Understanding Human Development

Question 1

What is development?

Answer 1

systematic changes and continuities in the individual that occur between conception and death

Question 2

Goals of studying human development

Answer 2

1. description
2. prediction
3. explanation
4. optimism

Question 3

What is a theory?

Answer 3

a set of statements that relate different facts or events, describe and explain development and predict future outcomes

Question 4

The Puritan view of children

Answer 4

people are inherently sinful

Question 5

The Romantic view of children

Answer 5

inherently pure

Question 6

The ‘tabula rasa’ view of children

Answer 6

children are blank slates

Question 7

The child rights view of children

Answer 7

considering the views of the child

Question 8

Biological-maturation perspective (theorists and focus)

Answer 8

• Gesell, Freud, Erikson

- Biological forces

Question 9

Environmental learning (theorists and focus)

Answer 9

• Skinner, Watson, Bandura

- Environment, learning

Question 10

Constructivist (theorists and focus)

Answer 10

• Piaget

- Children’s active role in development

Question 11

Contextual/systems (theorists and focus)

Answer 11

• Bronfenbrenner, Gottlieb

- Ongoing transactions between biology and environment

Question 12

Today’s lifespan perspective

Answer 12

Development is..

• lifelong
• multiply influenced
• multidirectional
• plastic
• embedded in multiple contexts

Question 13

Cross-sectional design

Answer 13

• compares the performance of people of different age groups at a single time
• advantage: provides info about age differences
• disadvantage: cohort effects

Question 14

Longitudinal design

Answer 14

• one age group (cohort) is assessed repeatedly over time
• advantages tells us…
  1. whether most people change in the same direction
  2. whether the characteristics measured remain consistent over time
• whether experiences early in life predict traits and behaviours in later life
• disadvantages:
  1. time of measurement effects
  2. costly and time consuming
  3. participants drop out

Question 15

Sequential design

Answer 15

-groups of people of 2 or more different ages are studied repeatedly over a period of time

Question 16

Case study

Answer 16

• intensive study of a single individual
• advantage: can provide a rich and detailed picture of development
• disadvantage: conclusions are based on a single individual may not hold true for other people

Question 17

Experimental Method

Answer 17

• investigator manipulates some aspect of environment to see what effect this has on people’s behaviour
• advantages: can establish cause and effect
• disadvantages: artificiality, cannot address many questions for ethical or practical reasons.

Question 18

Correlational method

Answer 18

• involves determining whether two or more naturally occurring variables are related in some specific way
• advantages:
  1. allows us to predict behaviour
  2. can suggest a causal relationship in situations where experiments would be unethical or impossible
• has a ‘real world’ quality
• disadvantages: cannot establish cause and effect

Question 19

chronosystem

Answer 19

the environmental events and transitions that occur throughout a child’s life, including any sociohistorical events.

Question 20

cohort

Answer 20

a group of people born at the same time

Question 21

exosystem

Answer 21

an environment in which an individual is not involved, which is external to his or her experience, but nonetheless affects him or her anyway. An example of an exosystem is the child’s parent’s workplace.

Question 22

macrosystem

Answer 22

the cultural environment in which the child resides

Question 23

mesosystem

Answer 23

The mesosystem refers to the point in which two social microsystems merge. One example of a mesosystem is the combination of the home and school environments. These intersect and become a mesosystem when events, situations, work and friendships cross back and forth between both environments.

Question 24

microsystem

Answer 24

the immediate settings in which the person functions (eg family)

Question 25

quasi experiment

Answer 25

an experiment-like study that evaluates the effects of different treatments but does not randomly assign individuals to treatment groups