Infancy Flashcards
What are the 3 major questions that reoccur in developmental psych?
1) Nature versus Nurture
2) Continuity versus Discontinuity
3) Universal versus context specific
What is nature versus nurture?
Asks if a given trait is biologically or environmentally determined? Are people born the way they are or is it due to life circumstances? ALWAYS both
What is continuity versus discontinuity?
Asks, is our development overtime a relatively smooth progression or are the changes more abrupt (discontinuity is development in levels-dramatic switch from one state to the next)
What is universal versus context specific?
Asks do all people in the world follow the same developmental path or are there multiple pathways depending on context?
What type of development is relatively universal?
Perceptual development
What school of thought believes that social development is universal?
Behaviourism
What are the 3 levels of analysis?
Biological, psychological, environmental
What is the biological level?
Things like genes, hormones, puberty, brain processes, and basic needs that contribute to a behaviour
What is the psychological level?
Personal thoughts, feelings, motives, self-esteem, personality that contribute to a behaviour.
What is the environmental level?
The past and current physical and social environment, including sociocultural influences, that contribute to a behaviour.
What is the biopsychosocial model?
Model that takes into account all three levels of analysis, as well as life cycle forces.
What are life cycle forces?
The contribution of timing to an event-the same event can have drastically different effects depending on timing (ex: pregnancy at 33 versus 15)
What are some examples of mind-body interactions? (Biological and psychological)
When you imagine your favourite food and it causes digestive enzymes to release
People recover faster when they have “something to live for”
What are some examples of environment-body interactions?
Enriched environment during infancy leads to greater brain development, epigenetics.
What is a reflex?
An inborn, automatic response to a particular form of stimulation. Babies are born with a number of these which tend to disappear
What are some reflexes that have an adaptive/survival value?
Rooting, sucking, eyeblink, swimming
What are some reflexes that help with the development of motor skills?
Stepping, swimming, moro reflex
What is a reflex where we have no clue why it exists?
Babinski Reflex
What is the eyeblink reflex?
If you shine a bright light at an infants eyes or clap near its head it will quickly shut its eyes
When does the eyeblink reflex disappear?
Never. Permanent
What is the rooting reflex?
If you stroke the babies cheek near the corner of the mouth, the head will turn towards the source. Helps baby find the nipple
When does the rooting reflex disappear?
3 weeks (becomes voluntary head turning at this time)
What is the babinski reflex?
When you run your hand down a babies foot and the toes flair
Why do we care about reflexes?
Gives an indicator of CNS development- if reflexes are absent, too rigid, or fail to disappear, we should be concerned.
Why do reflexes disappear? (2 Reasons)
1) It’s probably good to have control over them later in l life
2) Integration with voluntary behaviours
What percentage of an adults brain mass do we have at birth, age 6 months, and age 9 years?
Birth: 25%
6 months: 50%
9 years: 90%
What is synaptogenesis?
When neurons form interconnected networks (new synapses)-dendrites grow and form connections with other neurons
When is synaptogenesis especially fast?
Until around 2 years old.
How many connections are there per neuron in an adult?
10 000
Where do these connections begin?
In the simpler regions-ex: Medulla for breathing and heart rate.
When does the frontal cortex mature?
Not until around age 20-30
What is synaptic pruning?
When unused connections are lost-continues until adolescence, improves neural efficiency.
What age will you have the most synapses you’ll ever have in your life?
2 years
What is myelination?
Improved conduction speed-occurs throughout infancy, brain becomes more efficient.
Which areas of the brain are myelinated first?
Simpler areas
When does the frontal cortex bump (myelination) happen and when is it completed?
Adolescence-completed around age 20-30.
What is Larry Steinbergs work?
Expert witness in court cases-some states still have the death penalty even for children! Steinberg argues that prefrontal cortex is the last part to develop (planning and understanding consequences). Limbic system matures before (social reward). Adolescents imagine all the pros of a situation and no cons. Applies this to decisions like joining the army
What is maturation?
Genetically programmed biological process that governs growth of body, brain (rate is different for different kids but order stays the same)
What is the cephalocaudal principle?
Development proceeds from the head down-motor principles start in head (neck lifting). Move head, arms, legs
What is the proximodistal principle?
