Exam 3 - Childhood Flashcards
Middle Childhood
The second phase of childhood, comprising the ages from roughly 7 to 12 years.
Industry
Erik Erikson’s term for the middle childhood psychosocial task involving:
- bending to adult reality
- needing to work for what we want.
Initiative
Erik Erikson’s term for the early childhood psychosocial task involves exuberantly testing skills.
What makes human’s different from apes
- Reflect our actions
- read each other’s minds
What stage of Erikson’s psychosocial tasks is most similar to early childhood
Adolescence, other age of exploration
What are the two types of physical skills according to developmentalism?
- Gross Motor skills
- Fine motor skills
What are boys slightly better at than girls and how do girls make up for it?
Gross motor skills - boys can throw faster but girls better at fine motor skills
- Relation with physical abilities and school talents
- How to improve academic abilities
Preschoolers with exponential physical abilities advance at school
Improve academic abilities = train children to reproduce images
Two threats to preschool physical skills
- Lack of outdoor play
- Lack of food
What reduces lack of outdoor play
Internet + high tech educational tools
More parent screen time = less preschool outdoor time
Benefit and disadvantages of learning tools
Learning tools stimulate school-related skills
- outside time does the same
What does undernutrition impair and how
Undernutrition impairs gross and fine motor skills
Compromises:
- Development
- too tired to engage with the world
In the 1980s undernourished children maximized growth by
-
cutting down on play
- lack ability to compromise & understand
Fine motor skills
involve small, coordinated movements, such as drawing faces and writing one’s name
Gross motor skills
refer to large muscle movements, such as running, climbing, and hopping
What activities are better for somebody with great gross motor skills but terrible fine motor skills
- Long distance running
- High jump
Which strategy is least helpful in stimulating physical development during early childhood
pushing preschoolers
_____ is the understanding that a general category can encompass several subordinate elements.
Class inclusion
According to Lev Vygotsky, children learn through their interactions with parents, teachers, and older siblings. These individuals can be crucial to learning by _____.
Teaching or specifically instructing them
Evolutionary psychologists believe that the reason humans have advanced intellectually when compared to other animals is that humans have the capacity to _____.
think about other people’s minds and decode their intentions and thoughts
_____ refers to a child’s knowledge that one can pour fluid from a tall, thin glass into a fat, wide glass, and it will still have the same amount of liquid.
Reversibility
Many preschoolers say “runned,” “teached,” and “mouses” rather than using the correct form. These are examples of _____.
overregularization
Veronica can write her name due to her _____ skills.
Fine motor
Samantha is a young girl and is concerned that if she gets a short haircut, she might become a boy. This is BEST seen as an example of _____.
a lack of identity constancy
Jarell is celebrating his seventh birthday. Which life stage has he just completed?
Early childhood
Reggie can ride a bike only if his mom is providing some physical support and coaching. Lev Vygotsky would say that _____.
riding a bike is within Reggie’s zone of proximal development.
Jeremy is celebrating his third birthday. Which life stage has he just entered?
early childhood
An experimenter begins with two equal glasses of water and then pours one of the glasses into a container of different sizes and shapes. The experimenter is MOST likely testing for conservation of _____.
Volume
Marcus can copy two short words and catch a ball with both hands with his arms in front of his body. Mastery of these skills indicates that Marcus is at LEAST _____ year(s) old.
6
An experimenter lines up seven checkers in each of two rows of unequal length and asks a child if one row has just as many checkers as the other. The experimenter is MOST likely testing for conservation of _____.
number
“Mr. Sun goes to bed because I do.” This 3-year-old child’s statement shows signs of _____.
- Animism
- Egocentrism
Mrs. Taylor gives help to her class when needed and then backs off when a student masters a specific skill. Mrs. Taylor is using a teaching technique called _____.
scaffolding
age 7 or 8 is a landmark for
- Looking beyond immediate appearances
- For understanding categories
- For decentering in the physical and social worlds
- For abandoning the tooth fairy and the idea that our stuffed animals are alive
- For entering the mental planet of adults.
Preoperational stage
Children’s perceptions are captured by their immediate appearances:
“What they see is what is real.”
