Lecture 11: Flashcards
What is development?
The sequence and interplay of physical, psychological, cognitive and social changes and continuities that humans undergo as they grow older
i.e. a dynamic process of growth, change and stability across the lifespan
What is cognition?
Mental activity through which human being acquire and process knowledge including the functions of perception, learning, memory, language acquisition, problem solving, thought and imaging
How is the model of development dynamic and interactie?
various factors affect development.
These include social emotional & environmental,
Physical development, and cognitive development
these have an affect across the life course
Why is a child’s level of cognitive development important for their understanding of health and disease?
It affects
their early development of positive health behaviours
their response to illness, injury and treatment
how they report symptoms and view causes
What are the stages of development?
Infancy - sensorimotor (birth - 2 years)
Early childhood - preoperational (2-7years)
Middle childhood - concrete operational (7-11years)
Adolescence, Adulthood and late adulthood - formal operational (11+ years)
What is a scheme?
a mental strcture made up of organised group of memories, thoughts and strategies that a child uses to interpret the world
What are piaget’s two ways of learning new information?
assimilation (see new concept as similar to one understood before)
accomodation (alteration or rearranging old ideas to fit in new information/concept)
What is the snesorimotor stage?
Classified as of birth to 2 years. babies begin with hard wired reflexes. Their maturation of motor skills allows interaction with the environment
reflexive schemes substage 1 (0-1 months)
Newborn reflexes are a basis of sensorimotor intelligence
Suck, grasp and look in much the same way no matter what the circumstances
What is the preoperational stage?
2-7 years
Children engage in symbolic thought - clear mental representations of objects and events not physically present
rapid language development
WHat are the 2 prelogical stages (aged 2-6 years)
1) phenomenistic stage
where preoperational thought predominates
child often explains the relationship between source of illness and body in ‘magical’ terms or by association
2) contagion stage
where the child understands the need for at least temporal or spatial proximity to illness source
What is the concrete operational stage?
7-11 years
learn rules such as conservation
thinking more logical, flexible and organised
core processes mastere: decentration & reversibility
What are the 2 logical explanations of the concrete operational stage?
1) contamination stage where child defines illness in terms of multiple symptoms and views it as transmitted through physical contact with source
2) internalisation where child views illness as internalising an external contamination and develops an understanding of the role of avoidance behaviours
What does research tell us about concrete operational thought?
The difference in the amount of schooling, context and culture can affect children’s performance if concrete operational tasks
I.e. skills do not emerge spontaneously
Previous health care experiences influences understanding
Cognitive schemes be once automatic with practice, freeing up working memory
I,e, increasingly complex circuits and skills build on simple circuits and skills over time
What is the formal operational stage?
12 years onwards
Child has capacity for abstract, flexible, scientific/ systematic thinking
Child has higher order/hypothetico-deductive reasoning
What are the formal-logical explanations of illness?
Physiological - non functioning or malfunctioning of an organ or process
Psychophysiological - most mature understanding of an illness
There are Internal physiological processes but child understands additional cause may be psychological
Do all individuals reach the formal operational stage?
No, this stage doesn’t exist in many village and tribal societies in which the symbolic skills are not emphasises
Most people are only likely to think abstractly in situations in which they’ve had previous experience
Often, 40-60% of uni students fail the formal operational problems
How does the context of formal operations make a difference?
Physics majors are more likely to display formal thought in their area of expertise I.e. pendulum problem, while English majors show a higher % of displaying formal thought in literary problems.
This shows that previous experience plays a large role on formal operations and that the context of the problem is also important
What is Kister and Patterson’s contribution to understanding health and illness?
They studied child’s use of immanent justice to understanding illness
Discovered that children with a clearer understanding of the concept of contagion exhibited fewer immanent justice explanations
What is the Vygotsky social cultural theory?
A theory that looks at the important contributions that society makes to individual development
It stresses the interaction between developing people and the culture in which they live
Parents, caregivers, peers and culture a responsible for the development of higher order functions in a child,
Every function in the child’s cultural development appears first on the social level, between people and secondly, on an individual level, inside the child,
This is equally true for voluntary attention, logical memory and the formation of concepts
All the higher functions originate as creak relationships between individuals,
What is the zone of proximal development?
The distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers
Includes all knowledge and skills that a person cannot yet understand or perform on their own yet but is capable of doing so with guidance
Where does learning take place?
In the zone of proximal development
What do teachers use to help children learn?
Scaffolding where the parent/teacher adjusts the amount and type of support to the child’s level of development
Done through verbal instruction, modelling steps,
What is the other aspect of vygotsky’s learning?
Culture which can vary in the institutions or settings the child is in
What is vygotsky’s statement on understanding health and illness?
There’s a limit to what a child of a certain age is able to achieve which is termed the “able instruction “
What is able instruction?
X= level of child's understanding on their own X+1 = level of understanding with able instruction (via the zone of proximal development)
What may therapists do to promote a child’s progress in learning?
Ask them to complete a task slightly more difficult than what they can achieve
Via modelling the desired movements (social learning theory and observational learning) or giving verbal directions (using positive reinforcement).
How is able instruction useful to health professionals?
It can be used to give children a better understanding of their illness
X+1 cannot be beyond what the child is capable of
The scaffolding is best done on a 1 to 1 basis
What did Vygotsky stress?
The importance of social context and culture on a child’s development, learning and cognition.
this is especially important to consider in a country of multi-cultural setting
What are some differences between Vygotsky’s and Piaget’s contributions?
Vygotsky only constructed an outline whereas Piaget offered richness and exerimental paradigms.
Vygotsky did focus on the socio-cultural context, but may have underestimated the biological underpinnings.
This relates to the biopsychosocial model where we are required to think about all of the factors when it comes to development
What are some discoveries made from the Berry et al study of juvenile arthiritis?
Children’s understanding followed developmental progression (older children had a more sophisticated understanding of their illness)
The level of cognitive development was better predictor of understanding than any age
developmental progression was only statistically significant for 2 questions. (different aspects of illness, or their causes, the level of understanding was different)
