Quiz 2 Flashcards
development is a function of the social and cultural environment we grow up in
time period, world location, culture type, art
Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory
children develop thinking skills by interacting with and being guided by adults within their culture
four interrelated levels to the Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory
ontogenetic, microgenetic, phylogenetic, sociohistorical
ontogenetic
development of the person over a lifetime
- vision
- language learning
microgenetic
changes over a brief period of time
- learning coding after taking a class
phylogenetic
changes over evolutionary time
- evolutionary psychology
sociohistorical
changes across recent generations
- technology
cognitive artifacts
methods of thinking and problem-solving that children learn from adults
belief transfer
Culture teaches how to think and what to think
type of cognitive artifacts
- physical/material –> maps, documents, computers
- mental/symbolic –> ways of thinking, literacy, mathematics
other cultural effects on children’s development
- sociohistorical influences
- technology
sociohistorical influences
a culture’s history shapes development
- Children show no difference in IQ
- Those who use pictorial suggested to have better visuospatial abilities
technology
1) Nearly all college students today are digital natives
- Grew up with digital media
- Similar to first and second language
2) Plasticity
- No “smartphone” module in the brain, yet children easily develop skills of use
3) Different effects
- Early exposure to media can be associated with learning disruptions
- Video games can be associated with better attention and spatial cognition
Vygotsky’s General Genetic Law of Cultural Development
Any function appears first on a social level, then on a psychological level
- Between people (inter-psychological category)
- Within the child (intra-psychological category)
- E.g., memory first occurs in sharing recollections with others, then as an individually experienced process
- interactions with adults are crucial (varies drastically by culture)
How do social interactions foster cognitive growth?
- Vygotsky’s Theory of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)
- Vygotsky’s Theory of Scaffolding
Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)
Level of task difficulty that a child cannot do alone, but can do with help
- Balance
- outer circle: things the learner cannot do
- medium circle: Zone of Proximal Development - things the learner can do with help
- inner circle: things the learner can do on their own
scaffolding
Gradually changing teaching to meet the increasing skills
Rogoff’s extension of Vygotsky’s
guided participation refers to adult-child interactions during the more routine activities
- chores, TV watching, hearing conversations
- ZPD can be applied across cultures, but guided participation tends to vary in the WEIRD samples
Shared Remembering (in the West; instead of guided participation)
Treat the child as a conversation partner
- E.g., remember what we saw at the park?
memory development benefits of Shared Remembering
- Communicate memories
- Learn about themselves
- Learn about own history
- Learn about what is important to remember
cultural differences in conversations study (Schroder et al., 2013)
3-year-olds
Western culture (Germany/Greece)
- Longer
- More reminiscing
- Focus on the child’s personal judgments (autonomous talk)
Non-Western culture (Cameroon/India)
- Repetitions
- Fewer evaluations
- Focus on social responsibility, respect
other important adult-child interactions
- reading to children
- symbolic play
reading to children
- Predictive of their later reading ability
- Better expressive and receptive language if interactive –> e.g., “What is Eeyore doing?”
symbolic play
- Pretend play
- More skilled partners → faster development
-Theory of Mind & Knowledge of Objects - Varies by culture
summary of cultural influences on development
- Guided participation occurs universally, but ways differ by culture
- Cultural differences:
Children segregated from adults learn skills in an outside context (school) with verbal instruction;
Children stay with adults most of the day and learn behaviors in context through observation and interaction - There is no single path to becoming an effective member of society
Tang et al. (2020)
Methods
- Behavior Inhibition (BI) in 14-month-old infants:
Temperament with cautious and fearful behaviors to unfamiliar situations;
Observation
- EEG in adolescents - Flanker Test:
Error-related-negativity (ERN) is observed when a mistake is made;
Quick electrical “ops”;
Amplitudes differ
- Self-report in adults
Results
- High BI in infancy predicted reserved personality in adulthood:
Lower social functioning,
Fewer relationships,
Higher levels of internalizing behaviors (e.g., anxiety)
- High BI and psychopathology positively associated:
For those with higher ERN amps → increased error monitoring (reacting strongly to a mistake)
Implication
- Temperament in infancy can be predictive of adult well-being
mental representation
mental coding of the information
can represent information (mental representation) in different forms
- Writing/letters
- Maps
- Categories
symbol
stand-in for real object/event
representational insight
knowledge than an entity can stand for something other than itself
- e.g., plush toy represents a bear
When can children understand and use symbols (pictures/models)? Deloache (1987)
- 2 and 3-year-olds
- Shown picture or a scale model of a room
- Showing where the toy is hidden
- Children asked to find a hidden toy in a real room
- With scale models, older children (3-year-olds, but not 2-year-olds) can find the toy
- 2-year-olds fail to recognize scale model represent the room
- But when showing 2-year-olds pictures (instead of scale models)
- Perform much better
dual representation
ability to think about an entity in two different ways at the same time
- Scale model → difficult because it is interesting by itself
- Picture → easy because it is less interesting, meant to be representational
- This ability is still developing in 2-year-olds
Can 2-year-olds use the scale model when dual representation is not required?
