Social and cultural development in adolescents

Question 1

Describe the three central features to social development in adolescence

Answer 1

1. Growth- new experiences, skills, concepts and emotions and begin to function in a larger number of social and personal fields. Puberty also.
2. Differentiation- one’s range of activities, behaviours, skills, ideas, social contacts and emotions becomes broader, or more different. The differences, or variability, between individuals become larger as individual adolescents set off on their own developmental trajectories.
3. Synthesis- Adolescents need to synthesise (bring together) this ‘newness’ into a comprehensible and coherent approach to the world

Question 2

Name the central goals or challenges adolescents need to address

Answer 2

1. Be autonomous and emotionally regulated
2. Have a sense of their Identity
3. Be able to form relationships with both same and opposite sex peers.

Question 3

What five domains do these developments occur

Answer 3

1. Self
2. Family
3. Peer group
4. Social environment
5. Puberty

Question 4

What is meant by Phylogeny?

Answer 4

Phylogeny is the evolutionary growth and development of a species

Question 5

What recapitulates Phylogeny? Explain what this means

Answer 5

Ontogeny is the development of a person from conception. Recapitulation is the repeating of actions over and over again, this phrase refers to the repetition of evolutionary stages in the growth of the foetus and young mammal.

Question 6

What evidence did Hall provide that this recapitulation occurs?

Answer 6

That the more primitive parts of the brain develop before the more recent ones.

Question 7

How does Hall depict adolescence?

Answer 7

The time in which the evolutionary momentum subsides (instincts). In this way it is a second birth.

Question 8

What is meant by a Zeitgeist?

Answer 8

The common beliefs, thoughts or feelings held by a generation

Question 9

What zeitgeist did Lewin reject?

Answer 9

The notion that psychological phenomena such as needs, hopes or fears could not be experimented on.

Question 10

What is meant by Lewin’s field theory?

Answer 10

That behaviour is a function of a person and their interaction with their environment. (B = F (P,E))

Question 11

What is meant by a life space according to Lewin?

Answer 11

A person’s environment can be divided into regions corresponding to the individual’s characteristics, needs and perceptions of the environment. The person and the environment represent inseparable constructs, which together constitute the life space. Thus life space is the combination of all factors that influence behaviour at any time.

Question 12

Regions within the life space have attracting or repelling properties, what are these known as?

Answer 12

Positive or negative valences

Question 13

What is meant by locomotion in a life space

Answer 13

movement towards or away from a valenced region

Question 14

When may conflict arise in a life space

Answer 14

When different valences compete for locomotion or when a valence is both positive and negative

Question 15

How does a life space develop?

Answer 15

The person becomes more differentiated and the regions become more numerous and less permeable

Question 16

In adolescence how is changed defined in the life space? What does this promote

Answer 16

Increased locomotion from one region to another. This promotes and is promoted by increased size in the life space and the entry into new situations that are ‘cognitively unstructured’

Question 17

What does time allocation patterns give insight to?

Answer 17

value systems and life goals

Question 18

What might leisure activities help develop in adolescents?

Answer 18

autonomy

Question 19

When studying adolescent time usage what four categories did Bruno use

Answer 19

1) outer directed time- time spent towards academic or financial goals etc
2) inner directed time- time spent on inner development eg sports, hobbies etc
3) other-people directed time- time spent increasing popularity or developing relationships
4) none directed time- time spent relaxing

Question 20

How did genders differ in the time allocation study

Answer 20

They preferred them in the same order (outer, inner, other people, none directed) however girls showed more of an inclination towards other and boys showed more none directed.

Question 21

In the urban time allocation study, what differences were found between urban and rural dwelling people?

Answer 21

Rural dwelling spent more time on sports and passive leisure activities while urban dwellers engaged in more social such as cinema and nightclubs. Rural dwellers also showed more leisure boredom which has been linked to drug abuse and delinquency.

Question 22

Why does the article suggest immigrant adolescents use mental health services less?

Answer 22

Parents are less likely to spot the symptoms

Question 23

Name the different systems of bronfenner’s ecological model

Answer 23

The individual- age, sex, health etc
Microsystem- family, peers, school, neighbourhood etc
Mesosystem
Exosystem- Family friends, neighbours, Mass media, services
Macrosystem- attitudes and ideologies of culture
Chronosystem- time

Question 24

What is social cognition?

Answer 24

Meaningful interactions with others

Question 25

What is meant by social competence?

Answer 25

ability to achieve personal goals from interactions with others, while maintaining a positive relationship with the other person

Question 26

Why is social competence important?

Answer 26

It is a Predictor of cognitive abilities, mental problems, socioeconomic status, risk behaviour

Question 27

Name the function and brain areas associated with the mirror/ simulation/ action network

Answer 27

inferior frontal gyrus, lateral parietal cortex. Function; recognition of other people’s actions and planning of our own

Question 28

Name the function and brain areas associated with the amygdala network

Answer 28

amygdala, ventral striatum, orbitofrontal cortex

Function: recognition and evaluation of emotional and social stimuli

Question 29

Name the function and brain areas associated with the mentalizing network

Answer 29

(medial prefrontal cortex), posterior cingulate gyrus, temporal pole, superior temporal sulcas, (temporal parietal junction)
Function: What does the other think? Recognising social abilities in others

Question 30

Name the function and brain areas associated with the empathy network

Answer 30

amygdala, orbitofrontal cortex, anterior insula

Question 31

How does the amount of grey matter change during adolescence?

Answer 31

Decreases in evolutionarily old areas first and areas involved in higher cognition last (prefrontal cortex.) Local connections decrease while distal connections increase.

Question 32

Which network has early development and which has late development?

Answer 32

Amygdala: early
Mentalising: late

Question 33

What is meant by culture

Answer 33

Information that is not fixed in the genome and that is transmitted socially

Question 34

Compare Piaget’s cognitive constructionism and Vygotsky’s social constructivism

Answer 34

Piaget put emphasis on the individual’s experience and process through which learning occurs while Vygotsky put emphasis on negotiating learning through interaction with others.

Question 35

What is meant by alloparenting and what effect does it have on attachment?

Answer 35

Different caretakers and it does not have an effect on primary caregiver

Question 36

What cultures were included in the study?

Answer 36

Dutch, Surinamese, Turkish and Morrocean

Question 37

What is meant by proto-professionalise in psychology?

Answer 37

Using a scientific term for a disorder when the person hasn’t even been tested