Developmental Psychology Flashcards
Object permanence
Objects continue to exist even when they are out of sight
The occluded object retains its spatial & physical properties
The occluded object is still subject to physical laws
Piaget’s Theory
• Sensorimotor (0-2)
• Pre-operational (2-7)
• Concrete operational (7-11)
• Formal operational (11+
Sensorimotor Stage
• 0-24 months
• Learns about world through actions and sensory information
• Learns to differentiate self from the environment
• Start to understand causality, and form internal mental representations….
• Object permanence attained at 12 months, full internal representations by 18-24 months
When does reflex activity develop?
0-1 months
Stage 1: Reflex activity
Practice innate reflexes (ex: sucking, looking)
Sensorimotor Substages
• Reflex activity
• Primary circular reactions
• Secondary circular reactions
• Coordination of secondary circular reactions
• Tertiary circular reactions
• Internal representation
Primary circular reactions
̶ Simple behaviours derived from basic reflexes
̶ Start repeating behaviour (ex: thumb sucking)
̶ Focused on body
̶ No differentiation between self and outside world
Stage 2: When do primary circular reactions develop?
1-4 months
Stage 3: Secondary circular reactions
• “secondary” behaviours = own, not reflexes
• Start to focus on objects
• Begin to change surroundings intentionally ̶ Ex: kick legs, hit mobile, kick legs again
• Establish connection between body movement and external environment
When do secondary circular reactions develop?
4-10 months
Stage 4: Coordination of secondary circular reactions
• Engage with objects using a variety of actions
• Combine actions to achieve goals and solve novel problems
̶ Some evidence of means-ends behaviour
•Ex.movesomethingoutofwaytoreachandgettoy
̶ But, not insightful, driven by trial-and-error •Limitedbyexistingrepertoireofactions
• Lackflexibility
• A-not-B errors until 12 months ̶ egocentrism
When does coordination of secondary circular reactions develop?
10-12 months
Stage 5: Tertiary circular reactions
• Still repetitive or circular behaviours
• Discover the properties of objects and the environment
• Understand objects through trial-and-error
̶ Not yet inventive or insightful
• Improvements in problem-solving
̶ Experiment with new actions, modify unsuccessful actions
• Still lack internal representations
When do tertiary circular reactions develop?
12-18 months
Stage 6: Internal Representation
• Now has mental representation of the world
̶ Can think and plan actions
̶ Deferred imitation
• Solve novel problems insightfully
When does internal representation develop?
18-24 months
Deferred imitation (enduring mental rep.)
̶ Copying behaviour after a delay
̶ Not until stage 6
Typically a representation of a person, see if they can remember that representation after a time delay
Object permanence time scale
Begin to search for objects around 8-9 months
A not B error until 12 months
Critiques of Piaget
• Methods: Observational methods, often with own children ̶ quantitative, experimental data rare
̶ “clinical method” rather than standardized
• Confounds:
̶ Motor coordination and motor planning deficits
• Inability to perform coordinated actions (means-end) ̶ Memory deficits
̶ Communication – biased by cues • Younger infants could show some evidence if: ̶ Simplify procedure in experimental studies
• Change procedure
• Change the dependent variable
• Earlier than Piaget predicted? ̶ Basic object permanence
̶ Planning
̶ Deferred imitation
Critique of Piaget: A-not-B error earlier
• Piaget: don’t solve until 12 months
• Slight design tweaks can lead to different results. Examples:
̶ Butterworth (1977)
̶ Smith & Thelen (2003)
A-not-B error: Butterworth (1977)
• 3 conditions
̶ Normal design
̶ Covered but visible
̶ Visible and uncovered
BUT Errors in all 3 conditions, even when object covered but visible
̶ Reflects lack of coordination, not necessarily lack of object permanence
They’ve been reinforced to go to a certain side so may be difficult for infants to suppress that
A-not-B error: Smith & Thelen(2003)
One variation had infant stand instead of sit during “B” trial ̶ 10m old infants performed like 12m old
• Standing made the “A” position less salient
Which may have given the infant a chance to get out of the reinforcement rut
Methodological changes to Piaget studies
• Darkness rather than occlusion by other objects (visual vs manual search)
̶ Shown object within reach, lights turned off
̶ Infants as young as 5m will grasp for out of sight objects (Bower and Wishart, 1972)
̶ But still just performing “reaching action” (extension of ongoing action or reproduction of previous action)?
