Developmental Psychology 2 Flashcards
Priority 2
Name Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development.
Sensorimotor (0-2 years), preoperational (2-7 years), concrete operational (7-12 years), and formal operational (12+ years).
What are the key achievements of Piaget’s sensorimotor stage?
Object permanence, deferred imitation, which represent the beginning of symbolic thought.
What is deferred imitation?
Ability to imitate an observed act at a later time.
What are circular reactions?
The means by which, according to Piaget, learning occurs, wherein behaviors are performed to reproduce events that happened initially by chance.
What is the key achievement of Piaget’s preoperational stage?
Dramatic increase in symbolic thought, e.g., language, substitute pretend play. Emergence of intuitive thought.
What is substitute pretend play?
Objects stand in for something else.
What is intuitive thought for Piaget?
Substage of preoperational stage in which children begin reasoning and become aware that they have knowledge, but don’t know where it came from.
What are some limitations of Piaget’s preoperational stage?
Egocentrism, magical thinking, animism, lack of conservation, centration, irreversibility.
What is centration?
Tendency to focus on one detail to the neglect of other important ones.
What is irreversibility?
Lack of understanding that some actions can be reversed.
What are the key achievements of the concrete operational stage?
Development of reversibility and decentration, allowing child to conserve; transivity and hierarchical classification.
What is conservation and how does it develop?
Understanding that the properties of an object don’t change, even if its physical appearance does. Conservation of number develops first, then length, liquid, mass, area, weight, and volume.
What is horizontal decalage?
Piaget’s term for sequential mastery of concepts within a given stage of development.
What is transivity?
Piaget’s term for being able to sort objects mentally (think working memory).
What are the key achievements of the formal operational stage?
Process of abstract concepts, e.g., using hypothetical-deductive reasoning and propositional thought.
What is hypothetical-deductive reasoning?
Piaget’s term for the ability to arrive at and test alternative explanations.
What is propositional thought?
Piaget’s term for critical thinking, the ability to evaluate the logical validity of verbal assertions abstractly (without concrete references).
What is formal operational egocentrism?
The naive belief, prevalent among adolescents with new abstract reasoning powers, that the world can become a better place through implementation of the adolescent’s idealized schemes.
What is the imaginary audience?
The adolescent belief that others are as concerned about her/his behavior as her/himself.
What is the personal fable?
The adolescent’s belief that s/he is unique and indestructible and that rules are excepted for them.
What has research shown about Piaget’s theories?
Confirmed invariant sequence of development. Piaget appears to have underestimated the cognitive abilities of children. Only about half of adults reach formal operational thought; of them many only use it in their areas of expertise.
What is the information processing theory of development?
Cognitive processes are analogous to computer processes, operating through rules and logic, with limited qualitative and quantitative capacities. Children become better information processors (thinkers) as brain capacities expand and rules and logic improve.
What are the key concepts of Vygotsky’s theory of cognitive development?
Cognition depends on social, cultural, and historical context. Development occurs as children intrapersonally apply knowledge that was gained interpersonally.
What is Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development?
A metaphorical gap between what a child can do alone and what s/he can do with help from more competent others. Learning occurs more rapidly in the zone.
What is scaffolding?
Vygotsky’s term for the help provided to learning children by competent others; involves providing cues and encouraging novel solutions.
What is infantile amnesia?
Adults’ loss of episodic memory prior to about age three. Theorized to result from lack of schematic organization and as a consequence of language development, specifically self-talk and reason.
What are the reasons for the surge in memory around age seven?
Increased short-term memory capacity, consistent use of rehearsal and other memory strategies, increased knowledge about things to be remembered, and development of metamemory.
What are the four types of cry babies make and when do they arise?
Shortly after birth are the basic cry (hunger), a pain cry, and an angry cry. Around three weeks, a cry for attention can be distinguished. The pain cry is generally experienced by adults as the most arousing.
What are the key features of language?
It is a system of words that act as symbols; it is rule-governed, but creative within those rules.
What are the seven stages of language development?
Cooing (1-2 mos), babbling (4-6 mos), first words (10-16 mos), holophrastic speech (12-18 mos), telegraphic speech (18 to 24 mos), rapid vocabulary growth (30-36 mos), complex grammatical forms (3-6 years).
What is holophrastic speech?
Combining a single word with gestures and inflection to express a full thought.
What is telegraphic speech?
Two-word sentences comprised of the most critical words.
What are the three principle theories of language development?
Behavioral, nativist, and cognitive.
What does the cognitive theory of language development argue?
Language is a consequence of cognitive development. Children are motivated to acquire language because they wish to express meaning, i.e., meaning comes first, then children find words to hang on the meaning.
Why might a bilingual speaker code switch (change language in mid-conversation)?
- inadequate expressiveness of the abandon language
- to indicate solidarity with the interlocutor
- to express an attitude.
What is “Ferberizing?”
An infant sleep-training technique developed by Richard Ferber (1985) in which parents, beginning at about 5-6 months, systematically increase the amount of time to respond to a cry when an infant is put to bed. Research supports this approach with non-anxious children.
What is social referencing?
When an infant begins “reading” her/his caregiver’s emotions as a guide for action. Begins about 6 months. Reference: visual cliff.
What is separation anxiety?
Infant’s distress at separation from caregiver. Begins about 6 months, but peaks around 14-18 months, diminishing through preschool years.
What is stranger anxiety?
Infant’s strong negative reaction to unfamiliar persons. Typically begins 8-10 months, but can start ~6 months, peaking around 18 months and declining during second year. Moderated by caregiver’s presence.
What are the behaviors associated with prolonged response to separation by 15-30 month olds?
Protest, despair, detachment.
