Unit 2 (Chapter 3 & 4)

Question 1

Experience-expectant process

Answer 1

Brain development that occurs based on environmental experiences that all members of the species typically encounter. (Ex: Learning how to walk. Need stimulation and social cues)

Question 2

Experience-dependent processes:

Answer 2

Brain development that occurs based on unique environmental stimuli shared only by individuals in particular environmental circumstances. (Ex: If an individual was not exposed and trained to weave a cultural basket at a young age, they would not have the same dexterity or ability as one has learned to at an early age.)

Question 3

Gross-motor skill

Answer 3

A motor skill that relies on large muscles, such as those in the legs and arms.

Posture provides foundation

Question 4

Fine motor skill

Answer 4

A motor skill that relies on small muscles, such as those in the fingers.

Question 5

What has the cross-cultural study of early motor development revealed regarding gross motor and fine motor skills?

Answer 5

•Some scholar have questioned whether the timing of motor skills development is the same around the world
•Cross-cultural studies conducted in the 1950s through the 1970s found that African children sat independently, stood up, and walked earlier than U.S. infants.
oContemporary researchers tend to de-emphasize the earlier findings.
 Poor research methodologies
 Recent studies have failed to fully replicate the original findings.
 The timing of motor development may not be as important an issue as was once thought. Children in all culture eventually learn how to walk, run, and play with the same level of enthusiasm and skill.

Question 6

Posture

Answer 6

The way a person holds his or her body as a whole.

Question 7

Sensorimotor stage

Answer 7

Piaget’s first stage of cognitive development, in which infants develop from reflex-driven organisms to more complex and symbolic thinkers.

• The key processes that drive the change from one substage to the next are assimilation and accommodation.
o These processes underlie the ongoing development of mental structures called schemes

Question 8

Schemes

Answer 8

Mental structures that help us organize and process information.

Question 9

What is object permanence and why is it significant?

Answer 9

Object permanence
The understanding that an object continues to exist even when it is not immediately present or visible.

o In order to have object permanence, the infant must be able to mentally represent the object for which they search. Once they have representational ability, they can search for an object that is outside her visual awareness.

Question 10

What is the A-not-B error, and how is it related to object permanence?

Answer 10

A-not-B error
A mistake made by children in Piaget’s sensorimotor stage as they search for a hidden object in a location where it has been repeatedly placed but is no longer hidden.

Question 11

Describe language development in terms of expressive and receptive abilities

Answer 11

Receptive language (comprehension)
Language that an infant understands but may not be able to produce.
• Requires only the ability to hear and process information

Expressive language (production)
Language that an infant can produce.
• Requires the ability to control and produce sounds, and cognitive awareness of the meaning of those sounds.

Question 12

Sequence of expressive language

Answer 12

Crying
Cooing (1-2 months)
Babbling (6-8 months)
First words (10-12 months)

Question 13

Holophrase

Answer 13

One-word utterances that express a complete thought or phrase.

Question 14

Telegraphic speech

Answer 14

The creation of short phrases that convey meaning but lack some of the parts of speech that are necessary for a full and complete sentence.

Question 15

Joint attention

Answer 15

The ability to direct the attention of a social partner to objects or events and, in turn, follow their attention-directing gestures, such as head-turning and pointing.

Question 16

Describe the explanation for language development that involves the language acquisition device (2 ways)

Answer 16

Language acquisition device (LAD)
The name given by Noam Chomsky to a theoretical structure possessed by all humans that prewires us to learn language and grammar rules.

• Physical parts of the brain involved in the comprehension and production of speech: Wernicke’s and Broca’s areas

Infant-directed speech
A way of speaking to infants that is higher in pitch, simpler, and more repetitive than speech directed at adults or children. It seems to be used automatically when in the presence of an infant.

Question 17

What is the interactionist approach to language development?

Answer 17

Interactionist approach
A view of language learning that stresses the role of socialization.

• Studies found that the amount and type of speech that parents direct toward their infants are correlated with the child’s rate of language acquisitions
• Differences in vocabulary size have been found to relate to parent-infant communication.
• The vocabulary spurt may be related to increased communication by the parents, changes in the brain, and increasing social and cognitive abilities.

Question 18

Summarize the development of vision in terms of acuity.

Answer 18

Acuity

• The newborn’s visual acuity (the ability to see) is estimated to range from 20/120 to 20/240

Question 19

Summarize the development of vision in terms of focal length

Answer 19

• During the first month, a newborn’s focal length (the distance at which things can be clearly seen) is about 18 to 30 cm.
o Distance between nursing newborns and their mothers’ faces
• At about 2 months, focal length and acuity improved
• By age 1, infants can see like adults.

Question 20

Summarize the development of vision in terms of colour vision.

Answer 20

Colour Vision
• Infants as young as 2 weeks old can discriminate between colours, though not as well as adults
• By 4 months, infants appear to have fully developed color perception
• Delay due to neurons in the retina that respond to color, called cones, still developing in the months after birth

Question 21

Describe the major milestones in hearing from birth to the first year.