yes
Shrinking Room Experiment (Deloache et al. 1997)
- 2-year-olds
- Were convinced that the model is the same room but shrunk
- Better performance for those who did not have to use dual representation (like the standard model requires)
symbolic play
18 months
- e.g., using a banana as a phone
Symbolic Play ≠ Dual Representation
- 18-month-olds see a banana as a banana OR a phone
- Not both at once
scale errors
1.5 - 2.5 years
- Difficulty distinguishing real objects from symbolic representation
appearance/reality distinction
knowledge that appearance of the object does not necessarily correspond to its reality
- “Not all shiny are gold”
- “Don’t judge a book by its cover”
- Such perspective gained with experience
generic identity
knowing that identity is consistent regardless of changes in appearance
- developed by 6-years-old
pioneering study on generic identity - DeVries (1969)
- 3-year-olds and 6-year-olds
- Played with a trained cat, Maynard
- Then Maynard was dressed in a dog mask
- Children saw the tail and body during the change
- Asked children: Is it now a dog?
- 3-year-olds said yes
another study on generic identity - Flavell et al. (1986)
- 3-year-olds and 8-year-olds
- Watched milk get poured in a red glass
- Asked children:
- How object looks right now
- How they truly are
- 3-year-olds: same answer for both
- Red
- Red
Why is the appearance/reality distinction difficult?
- dual encoding
- linguistic demands of the task
dual encoding
ability to represent an object in more than one form at a time
- Similar to dual representation
- 3-year-olds can only focus on one (appearance or actual identity)
linguistic demands of the task
- Instructions are hard
- Appearance encoded visually but identity is communicated
When linguistic demands are low and identity information is provided visually, 14-month-olds show some dual representation
Cacchione et al. (2013)
- Showed a bunny transforming to a carrot to half infants
- Bunny then was put in a box, changed form to carrot
- Infants asked to search the box
- Those who saw transformation were less surprised to see the carrot there
summary of dual-representational ability
- Develops gradually from infancy to 6 years
- Developmental timing varies across circumstances:
Pictures vs. Models;
Can be found early (14 months) in some circumstances (when visual information provided)
Jean Piaget (1896-1980)
- One of the most famous developmental psychologists
- Changed perceptions on how children learn:
Children are not little adults;
Differences in now just how much they know but also in how they know it
Piaget’s theory basics
- Stages view on development –> Not gradual, but a series of changes
- Functions are continuous –> Abilities do not just pop up
- Domain general view on development –> Single cognitive system oversees problem-solving, imitation, etc.
