Prenatal development

Question 1

What is classed as prenatal development?

Answer 1

From contraception to birth.

Question 2

What are the rough stages of prenatal development?

Answer 2

Zygote, cells specialise (up to two weeks)
Embryo sexual development and organs develop. (2-8 weeks)
Foetal, organs fully develop (up to 2 months).

Question 3

What happens to the zygote?

Answer 3

Starts as a single cell containing all chromosomes and undergoes rapid cell division.

Question 4

What happens during the embryo phase?

Answer 4

Development at a rapid pace, most critical to damage due to crucial organ development.

Question 5

At what stages of embryonic development do The brain and spinal cord, heart and movement develop?

Answer 5

18 days heart develops, 3 weeks it beats, 2 weeks and 4 days brain and spinal cord develop,
Moves between 5-6 weeks.

Question 6

At what stages of the foetal development does sensitivity, sound and taste occur?

Answer 6

Sensitive to touch at 13-14 weeks, 20 weeks can respond to sound, 25 week can respond to taste.

Question 7

What can the foetus do in regard to taste by week 25 and what does this show?

Answer 7

Decrease swallowing at bitter tastes and increase at sweet. Showing its an innate evolutionary response.

Question 8

How did we study the abilities of a foetus?

Answer 8

Using scans which are low cost and safe, Foetal heart rate (FHR) in order to study responses.

Question 9

What has been studied to do with foetus’ and sound?

Answer 9

Mother saying a rhyme everyday between weeks 30-37, found a heart rate decrease after birth when hearing the rhyme showing calmness to the mother.
Same was found when music was played after birth that was repeated during pregnancy.

Question 10

What is the technique called when a baby is familiar to something that was used during pregnancy?

Answer 10

Exposure learning.

Question 11

When does learning begin?

Answer 11

During utero when the baby learns how to swallow and intake nutrients.

Question 12

How common is a birth deficit and what is usually the cause?

Answer 12

3-5% and teratogens.

Question 13

What is a teratogen

Answer 13

Factors that increase risks in pregnancy, e.g. diet, smoking, alcohol and certain medication.

Question 14

What was the study found for diet in Gambia?

Answer 14

Babies born during harvest season who’s mothers had available crops to eat were born healthier whereas those who were born outside this season had more implications.

Question 15

What was found in the Dutch study of famine in 1943-7?

Answer 15

That the babies born during the famine had a 2x more likelihood to develop heart disease, schizophrenia, diabetes and more and that this was a generational effect.

Question 16

What is the critical period?

Answer 16

Time in which a particular organ or body part is more susceptible to teratogenic damage.

Question 17

Why has no experimental research not been done into teratogen?

Answer 17

Because it is unethical to purposely harm a foetus or mother.

Question 18

What stages are more susceptible to teratogens and why?

Answer 18

Zygote: most do not know of pregnancy and therefore babies can be easily lost due to teratogens.
Embryo: most susceptible to damage due to most development.
Foetus: No major defects but smaller illnesses due to most of the baby already being formed.

Question 19

What did the study by Ness 1999 find about cocaine and smoking?

Answer 19

400 in sample miscarried and 570 did not. The self report techniques found no correlation with cocaine due to the unreliability but when urine and hair samples were analysed was found cocaine increased miscarriage rates by 1.4 and smoking 1.8.

Question 20

What did Reissland 2015 find out about smoking and movement in foetus?

Answer 20

That the smoking groups did not move as much and therefore shows that due to CNS development that they will develop slower than non smoking group.

Question 21

What does foetal alcohol syndrome cause?

Answer 21

Causes permanent birth defects, specifically to the CNS and brain damage, common effects are impaired activity motor control, attention deficit and memory and language problems.

Question 22

What is the different between preterm and low birth weight?

Answer 22

Preterm is a baby born before 37 weeks, low birth rate is a baby born at full term but lighter than normal e.g. less than 5.5lbs.

Question 23

How much more likely are babies to die in early infancy if their birth weight is between 3.5-5.5?

Answer 23

7x more likely.

Question 24

What did Costello et al 2007 find out about low birth weight?

Answer 24

Girls with low birth weight are more likely to develop depression between 13-16?

Question 25

Why is Costello et al’s low birth weight study unreliable?

Answer 25

Because it does not include environmental factors nor consider that girls are more likely to develop depression than boys no matter the birth weight, due to girls starting puberty earlier. It also doesn’t consider the effect of the mother having depression.

Question 26

What are chromosomal abnormalities?

Answer 26

Changes that affect chromosomes can cause problems with growth, development and function.

Question 27

What is a chromosomal disorder?

Answer 27

Change in the structure or number of chromosomes.