Answer 21

3-4 months before birth: ear is formed and functional
-> Can only hear muffled sounds

Birth-3 months:

• Startled by loud sounds
• Quiets or smiles when spoken to
• Seems to recognize your voice and quiets if crying
• Increases or decreases sucking behaviour in response to sound

4-6 months:

• Moves eyes in direction of sounds
• Responds to changes in tone of your voice
• Notices toys that makesounds
• Pays attention to music

7 months-1 year old:

• Enjoys games like peek-a-boo and pat-a-cake
• Turns and looks in direction of sounds
• Listens when spoken to
• Recognizes words for common items like “cup” “shoe” “book” or “juice”.
• Begins to respond to requests (Ex: Want more? Come here”.)

Question 22

6. Discuss the mismatch between the western medical model and the conditions under which human biology evolved in terms of feeding, responses to crying, and sleeping.

Answer 22

The dominant Western medical model of infant care states that infants should sleep separately from their mothers and that night wakings should be treated with a variety of behavioural interventions, such as graduated extinction or “controlled crying”.
• Today, co-sleeping remains a cross-cultural, species-wide, and physiologically normal practice.
o Only in a few cultures (typically Western, industrialized societies) do infants sleep outside the context of their breastfeeding mothers.

Co-sleeping
A variety of shared sleeping arrangements, where infant and caregiver sleep within sensory range of one another (on the same or separate surfaces), thereby permitting each to detect and respond to the cues of the other.

Bedsharing
A specific instance of co-sleeping, where infant and caregiver sleep together in the same adult bed.

Question 23

What are the consequences of the mismatch between the western medical model and the conditions under which human biology evolved in terms of feeding, responses to crying, and sleeping?

Answer 23

• There is a potential mismatch between the conditions under which human biology evolved and contemporary Western lifestyles
o Example: Formula feeding, infant schedules, delayed responses to crying, and the like are thought to clash with the evolved needs and natural inclinations of infants and their caregivers.
• Effects on health?
o Negative developmental outcomes, such as gastrointestinal infection, dehydration, failure to thrive and attachment issues

• Development and well-being are enhanced when mothers meet their infants’ evolved needs for physical and emotional closeness at night.

Question 24

Freud’s Psychodynamic perspective (Freud’s Oral and Anal Stages)

Answer 24

Freud has 2 stages known as the oral and anal stage.
He believed that individuals are driven by constant battles between the id, ego and the superego, as well as the libero, all unconsciously. The libido’s energy moved through different phases. Depending on how well the infant passes through the oral and anal phase, these events will carry on into their adult life.

The id appears in the oral stage and it is the part of the mind that wants instead gratification. It has no limit or boundaries as to what it wants. The ego appears in the anal stage and it is responsible to control the id as well as control the bodily functions, notably the bowel movements, that are considered impulsive.

Oral fixation takes form of smoking and talking a lot. This signifies that the individual would return to the oral stage because they had little or too much gratification during the oral stage.

Anal fixation takes form in an obsessive personality. This occurs when an individual had little or too much gratification during the anal stage.

Question 25

Erikson’s psychodynamic perspective

Answer 25

Similarly, to Freud, Erikson has 2 stages: trust vs mistrust, and autonomy vs shame and doubt.

As the name implies, the first stage is where the infant learns to truest or mistrust their environment and people around them, notably their caregiver and immediate surroundings.

The second stage is when the infant slowly learns to have self control by going through key accomplishments, with one of them being toilet training similarly to Freud. The difference is that the infant learns to master it. Another similarity is that these accomplishments and failures can affect them in the future and shape the individual’s personality. In Erikson’s case, individuals who did not base the trust vs mistrust stage would mistrust people around them and would think that people will hurt them physically or emotionally. However, unlike Freud who focus on the sex and the libido, Erikson believed more in the social interaction that the individual encounters. They also have the idea of an unconscious conflict within the individual.

Question 26

2. Summarize the findings on temperament and why temperament is so important.

Answer 26

Temperament
-Biologically based individual differences in how one responds to the environment that influence emotions, physical activity level, and attention.

Rothbart has suggested that biological and brain processes influence infants’ patterns ofnegative affectivity,extraversion/surgency, andeffortful control.

Temperament is important because it helps caregivers better understand children’s individual differences. By
understanding temperament, caregivers can learn how to help children express their preferences, desires, and feelings appropriately.

Question 27

What does goodness of fit mean? Provide an example of how goodness of fit could apply for each of three patterns as identified by the New York Longitudinal Study.

Answer 27

Goodness of fit
The relationship between environmental forces and predisposed temperamental behaviour.
• This interplay between child and parental constitutions mediated the infant’s future emotional attachments and outcomes.
• If parents are unable to adjust their responses to match the child’s temperament, less-than-optimal development may result.

Easy temperament: The relationship between environmental forces is positive with the easy tempered child. Therefore, the child is uninhibited and would approach new situations and people with ease.

Difficult temperament: The relationship between environmental forces is negative with the difficult tempered child. For example, a child who doesn’t come to daycare on a regular basis would have a hard time adjusting to the routine and would therefore cry because of the new situations.

