Unit 5: Development in Early Childhood (2-6 years) Flashcards
How much height and weight do children between the ages of 2 - 6 gain in total?
30 cm
8kg
Muscle maturation occurs, as fat is turned into muscles. This leads to the average body mass index (BMI) being at its ______ between 5-6 years.
lowest
How tall and heavy is the average 6 year old?
> 110 cm
12-23 kg
How does the center of gravity shift, why and which effect does that have?
shifts from chest to abdomen
faster growing legs (and arms) -> 60% height increase by puberty
provides more stability and development of more complex movements
Which factors can influence growth and maturation?
genetic inheritance
exercise and daily physical activity
Social class
Physical deficiencies/ illnesses
Trauma and physical/ psychological abuse
Nutrition
What does a very high level of training cause?
less growth
When do most eating disorders begin?
during physical development
What does obesity in early puberty mainly cause?
delays in cognitive development
Where do the hemispheres mainly get their information from/ exert their influence on?
contralateral parts
Which structure allows for a transfer of information between the hemispheres and why is the exchange of information crucial?
corpus callosum
crucial for everyday functioning (e.g. coordinated movements)
When does the process of myelinisation occur at a particularly high rate and which effect does this have?
3-6
increased efficiency of corpus callosum
lateralization
each hemisphere is specialized for certain functions
Is lateralization true for all processes?
no
e.g. speech comprehension
Does lateralization depend on handedness?
yes
handedness
preference of using one hand or side of the body over the other
How many adults are righthanded, and what does this mean when talking about lateralization?
90%
dominant left half of brain
Even though there are signs of lateralization from birth, when is handedness well established?
2-3 years
Should you “lateralize” your child by the age of 5 if it does not happen spontaneously?
yes
double lateralization hypothesis
innate laterality (genetic inheritance, spontaneous)
learned laterality (use of objects)
How can preoperational children think compared to sensorimotor beings?
in symbols (not just via senses)
What is symbolic function?
ability to make one thing represent another
Which are examples of manifestations of mental representations appearing during the preoperational stage?
drawing
symbolic play
language (describing objects)
cataloguing/ categorization and class logic
children have an enormous capacity for learning new words and logical connections between them
animism
belief that inanimate objects are alive
non-human objects have human characteristics
Why are children in the preoperational stage egocentric?
children understand the world from own perspective and have difficulties to understand the POV of others
How did Piaget and Inhelder study egocentrism in children?
Three mountains study
Do children in the preoperational stage still act intuitively, despite their ability to describe things not immediately present?
yes
How do children interpret the environment? (e.g. DeVries & “Maynard” experiment)
based on its appearance
conservation
recognition that properties of an object are not altered if appearance is altered in a superficial way
Do children in the preoperational stage understand conservation?
no
Flavell: experiment with water containers
-> children below 6-7 think taller container contains more liquid
Which concepts do children in the preoperational stage lack, to understand conservation (according to Piaget)?
Decentration: ability to concentrate on more than one aspect of a problem at a time
Reversibility: ability to mentally reverse actions
Which other properties of objects prove that children younger than 6-7 don’t understand conservation (Flavell)?
Mass (longer = more perceived mass)
Number (same amount of objects wider spaced is perceived as more objects being there)
Which are the 5 behaviors Piaget identified as vehicles of representation?
delayed imitation
mental imagery
language
drawing
play
Signifier
designates graphic or phonetic representation
Signified
meaning of a word
semantic aspect
What’s the difference between Signals, Symbols and Signs?
Signal: signifier directly linked to signified (e.g. smoke and ifre)
Symbol: greater distance between signifier and signified (e.g. symbol of a house and house)
Sign: arbitrary, no relation (e.g. mathematical signs)
When does the ability to use differentiated signifiers begin to develop?
1.5 years
Delayed imitation
imitation in absence of model
reveals existence of internal models
Symbolic play
situations produced in symbolic way
-> giving meaning to elements
Mental imagery
internalized imitation
-> representation of situations