They believe, among other things, that inanimate objects are really alive and that if the appearance of a quantity of liquid changes (for example, if it is poured from a short, wide glass into a tall, thin one), the amount of liquid itself changes.
Concrete operational
thinking defined by what older children possess:
the ability to reason about the world in a logical, adult-like way.
Preoperational thinking
defined by what young children are missing
the ability to step back from their immediate perceptions
Conservation tasks
knowing that the amount of a given substance remains identical despite changes in its shape or form
Reversibility
the idea that an operation (or procedure) can be repeated in the opposite direction.
Identity consistency
don’t realize that people remain their essential selves despite changes in the way they visually appear
Animism
refers to the problem young children have in sorting out what is alive
Centering
Young children interpret things according to what first catches their eye, rather than taking in the entire visual array
Decenter
can step back from a substance’s immediate appearance and understand that an increase in one dimension makes up for a loss in the other one.
Class inclusion
The understanding is that a general category can encompass several subordinate elements.
Artificialism
Young children believe that human beings make nature
Egocentrism
the inability to understand that other people have different points of view.
And the world literal centers around you
Development zone of proximal (ZPD)
defined as the difference between what the child can do by himself and his level of potential development as determined through problem-solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers
Scaffolding
The process of teaching new skills by entering a child’s zone of proximal development and tailoring one’s efforts to that person’s competence level.
Inner speech
In Vygotsky’s theory, the way in which human beings learn to regulate their behavior and master cognitive challenges, through silently repeating information or talking to themselves.
Phonemes
word sounds of language
Morphemes
meaning units of language
EX: boys have two units of meaning: boy and the plural suffix -s
Mean length of utterance (MLU)
the average number of morphemes per sentence
Syntax
The system of grammatical rules in a particular language.
Overregularization
An error in early language development, in which young children apply the rules for plurals and past tenses even to exceptions, so irregular forms sound like regular forms.
Overextensions
extending a verbal label too broadly
Underextensions
making name categories too narrow.
Semantics
understanding word meanings
how do children go through different stages of cognitive growth?
- Assimilation
- Accommodation
When leaves infancy, enter preoperational thought ___ how is this different from adults
- tremendous mental strides
- different from adults = unable to look beyond way object immediately appear
when do children enter the concrete operational stage?
Age 7 or 8
what do Conservation tasks show
children under 7 don’t understand conservation
Conservation-of-mass-task
Conservation-of-liquid task
Why can’t children conserve?
Can’t grasp reversibility
Centering impair class inclusion (more skittle than gummies = want skittles)
How does conservation change in concrete operations?
The idea that bigger equals more extends to every aspect of preoperational thought
3 peculiar perceptions about people
- Egocentrism
- Artificalism
- Animism - see inanimate objects as having consciousness
Lasts our whole life
What do young children like
identity consistency
What illustrates the concept of assimilation
Animism + artificialitsm
How does transition away from pre-operations happen from age 5 to 8
Gradually
- Age 5 and 7 = thinking less static
- a better understanding of conservation-of-liquid but not completely there
- Age 8 = reach concrete operational stage
Specific conservation appears at different ages
Master conservation of numbers then mass & liquid
Fully mastered at age 11 or 12
4 things Piaget got wrong
- Overstated young children’s egocentrism - happens far before age 8
- Children abandon animism at age 7-8 -
- Age at which children master specific conservation task vary place by place = due to nature interacting with nurture
- Teaching promotes cognitive growth
Psychologist Lev Vygotsky view on cognitive development
People propel mental growth
Learning takes place in
zone of proximal development (ZPD)
Good scaffolder in the western world
- Actively instruct but sensitive to child’s response
- Form secure attachment
- Break larger cognitive challenges into manageable steps
- Help until fully mastered before moving on
Good scaffolder in collectivist societies
- children listen
- watch adults
Language according to Vygotsky -
speaking vital for a child’s ability to think
words a child hears from parents migrate inward this is
Inner speech
How does speech development in early childhood, age 3, and kindergarten
- Early childhood = language explodes
- Age 2 = beginning to put words together
- Kindergarten = adult language nailed down
Phonemes change from infant, age 3, & early elementary school
- Infant - repeat sounds that seem similar
- Age 3 - trouble mispronouncing multi-syllable words
- Early elementary school - articulation problems disappear
how do Children mean length of utterance (MLU) expands and what is a milestone
with age
3 or 4 - children fascinated by using “ and “
when do Children typically produce grammatically correct sentences by
preschool
What is the most amazing change in language?