- Children are Active Agents –> Not passive learners;
Explore; “little scientists” - Constructive process of cognition –> Theories change with age
- How do children “construct” knowledge –> Children use schemas
schemas
mental categories of related events/objects
- add new schemas and refine old
- schemas change physical to functional, conceptual, and abstract
- E.g., things I can grasp (physical) → things I can eat (functional)
Piaget’s functional invariants
organization + adaptation that characterize all systems throughout the lifespan
organization
- Schemas are related
- Integration of schemas into higher order systems
- Scheme for sucking + scheme for arm-moving into thumb-sucking scheme
adaptation
- Tendency to adjust schemas for environmental demands
- Adaptation through assimilation and accommodation
assimilation
fitting new experiences into existing schemas
- accumulating evidence
- E.g., seeing a new breed of a dog and adding it to a “dog” scheme
accommodation
modifying schemas as a result of new experience
- E.g., cats also have fur, are small, and have 4 legs, but they do not fit into the dog schema
equilibration
tendency to keep schemas in balance
disequilibrium
experience of conflict between new information and existing concepts
Piaget’s stages of development
- Sensorimotor stage → birth to 2 years
- Preoperational period → 2 to 7 years
- Concrete operational period → 7 to 11 years
- Formal operational period → 11 and beyond
- universal
- cannot be skipped
sensorimotor period (0-2 years)
first year of life
- Substage 1 → Reflexes
E.g., grasping
- Substage 2 → Intentional actions on self
E.g., thumb sucking
Occur by accident
- Substage 3 → Intentional actions on objects
E.g., hit the mobile
Occur by accident
- Substage 4 → Coordinating schemes
E.g., remove an obstacle to get a toy
Combine actions learned in substages 2 and 3;
Goal-directed
second year of life
- Substage 5 → Active Experimentation
E.g., climbing surfaces
Altering schemes to meet new goals;
Coincides with increased locomotive skills
- Substage 6 → First Symbolic Thinking
Language → first words;
Deferred Imitation → imitating after some time has passed;
Symbolic Play → banana is a phone
preoperational stage
- May have imaginative companions
E.g., tea parties - Limited problem-solving
- Classification problems –> Can only classify along a single dimension
E.g., either color or shape
Seriation problems - Cannot always order objects based on a characteristic
E.g., by size - Egocentrism
E.g., everyone sees what I see (mountain task) - Animism
E.g., teddy bear is hurt - Lack conservation
- Lack of understanding that objects can share the same property with different appearance
E.g., mass, number, solid, liquid quantity - Perceptual salience –> The appearance of “taller” overrides the reality of equal amounts
- Centration –> Focus on one characteristic only
- Irreversible thinking –> 2 + 3 = 5, 5 - 3 = ?
concrete operational (7-11 years)
- conservations skills
- reversible thinking –> water to ice, ice to water
- decentering
- logical thinking (limited to reality and familiar objects)
- seriation and classification skills –> can order and classify objects
- transitive thinking –> comparison abilities
e.g., If J is taller than M, and M is taller than S, who is taller— J or S?
conservation skills
understanding that objects can share the same property with different appearance
decentering
ability to consider multiple aspects of an object
formal operations (11-16 years)
- Adolescence/puberty
- Reflexive abstraction
E.g., thinking about thinking - Logical thinking about ideas –> Real, hypothetical, and abstract
- Decontextualized thinking –> Separate prior knowledge/beliefs from new evidence to the contrary
- Adolescent egocentrism –> differentiating own thoughts from others, imaginary audience, personal fable
imaginary audience
- The spotlight effect → feel like they’re constantly on stage
- Peaks during early adolescence, then declines
personal fable
belief that experiences are exclusive/unique, belief that they are invulnerable
- e.g., “No one has ever felt like this before!”, “I drive better when I’m drunk!”
criticism of Piaget’s theory
- Underestimates infants’ and young children’s cognitive ability; overestimates adolescents’ cognitive ability
- Vague about mechanisms/processes of change
- Does not account for variability in children’s performance
- Children may accelerate in one domain before another
- Undervalues the sociocultural environment’s influence on cognitive development
- But: Piaget unarguably changed the study of human development and impacted the field of study more than any other theories
- Formal operations (11-16 years): Piaget’s description of formal operations overestimates the logical capability and/or usage of most individuals; Varies by culture, individual, and situation
some symbolic play
~18 months
- e.g., pretend banana is a phone
sociodramatic play
- E.g., pretend to be a pirate
- ~3 years
- Social
- Peaks at ~6 years of age and decreases into adolescence
- One of the most common activities (can take up to 30% of the waking day)
cultural differences in symbolic play
- Symbolic play is based on objects available and roles of adults:
E.g., cardboard boxes (WEIRD)
E.g., real or toy tools (traditional) - Children from traditional societies are more likely to imitate adult work –> Hunter-gatherer or horticultural societies more likely to observe adults at work
benefits of symbolic play
Higher symbolic play → higher levels of…
- Language development
- Perspective taking
- Executive-function abilities –> Related to attention and information processing, Predict social and academic performance
