Developmental Psychology Flashcards
What is developmental psychology?
Study of how behaviour changes over time
What is the post hoc fallacy?
False assumption that because one event occurred before another event, it must have caused the event
What is a cross-sectional design?
A research design that examines people of different ages at a single point in time
What are cohort effects?
Effects observed in a sample of participants that result from individual’s in the sample growing up at the same time
What is a longitudinal design?
A research design that examines development in the same group of people on multiple occasions over time
What is the infant determinism myth?
The widespread assumption that extremely early experiences are almost always more influential that later experiences in shaping us as adults
What is the childhood fragility myth?
The assumption that children are delicate little creatures who are easily damaged
What is gene-environment interaction?
The situation where the effects of genes depend on the environment in which they are expressed
What is nature via nurture?
The tendency of individuals with certain genetic predispositions to seek out and create environments that permit the expression of those predispositions
What is gene expression?
The activation or deactivation of genes by environmental experiences throughout development
True or False: just because one event precedes a second event does not necessarily mean that it causes it
True
True or False: research shows that most children are passive recipients of their parents’ influence
False
True or False: most children exposed to severe stressors end up with healthy patterns of psychological adjustment
True
True or False: gene expression is predetermined at birth and doesn’t change in response to environmental experiences
False
What is adolescence?
The transition between childhood and adulthood commonly associated with the teenage years
What is puberty?
The achievement of sexual maturation resulting in the potential to reproduce
What are primary sex characteristics?
Physical features, such as the reproductive organs and genitals, that distinguish the sexes
What are secondary sex characteristics?
Sex-differentiating characteristics that do not relate directly to reproduction, such as breast enlargement in females and deepening voices in males
What is menarche?
The start of menstruation
What is spermarche?
A boys’ first ejaculation
What is menopause?
The termination of menstruation, marking the end of a women’s reproductive potential
What is cognitive development?
The study of how children acquire the ability to learn, think, reason, communicate and remember
True or False: androgens cause changes in boys at puberty, whereas oestrogens cause changes in girls
False
True or False: elderly people’s hearing, sight and other senses decline, but their ability to learn new motor skills are still intact
False
Who was the firs psychologist to propose a theory of cognitive development?
Jean Piaget
What is equilibration?
The desire for children to achieve a balance between their experience of the world and their understanding of it
What is assimilation? (Development)
A Piagetian process of absorbing new experience into current knowledge structures
What is accommodation?
The Piagetian process of altering a belief to make it more compatible with experience
What are Piaget’s stages of development?
Sensorimotor
Preoperational
Concrete operational
Formal operational
What is the sensorimotor stage?
The stage in Piaget’s theory characterised by a focus in the here-and-now without the ability to represent experiences mentally
What is object permanence?
The understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of view
What is the preoperational stage?
The stage in Piaget’s theory characterised by the ability to construct mental representations of experience, but not yet perform operations on them
What is egocentrism?
The inability to see the world from others’ perspectives
What is conservation?
A Piagetian task requiring children to understand that despite a transformation in the physical presentation of an amount, the amount remains the same
What is the concrete operational stage?
The stage in Piaget’s theory characterised by the ability to perform mental operations on physical events only
What is the formal operational stage?
The stage is Piaget’s theory characterised by the ability to perform hypothetical reasoning behind the here-and-now
The beginning of which stage is characterised by the formation of object permanence?
Preoperational
Which stage is characterised by egocentrism and the inability to conserve quantity?
Preoperational
What are the downfalls of Piaget’s theory?
- Most of development is more continuous than stage-like
- Young children may not be able to effectively verbalise there experiences
- Does not take cultural differences into account
What was Vygotsky interested in?
How social and cultural factors influence learning
What is scaffolding?
A Vygotskian learning mechanism in which parents provide initial assistance in children’s learning, but gradually remove structure as the children become more competent
What is the zone of proximal development?
A phase of learning during which children can benefit from instruction
What age do babies begin to recognise themselves in a mirror?
Between one and one and a half
What age do children recognise themselves in photos?
Two years old
What age do children recognise themselves in videos?
Three years old
What is the theory of mind?
The ability to reason about what other people want, feel and think
On what tasks do younger people perform better than older people?
Recall memory tasks
Speed processing tasks
What tasks are not impaired with ageing?
