Problem 3 Flashcards
What role does empathy play in Eisenberg’s theory of prosocial behavior?
- Eisenberg’s theory emphasizes a close link between reasoning, behavior, and prosocial actions.
- Feelings of empathy often lead to appropriate prosocial behavior.
How do individual differences affect empathy?
Some people may have a reduced capacity for empathy, possibly due to genetic factors. Psychopaths, for example, rarely feel intense emotions, including empathy.
How does empathy develop in young children?
- Initially, children may share distress through imitation.
- As they develop, their imitation becomes full-fledged empathy, leading them to try to comfort others.
What is the relationship between empathy and moral reasoning?
- Empathy allows children to act morally without relying on moral reasoning.
- Simply witnessing distress can trigger a desire to help.
What are the different types of empathy?
Emotional empathy: Feeling another’s emotions immediately.
Cognitive empathy: Understanding another’s emotional state and perspective.
Motor empathy: Physically mirroring another’s actions or emotions.
How does empathy relate to emotional regulation?
Children with better emotional regulation tend to show higher levels of both emotional and cognitive empathy.
How does social context influence empathy?
Empathy increases in cooperative situations but can decrease in competitive settings, sometimes leading to counterempathy (e.g., schadenfreude).
Development of empathy
First year of life: Infants may share others’ distress mostly as a form of imitation.
Shortly thereafter (toddlerhood): Imitation evolves into full-fledged empathy, where children begin to feel others’ distress and may attempt to alleviate it.
Age 3: Strong, immediate empathy can lead to behaviors like sharing a favorite doll.
Age 7 vs. Age 13: Younger children (age 7) show stronger schadenfreude (pleasure in others’ misfortune) compared to older children (age 13), which may relate to lower sharing behaviors.
Developmental differences in emotional vs. cognitive empathy:
Emotional empathy appears earlier, while cognitive empathy develops later and requires social cognitive skills.
Schadenfreude
is the feeling of pleasure or satisfaction at someone else’s misfortune or failure.
Important Studies
MRI Studies on Empathy and Schadenfreude
Studies using MRI scans show that brain areas related to empathy activate when people witness others in distress.
In contrast, schadenfreude activates reward-related areas in the brain, suggesting that different neural mechanisms underlie these emotions.
Empathy and Sharing Behavior
Children’s sharing behaviors correlate with their levels of empathy.
Younger children who exhibit stronger schadenfreude (age 7) are less likely to share compared to older children (age 13), suggesting a developmental shift in prosocial behavior.
Empathy in Toddlers and Altruistic Behavior
Research shows that toddlers as young as 14–18 months will help an adult in distress, even without expecting a reward.
This suggests that altruistic behavior emerges very early in development.
What are the key factors that make punishment effective?
Consistency in delivery
Administered by a warm, caring adult
Accompanied by a reasoned explanation
What are the developmental milestones related to punishment?
Young children (around 4 years old) struggle with understanding delayed consequences.
As children grow, they better internalize rules when explanations accompany punishment.
Adolescents are more likely to challenge harsh, authoritarian punishments
How does warmth and care impact the effectiveness of punishment?
Warm, caring adults make punishment more effective in promoting long-term moral behavior.
Cold, strict discipline may result in compliance only when authority figures are present.
- Why should punishment be used sparingly?
Overuse can lead to diminished perception of the adult as warm and caring.
Frequent punishment can reduce effectiveness and increase resistance.
How can adults help children recall past misbehaviors?
Reliving the act: asking the child to recall the event and their motivations.
Using cognitive techniques to link past behavior with present consequences
How does physical punishment vary across cultures?
In some cultures (e.g., African-American families), mild physical punishment is linked to positive outcomes.
In cultures where physical punishment is uncommon, it correlates more strongly with negative behavior.
Socioeconomic factors influence the prevalence and effects of physical punishment.
What are the associations between physical punishment and childhood outcomes?
More immediate compliance (large effect)
Greater risk of physical abuse (medium to large effect)
Increased antisocial behavior (medium effect)
Poorer mental health (medium effect)
Higher aggression (small to medium effect)
Less internalization of morals (small effect)
What are the long-term effects of physical punishment in adulthood?
Higher aggression (medium effect)
Increased antisocial behavior (small to medium effect)
Poorer mental health (small effect)
Greater likelihood of abusive relationships (small effect)
What is modeling theory?
Social learning theory suggests children imitate behaviors they observe.
More likely to imitate if they respect and like the model.
Can explain both prosocial and antisocial behavior development.
What was the Bobo doll study, and what did it show?
Conducted by Bandura, children watched an adult behave aggressively toward a toy.
Children imitated the aggressive behavior with high specificity.
Demonstrated that exposure to aggression increases aggressive behaviors in children.
How can modeling encourage prosocial behavior?
Children are more likely to imitate prosocial actions of warm, respected models.
