Week 2 Material- MCQ's ONLY

Question 1

What is developmental psychology?

Answer 1

Development across the lifespan.

Question 2

Research Methods: Diaries

Answer 2

Child research began with diary studies
relying on observation – e.g. Piaget

Parents as researchers observing their own
children.

Parents being asked by researchers to
observe their children on specific behaviours.

Question 3

Longitudinal Design

Answer 3

Advantages
• Control for extraneous/confounding
variables such as family life, gender,
ability, preferences, etc.

Disadvantages
• Takes a lot of time.
• Withdrawal of children

Question 4

Cross-Sectional Design

Answer 4

Advantages
• Large quantity of information
• Large number of participants

Disadvantages
• How representative is the sample?
• Can we really compare two different
groups?

Question 5

Charles Darwin (1809-1882)

Answer 5

Developed baby biography as one of the first methods for studying children.

The proposed theory of evolution that still influences research in modern child development, such as:
• Attachment
• Innate fears
• Sex differences
• Aggression and altruism
• Learning

Question 6

Albert Binet (1857-1911)

Answer 6

Binet started investigating children’s intelligence, and
developing standardised tests 1900.

Commissioned to identify students who needed
educational assistance.

Concept of a mental age

Now Stanford-Binet test – Intelligence Quotient (IQ): 
Test Five factors of cognitive ability: 
• Fluid Reasoning, 
• Knowledge, 
• Quantitative Reasoning, 
• Visual-Spatial Processing, and 
• Working Memory. 
• Each of these factors is tested in two separate domains, 
verbal and nonverbal.

Question 7

Pavlov

Answer 7

Behaviourism:
• All behaviour is learned = nurture
• Pavlov’s dogs
• Classical conditioning

Question 8

Other Behaviourist Techniques

Answer 8

Behaviourism is basis 
for many child-rearing 
practices today, e.g. 
Supernanny’s naughty 
step technique.

Question 9

John Bowlby

Answer 9

Bowlby’s Maternal Deprivation
Hypothesis (1950s).

Explained social, linguistic, and 
cognitive impairments in orphanages 
due to lack of emotional warmth
.
‘Failure to thrive’

Critical period for attachment
formation – birth to 3-years.

Question 10

Bandura

Answer 10

Social Learning Theory

Bandura’s Bobo doll experiments
(1961).

Children learn by watching others =
nurture.

Applied aspects: Still used in debates
about children watching videos, playing
violent computer games etc.

Question 11

Jean Piaget (1920s-70s)

Answer 11

Piaget’s stage theories
of cognitive
development.

The child is born with
structures ready to
absorb knowledge.

Question 12

Lev Vygotsky (the 1920s, 30s)

Answer 12

Vygotsky’s sociocultural
theory of cognitive
development.

The child develops
understanding through
his/her interaction with
the world.

Question 13

The English – Romanian 
Adoption Study (ERA). Part 1

Answer 13

Background:
Children adopted into Western families
following the 1989 fall of Caeusescu regime
in Romania.

Institutionalized children experienced 
extreme deprivation (nutritional, psychosocial, intellectual).

The study compared the development
of Romanian and UK adoptees.

Question 14

Rutter et al (2004)

Answer 14

Romanian orphans adopted by British parents
vs. British orphans adopted by British parents.

They studied these children from the moment they were adopted until the children were 6 years of age.

They were interested in looking at the possible differences between the two groups with respect to physical and cognitive development