Essay - Social Development Flashcards
What is social development?
Social development refers to the way an individual relates to others and develops the skills needed for participating in the social context
What is socialisation?
When members of society influence the beliefs and behaviours of children, which enables them to adopt the culture, norms and values of that society
Why study social development? (4)
1 Key developmental contexts across life of a being
2 Links to other developmental processes - language, moral, learning & academic achievement
3 Intregral to human development
4 Integral to school/academic achievement
What are the three social development essentials?
- Thinking about self (development of self-awareness)
- Thinking about others (development of perspective-taking ability)
- Thinking about connections between people (development of childhood relationships)
What are the three key concepts when thinking about the self?
Self-esteem
Self-concept (differentiated across many disciplines)
Self-efficacy
What are the three key development areas when thinking about the self?
- Social feedback
- Social comparison
- Social role models
Example of social feedback
Laughing at a child in class when something goes wrong
What is social comparison?
Comparing oneself to others who perform better or worse than ourselves
What are social role models important?
If you admire or respect a role model it makes you feel like you can do it to?
What is important to note about the self?
It is complex and different across many areas of our life eg learner, sibling
What are the 4 key aspects to thinking about others
- Moral development
- Emotional understanding
- Perspective-taking ability
- Prosocial reasoning
How does moral development help us think about others?
Helps us gradually understand that our moral position on something effects other people
How does emotion understanding assist us with thinking about others?
Moves us from understanding emotion in our own bodies to recognising them in other people - expressions, body language
What is perspective-taking ability (PTA)?
Ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes
Who came up with perspective-taking ability theory? What type of theory is it
Robert Selman
Stage-based theory
Sum up the PTA theory
Selman used dilemmas to test ability. Children scored according to responses. Development was measured by their capacity to take into account others perspectives
What are the 5 stages of Selman’s PTA?
- Early childhood = unable to differentiate perspectives
- Middle childhood = people may have different information, leading to different perspectives
- Late childhood = can step into another person’s shoes.Not just knowing what they are feeling, but feeling what they are feeling & consciously taking into account someone else’s view.
- Adolescence = step outside the situation. can look at a situation fresh, from a third person perspective
- Late adolescence = recognising influence of value systems - perspectives of multiple stakeholders and that all those players have their perspectives influenced by values of their own
What are the three areas of skill development in PTA?
- Social problem solving skills
- Altruism and empathy
- Emotional understanding
What does high PTA lead to
Higher peer acceptance and popularity
What does low PTA lead to?
Peer dislike and rejection
What are peers (4)
- Same age/same class
- Associates
- Interactions increase with age
- Requires social skills (empathy, altruism, social problem solving)
What are friends?
- Same age and similar
- Mutual liking
- Interactions increase in quality with age
- Requires advanced social skills - trust and sharing, social support
5 problems of social development
- Child may not develop appropriate social skills eg autism, adhd
- Children may not be accepted by peer group
- Persistent rejection and bullying limit social development
- Children may be deprived of an opportunity for social development
- Disability or illness may limit social activities or social skills
How can we foster social development? (5)
- Promote and foster positive social behaviour
- Create classroom opportunities for positive social interaction, cooperation and helping behaviours
- Model positive interaction skills and behaviours
- Supervise the social context and step in if you see bullying, ostracism and rejection
- Explicitly teach using moral and social dilemmas to promote perspective taking
