Developng Through the Life Span

Developmental Psychology • Examination of physical, cognitive, and social development across the life span • Adults differing from infants • How are they similar, how are they different, and what stages do we go through? Stage Theories Prenatal Development and Newborn • Conception • Prenatal Development • Zygote: Fertilized egg that survives past 10 days to 2 weeks • Embryo: Zygote attaching to uterine wall becoming a clump of cells for about 6 weeks (organs begin to function and hear begins to beat) • Fetus: 9 weeks after conception to about 40 weeks • Teratogens: agents such as viruses and drugs that can damage the embryo or fetus Newborns and Infancy • Brain Development • Motor Development • Cognitive Development: Mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating Cognitive Development • Previous thought (prior to late 1800s), researchers convinced that a child’s mind was a miniature model of an adults • Jean Piaget (1896-1980) • Carefully observed children through a series of studies and became convinced that a child’s way of thinking is very different than an adult Piaget’s Theory • Sensorimotor Stage (Birth to 2) • Babies take in the world through their senses and actions by looking, hearing, touching, mouthing, and grasping • Lack object permanence: awareness that objects continue to exist if when not perceived • Preoperational Stage (2 to 6 or 7) • Able to represent things with words and images but too young to perform mental operations (such as remembering an action than mentally reversing it) • Egocentrism: difficult perceiving things from another’s point of view Children’s conversations also reveal their egocentrism, as one young boy demonstrated (Phillips, 1969, p. 61): “Do you have a brother?” “Yes.” “What’s his name?” “Jim.” “Does Jim have a brother?” “No.” Piaget’s Theory • Concrete Operational (about age 7) • Given physical materials, they can understand conservation • Conduct the mental operations of pouring the milk back in • Formal Operational Stage (by age 12) • Progress from reasoning of purely concrete reasoning to expanding to encompass abstract thinking • Abstract reasoning Current though on Piaget’s Theory • Today many researchers see development as more continuous than Piaget • Children could engage in some conceptual abilities that Piaget missed Vygotsky’s Theory: Social Child • Focused on how the mind grows through interaction with the social environment • Scaffold of temporary levels of thinking that lead to higher levels of thinking Social Development • By 4.5 months, infants can tell apart familiar and unfamiliar languages • By 8 months, they develop stranger anxiety Origins of Attachment • Caregiver-infant attachment bond is a powerful survival impulse that keeps infants close to their caregivers • Body Contact • Harlow monkey experiments Origins of Attachment • Caregiver-infant attachment bond is a powerful survival impulse that keeps infants close to their caregivers • Body Contact • Harlow monkey experiments • Familiarity • Critical period of time in which familiarity facilitates bonding, a rigid attachment process called imprinting • Children do not imprint, but do become attached to what they’ve known Attachment Differences • Attachment studies by Mary Ainsworth (1979) • Observed 6-month olds with their mothers at home and then observed the 1-year olds in a strange setting • Secure attachment: Explore new environment when their mother is present, become distressed with they leave, then seek contact with her when she returns • Insecure attachment: Do not explore new environment even in the presence of their mother, may cling to her, cry loudly when she leaves, and is upset or indifferent upon her return Deprivation of Attachment • Romania 1970s and 1980s • Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu wanted more human capital, outlawed contraception, forbade abortion, taxed families with fewer than 5 children • 15 to 1 caregiver ratio • Socially deprived led to high rate of reduced IQ scores, abnormal stress response, and and quadruple rates of ADHD Self-Concept • By age 12, understanding and assessment of who they are • Begins with recognition of mirrored image of themselves and progresses to gender identity, group membership, similarities and differences with peers Parenting styles • Authoritarian: Coercive by rules and expect obedience • Permissive: Un-restraining, make few demands • Neglectful: Uninvolved, neither demanding nor responsive • Authoritative: Confronting, both demanding and responsive Adolescence and Moral Development • Development of reasoning • Moral reasoning: Thinking that occurs to consider right and wrong • Moral intuition: Morality is rooted in quick gut feeling Adolescence and Moral Development • Development of reasoning • Moral reasoning: Thinking that occurs to consider right and wrong • Moral intuition: Morality is rooted in quick gut feeling • Moral Action: Morality involves in doing the right thing rather than talking about it (e.g., delay gratification, Marshmallow test) Erik Erikson’s Social Development Adulthood and Late Adulthood • Differences between 20 and 50 and 30 and 60, although may not be as drastic as what is observed in infancy and adolescence • Early adulthood (roughly twenties and thirties) • Middle adulthood (to age 65) • Late adulthood (years after 65) Physical Changes in Middle and Late Adulthood • Middle adulthood: Hormonal changes and potential declining physical capabilities • Late adulthood: Slower neural processing, brain regions important to memory begin to decline, breakdowns in hippocampus, more susceptible to sickness • Exercise can slow the aging process • US life expectancy is 79