semantics
How did semantics change
- Age 1 - three or four-word vocabulary
- Age 6 - 10,000 words
how are errors in semantics fixed?
through
- Assimilation
- Accommodation
3 error in semantics
-
Over-regularization = 3 or 4 YO
- mistake while learning language
-
Over-extensions = 3 YO
- (thinking dog is cat cause they both have 4 legs)
-
Underextensions
- (thinking only her dog is a dog everything else is something else)
a Piagetian label for:
Vince tells you that a tree in a garden is watching him
animism
a Piagetian label for :
when you stub your toe Vince gives you his stuffed animal
egocentrism
a Piagetian label for:
Vince explains his dad made the sun
artificialism
a Piagetian label for:
Vince says there’s more now when you pour juice from a wide jar into a skinny glass
can’t conserve
Piagetian label for:
Vincent tells you that your sister turned into a princess yesterday when she put on a costume
no identify constancy
Basic mental differences between eight-year-olds in concrete operational stage and pre-operational four-year-olds
- Children in concrete operations:
- can step back from their current perceptions
- think conceptually
-
preoperational children:
- can’t go beyond how things immediately appear
What allows us to reflect on our past
language
Autobiographical memories
refer to reflecting on our life histories:
from our earliest memories at age 3 or 4 to that incredible experience at work last week.
Theory of mind
the understanding that other people have perspectives different from their own
How do Autobiographical memories form
through past talk conversations
Autobiographical memories from a preschool, to adolescence
- Preschool = children have mutual stories of past self
- Age 4 or 5 = initiate past talk conversations on their own
- Adolescence = link memories to each other and construct a timeline of life
when is identity achieved?
16
use events to reflect on her personality
Caregivers stimulate memories by
asking questions about experiences shared with child
What does past talk do?
Past talk = scaffold the values a given society holds
Personal autobiographies scaffolding through
loving caregiver - child interactions
Children with depressed mothers=
produced overly general memories
Traumatic childhood experiences does what
stunt memories
Children removed from an abusive home =
denied remembering anything about event
when autobiographical memories form what also happens
Children also understand other people live in different mental spaces
When do you reach the landmark of a theory of mind how do you know when reached
age 4 or 5
Developmentalist use false-belief tasks to prove a milestone
Why is having a theory of mind important
- To having a real conversation
- Convincing someone to do what you say
- Understanding not everybody has your best interest at heart
What happens at 3 and how do children with a theory of mind do better at this
At three we start impulsively tell lies
A child with the theory of mind = lies more strategic and sophisticated
False-belief studies did what
convinced developmental Piaget idea on proportional egocentrism was wrong
People who pass theory of mind later
Collectivist cultures -
take longer to grasp the idea that people have conflicting opinions
Why do collectivist cultures pass theory of mind later?
Parents socialize obedience greatly
People who pass theory of mind earlier
- Western preschoolers with siblings
- Bilingual preschoolers
- Preschoolers ability to control themself highly
Being early or late in developing a theory of mind does what
real-world affects
Children with the superior theory of mind skills are
more popular
Theory of mind abilities
- linked to sharing
- helping
- In girls linked
- behaving in a caring way
4 ways to help stimulate theory of mind
- Train preschoolers in perspective-taking by pointing out others feelings
- When reading discuss what each protagonist feels
- Embedded false belief task into games
- Encourage dramatic play
What preschool game is implicitly tailored to teach the theory of mind
hide & seek
Exercise play
Running and chasing play that exercises children’s physical skills.
Rough-and-tumble play
refers to the excited shoving and wrestling that is most apparent with boys
Fantasy play
Pretend play in which a child makes up a scene, often with a toy or other prop.
Collaborative pretend play
fantasizing together with another child gets going at about age 4
Gender-segregated play
Play in which boys and girls associate only with members of their own gender-typical of childhood.
Gender schema theory
once children understand their category (girl or boy), they selectively attend to the activities of their own sex.
