Developmental psychology Flashcards
Attachment
he strong emotional bond that develops between children and their primary caregivers over the first few years of life that enhances our adjustment throughout our lives
Types of attachment
Secure Attachments – free exploration and happiness on mother’s return
· Insecure Attachments – little exploration and little emotional response to mother
Assessment of attachment
Ainsworth (1978) The Strange Situation
· A controlled experiment with a 12-18 month child
· Child and mother or father plays in unfamiliar toy room.
· A stranger enters the room and plays with the child.
· The mother/father soon leaves the child with the stranger • Later the stranger departs; the child is left briefly alone
· The caregiver returns.
· The infant’s behaviour at each stage is observed and characterised
· Secure response:
I. Child uses parent as a source of safety and so seeks proximity/social reassurance from parent in presence of stranger; the child shows distress on separation; the child is able to be calmed on parent’s return.
· Variations may show insecurity in the child’s attachment, reflecting different parenting styles
Nature vs nurture
I. Nature - sets out their course via gender, genetics, temperament and maturational stages
II. Nurture - shapes this predetermined course via the environment; parenting, stimulation and nutrition
Temperament
innate aspects of individual’s personality, such as introversion/extroversion
Reciprocal socialisation
socialisation is bidirectional therefore children socialise parents just as parents socialise children
Piaget’s model of development
0-2 yrs sensorimotor(words primarily through sensory experiences and physical interactions with objects)
2-7- preoperational (world is represented symbolically through words and mental images; no understanding of basic mental operations or rules)
7-11 concrete operational (working out in head)
12+ Formal operational
