved in stage 6
Violation of expectation
Habituation study - look longer at new or unexpected situations - suggests they know how something should behave
Renée Baillargeon - op
Infant’s failure to search for hidden object may stem from inability to perform coordinated actions - instead searched for cues that a child understood solidity principle
A not B explainations
Memory, control of action (immature frontal cortex - motor planning), previous behaviour
How do babies aquire knowledge?
Piaget - constructivist
Spelke & Wynn - nativist - innate principles
What is the preoperational stage characterised by?
Development of internalised representations - imitation, pretend play and imagery
Egocentrism
Centration
Reversibility
Distinction between symbols and signs
Symbols are personalised representations and signs are conventional representations (banana as phone vs thumbs up)
Egocentrism
Egocentric communication - common in preschoolers
Centration
Tendancy to focus on one aspect of a situation and ignore other aspects - pizza slices hungry
Reversibility
Lack of understanding that if you split something you can remodel it to the original form
What is the concrete operations stage characterised by? (4)
Aquisitions of operations, understanding of conservation, class inclusion/seriation and transitivity, logical replaces intuitive thinking.
What is formal operational stage is characterised by?
Abstract thought (algebra) and logical thought (hypotheses)
Hypothetico-deductive reasoning tests
Piaget and Inhelder’s pendulum problem and combination of chemicals problem
What schema do formal operational thinker have?
Combinatorial schema - keep trying
What is abstract thinking made up of? (3)
Idealistic thinking (realities), meta-cognition and hypothetical thinking
Evaluating Piaget’s theory: Pros
- first account of cognitive development
- positive vision that children are active thinkers
- came up with core concepts - egocentrism, conservation and object permanence
Evaluating Piaget’s theory: Cons
- does development proceed in discrete qualitative stages?
- valid account of children’s abilities?
- competance and performance… motivation and articulation etc
Age of ability to solve problems may be down to…
Experience, familiarity of context and drawing from other problems
Flavell(1981) two levels of perspective taking:
Level 1: knowing someone can see something.
Level 2: knowing what someone can see
Moll and Tomasello (2004) Gaze
12 month old follow and adults gaze - aware that others know something they don’t
Alternative theories
Vygotsky’s Socioculteral thoery - development through social interaction
Zone of proximal development - difference between what a child can do and has potential to do
Scaffolding - development from internalisation of socially shared processes - skilled to less skilled
Information processing in cognitive development
As cognitions become more efficient, additional resources are available for other cognitive tasks i.e. memory, perception and verbal-comprehension
Thoery of mind
Understanding that others have beliefs and these guide their behaviour
Deception and false belief
Children perform better on deception
Children who perform well in false belief task lie less sincerely
Factors in developing an understanding of mind (3)
Maturation of socially specific processes, development of general abilities (inhibition etc.) and contribution of social influences
Children perform better on false belief tasks if:
They have daily interaction with adults, mothers talk to them about pschological states, they are not autistic and have older siblings.
Hindsight bias
Events that have happened seem more predictable once they have occured
Intent vs consequences
Older children base judgement on intent
Piaget’s three stage theory of moral development
Amoral, moral realist (consequences), moral relativist (apply rules, judge based on intent)
Kohlberg’s stage theory (3)
Preconventional (self interest - reward/punishment), conventional (awareness and compliance with rules), postconventional (individual rights and harm is wrong)
Self interest vs rules
Younger = self interest
Innate moral understanding
6-10 mnth olds prefer to look at someone helping than hindering others
Evaluating Kohlberg’s theory
Cultural (rights, harmony etc) and role of gender (only based on studies of boys - girls more caring?)
Cognitive skills and morals
Higher IQ, more education and performance on perspective tasks = more advanced moral reasoning skills
Parental influence on moral development
Adult behaviour modelling, punishment styles (should this be individualised?), security of relationship
Attachment
A close, reciprocal, emotional relationship between two persons characterised by mutual affection and desire to maintain close proximity
Who is know for studying stages of attachment?
Schafer and Emerson (1964)
Phases of attachment (4)
Asocial (0-6 weeks) , indiscriminate phase (preference for social interaction 6wks - 6months), specific attachment phase (single caregiver 7-9mths) and multiple attachment phase (9-18mths)
Theories of attachment (3)
Psychoanalytic, learning and ethological
Psychoanalytic attachment
Freud - oral creatures - mother=food
Learning theory of attachment
Primary reinforcers (food, warmth etc.), secondary reinforcer (mother much like pavlov’s bell) - Harlow’s wire monkey = food
Ethiological theory of attachment
Lorenz - imprinting
Bowlby - adults predisposed to respond appropriately to a baby
Strong enforcement for carers - noices, mirroring and cuteness
How do infants develop mental representations if their worthiness?
They base it off of peoples avaliability and willingness to provide care and protection
The strange situation explores:
Stranger anxiety and seperation anxiety
Ainsworth
Secure attachment pattern
Infant welcomes contact and is upset bu absense - caregiver is secure base. Caregiver shows mutual attention
Resistant attachment pattern
Consistant contact with caregiver and very distressed by seperation. Caregiver shows inconsistent attention to infant’s needs
Avoidant attachment pattern
Little contact with caregiver and little distress when seperated. Sometimes sociable with strangers. Caregiver generally unresponsive to infant.
Disoriented attachement pattern
Infant shows variable interest in caregiver. Dazed/freezes when reunited. Caregiver neglectful and inconsistent - may be associated with depression in primary care giver
Kagan’s temperament hypothesis
Attachment based off of temperament - easy, difficult and slow to warm up (secure, resistent and avoidant).
Evaluation of Kagan’s temperament hypothesis
Would expect that both parents have equal attachment style
Lyons-Ruth etal 1990 - intervention for depressed and poverty stricken mothers - more secure attachments and higher intelligence test scores
Parent attachment styles
Secure (loving), dismissing (no problem leaving) and preoccupied (anxious)
12-18months secure attachment associated with: (4)
Better problem solving, more attractive playmates, more positive/fewer negative emotions, more complex and creative in play
Attachment and memory
More secure = better memory of +ve and worse memory if -ve events
