Introduction and RM

Question 1

What is developmental psychology?

Answer 1

The study of change and stability over the lifespan - looks at how we change physically, cognitively, behaviourally and socially due to biological, individual and environmental differences

Question 2

What are the three types of development?

Answer 2

Ontogenetic, microgenetic, phylogenetic

Question 3

What is ontogenetic development?

Answer 3

The development of an individual over their lifetime

Question 4

What is microgenetic development?

Answer 4

Changes that occur over very brief periods of time

Question 5

What is phylogenetic treatment?

Answer 5

Changes over evolutionary time

Question 6

What are the three levels of explanation?

Answer 6

The brain, mental processes, individual differences and environment

Question 7

Describe the brain as a level of explanation

Answer 7

How changes in the brain can cause change in behaviour

Question 8

Describe mental processes as a level of explanation

Answer 8

Language, memory, attention - how we can observe and measure changes in these processes

Question 9

Describe individual differences and environment

Answer 9

How this causes development

Question 10

What are the different domains development can be examined in?

Answer 10

Physical, cognitive and psychosocial

Question 11

Describe the physical domain of measuring development

Answer 11

How we grow and mature physically

Question 12

Describe the cognitive domain of examining development

Answer 12

How we learn, memorise, and problem solve

Question 13

Describe the psychosocial domain of examining development

Answer 13

How our personality and emotions change

Question 14

What are the different ways of studying development?

Answer 14

Quantitative, qualitative, and stability

Question 15

What are quantitative changes?

Answer 15

Easily measurable and quantifiable aspects of development

Question 16

What are qualitative changes?

Answer 16

Changes in functions or processes

Question 17

What are the factors that affect development?

Answer 17

Nature and nurture

Question 18

What is continuity?

Answer 18

The extent that development is a series of gradual small continuous changes (e.g adding more of the same skill)

Question 19

What is discontinuity?

Answer 19

The extent that development involves abrupt transformations (e.g a process in which new ways of thinking emerge at specific times)

Question 20

What is the order of the scientific method?

Answer 20

Observation, hypothesis, test hypothesis, analyses, report finding and draw conclusions, then either replicate results or test new hypothesis

Question 21

What are important considerations

Answer 21

1) Are measures reliable and valid
2) When does change actually occur
3) What age group are we testing
4) WEIRD samples

Question 22

What does WEIRD stand for?

Answer 22

Western, Educated, Industrialised, Rich, Democratic

Question 23

What are methods for understanding change?

Answer 23

Cross - sectional studies, Longitudinal, and microgenetic

Question 24

What are cross-sectional studies

Answer 24

Children of different ages studied at the same time.

Question 25

Evaluate cross-sectional studies

Answer 25

Strength - least time consuming as don’t need the kids to get older
Weakness - can’t look at how individual children change as performance is averaged

Question 26

What are longitudinal studies?

Answer 26

The same children are tested repeatedly at multiple time points as they grow older

Question 27

Evaluate longitudinal studies?

Answer 27

Strength - can look at both individual change and across children change
Weakness - practice effects leading to change, costs a lot of money and time

Question 28

What are microgenetic studies?

Answer 28

Extreme version of longitudinal studies, individual children being tested repeatedly over a short period of time

Question 29

Evaluate microgenetic studies?

Answer 29

Strength - very precise descriptions due to high intensity of measurements
Weakness - intensive to run so often only results in small samples

Question 30

What is the experimental design?

Answer 30

Looking at the effect of variables on children’s skills or abilities (if the IV affects the DV)

Question 31

How can indirect and observational methods gather data about children?

Answer 31

• Interviews or questionnaires with parents or children
• Naturalistic observation (in the environment where the behaviour happens)
  -Structured observation in a lab situation to evoke the behaviour of interest

Question 32

How do cognitive measures gather data about children?

Answer 32

Tasks specifically designed to measure a process of interest such as IQ tests

Question 33

How do psychophysical methods gather data about children?

Answer 33

Methods to uncover basic biological processes that can sometimes help us to infer perception and cognition, ie eye tracking

Question 34

How do cognitive neuroscience techniques gather data about children?

Answer 34

EEG - measures changes in electrical activity in the cerebral cortex
fMRI - detects differences in oxygen in the brain, and reveals what brain areas are activated when engaged in a particular task

Question 35

What are the challenges of working with children?

Answer 35

They have limited language, attention, and motor skills making it hard to engage them and create tasks that capture their abilities. Creativity is required.