Development proceeds from the centre of the body outwards (babies can clap before grasping) Motor development goes from gross, to fine.
What are some examples of gross motor development?
Standing, crawling, walking
What are some examples of fine motor development?
Reaching, grasping
When can children start to hold their chin and chest up respectively?
Chin: 1 month
Chest: 2 months
When can children sit unsupported?
7 months
When can children stand while holding furniture?
9 months
When can children crawl?
10 months
When can children stand and walk alone respectively?
Stand: 11 months
Walk: Around 12 months
How does the stepping skill follow a U-shaped pattern?
Birth reflex: Hold baby up, they move legs
Disappears around 2 months, reappears later
How much time do toddlers spend practicing walking?
6 hours a day, travel length of 29 football fields every single day
Why do toddlers spend so much time walking?
Because childrens attempts to do things exceeds inhibition-can’t stop themselves (evolutionarily adaptive-forces practice)
What is the general (NOT UNIVERSAL) sequence that western babies follow with motor stages?
Crawl, pull up, stand
When does a delayed stage become a big deal?
If there’s multiple others that are also delayed
What is an example of how motor development can also be connected to other areas of development?
Motor dev: Grab cats tail
Cognitive dev: Cat runs away, wonder why?
How can the type of food you feed a baby help them?
Breastfeeding: Improved cognitive performance
Malnutrition: Stunted growth and brain development
What else can help a babies development?
Having an enriched environment-lots of toys, people to interact with, touch
How can touch help preterm babies?
Accelerates weight gain and neurological development
How does biology set limits on how much your environment can influence you?
You have upper and lower limits for potential IQ, height etc. Environment can help you reach the upper limit, but you will never pass it. Environment tells you where you’ll fall within a range.
What are the 4 steps in reaching and grasping and when do they happen?
1) Pre-reaching (arms flailing) (newborn)
2) Reaching with Ulnar Grasp (only fingers, not thumb) (3-4 months)
3) Transfer objects from hand to hand (4-5 months)
4) Pincer grasp
Which senses are the most developed at birth?
Touch, taste, smell, sound (can practice in the womb)
How is hearing developed in the womb?
Hearing moms digestive system and her voice
How is touch developed in the womb?
Thumb sucking, yanking on umbilical cord, playing with toes
How is taste and smell developed in the womb?
Diet of the mom affects taste of amniotic fluid-taste preferences carry on into later life, usually preference for SWEET (liking of salty around 4 months). Also can identify moms smell at birth.
Which areas on a newborn are the most sensitive to touch?
Faces, hands, genitals.
Why is pain especially intense in infancy?
Due to cortical immaturity
What can help soothe pain?
Sugar water, breastmilk, touch
What is exploratory mouthing?
Age 6 months, infants will chew on lots of stuff. Their mouths are full of touch receptors which is a great way to explore the world
What was Decasper and Fifers study on infant hearing?
Voice recognition-newborns could control what they listen to depending on speed of pacifier sucking- had 2 recordings: mom or a stranger reading the same thing. Infants would preferentially choose moms voice
What age did infants choose their moms voice over a strangers?
2 days
What was Decasper and Spence’s study on infant hearing?
Half of mothers read the cat in the hat while pregnant, half read dog in the fog. Babies could choose the story. Results were that babies would preferentially choose the story they had heard in the womb, even if it was read by a stranger!
What do the two Decasper studies represent?
Infants getting used to certain stimuli prenatally and having a preference later in life.
How do we demonstrate habituation and dishabituation in the womb?
Play music for a fetus, they start kicking. As the song plays over and over, gets less excited. BUT if you play something else, they get excited again!
What is the earliest age of infant hearing?
30 weeks
What kind of conditioning does the soother sucking demonstrate?
Operant conditioning-changing behaviour for a desirable outcome
How do we demonstrate mental categorization in infants that are days old?
Habituation and dishabituation to ascending and descending tones.
At what age can infants recognize different melodies?
2 months
At what age can infants distinguish between tempos?
4 months
At what age do infants develop a sense of musical phrasing?
4-7 months
At what age do infants prefer consonant to dissonant changes?
6 months
At what age can we discriminate all 400 phonemes?