Bower (1982)
• Infants a few months old, shown object, screen moved in front of object, then returned to original position
̶ 2 conditions: Object still in place versus empty space ̶ Monitored child’s heart rate (infant doesn’t need to do anything)
• Piaget: too young to have info about objects that are no longer present = no reaction (wrong)
• Bower: faster heart rate (more surprise) in second (empty) condition
Baillargeon et al (1985)
• Should look longer at the impossible event ̶ If they find it surprising
• Drawbridge and solid box
̶ Experimental condition (box behind the drawbridge) ̶ Control (box next to the drawbridge)
Conclusion:
̶ Infants expected the screen to stop against the box ̶ Infants understood the box continued to exist
Infants as young as 5m show object permanence
Criticisms of the VOE approach?
Only indicates limited awareness of events (i.e. perceives a difference)
Or perceptual preference for novelty, but not understanding
Do looking preferences really tell us about what babies know? (see Schöner and Thelen, 2006)
Clifton et al. (1991)
Presented 6m olds with small (required 1 hand grasp) and large (2 hand grasp) objects
̶ Each object made identifying sound
̶ Infants made appropriate grip to reach for objects in darkness
̶ Authors conclude this is based on mental representations
Claxton et al. (2003)
• Differences in motor patterns in adults for planned actions (Marteniuk et al., 1987)
̶ Precise actions = slower approach
• 10m infants encouraged to throw ball or fit it into a hole
̶ If motor patterns determined by ball properties, should find no difference
̶ If determined by upcoming action, should find a difference ̶ Reaching action slower for precise action
(Mental representation of that action, same as adults with slower approach for precise task)
Willatts (1989): Planned actions
• Toy out of reach on a cloth
• Cloth and toy blocked by a barrier
• 9-month old children performed sequence of actions to get toy
• Many on the 1st attempt
̶ Novel, planned actions
̶ Mental representation of the world used to organise behaviour
(Piaget argued they’d only be able to do this through trial-and-error but they did it on 1st attempt)
Meltzoff & Moore (1994) (used to critique Piaget views on deferred imitation)
̶ Some infants saw adult make facial gesture, some saw neutral expression
̶ Day later, those who saw gesture were more likely to perform it to a neutral face
Shows they have that mental representation of that gesture in past
Meltzoff & Moore (1995) (used to critique Piaget views on deferred imitation)
̶ Experimenter performed series of actions with objects
̶ Both ages more likely to reproduce observed actions than those who did not see them
• Even after a FOUR MONTH DELAY!
Barr et al. (1996) (used to critique Piaget views on deferred imitation)
Infants saw series of actions with puppet and had to repeat after a 24hr delay
• Additional 6m-olds given 6 repetitions of actions
̶ 6m now score significantly higher than control
̶ Evidence of deferred imitation in 6m-olds
Patel et al. (2013): Context matters
• 6m, 9m, 24m tested using puppet paradigm, 24hr delay
• Varied the context during retrieval (auditory and visual)
̶ Full flexibility/generalization not achieved until 12m
developmental psychology
the study of physical, cognitive, social, emotional and behavioural changes throughout the life span
continuity
gradual process
discontinuity
discrete age specific stages
Baltes’ Model of Development
3 types of influences on development
- normative age-graded influences
- e.g. puberty, starting school
Normative history-graded influences
-e.g. wars, natural disasters
Non-normative life events
- e.g. death of a parent, serious injury
Cross-sectional studies
different participants, different ages, same time, cost effective, quick, but effected by individual differences and cohort effects
longitudinal studies
same participants, different ages, different times, high attrition rate, time-consuming, biased sample, original research question still viable at study completion?
