The Developing Person

1. The Developing Person • Developmental Psychology • a branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive and social change throughout the life span

2. Child Development Table of Contents Exit

3. Heredity • Developmental Psychology: The study of progressive changes in behavior and abilities • Heredity (Nature): Transmission of physical and psychological characteristics from parents to their children through genes • DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid): Molecular structure, shaped like a double helix that contains coded genetic information Table of Contents Exit

4. Union of Egg and Sperm

5. Prenatal Development • Zygote • the fertilized egg • enters a 2 week period of rapid cell division • develops into an embryo • Embryo • the developing human organism from 2 weeks through 2nd month • Fetus • the developing human organism from 9 weeks after conception to birth

6. Prenatal Development • 40 days 45 days 2 months 4 months

7. Genes • Genes: Specific areas on a strand of DNA that carry hereditary information • Dominant: The gene’s feature will appear each time the gene is present • Recessive: The gene’s feature will appear only if it is paired with another recessive gene Table of Contents Exit

8. Fig. 3.1 This image, made with a scanning electron microscope, shows several pairs of human chromosomes. (Colors are artificial.) © Biophoto Associates/Science-Source/Photo Researchers Table of Contents Exit

9. Fig. 3.2 (Top left) Linked molecules (organic bases) make up the “rungs” on DNA’s twisted “molecular ladder.” The order of these molecules serves as a code for genetic information. The code provides a genetic blueprint that is unique for each individual (except identical twins). The drawing shows only a small section of a DNA strand. An entire strand of DNA is composed of billions of smaller molecules. (Bottom left) The nucleus of each cell in the body contains chromosomes made up of tightly wound coils of DNA. (Don’t be misled by the drawing: Chromosomes are microscopic in size and the chemical molecules that make up DNA are even smaller.) Table of Contents Exit

10. Fig. 3.3 Gene patterns for children of brown-eyed parents, where each parent has one brown-eye gene and one blue-eye gene. Since the brown-eye gene is dominant, 1 child in 4 will be blue-eyed. Thus, there is a significant chance that two brown-eyed parents will have a blue-eyed child. Table of Contents Exit

11. Temperament and Environment • Temperament: The physical “core” of personality; includes sensitivity, irritability, distractibility, and typical mood • Easy Children: 40 %; relaxed and agreeable • Difficult Children: 10 %; moody, intense, easily angered • Slow-to-Warm-Up Children: 15 %; restrained, unexpressive, shy • Remaining Children: Do not fit into any specific category Table of Contents Exit

12. Environment • Environment (“Nurture”): All external conditions that affect a person and perhaps his/her development • Sensitive Periods: A period of increased sensitivity to environmental influences; also, a time when certain events must occur for normal development to take place • Congenital Problem: A problem or defect that occurs during prenatal development; “birth defect” • Genetic Disorder: Problem caused by inherited characteristics from parents; e.g., cystic fibrosis Table of Contents Exit

13. Teratogens • Anything capable of causing birth defects (e.g., narcotics, radiation, cigarette smoke, lead, and cocaine) • Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS): Caused by repeated heavy alcohol consumption during pregnancy. Infants: • Have low birth weight, a small head, body defects, and facial malformations • Lack Cupid’s Bow, the bow-shaped portion of the upper lip (look in the mirror to see) Table of Contents Exit

14. How to Minimize Prenatal Risks • Maintain good nutrition during pregnancy • Learn relaxation and stress reduction techniques to ease transition to motherhood • Avoid teratogens and other harmful substances • Get adequate exercise during pregnancy • Obtain general education about pregnancy and childbirth Table of Contents Exit

15. Childbirth • Medicated Birth: Traditional; mother is assisted by physician and given drugs for pain • Prepared Childbirth: Parents learn specific behavioral techniques to manage pain and facilitate labor. Lamaze method is most famous Table of Contents Exit

