HDE 103 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Gerontocracy, Demographic Transition, Infant Mortality
11 Jun 2018
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I. HDE 103 Study Guide for the Midterm
A. Identification:
1. Demographic transition – is the transition from high birth and death rates to lower birth and death rates as a country
or region develops from a pre-industrial to an industrialized economic system.
2. Interpretive reproduction – how people and children interpret the cultural norms/rules/standards in their world and
how they reproduce it; it allows the opportunity for children to be active participants and recipients of how they
receive (and act upon) culture
a. Interpretive captures the innovative and creative aspects of children’s participation in society, taking info from
the adult worlds and appropriating it to address their own peer concerns
b. Reproduction captures the idea that children are, by their very participation in society, constrained by the
existing social structure and by societal reproduction
i. They are affected by the societies and cultures of which they are members, and the historical dynamics that
shaped them
ii. i.e., children and childhood is shaped now from the past, focuses on peer cultures
3. Culture – total pattern of a group’s customs, beliefs, art, and technology
4. WEIRD – White Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic; what most statistics are based on but is a skewed
perspective because it doesn’t apply to everyone
5. Neontocracy – a society focused on the children (children at the top)
6. Gerontocracy – a society focused on the elders/adults (children integrate and become important later in life; delayed
personhood)
7. Parental Investment Theory – how much each parent invests into reproduction
a. Generally, men are more likely to want to have many offspring (little investment for them)
b. Dads: when men are abundant (few women), they are more likely to behave like dads because they have to
invest in their partner to have offspring
c. Cads: when less men (more women), men can “jump ship” more and reproduce with everyone
d. Women have a lot of investment to have offspring and tend to be more selective
8. Parent-Child Conflict – parents and children have differing expectations
a. Often, a child’s needs, wants, or considerations are never taken into account
b. There are different motivations for making and keeping kids (gender/cultural differences amplify or suppress
them)
c. The thought that children are born to parents and need all of their resources
d. The parent who can ditch (the father), will ditch
e. Women keep men around for security; men want to reproduce a lot
9. Subsistence – home economics (mother typically); providing clothing, education, socialization, and caring for daily
needs
10. Production – economics (father typically); breaking, planting, plowing, caring for/harvesting crops, hunting, working
to bring home salary
11. Microsystem – direct interactions, closest to the child (i.e., mother, father, primary caregiver, sibling)
12. Mesosystem – the interaction between two or more microsystem people (i.e., mom to teacher)
13. Exosystem – things in a child’s environment that do not have direct interaction in the immediate environment (i.e.,
social policies, laws, etc.)
14. Macrosystem – greater ideologies of society in which a child is raised (i.e., cultural or religious norms influenced by
institutions)
15. Orb Web Model – Children are embedded in their context, factors affecting children vary with age each circle
represents age/stage; move around circle at each stage; to new circle at next stage.
a. Lines are foundational supports, each black bar spins a new web
b. Peer cultures are not the same as stages –created within the web and reaching across stages; remain part of one’s
life history and influence one’s experiences
c.
16. Alloparent – another person who provides care to the child
17. Infanticide – killing of infants; occurred in traditional societies when any signs of weakness shown
18. Sympathetic Magic – a connection made between a symptom of the child’s and mother’s behavior
a. Ex: If the mom was behaving good or bad, whatever happens to the child reflects on the mother
b. Ex: In Kaliai women, epilepsy is said to occur when they eat a wallaby, which make small jerky movements
19. Sex Ratio – the proportion of men to women in an environment
20. Intergenerational Transmission – culture transfer from parents to children (or even grandparents down to
grandchildren)
21. Self-Regulation – regulating one’s emotions and behaviors in situations; favorable for getting along with others in
society
22. Storytelling – Where children, across all cultures, learn about their role is in the narratives and stories that families
relay to them; their memories are not yet developed; thus, they learn about their role, their life, and their identity
within the family
a. Stories display big, identity forming information about the child: funny, assertive, bold, brave, etc.