experiment found that children who engaged in fantasy pretend play had better executive function abilities than those who did not
counterfactual reasoning
- “As if” perspective
- Unusual scenarios helps in the navigation of real-life situations
distinguishing real from fantasy
- Can tell the difference between dreams and reality (3-4-year-olds)
- But many 3-year-olds believe that the same dream can be experienced by different people
- And that dreams can be easily manipulated
- But they can use schemes (categories) –> Know that Superman and Mickey Mouse do not interact
3-year-olds reject factual information if…
it is in a make-believe context
- After watching Dora the Explorer, 3-year-olds stated that Spanish words were “just pretend”
source monitoring
determining origins or memories of knowledge
- Difficult for children
- Touch your nose vs. pretend to touch your nose
- Asked later if they really did
- Even 6-year-olds sometimes say yes when they actually did not
imaginary friends
- Same time as sociodramatic play (~3-year-olds)
- E.g., pretend children, talking animals
- Pretty common → 65% of children had an imaginary friend
- Cognitive advantage → better storytelling skills
role of cognitive maturity
- 3-5-year-olds
Told a story about Candy Witch
- Older children were more likely to believe
- Belief in fantasy needs cognitive maturity
Guess which box the toy is in
- Told Princess Alice wants to help
- Introduced an unexpected event during some trails
- Light flick, picture drop
- Older children changed their choice
- Verbally confirmed
amnesia
memory loss
- Can still recall language, basic facts (e.g., current president)
anterograde amnesia
no memory formation about new events
retrograde amnesia
no memory for past events
- episodic memory loss
ways to test memory in infants
- Novelty preference
- Conjugate reinforcement procedure
- Deferred imitation
novelty preference
- Infants habituate to a stimulus
- Afterwards, shown familiarized and novel stimulus side-by-side
- Preference for novel indicates memory of familiarized
preference of novelty and familiarity based on time since exposure –> novelty preference
- 3.5-month-olds saw a stimulus for 30 seconds
- Goldilock effect
- Prefer novel when memory traces are strong, familiar when memory traces are weak in order to strength the trace
- 1 day = in the middle/transition
conjugate reinforcement procedure
- Works with 2-month-olds
- Using conditioning
- Measure baseline leg kicking –> 3 minutes
- Reinforcement period –> 9 minutes, Ribbon attached to leg and mobile
- Delay –> 1 hour or 1 day
- Test period: Unattached to mobile, If higher rate than baseline → memory, If lower rate than baseline → forgetting
- Remember up to 8 days
infant memory is…
context dependent
deferred imitation
- Imitating a model after delay
- A model shows an action with a novel object
- Placing a bar across two posts, hang plate from bar, strike bar with mallet
- Delay
- Infants are given the object
If infants display the same action → memory - Can do from 9 months
- Can remember for as long as 1 year
Brown & Lamb (2015)
Implants on children’s testimonies
- Developmental changes
- The way questions asked
- Time between event and interview
The way of asking questions
- Open-ended questions –> Better accuracy, more important information, better organization
- “Wh-” questions or Yes/No questions –> Inaccurate, fewer details
Age
- 3-4-year-olds are better with focused questions
- 5-6-year-olds are better with open-ended questions
- After 5, the difference lessens
Children with disabilities
- Moderate levels of intellectual disability
- Good with open-ended prompts
- Better with more focused open-ended prompts
- Continue to need support on interviewer-provided structure (similar to young children)
Interviewer bias
- Topics of questions
- Tone, facial expressions, gestures
- Repetitions of questions
- Prior questioning might impact subsequent responses
- Exposure to false information –> Can incorporate that information in the responses
NICHD Protocol
- Talk about everyday experiences and ground rules first (truth)
- Open-ended questions
- Open and focused
- Cued invitations
- Answers as cues for more information
- Child-directed retrieval process
memory in infancy
- hippocampus –> most parts are adultlike before birth
- dentate gyrus –> part of hippocampus; episodic memory; not fully developed; adultlike at ~10 months; explains low memory of infants under 6 months
infantile amnesia
inability of adults to recall specific events or episodes from early childhood
- autobiographical memory loss
- cannot remember much of anything before the age of 3.5 or 4 years
old views of infantile amnesia
Freud: infant memories are “repressed”
- Not likely; current scientists have various theories explaining infantile amnesia, none of which are Freudian
- On the contrary, emotional events from childhood are more likely to be remembered
Storage failure
- Not likely; deferred imitation shows the opposite
current views of infantile amnesia
encoding differences
- The way we represent information changes
- Language –> Inability to convert motor memories into verbal ones prevents children from recalling events from infancy
- Underdeveloped sense of self –> Thus no recall of autobiographical memories
- Social interactions –> Shared experiences
- Neuro –> Hippocampus
implicit memories
unconscious, automatic memories like how to perform a skill (e.g., riding a bike)
explicit memories
conscious recollection of facts and events, requiring deliberate retrieval and thought to recall information like remembering a friend’s birthday