16. Deprivation and Enrichment • Deprivation: Lack of normal stimulation, nutrition, comfort, or love • Enrichment: When an environment is deliberately made more complex and intellectually stimulating and emotionally supportive Table of Contents Exit

17. The Mozart Effect: Real or Nonsense? • Rauscher & Shaw (1998) claimed that after college students listened to Mozart they scored higher on a spatial reasoning test • Original experiment done with adults; tells us nothing about infants • What effect would listening to other styles of music have? • Most researchers unable to duplicate the effect • Conclusion: Those who listened to Mozart were just more alert or in a better mood Table of Contents Exit

18. Newborns (Neonates) and Their Reflexes • Grasping Reflex: If an object is placed in the infant’s palm, she’ll grasp it automatically (all reflexes are automatic responses; i.e., they come from nature, not nurture) • Rooting Reflex: Lightly touch the infant’s cheek and he’ll turn toward the object and attempt to nurse; helps infant find nipple or food • Sucking Reflex: Touch an object or nipple to the infant’s mouth and she’ll make rhythmic sucking movements • Moro Reflex: If a baby’s position is abruptly changed or if he is startled by a loud noise, he will make a hugging motion Table of Contents Exit

19. Fig. 3.5 Infant imitation. In the top row of photos, Andrew Meltzoff makes facial gestures at an infant. The bottom row records the infant’s responses. Videotapes of Meltzoff and of tested infants helped ensure objectivity. (Photos courtesy of Andrew N. Meltzoff.) Table of Contents Exit

20. The Newborn Percentage of time spent looking 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Familiar stimulus Novel stimulus

21. 40 30 20 10 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 The Newborn Time spent looking (seconds) Presentation

22. At birth 3 months 15 months Cortical Neurons Physical Development • Maturation • biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior • relatively uninfluenced by experience • sets the course for development while experience adjusts it

23. Fig. 3.7 Motor development. Most infants follow an orderly pattern of motor development. Although the order in which children progress is similar, there are large individual differences in the ages at which each ability appears. The ages listed are averages for American children. It is not unusual for many of the skills to appear 1 or 2 months earlier than average or several months later (Frankenberg & Dodds, 1967; Harris & Liebert, 1991). Parents should not be alarmed if a child’s behavior differs some from the average. Table of Contents Exit

24. Maturation • Definition: Physical growth and development of the body, brain, and nervous system • Increased muscular control occurs in patterns; order of maturation is almost universal • Cephalocaudal: From head to toe • Proximodistal: From center of the body to the extremities Table of Contents Exit

25. Fig. 3.8 Psychologist Carolyn Rovee-Collier has shown that babies as young as 3 months old can learn to control their movements. In her experiments, babies lie on their backs under a colorful crib mobile. A ribbon is tied around the baby’s ankle and connected to the mobile. Whenever babies spontaneously kick their legs, the mobile jiggles and rattles. Within a few minutes, infants learn to kick faster. Their reward for kicking is a chance to see the mobile move (Hayne & Rovee-Collier, 1995). © Michael Newman/PhotoEdit Table of Contents Exit

26. Emotional and Social Development • Basic Emotions: Anger, fear, joy; appear to be unlearned • Social Smile: Smiling elicited by social stimuli; not exclusive to seeing parents • Self-Awareness: Awareness of oneself as a person; can be tested by having infants look in a mirror and see if they recognize themselves • Social Referencing: Observing other people to get information or guidance Table of Contents Exit

27. Fig. 3.9 The traditional view of infancy holds that emotions are rapidly differentiated from an initial capacity for excitement. (After K.M.B. Bridges, 1932. From “Emotional Development in Early Infancy.” Reprinted by permission of the Society for Research in Child Development.) Table of Contents Exit

