Part 1 Flashcards
What is Developmental Psychology?
Field of study that deals with behavior, thoughts, and emotions of individuals as they go through
various parts of the lifespan
It includes child development, adolescent development but our primary focus will be on Child
development roughly from birth to 18 years of age.
Empirical research
Scientific studies of observable events that are measured and evaluated
objectively
Law of Association
If a person experiences two or more environmental events (stimuli or
sensations) at the same time or one right after the other (contiguously)
these 2 or more events will become associated (bound together) in the
person’s mind
Sleeper Effect
These sleeper effects are various issues and problems that may show up later in development.
Nativism
It says that knowledge and rules are native to the human mind, inborn and
do not have to be acquired through experience
People must already have built into their mind certain concepts such as
space and time to even begin to understand what a shape is for instance
Differences between experiments, correlational studies and descriptive studies
Experiments aims to study cause and effect correlational compares two subjects to find cause and effect and descriptive goes in dept of why a behavior is happening.
experiments
An experiment is the most direct and conclusive approach to testing a
hypothesis (about a cause-and-effect relationship between 2 variables)
correlational studies
Researcher does not manipulate any variable but observes or measures
two or more variables to find relationships between them
descriptive studies
Aim is to describe behavior of an individual or group without systematically
investigating relationships between specific variables
Why is it important for Society to understand Child Development?
Protect and advance the well being of children
Research findings lead to helpful advice in our interaction with children
Levels of analysis
Physiological Level, Developmental Level, Cultural level, Cognitive level, Social Level, Evolutionary level, Learning level, Neural level, Genetic level
The Cycle of Science
Facts lead to theories which lead to hypotheses which are tested by
research studies or experiments
Difference between a Between Groups experiment and a Within subject experiments
Between-Groups: Each participant experiences only one condition.
Within-Subjects: Each participant experiences all conditions.
What is Learning?
Any process through which experience at one time can alter an individuals
behavior at a future time.
Any subsequent behavior that was not part of the individuals immediate
response to stimuli during the learning experience
What is Classical Conditioning?
It is a learning process that has to do with the formation of new reflexes
Biology as it relates to developmental psychology
create holistic models, illustrating how nature and nurture work together in shaping human behavior and development
Maturation
It is a genetic or biologically determined process of growth that unfolds over a period of time.
Structure
A part of the person that develops
Muscle, nervous tissue, or mental knowledge
What does the study of cognitive development involve?
It involves the regular age related changes in children’s cognition over time. This is also called developmental function.
The study of cognitive development also involves the individual differences each child experiences in such cognition
What might be some risks to healthy child development?
Serious Illness
Living with a psychotic parent
Family Income
Substance Abuse
Abuse
Child’s experience at school
What are some questions we have to deal with as a society in terms of making proper social policy for children?
When should a child be tried as an adult if he or she commits a crime?
What is the appropriate age to start sex education?
Are preschool programs for disadvantaged children effective?
Is joint custody best for children of divorced parents?
Should birth parents always have access to the adopted child?
Can facing adversity in childhood also have positive influences on development? How so?
For some children they may be better able to adapt to certain challenges as an adult
They may have the complete opposite behavior that a parent may have displayed (such as substance abuse issues). They may never touch the addictive substance as a result.
What is a Gene?
A gene is the basic physical and functional unit of heredity. Genes are
made up of DNA. Some genes act as instructions to make molecules called
proteins. However, many genes do not code for proteins
What is a genotype?
It is a set of genes that an individual inherits
What is a Phenotype?
Refers to the observable properties of the body and behavioral traits
Laboratory study
Research study where subjects are bought to a specially designated area
that has been setup to facilitate the researchers collection of data or
control over environmental conditions
Field study
Any research study done in a setting other then in a laboratory
Data collection methods
self-report method, Observational methods, naturalistic observation, and Tests
self report methods
People are asked to rate or describe their own behavior or mental state in
some way
Observational methods
Observe and recording the behavior of interest (instead of someone’s self
report
naturalistic observation
Researcher avoids interfering with the subjects behavior
Tests
Researcher presents stimuli or problems to which the subject responds
Why is gene important
1.Genes provide the codes for building proteins and serve as the biological
units of heredity
They are replicated and passed along from parents to offspring
They cause the offspring’s resemblance to parents
Individuals vary because of the different and various genes inherited
Genes can also affect behavioral traits
selective breeding
The mating of individuals that lie toward the desired extreme on the
measure in question
mutations
Mutations are errors that occasionally and unpredictably occur during DNA
replication causing the replica to be not quite identical to the original
Social Psychologists
Explain people’s beliefs and social behaviors in terms of past experiences
Clinical Psychologists
They explain people’s emotional problems in terms of their past experiences
Cognitive Psychologists
try to understand the basic processes of
perception, memory, and thought that are involved in people’s ability to learn.
Reflex
Simple, relatively automatic stimulus response mediated by the nervous system.
