PSYC105 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Puzzle Video Game, Ethology, Egocentrism
1 Jun 2018
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Developmental Psychology
• The study of human behaviour as a function of age → how and
why we change
• Change as a function of:
o Physical maturation (physically and nervous system)
o Cognitive development
o Social experience
Change and Continuities –
• Change → systematic changes are orderly, patterned and relatively enduring
(e.g. crawling to walking, physical/sexual maturation at puberty – milestones)
• Continuities → refers to ways in which we remain the same or consistent over
time (e.g. attachment from infancy to adulthood, temperament/personality,
stability)
• Always universality and variance (cultures/genetics/environmental factors can
determine differences)
Areas of study in developmental psychology:
• Physical development → body changes, motor skills, puberty, physical signs
of ageing
• Cognitive development → perception, language, learning, memory, problem
solving
• Psychosocial development → personality, emotional, gender identity, moral
behaviour, interpersonal skills, roles
Developmental Theories:
• These theories organize and shape our thinking – guides collection of new
facts
• What is learned depends on which theories are dominant and which theories
best account for the facts (e.g. Vygotsky, behaviourism, McCrae & Costa) –
depends on period of time as well
• Impact of parents theories → folk psychology
o Parental locus of control and efficacy
o Representations of the child
o Discipline approaches
• A child is exhibiting a challenging behaviour at a given age:
o It is likely to be due to his/her temperament – born that way
o It is likely to be due to the way he/she has been managed by parents
o It is likely to be due to some problem he/she experiences at school
• ALL DIFFERENT THEORIES (can intertwine)
Conceptual Challenges:
• Bidirectional influences → parent and child = transactional (influences each
other), gene environment interactions e.g. evocative – child is active
participant in development
• Cohort effects – cross-sectional vs. longitudinal designs → exposure to
technology competency and age (comparisons), SIDS prevention and motor
development (comparison to 1990s when research on factors causing SIDS
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
that found kids sleeping on their tummy can cause this, now new cohort
effects (new generation) of children not sleeping on their tummies – lacks
development)
• Early experience – critical and sensitive periods → EARLY YEARS
CRUCIAL but can be an oversimplification (bonding example with mothers
instead of taken to nurseries), more applicable to biological aspects of
development
Early Experience – Sensitive Periods:
• Early experience comes from embryology → ‘teratogens’ but timing of
exposure is critical e.g. facial anomalies in fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (if
a mother drinking too much alcohol whilst fetus forming, facial anomalies can
occur)
• Empirical support –
o Neurological development happens in first 3 years of life
▪ Massive amounts of extensive myelination occur during this
time → can have huge impact of child’s later development
o Language development – early deprivation important
o Studies of Romanian orphans who were later adopted
▪ Cognitive impairments are related to timing of deprivation, but
also duration of deprivation (children retained deficits from
early deprivation)
• Experience in the womb:
o Blastocyst → embryo → fetus → baby
Major Theories of Development:
• Psychoanalytic theory → Freud and Erikson
• Cognitive developmental theory → Piaget and Kohlberg
• Social cognitive theory → early behaviourist theories through to Bandura’s
social cognitive theory
• Ethological theory → attachment theories of Ainsworth and Bowlby
Stage Theorists Vs. Learning Theorists:
• Stage theorists = interested in identifying patterns, largely universal, common
patterns
o Some kind of biological genetic underpinning – nature vs. nurture?
▪ Universal genetically determined capacities for language,
motor development BUT expression influenced by
environment
• Learning theorists = individual differences in how people behave, how they
are influenced by environmental specific influences, different trajectories
• Example → Speech development:
o Children have an innate ability to learn a spoken language
o Middle class USA compared to Guatamalan kids
o Depends on interaction between inherited/innate characteristics and
environmental experiences and demands
• Example → Motor development:
o Maturation; unfolding of genetically programmed behaviour patterns
o BUT environment has an impact;
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Developmental psychology: the study of human behaviour as a function of age how and why we change, change as a function of, physical maturation (physically and nervous system, cognitive development, social experience. Crucial but can be an oversimplification (bonding example with mothers instead of taken to nurseries), more applicable to biological aspects of development. Infants under 8 months = out of sight, out of mind no effort to retrieve hidden object. Infants 9-12 months = search for but where last found, a not. B effect object does not exist independent child"s actions. Infants 12-18 months = understand not only that objects continue to exist but that they can be moved while out of sight. I like: other people have minds, broccoli experiment first recognition that people see things differently, false belief task understanding another person"s false beliefs. Overview of attachment: origins of attachment theory- animal work ethology. Individual differences assessing attachment the strange situation.