28. Fig. 3.10 Infants display many of the same emotional expressions as adults do. Carroll Izard believes such expressions show that distinct emotions appear within the first months of life. Other theorists argue that specific emotions come into focus more gradually, as an infant’s nervous system matures. Either way, parents can expect to see a full range of basic emotions by the end of a baby’s first year. Over the first 2 years, children become increasingly active in initiating emotional exchanges with parents (Grolnick, Cosgrove, & Bridges, 1996). Table of Contents Exit

29. Imprinting (Lorenz) • Definition: Rapid, relatively permanent type of learning that occurs during a limited time period early in life • Lorenz (an ethologist) studied natural behavior patterns of animals • Hatched baby geese in an incubator; when geese were born, first moving object they saw was Lorenz • They followed him around and acted as though he were their mother! Table of Contents Exit

30. Mary Ainsworth and Attachment • Separation Anxiety: Crying and signs of fear when a child is left alone or is with a stranger; generally appears around 8-12 months • Quality of Attachment (Ainsworth) • Secure: Stable and positive emotional bond • Insecure-Avoidant: Anxious emotional bond; tendency to avoid reunion with parent or caregiver • Insecure-Ambivalent: Anxious emotional bond; desire to be with parent or caregiver and some resistance to being reunited with Mom • Contact Comfort (Harlow): Pleasant and reassuring feeling babies get from touching something warm and soft, especially theirmother Table of Contents Exit

31. Fig. 3.11 In the United States, about two thirds of all children from middle-class families are securely attached. About 1 child in 3 is insecurely attached. (Percentages are approximate. From Kaplan, 1998.) Table of Contents Exit

32. Social Development • Harlow’s Surrogate Mother Experiments • Monkeys preferred contact with the comfortable cloth mother, even while feeding from the nourishing wire mother

33. Fig. 3.12 An infant monkey clings to a cloth-covered surrogate mother. Baby monkeys becomes attached to the cloth “contact-comfort” mother but not to a similar wire mother. This is true even when the wire mother provides food. Contact comfort may also underlie the tendency of children to become attached to inanimate objects, such as blankets or stuffed toys. However, a study of 2- to 3-year-old “blanket-attached” children found that they were no more insecure than others (Passman, 1987). (So, maybe Linus is okay after all.) Table of Contents Exit

34. Social Development • Monkeys raised by artificial mothers were terror-stricken when placed in strange situations without their surrogate mothers.

35. Play and Social Skills • Solitary Play: When a child plays alone even when with other children • Cooperative Play: When two or more children must coordinate their actions • Affectional Needs: Needs for love and affection Table of Contents Exit

36. Optimal Caregiving • Proactive Maternal Influences: A mother’s warm, educational interactions with her child • Goodness of Fit (Chess & Thomas): Degree to which parents and child have compatible temperaments • Paternal Influences: Sum of all effects a father has on his child Table of Contents Exit

37. Parenting Styles (Baumrind, 1991) • Authoritarian Parents: Enforce rigid rules and demand strict obedience to authority. Children tend to be self-absorbed as adults and have higher rates of drug abuse and violence • Overly Permissive: Give little guidance. Allow too much freedom, or don’t hold children accountable for their actions. Children tend to be dependent and immature and frequently misbehave • Authoritative: Provide firm and consistent guidance combined with love and affection. Children tend to be competent, self-controlled, independent, and assertive Table of Contents Exit

38. Types of Child Discipline • Power Assertion: Using physical punishment or a show of force, e.g., removing toys or privileges • Withdrawal of Love: Withholding affection • Management Techniques: Combine praise, recognition, approval, rules, and reasoning Table of Contents Exit

39. Language Acquisition • Cooing: Repetition of vowel sounds by infants; typically starts at 6-8 weeks • Babbling: Repetition of meaningless language sounds (e.g., babababa); uses consonants B, D, M, and G; starts at 7 months • Single-Word Stage: The child says one word at a time • Telegraphic Speech: Two word sentences that communicate a single idea (e.g., Want cookie) Table of Contents Exit