Habituation
Simple effect of learning on the reflexes. It is a decline in the magnitude of the reflexive response when the stimulus is repeated several times in succession.
Extinction
Extinguishing the conditioned response
Spontaneous Recovery
Bringing back the conditioned response. After you
perform extinction you can bring back the conditioned response
Operant conditioning
Learning process by which the effect or
consequence effects the future rate of production of that response
Reinforcer
A stimulus change that occurs after a response that increases the subsequent frequency of that response.
Positive Reinforcement
Arrival of some stimulus following a response makes the response more likely to recur.
Negative Reinforcement
Removal of some stimulus following a response makes the response more likely to recur
Positive Punishment
Arrival of stimulus decreases the likelihood that the response will occur again
Negative Punishment
Removal of a stimulus decreases the likelihood that the response will occur again.
Observational Learning
Learning by watching others
Neural level
(brain as the cause)
Example: a traumatic brain injury as the reason why someone loses their memory
Evolutionary level
(natural selection as the cause)
Example: survival of the fittest as a reason for human behaviors such as
protecting ones own child in a dangerous situation
Genetic level
(genes as the cause)
Example: a genetic difference that causes a change in behavior that is
different than the norm
Learning level
(individual’s prior experiences with the environment as the
cause)
Example: having an experience in our environment like going to school to
learn how to read or how to behave in society
Cognitive level
(the individuals knowledge and beliefs as a cause)
Example: having a phobia or belief that a dog is very dangerous will cause
you to avoid dogs when you see them
Social Level
(the Influence of other people as a cause)
Example: A friend influencing you to arrive to class late
Cultural level
(the culture in which the person develops as the cause)
Example: the way you perceive the world as influenced by your culture
Developmental Level
(age related changes as a cause)
Example: menopause and its effect on mental health
Physiological Level
(chemical functions)
Example: Chemical imbalances in the brain and its role in mental and
emotional disorders
Fact
also referred to as an observation
An objective statement based on direct observation, that reasonable
observers agree is true
Could be particular observable patterns of behaviors
Opinion
Holds an element of belief or viewpoint which hasn’t been validated or proven yet
Theory
An idea of conceptual model that is designed to explain existing
facts and make predictions about new facts that may be discovered
Hypothesis
An predictions about new facts that is made from a theory
A specific prediction about what will be observed in a research study.
What will happen?
Independent Variable
The variable that is hypothesized to cause some effect on another variable
Variable
is anything that can vary
Dependent Variable
The variable that is hypothesized to be affected
In psychology the dependent variable is equal to measures of behavior
Independent and dependent relationship
Any change observed in the dependent variable is caused by the change
in the independent variable and not by some other factor that happened
to vary
Subjects
People or animals studied
Within subject experiment
The different conditions of the independent
variable are applied to each subject
Between groups experiment
the different conditions are applied across
the different groups of subjects
Difficult with correlational studies
It is not an experiment making it hard to determine cause and effect
Since it was not controlled other reasons may have effected the outcome
Materialism
The concept that all human behavior could be understood by physical
processes
all function
Motor area, Frontal lobe, sensory area, Broca’s area, temporal lobe, Braim stem, Parietal lobe, occipital lobe, Wernicke’s area, cerebellum
Empiricism
Human knowledge and thought derive ultimately from sensory
experience (vision, hearing, touch, and so forth)
evolutionary psychology
into behavior and that living things have acquired tendencies to behave in
ways that promote their survival and reproduction
case studies
Observable in nature
Not a test or an experiment
Documented cases of individuals
Neurons
A specialized nerve cell that transmits information throughout the nervous system
Known as the building block of the brain
4 main parts of the Neuron
Dendrites
Cell Body
Axon
Synapse/ Presynaptic terminals
Neurotransmitter
A chemical message that acts on the membrane of the dendrite of the receiving neuron
Cerebral Cortex
It is divided into 4 sections. It is a thin gray moist material densely packed with
cell bodies of neurons. This is where human thought, sensation, language processes, and other
cognitive functions take place.
The four sections of the cerebral cortex
A) Frontal Lobe B) Parietal Lobe C) Occipital Lobe D) Temporal Lobe
Frontal Lobe
is responsible for impulse control, judgment, problem solving, controlling and
executing behavior and complex organization
Temporal Lobe
Processes auditory signals such as hearing, high level auditory processing such as
speech, and face recognition
Parietal Lobes
Integrates sensory information from various senses, is responsible for
manipulation of objects and visual-spatial processing
Occipital Lobe
involved in Visual processing, receives information originating from the retina.
Processes information and passes it to relevant areas
Cognition
Is the process or faculties by which knowledge is acquired and manipulated
Cognition
automatic processes
Something we do without giving it much thought such as reading and driving for most
It involves mental activity of all types
Function
function is the action related to a structure
Movement of a muscle, firing of a nerve, or activation of a mental representation
Definition of level of analysis
Process that study personality