Slow-to Warm-Up temperament: A child moving to a higher grade. The child might feel slow to warm up due to all the novelty in their new classroom, but because they are familiar with the school and surrounded by their familiar peers, they will slowly warm up.

Question 28

What is attachment theory?

Answer 28

Attachment theory
The perspective that the process of social, emotional, and cognitive development occurs in the context of caregiver–infant attachment.
• Birth to 12 weeks: pre-attachment
• 3-6 months: Beginning of attachment
• 6-8 months until early childhood: Clear attachment
• Preschool years onward: Goal directed attachment

Question 29

What is separation anxiety?

Answer 29

Separation anxiety
A set of seeking and distress behaviours that occur when the primary caregiver is removed from the immediate environment of the infant/child.
• Bowlby viewed separation anxiety as evidence of object permanence
• It occurs because the infant has the capacity to think about the caregiver even when the caregiver is not present.

Question 30

What is Stranger anxiety?

Answer 30

Stranger anxiety

Distressed avoidance of a novel individual.

Question 31

Why was Harlow’s research on monkeys and attachment so important?

Answer 31

• The attachment is an inborn developmental process necessary for survival, and not merely the result of reinforcement.
• Attachment is a basic need and necessary for survival

Question 32

Describe the Strange Situation

Answer 32

Strange Situation
A means of categorizing attachment styles, consisting of a series of episodes in which a mother and her child are observed together, separated, and reunited in the presence of a stranger.

Question 33

What are the three attachment styles first identified by Mary Ainsworth?

Answer 33

Secure attachment
-An attachment style characterized by flexible proximity between parent and infant and positive reunion behaviour.

Insecure-avoidant attachment
-A type of insecure attachment in which infants show little or no distress upon separation and avoidant behaviour such as running from parent upon reunion

Insecure-resistant attachment
-A type of insecure attachment in which infants show very high distress when separated and mixed reactions when reunited.

Question 34

Describe the fourth recently added attachment style and why it is important.

Answer 34

Disorganized/Disoriented attachment
A type of insecure attachment characterized by inconsistent behaviour upon separation and reunion that shows no clear pattern.
• More likely than those in other groups to have suffered some form of maltreatment. In extreme cases, these children may even develop failure to thrive.

Question 35

What are some of the predictors of secure attachment?

Answer 35

1. Sociability and extraversion are higher in mothers of securely attached children
2. Mother also tend to be lower on measures of depression, neuroticism, and anxiety
3. Mother’s insightful about her infant’s internal states and motives is also positively associated with attachment security
4. Marital satisfaction
   o Couples experiencing marital conflict may have a harder time responding sensitively to their infant’s cues.
5. Caregiver sensitivity is the central factor in the development of attachment security
   o Consistent attends to the infant’s cues
   o Accurately interprets their meaning
   o Promptly responds appropriately to enhance the infant’s trust in the caregiver

Question 36

Describe synchrony and provide an example.

Answer 36

Synchrony
The reciprocal and mutually rewarding qualities of an infant–caregiver attachment relationship.

Example: At around 3-months of age, babies start to focus their efforts for connection on their special caregivers - mothers, fathers, and others who provide their care nearly every day.

Question 37

What are the socioemotional outcomes of secure attachment?

Answer 37

1. A more harmonious parent-child relationship later on
2. Secure infants tend to have more harmonious relationships with their caregivers in the second year
3. Benefit children’s other close relationships, such as with peers and close friends
4. Even with unfamiliar adults, we can that secure infants are subsequently more sociable then insecure infants
5. Participants who were categorized via the Strange Situation as securely attached at 12 and 18 months were more likely than those categorized as insecure to exhibit a variety of personality dimensions throughout childhood and adolescence, including emotional health, self-confidence, and social competence.
   o Attachment insecurities has been shown to be a risk factor in the development of psychology
6. Early secure attachment along with continued sensitive caregiving is a significant predictor of positive socio-emotional development

Question 38

Describe the stages of emotional development in infancy, including the development of secondary emotions.

Answer 38

Social smile
-In infancy, the first facial expression of pleasure, enabled by neurophysiological maturation and an increasing readiness for social interactions with caregivers.

Primary emotions
-An emotion that is present early in life and is most likely innate.

Stages (p.142)
• From Birth: Expresses basic emotions
• 2-3 months: Awakening sociability leads to emotion complexity
• 6 months: Memory aids emotions
• 9-20 months: Physical and cognitive development enable the emergence of secondary emotions.
• End of 2nd year: Emotional awareness explodes

Secondary emotions
-An emotion that emerges with the help of certain cognitive and social developments.

Guilt
-A feeling of regret or remorse arising from perceptions of having done something wrong.

Empathy
-The capacity to understand or feel what another person is feeling from their perspective.

Question 39

Why are secondary emotions important?

Answer 39

• Secondary emotions cannot appear without certain cognitive and social developments, such as understanding of self.
• SE serve a different type of purpose from the earlier cries for food or proximity.
• SE plays an important role in socio-emotional development across the lifespan
• Early emotional development evolved from and is intimately connected to the social world, a point that is particularly obvious when we look at how infants react to the emotions of their closest social partners: their parents.