Cued recall and recognition tasks
Everyday activity memory
Vocabulary
Crystallised intelligence (accumulated knowledge)
True or False: Piaget argued that development was domain-general and continuous
False
True or False: Vygotsky’s theory proposes that individual children vary in the age at which they achieve developmental readiness for particular cognitive abilities
True
True or False: the ability to count precise quantities is absent in some cultures
True
True or False: adolescents may not always make mature decisions about engaging in risky behaviours because their frontal lobes aren’t fully mature
True
True or False: older adults perform worse than younger adults on tests that require memory for random lists of words, but perform better on tests of knowledge and vocabulary
True
What is stranger anxiety?
The fear of strangers developing at eight or nine months of age
What is temperament?
Basic emotional style than appears early in development and is largely genetic in origin
What are the basic temperament styles?
Easy - adaptable and relaxed
Difficult - fussy and easily frustrated
Slow-to-warm-up - disturbed by new stimuli by gradually get used to them
Behavioural inhibition - become afraid of unfamiliar stimuli
Which temperament style is at higher risk for being shy and/or anxious late in life?
Behavioural inhibition
Infants with low behaviour inhibition are at risk for what later in childhood?
Impulsive behaviour
What is attachment?
A strong emotional connection we share with those whom we feel closest
What is a critical period?
A specific window of time during which an event must occur for normal development
What is a sensitive period?
A window of time where the development of some behaviours is easier but not vital for normal development
What is contact comfort?
The positive emotion afforded by touch
What are the different styles of attachment?
Secure attachment
Insecure-avoidant
Insecure-anxious
Disorganised attachment
What is secure attachment?
The infant reacts to mum’s departure by becoming upset, but greets her return with joy
What is insecure-avoidant attachment?
The infant reacts to mum’s departure with indifference, and shows little reaction on her return
What is insecure-anxious attachment?
The infant reacts to the mum’s departure with panic. He then shows a mixed emotional reaction on her return, simultaneously reaching for her yet squirming to get away after she picks him up
What is disorganised attachment?
Children with this pattern react to mum’s departure and return with an inconsistent and confused set of responses
What are the different parenting styles?
Permissive
Authoritarian
Authoritative
Uninvolved
What is the permissive parenting style?
Permissive parents tend to be lenient with their children, allowing them considerable freedom inside and outside the household. They use disciple sparingly, if at all, and often shower their children with affection.
What is the authoritarian parenting style?
Authoritarian parents tend to be strict with their children, giving their children little opportunity for free play or exploration, and punishing them when they don’t response appropriately to their demands. They show little affection towards their children
What is the authoritative parenting style?
Authoritative parents combine the best features of both permissive and authoritarian worlds. They are supportive of their children but set clear and firm limits with them
What is the uninvolved parenting style?
Uninvolved parents tend to ignore their children, paying little attention to either their positive or negative behaviours
What is the average expectable environment?
An environment that provide children with basic needs for affection and appropriate discipline
What is self-control?
The ability to inhibit an impulse to act
What is a gender role?
A set of behaviours that tend to be associated with being male or female
What is gender identity?
An individuals’ sense of being male or female
What is an identity?
Our sense of who we are, and our life goals and priorities
What is a psychosocial crisis?
A dilemma concerning an individual’s relations to other people
What is emerging adulthood?
The period of life between the ages of 18 and 25 during which many aspects of emotional development, identity and personality become solidified
What are the levels of Kohlberg’s scheme of moral development?
Pre-conventional morality
Conventional morality
Post-conventional morality
What is pre-conventional morality?
Egocentric - how do the consequences affect me?
What is conventional morality?
Interaction with others - appreciating laws and rules
What is post-conventional morality?
Questioning how we interact with others and if it can be altered to benefit society
What is a midlife crisis?
A supposed phase of adulthood characterised by emotional distress about the ageing process and an attempt to regain youth
What is empty-nest syndrome?
An alleged period of depression in mothers following the departure of their grown children from their home
True or False: studies of contact comfort suggest that nourishment isn’t the principal basis for attachment in primates
True
True or False: studies suggest that within the broad range of the average expectable environment, parenting style may not be a crucial determinant of children’s development
True
True or False: gender differences don’t emerge until parenting practices have the opportunity to influence children’s behaviour
False
True or False: when evaluating Kohlberg’s moral dilemmas, the answers people give are more important than the reasoning process they used to arrive at these answers
False
True or False: marriage and becoming a parent both exert an overall positive impact in adults’ stress levels
False