1 month old
What is prosody?
The musicality of language
At what age can we only hear phonemes of our native lanuage?
9 months
What is the statistical learning capacity?
Figure out which syllables have a high likelihood of following the previous and which don’t-helps differentiate different words
What is parentese?
Slow, clear, high pitched vocalization that babies prefer and also helps them to do statistical learning.
What can multisensory communication do?
Help babies associate words and objects
What is vision like at birth, 6 months, and 4 years?
Birth: 20/600
6 months: 20/80
4 years: 20/20
Why is vision so bad at birth?
Retinal cells are not fully developed-poor acuity. Cones are less dense, muscles controlling lens are not well developed
What is the Preferential Looking Procedure?
Give babies choices between two options, see what they prefer based on if they look at one longer than the other
What do infants typically prefer?
Colours, complex colours and shapes, mothers face to others, attractive faces to unattractive, novel versus old stimli
How does vision develop at age 2 months, 6 months, and 7 months?
2: Focus and colour vision
6: Acuity, scanning, tracking
7: Depth perception.
How was the visual cliff used to study depth perception?
Found that infants would stop crossing around the time crawling developed. (thought that this was also when depth perception developed)
When do we start using motion cues, binocular cues, and monocular cues respectively?
Motion: 3 months
Binocular: 2-3 months
Monocular: 5-12 months (also become wary of heights around this age).
Why do infants prefer bigger patterns when they are younger and smaller when they are bigger?
Because vision isn’t as well developed when they’re younger and they can’t see smaller patterns-later in life they typically prefer more complex things! (Poor contrast sensitivity)
What spots on a face do young infants tend to look at most?
High contrast areas-chin, hairline. This is before they have good detail detection.
What is the perceptual and linguistic narrowing effect?
When children lose the ability to distinguish between ALL faces (move to only human) and ALL phonemes (only own language)
What is experience expectant development?
We expect specific things to develop naturally
What is experience dependent development?
Language development and phoneme discrimination depends on experience-not all babies go through the same experiences!
What is habituation?
Simplest form of learning-gradual reduction in response to a stimulus after repeated exposure
What is recovery?
An indication that habituation is not due to fatigue-excitement starts back up at introduction of new stimuli
At what age can children discriminate cats and dogs, and at what age can children discriminate different kinds of cats?
3.5 months and 6 months respectively.
At what age can children discriminate animals from furniture?
2 months
At what age are infants able to discriminate between basic spatial categories (above/below, left/right of a line)
Within 2 days of birth. Can also discriminate open and closed shapes at this time
At what age can infants impose a boundary (eg: midline of a computer screen)
3 months!
What type of learning do infants do?
Classical conditioning, operant conditioning, habituation, imitation
How long do infants sleep per day?
16 hours, split between 6-8 cat naps.
Why do infants sometimes have day and night mixed up?
Due to the mother moving around during the day and rocking the fetus to sleep, versus laying down at night and baby being wide awake.
How many sleep stages do infants have?
2 (REM AND NON REM)
Why is it so important that 50% of babies sleep be REM?
Important for consolidation of memories, CNS dev, and learning. Babies brain needs to reconsolidate due to lots of new learning.
What is the quiet alertness stage?
Baby is awake, but calm (2-3 hours per day). Best time for learning!
Why could food be a reason babies need such little sleep?
Stomachs are tiny, need more feeding
How does sleep change in children?
Total amount declines (10 hours) but they sleep through the night! 5 sleep stages, 20% is REM
How much do 18-24 year olds sleep versus elderly people?
18-24: 8.5 hours
Elderly: 5-6 hours
What is SIDS?
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome
What is one of the correlations of SIDS?
Laying kid on stomach to sleep-could have something to do with breathing and rib muscles strength
What increases the risk of SIDS?
Smoking near baby, too warm, illness and low birth weight
What decreases the risk of SIDS?
Sleeping in room with parents (synchronized breathing) breast fed baby
At what transition point does the risk of SIDS increase?
When breathing goes from reflex to voluntary control.
What are some of the benefits of breastfeeding?
Correct fat-protein balance, changes balance for each stage! More digestible, disease protection, better growth, better jaw and tooth dev, easier transition to solid food.
