L1 - What we do we study in child development?

Question 1

Why study child development?

Answer 1

• Understanding children in their own right
• Understand why adults turn out to be the way they are
• Origins of behaviour and mind
  Understanding change and growth

Question 2

Why is nature/nurture a dichotomy?

Answer 2

• Effects of experience as soon as conception
• More common to talk about epigenetics

Question 3

What is continuity/dis?

Answer 3

• CONT - small changes in small increments Skill by skill and task by task
• DIS - Changes with age include occasional large shift involving qualitative differences

Question 4

Why are developmental milestones so important?

Answer 4

• Progression causes more change for their parents e.g motor movement = baby proofing
• These are distinct changes so it is good to monitor if any issues pop up
• e.g motor movement has a lot of variability but can overlap e.g some infants do not crawl but go straight to walking

Question 5

How does research improve well-being?

Answer 5

• Engagement, outreach and applied research = standardised assessments
• Awareness of different diseases e.g ADHD and autism
• Helpful for teachers

Question 6

What is reliability?

Answer 6

• Degree to which independent measures of a given behaviour are consistent (inter-rater and test/retest)

Question 7

What is validity?

Answer 7

• Degree to which a test measures what it is intended to measure (internal and external)
  (Does this measure what I want it to measure)

Question 8

What are the types of interviews?

Answer 8

• Structured - useful when goal is to collect self-reports on same topics from everyone being studied
• Clinical: useful for obtaining in depth information about an individual child

Question 9

What are the types of observations?

Answer 9

• Naturalistic: naturally occurring/spontaneous behaviour in an env NOT controlled by researcher, can be difficult to gain results you wish because you could be waiting a while
  Structured: method presents identical situations to each child and records child’s behaviour (can be used for particular situations and occurs in a lab)

Question 10

Describe questionnaires and lab assessments:

Answer 10

• Standardised measures of things
• Can use questionnaires for parents or teachers - parent will check off boxes for what their child can do but there will be issues with the reporting as it could be subjective

Question 11

What are essential characteristics of designs

Answer 11

• Random assignment
• Exp control
• Inference about cause and effect

Question 12

What are modern experimental techniques?

Answer 12

• Studies on zoom
  
  • Neuroimaging techniques
  • Sensory rooms
  • Head tracking mechanisms
  • Data mining techniques
  • EEC

Question 13

What is a longitudinal study?

Answer 13

• Same children are studied twice or more over a substantial length of time
• Useful for revealing stability and change over time
• Large investment of time and energy

Question 14

What is a cross-sectional study?

Answer 14

• Children of different ages are studied at the same time
• Useful for examining differences between age groups
• Uninformative about stability and time over time in the individual

Question 15

Ethics of the subjects:

Answer 15

• DO no harm: nothing is happening as a consequence of the study outside of their life
• Obtain informed consent: children do not have legal right to give consent - verbal assent and written consent from caregiver = explain at developmentally appropriate level
• Preserve ppt anonymity
• Discuss with parents the relevant research info
• Work to counteract unforeseen negative consequence
• Correct any inaccurate child impressions e,g child is a genius