cohort studies
different participants, same ages, different historical time, time consuming, danger of research question becoming obsolete
cohort-sequential studies
different and same participants, different and same ages, different and same historical times, high attrition rate, time consuming, question may become obsolete
monozygotic twins
100% identical
dizygotic or fraternal twins
50% identical
genotype-environment interaction
child’s temperament affects interaction with their parents
sensation
information about environment picked up by sensory receptors and transmitted to brain
perception
interpretation by the brain of this input - how we understand the events, objects and people in our environment
visual acuity
poor at birth, rapid increase in first 6 months
near adult levels by 1 year
visual scanning
younger than 2 months, cannot track moving objects smoothly
1 month: focus on limited features of shape, particularly outside edges
2 months: start to focus on internal features
colour vision
new-borns can distinguish between white and red, but not other colours
around 1 month, look longer at brighter, bold colours
by 4 months close to adult ability
how do we test perceptual abilities?
preference tests
habituation tests
conditioning
preference tests
present two stimuli at the same time, measure how long infant looks at each, does infant look at one more than the other (they can tell a difference between the two)
habituation tests
shown interesting stimulus repeatedly (infant loses interest eventually - habituation), change to a different stimulus, infant shows renewed interest and looks again (dishabituation), if so, the infant can tell the difference
conditioning
repeatedly reward target behaviour, infant becomes habituated to stimulus, stimulus is altered (example: HAS procedure)
Fantz 1961
found 1-15 week olds prefer looking at complex patterns
Maurer and Barrera (1981)
added controls for complexity
found at 1 month old there was no difference in looking times
found at 2 months they looked longer at the ‘natural face’
Goren at al. (1975)
used moving stimuli instead of static
new-borns tracked schematic face more than other two
Johnson et al. (1991)
replicated effect with new-borns
by 3 months, no longer track face more
why does this preference vanish?
Johnson and Morton (1991) 2 process model
CONSPEC - early system (subcortical structures) biases infants to orient towards faces
CONLEARN - later taken over by more mature system (visual cortex) and more precise recognition
Pascalis et al. (1995)
preference for mother’s face disappeared when outside of face and hairline masked
new-borns use outer features to identify
Turati et al. (2006)
found that infants could use both outer and inner features
Pascalis et al. (2002)
6-month infants could discriminate between monkey faces and human faces
9-month infants and adults could only discriminate between human faces
if exposed to monkey faces, 9-month olds could discriminate
‘Other-race effect’
adults poorer at discriminating faces of other races compared to own race (Tanaka et al. 2004)
3 month olds show preference for own race faces (Kelly et al. 2005)
Quinn et al. (2002)
fathers for primary caregivers = preference for male faces
face specific perceptual developmental theory
ongoing development of face-specific perception mechanisms, continue to develop into late child and adolescence
face perception gets better because of increased exposure/ experience with faces
general cognitive development theory
face perception matures early (4-5 years)
performance increases later as general cognitive mechanisms improve
neurodivergent face perception
William’s syndrome - process unfamiliar faces atypically, prolonged face gaze
Prosopagnosia
face blindness caused by damage or abnormalities in right fusiform gyrus
Congenital Prosopagnosia
face blindness from birth, appears to run in families, different degrees of severity, might not even be able to recognise their own face
phonology
‘phonemes’ or sound segments
semantics
system of meaning - ‘morphemes’
syntax
rules by which words/ phrases are arranged
pragmatics
how language is used in different contexts or genres
Speech perception, before birth?
Evidence of fetal reactions from 20 weeks
preference for ‘uterine’ version of mothers voice after birth
Neonates prefer sounds produced by the mother
Language production
From 1-2 months - cooing and laughing
6-10 months - canonical babbling, include more vowels and consonants, combine these in a way that can sound like words, scream for attention, some sounds preserved for primary caregiver or other familiar individuals
10+ months - modulated babbling, add stress and intonation patterns, overlaps with meaningful speech period