Caregivers who model kindness and sharing increase the likelihood of those behaviors in children
Why does modeling theory need further development?
Explains how children imitate behavior but not why they choose specific role models.
Lacks a full explanation of how social context influences behavioral choices
What factors make children more likely to imitate a model?
Warmth and respect for the model
Clear and frequent demonstrations of behavior
Ease of imitation (simple behaviors are more likely to be copied)
What role does socioeconomic context play in punishment?
Physical punishment is more prevalent in areas with higher poverty rates.
Communities with stronger social support structures use physical punishment less.
What are the three levels of affiliation in peer interactions?
- Interactions: can be prosocial if they facilitate social engagement, antisocial if they
discourage social engagement, or withdrawn as in cases of
shyness. - Relationships: consist of a progression of interactions
- Groups: arise from
sets of relationships, and they can be evaluated in terms of
their cohesiveness, dominance relations, diversity, and local
norms.
How do toddlers typically choose their friends?
Based on similarity to themselves in traits and behaviors.
What is a significant shift in peer interactions during middle childhood?
Children begin to prefer same-sex peer groups.
What are common peer group influences on adolescents?
Personal taste (clothing, music, slang) and social norms, while parents still influence values and career choices
How do infants first engage in social interactions?
Through joint arousal, where one child’s emotions influence another’s.
What developmental changes occur in social conflict between ages 2-4?
Younger children fight over physical resources (toys), while older children argue over ideas and rules.
How do adolescent peer interactions differ from childhood interactions?
There is more emphasis on cross-sex friendships and romantic relationships
Q: What key function do friendships serve in childhood development?
They provide emotional support, social learning, and conflict resolution skills.
How do toddlers and preschoolers demonstrate friendship?
Through shared play, prosocial behaviors, and early empathy.
What effect do friendships have on children in difficult situations?
Strong friendships can buffer the negative effects of adversity (e.g., peer rejection, cultural displacement).
How do boys’ and girls’ peer groups differ in middle childhood?
Boys’ groups tend to be larger and focus on dominance, while girls’ groups emphasize closeness and communication.
What are common concerns regarding video games and child development?
Increased aggression, reduced social interactions, but also potential cognitive benefits (e.g., problem-solving skills).
What is a common effect of gender roles in childhood peer interactions?
Boys are encouraged toward competition and independence, while girls focus on relationships and caregiving.
How do play patterns between boys and girls change in middle childhood?
Children sort into same-sex groups, engaging mostly in single-sex interactions.
What psychological theory explains gender-segregated play?
The psychoanalytic theory attributes it to the latency period, where sexuality is dormant.
Why does friendship jealousy increase in early adolescence?
Adolescents become more aware of social comparisons and may fear losing their best friend’s favor.
How do boys’ and girls’ friendships differ?
Boys form larger, hierarchy-driven groups, while girls engage in more intimate, emotionally intense friendships.
Boys VS Girls demonstrating aggression in friendships
Girls: Through relational aggression, such as excluding peers or spreading rumors.
Boys: Through physical aggression, often in the form of rough-and-tumble play.
Pros and Cons of Friendship
Pros: enhance self-worth, provide emotional support, foster social skills, and buffer against stress.
Cons: can lead to jealousy, co-rumination (excessive dwelling on negative emotions), and reinforcement of negative behaviors.
What role do imaginary companions play in a child’s social development?
They help children practice social skills, manage emotions, and explore different relationship roles.
How do bullies and victims differ in their characteristics?
Bullies often have high self-esteem and engage in proactive aggression, while victims tend to be anxious and socially isolated.
Some have deficits in social cognition, leading them to misinterpret others’ actions as hostile, while others are highly aware of their victims’ emotions and use them to maximize humiliation.
Bullies are more likely to show temper flare-ups in childhood and have criminal convictions later in life.
Bullies are more likely to show temper flare-ups in childhood and have criminal convictions later in life.
Types of Aggression
- physical aggression (hitting),
- relational aggression (social exclusion),
- verbal aggression (insults).
Why might girls’ friendships be more fragile than boys’?
Due to higher emotional intensity and a lack of group dynamics that buffer conflicts.
Bullying
- repeated verbal or physical threats or attacks against a victim who is unable to defend themselves, often occurring in front of others
- extremely common even across cultures
Effects of Bullying
- Victims of bullying often experience unhappiness, depression, loneliness, and school avoidance.
- About 60% of school shooters were reported to have been victims of bullying, significantly higher than the general bullying rate of around 10%.
Victims of bullying
generally do not retaliate and may display submissiveness or docility
Enemies
- have a mutual dislike and hostility, often engaging in cycles of aggression and retaliation, whereas bullying is typically one-sided
- While preschoolers rarely have enemies (under 2%), over 30% of elementary school children report having at least one enemy
What are the three main types of interventions to curb bullying?