Transgender
people whose gender identity is different from their sex at birth
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs)
syndromes that center on deficits in self-awareness and theory of mind
How do developmentalism divide young children play
- Exercise play
- Rough-and-tumble play
What is unique in relation to gender and Rough-and-tumble play
- Biologically built into being male
- Males that engage in this play typically popular with peers
Roots of pretending starts in ___, who fosters this
infancy
mothers scaffold this skill
Toddler initiate scene + mother acting = fantasy play
When do Children start pretending with peers and what does this show?
Age 3
Shows preschoolers have a theory of mind - able to make sense of others minds better
When children reach concrete operations (about age 9 ) what happens
interest shifts to structured games
3 purposes of fantasy play
- Play allows children to practice adult role
- Play allows children a sense of control
- Play furthers our understanding of social norms
why do Girls become mommy and baby and boys become soldiers?
- girls:
- Realize women are the main child-care providers
- boys:
- Offers built-in training for wars they will face as adults.
Sociologist William Cosaro and fantasy
Child play focus on mastering upsetting events
When does Gender-segregated play starts?
in preschool (Age 5/6)
Difference between boy and girl play
Boys play more rambunctious than a girl
even if playing the same game
Boys in groups act
Boys try to be dominant and compete to win
Girl vs boy fantasy themes
-
Girl-to-girl fantasy =
- nurturing themes
-
Boys fantasy =
- warrior
- superhero mode
2 reasons Why girls tend to have a yucky view of boys
- Different play interests
- Boys generally don’t like girls in their space first
Separate worlds of boys and girls
Girls tend to like both boy and girl assigned toys more than boys
What causes gender-stereotyped play?
- A Biological Underpinning
- The Amplifying Effect of Socialization
- The Impact of Cognitions
when are female and male brains programed
In utero
testosterone programs a more female or male brain
What are high levels of testosterone-related to
When is it important
High testosterone level = more male play behavior at 2 YO
- High levels at 1-month old
- Female fetuses exposed to high levels of prenatal testosterone
Our environment reinforces what
Our environment reinforces males and females act in a different way
Splitting into separate play reinforces what
male-female norms
When children behave in gender-atypical ways what happens
Children reject classmates
when do we first grasp our gender label and modeling?
At age 2 1/2
at what age do we understand the physical difference between males and females
Age 3
when do we master identity constancy
Age 5
grasp the idea that once a certain gender you stay that way
How do we know that pink gives girls permission to act like boys?
Study shows pink becomes defining symbol of womanhood at childhood
Girls will play with pink “boy” toys
How to encourage less stereotyped play
- Give children a chance to interact and mixed-sex groups
- Organize classroom to foster mixed-gender play
- Showcase role models who behave in non-standard ways
3 common behaviors of autism
- Inability to have normal back-and-forth conversations
- Inability to share feelings
- Inability to connect with adults and friends
Diagnosis of autism
-
Behaviors:
- Restricted
- Stereotyped
- Repetitive
- Typically diagnosed in
- Preschool
- Things to look out for:
- Poor social referencing
- Delete language
Genetic and environmental causes of autism
-
Genetic
- Genetic trait
- Advanced age of Grandad
-
Environmental risks
- maternal abusive relationships
- Prenatal medication use
- Premature
- Older parents
- air pollution
Vaccines don’t cause autism
Roughly 1 in _____ children in the United States is diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder.
68
Drawing on Erickson and Piaget’s theories name the qualities that make middle childhood (and human beings) special
- our ability to transcend immediate appearances
- control our emotions to work for a goal
What does Piaget’s and Erikson’s middle childhood landmarks depend on
Frontal lobes
Frontal lobes
the brain region responsible for thinking through our actions and managing our emotions
Childhood obesity
A body mass index at or above the 95th percentile compared to the U.S. norms established for children in the 1970s.
Body Mass Index
The ratio of a person’s weight to a height;
the main indicator of overweight or underweight.
Early childhood Visual and motor cortices in what phase
Pruning phase
When does pruning in the frontal lobe starts
What does this explain
Age 9
Explains why we have high expectations for children during late elementary
How do children now compare to children of the past generations in terms of activity
Why is this
Today children less proficient physically than past generations
Due to: no regularly play outside