b. By 2 children will intervene when parents are telling stories about them
c. Example: Comparative Narratives: Both American and Taiwanese families use narratives and stories to socialize
their children equally but in different ways
d. Taiwanese families:
i. Shaped by Confucian ideals (macro) relay stories about their children’s moral transgressions and how they
are growing as moral agents challenging their parents interpretations of their moral transgressions
ii. Building moral character (collectivist society, in other terms)
e. American families:
i. Rarely challenge the morality of their children except that they are “good”, misdeeds are used as a source
of human and joviality, not a lesson, children had equity in their agency in the co-narration of their lives
ii. Building self-esteem (individualistic society, in other terms)
23. Temperament – innate responses to the physical and social environment
24. Attachment – an emotional bond that children form with their caregivers at 7-9 months of age
25. Synaptic pruning – dendrite connections that are used become stronger and faster; those that aren’t use wither away
26. Fine motor skills – development of motor abilities involving finely tuned movements of the hands
27. Weaning – stopping of breastfeeding
28. Controlled elimination – toilet training
a. In developed countries, the process is guided and supervised by parents. In traditional cultures, it’s guided by
older siblings and/or older children in the child’s environment. They learn from imitating and watching other
children because they spend most their waking hours in groups with children of mixed ages.
b. Developed countries/pediatricians also recommend toilet training when the child is ready (neontocracy!),
whereas some traditional cultures may require their children to go at certain times of the day + reprimand
children if they don’t
29. Inter birth interval (IBI) – the time period between child births; depends on resources, need in society
a. In more developed countries, IBI is further apart
30. Object permanence – understanding that an object still exists whether or not it is in view anymore
31. Scaffolding – degree of assistance provided to the learner in the zone of proximal development, gradually decreasing
as the learner’s skills develop
32. Zone of Proximal Development – difference between skills or tasks that children can accomplish alone and those
they are capable of performing if guided by an adult or a more competent peer
a. The “sweet” spot where a person can learn and achieve the most with some help from adult guidance or capable
peers
33. Primary emotions – universal across cultures (happy, sad, angry, fear, surprise, disgust)
34. Secondary emotions – emotions that require social learning (embarrassment, shame, guilt)
35. Primary intersubjectivity – organized, reciprocal interaction between an infant and caregiver with the interaction
itself at the focus.
36. Cherubs – a plump, angelic-like creature that personifies innocence; what children were thought to be like
37. Secondary intersubjectivity – a form of interaction between infant and caregiver emerging at age 9-12 months, with
communication and emotional sharing focused not just on the interaction but on the world beyond
38. Chattel – wealth or property closely related to “cattle”; like a slave; children were treated as property of the head of
the household
39. Changelings – basically like a leech/parasite that feeds off of the parent to get all the resources
40. Liminal state – Transitory state where newborn is not yet fully human/child because their soul is granted from the
ancestors so they’re between the spiritual world and the physical world. Because of this belief, parents go through
great pains to apologize to ancestors and appease them during pregnancy and birth
41. Goodness of fit – children develop best if there is a good fit between the temperament of the child and environmental
demands
42. Concerted cultivation – A style of parenting where parents try to stimulate and cultivate children’s development as
much as possible.
Document Summary
Hde 103 study guide for the midterm. Identification: demographic transition is the transition from high birth and death rates to lower birth and death rates as a country or region develops from a pre-industrial to an industrialized economic system. Interpretive reproduction how people and children interpret the cultural norms/rules/standards in their world and how they reproduce it; it allows the opportunity for children to be active participants and recipients of how they receive (and act upon) culture. Parent-child conflict parents and children have differing expectations: often, a child"s needs, wants, or considerations are never taken into account. There are different motivations for making and keeping kids (gender/cultural differences amplify or suppress them) The thought that children are born to parents and need all of their resources. The parent who can ditch (the father), will ditch: women keep men around for security; men want to reproduce a lot. Lines are foundational supports, each black bar spins a new web.