External regulation (punishing bullying behavior).
Internal regulation (teaching self-control and empathy to bullies).
Changing the victim’s behavior (assertiveness training).
Which form of intervention is most effective?
External regulation, such as close adult monitoring and punishment, has been shown to be the most immediately effective.
Why is it difficult to teach victims assertiveness?
Fearful or anxious children often struggle to project confidence, making them ongoing targets for bullies even after training.
What role do social groups play in childhood?
Groups provide a sense of belonging and identity but also introduce social hierarchies and status-related stress.
How do dominance hierarchies function in childhood groups?
They help reduce aggression by establishing clear social ranks, where subordinates avoid conflicts with higher-status individuals.
How do children’s views on popularity change as they grow
By elementary school, children become highly aware of their social status and may engage in behaviors to increase their popularity, including excluding others.
At what ages do romantic relationships increase in prevalence?
The rate of romantic relationships doubles from age 13 (36%) to age 17 (70%).
How do younger and older adolescents differ in their partner choices
Younger adolescents choose partners based on superficial traits (e.g., clothing, peer status), while older adolescents focus on compatibility and emotional connection.
What is a key predictor of long-term romantic relationship success?
The ability to resolve conflicts well in adolescence predicts more stable and satisfying relationships in adulthood.
How does early social rejection impact psychological adjustment?
Children who experience rejection often develop long-term emotional difficulties, including depression and anxiety.
How do childhood friendships and enemies shape future relationships?
Positive peer interactions predict better social skills and relationships later in life, while mutual aggression can lead to ongoing conflict tendencies.
What is sociometric status?
Sociometric status refers to an individual’s social position within a group based on peer evaluations of how much they are liked or disliked.
: What are the five sociometric categories used to classify children in peer groups?
Popular, rejected, controversial, average, and neglected children.
What method is commonly used to determine sociometric status?
The peer nomination technique, where children name their most and least liked peers.
Cliques
- emerge in late childhood (around sixth grade) and decline in importance after eighth grade.
- cliques are small, exclusive groups, while crowds are larger social categories defined by shared identities, values, and reputations (e.g., jocks, nerds, goths).
What are the two distinct types of popular children identified in research?
Popular prosocial “model” children (kind, cooperative, nonaggressive) and popular antisocial “tough” children (aggressive, rebellious, dominant).
What is the hostile attribution bias?
A tendency of rejected children to perceive ambiguous social situations as hostile, leading to aggressive or defensive responses.
How can parent-child interactions influence peer acceptance?
Negative interactions, such as harsh discipline, can lead children to develop social cognitive biases that result in peer rejection.
What are the five steps of the social information processing model proposed by Crick & Dodge (1994)?
- Encoding social cues: The child notices and encodes relevant social information from the environment.
- Interpreting intent: The child assigns meaning to the social cues, which can be influenced by biases (e.g., hostile attribution bias).
- Selecting a goal: The child determines what they want to achieve in the social situation (e.g., make a friend, defend themselves).
- Accessing response options: The child recalls past experiences or generates new ways to respond.
- Deciding a response: The child evaluates possible responses and selects the one they believe will be most effective.
Executing a behavior: The child implements the selected response and experiences social feedback.
What is the difference between sociometric popularity and perceived popularity?
Sociometric popularity is based on being well-liked, while perceived popularity is based on social dominance and influence.
How does relational aggression impact perceived popularity?
It can increase perceived popularity (social dominance) but does not necessarily lead to genuine friendships.
The child implements the selected response and experiences social feedback.
A mental database of past social experiences that helps in encoding and interpreting social situations.
What are “acquired rules” in social interactions?
Learned social norms and expectations that influence how a child responds to different situations.
. What are “social schemas”?
Mental frameworks that help children understand and predict social interactions based on past experiences.
What is social contagion in peer relationships?
The spread of behaviors, emotions, and habits through social networks, even among people who do not directly know each other.
Research Finding: Obesity, smoking, and happiness can spread up to three degrees of separation (Christakis & Fowler, 2007).
How does peer influence affect adolescent behavior?
Adolescents are more likely to adopt behaviors of their peers, including eating habits, academic performance, and risky behaviors (Ali et al., 2012).
Developmental Milestone: Peer influence is strongest in early to mid-adolescence (ages 12-15) when social identity is forming.
How does social network position influence emotions?
People who are central in a network (well-connected) tend to be happier.
Peripheral individuals (less connected) are more likely to experience loneliness (Fowler & Christakis, 2008).
What are effective interventions for improving peer relationships?
Social skills training: Teaching children how to interpret social cues, resolve conflicts, and engage in prosocial behavior.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT): Helping children reframe negative social thoughts and reduce hostile attribution bias.
Peer mentoring programs: Encouraging interactions with prosocial peers to improve social standing.
