Unit 9: Part 1

Question 1

Developmental psychology

Answer 1

A branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social change throughout the lifespan

Question 2

Zygote

Answer 2

The fertilized egg: it enters a two week period of rapid cell division and develops into an embryo

Question 3

Embryo

Answer 3

The developing human organism from about the end of fertilization through the second month

Question 4

Fetus

Answer 4

The developing human organism from a week after conception to birth

Question 5

Teratogens

Answer 5

(Literally, “monster makers”) agents, such as chemicals and viruses, that can reach the embryo or fetus during prenatal development and cause harm

Question 6

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)

Answer 6

Physical and cognitive abnormalities in children cause by a pregnant women’s heavy drinking in severe cases. Signs include a small, out-of-proportion head and abnormal facial features

Question 7

Habituation

Answer 7

Decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimulation

Question 8

Maturation

Answer 8

Biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience

Question 9

Cognition

Answer 9

All the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating

Question 10

Schema

Answer 10

A concept of framework that organizes and interprets information

Question 11

Assimilation

Answer 11

Adding a new example into a schema

Question 12

Accommodation

Answer 12

Adapting our current schemas to incorporate new information

Question 13

Jean Piaget

Answer 13

Development psychologist

Question 14

Sensorimotor stage

Answer 14

The stage (from birth to 2) during which infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions (what they see, hear, etc and motor activities (how they move)

Question 15

Object permanence

Answer 15

The awareness that objects continue to exist even when not perceived

Question 16

Preoperational stage

Answer 16

The stage (from 2-6/7) during which a child learns to use language but doesn’t yet comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic

Question 17

Conservation

Answer 17

The principle (which Piaget believed to be a part of concrete operational reasoning) that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects

Question 18

Egocentrism

Answer 18

In Piaget’s theory the preoperational child’s difficulty in taking another’s point of view

Question 19

Theory of mind

Answer 19

Peoples ideas about their own and others mental states - above their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behavior these might predict

Question 20

Concrete operational stage

Answer 20

In Piaget’s theory, the stage of cognitive development (from 7-11) during which children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about events

Question 21

Formal operational stage

Answer 21

In Piaget’s theory the stage of cognitive development (normally beginning at 12) during which people begin to think logically about abstract concepts

Question 22

Scaffold

Answer 22

A framework that offers children temporary support as they develop higher levels of thinking

Question 23

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD)

Answer 23

A disorder that appears in childhood and is marked by significant deficiencies in communication and social interaction and rigidly fixated interests and repetitive behaviors