40. Spanking • Gershoff (2002): Parents should minimize or avoid entirely • No long-term damage if backed up by supportive parenting • Frequent spanking leads to increased aggression and to an increase in behavioral problems Table of Contents Exit

41. Fig. 3.14 Mother-infant and father-infant interactions. These graphs show what occurred on routine days in a sample of 72 American homes. The graph on the left records the total amount of contact parents had with their babies, including such a actions as taking to, touching, hugging, or smiling a the infant. The graph on the right shows the amount of care-giving (diapering, washing, feeding, and so forth)done by each parent. Note that in both cases mother-infant interactions greatly exceed father-infant interactions. (Adapted from Belsky et al., 1984) Table of Contents Exit

42. Noam Chomsky and the Roots of Language • Biological Disposition: Presumed readiness of ALL humans to learn certain skills such as how to use language • Chomsky: Language patterns are inborn • Parentese (Motherese): Pattern of speech used when talking to infants • Marked by raised voice; short, simple sentences and repetition Table of Contents Exit

43. Jean Piaget and Cognitive Development • Piaget believed that all children passed through a set series of stages during their cognitive development; like Freud, he was a Stage Theorist • Transformations: Mentally changing the shape or form of a substance; children younger than 6 or 7 cannot do this • Assimilation: Application of existing mental patterns to new situations • Accommodation: Existing ideas are changed to accommodate new information or experiences Table of Contents Exit

44. Jean Piaget and the First Stage of Cognitive Development • Sensorimotor (0-2 Years): All sensory input and motor responses are coordinated; most intellectual development here is nonverbal • Object Permanence: Concept that objects still exist when they are out of sight Table of Contents Exit

45. Jean Piaget and the Second Stage of Cognitive Development • Preoperational Stage (2-7 Years): Children begin to use language and think symbolically, BUT their thinking is still intuitive and egocentric • Intuitive: Makes little use of reasoning and logic • Egocentric: Child is unable to accommodate viewpoints of others Table of Contents Exit

46. Jean Piaget and the Third Stage of Cognitive Development • Concrete Operational Stage (7-11Years): Children become able to use concepts of time, space, volume, and number BUT in ways that remain simplified and concrete, not abstract • Conservation: Mass, weight, and volume remain unchanged when the shape of objects changes • Reversibility of Thought: Relationships involving equality or identity can be reversed Table of Contents Exit

47. Fig. 3.17 Children under age 7 intuitively assume that a volume of liquid increases when it is poured from a short, wide container into a taller, thinner one. This boy thinks the tall container holds more than the short one. Actually each holds the same amount of liquid. Children make such judgments based on the height of the liquid, not its volume. Table of Contents Exit

48. Typical Age Range Description of Stage Developmental Phenomena Birth to nearly 2 years Sensorimotor Experiencing the world through senses and actions (looking, touching, mouthing) • Object permanence • Stranger anxiety About 2 to 6 years Preoperational Representing things with words and images but lacking logical reasoning • Pretend play • Egocentrism • Language development About 7 to 11 years Concrete operational Thinking logically about concrete events; grasping concrete analogies and performing arithmetical operations • Conservation • Mathematical transformations About 12 through adulthood Formal operational Abstract reasoning • Abstract logic • Potential for moral reasoning Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

49. 4. Possible outcome: Screen drops, revealing one object. 3. Object is removed. 1. Objects placed in case. 2. Screen comes up. 4. Impossible outcome: Screen drops, revealing two objects. Cognitive Development • Baby Mathematics • Shown a numerically impossible outcome, infants stare longer (Wynn, 1992)

50. Jean Piaget and the Last Stage of Cognitive Development • Formal Operations Stage (11 Years and Up): Thinking now includes abstract, theoretical, and hypothetical ideas • Abstract Ideas: Concepts and examples removed from specific examples and concrete situations • Hypothetical Possibilities: Suppositions, guesses, or projections Table of Contents Exit