Developmental Psychology Human Development

Developmental Psychology Hellow, future RPm! Doubt is definitely going to eat you this review season. I just want you to know that it is very VALID to feel that way. But always remember to go back to the reason why you are doing this. May this reviewer help you pass the boards like it did to me and to many people that I know <3 We will be remembered Perspectives on Nature and Nurture o Human Development – focuses on the scientific study of the systematic processes of change and stability in people o Life-Span Development – concept of human development as lifelong process, which can be studied scientifically o Life-Span Perspective – views development as lifelong, multidimensional, multidirectional, plastic, multidisciplinary, and contextual, and as a process that involves growth, maintenance, and regulation of loss Domains of Development Physical Development – growth of the body and brain, sensory capacities, motor skills, and health Cognitive Development – learning, attention, memory, language, thinking, reasoning, and creativity Psychosocial Development – emotions, personality, and social relationships o Social Construction – a concept or practice that is an invention of a particular culture or society o Stability-Change Issue – which involves the degree to which early traits and characteristics persists through life or change o Continuity-Discontinuity – focuses on the degree to which development involves either gradual, cumulative change (continuity) or distinct stages (discontinuity) Growth – physical changes - quantitative Maturation – transitional state that tells a person is fully functional - the unfolding of natural sequence of physical change and behavior patterns Development – functional changes - it encompasses physical, mental, and social aspects - progressive Learning – how a person adapt to the environment o Behavioral Genetics – scientific study of the extent to which genetic and environmental differences among people and animals are responsible for differences in their traits o Heritability – proportion of all the variability in the trait within a large sample of people that can be linked to genetic differences among those individuals o Gregor Mendel – studied the heredity in plants o Selective Breeding – involves attempting to breed animals for a particular trait to determine whether the trait is heritable ▪ Genes contribute to such attributes as activity level, emotionality, aggressiveness, and sex drive in rats mice, and chickens 1. Twin Studies 2. Adoption Studies 3. Family Studies o Concordance Rate – the percentage of pairs of people studied in which if one member of a pair displays the trait, the other does too Reaction Range – wide range of possibility that it might exhibit differently Canalized Range – limited possible changes of changing (fixed) - e.g., motor and language development o Genes turn on and off in patterned ways throughout the lifespan (Epigenetics) o Gene-Environment Interaction – the effects of genes depend on what kind of environment we experiences, and how we respond to the environment depends on what genes we gave o In an instance, Intelligence is strongly influenced by heredity. However, it is also affected by parental stimulation, education, peer influence, and others o 3 factors that contribute to individual differences in emotionality: 1. Genes 2. Shared Environmental Influences – common experiences that work to make them similar (e.g., parenting style) 3. Nonshared Environmental Influences – unique experiences to the individual – those who are not shared with the other members of the family (e.g., parental favoritism) 3 kinds of Gene-Environment Correlations Passive Gene-Environment – parent provide for their children is influenced partly by the parents’ genotypes Evocative Gene-Environment – child’s genotype evokes certain kind of reactions from other people - Genetic makeup may affect the reactions of other people to a child and, hence, the kind of social environment that the child will experience Active Gene-Environment – children’s genotype influence the kinds of environment they seek o Heredity – consists of inborn traits and characteristics provided by the child’s parents (Nature) o Environment – influences stems from the outside body, starting from conception throughout life (Nurture) o Individual Differences – people differ in gender, height, weight, and body build; in health and energy level, etc. o Heredity – consists of inborn traits provided by the parents o Context of Development: 1. Family – Nuclear and Extended Family 2. Socioeconomic Status – combination of economic and social factors describing an individual or family, including income, education, and occupation 3. Culture – society’s or group’s total way of life ▪ Ethnic Gloss – overgeneralization that obscures or blurs variations ▪ Race – identifiable biological category, is more accurately defined social construct 4. Gender 5. History o Normative Influences – biological or environmental events that affect many or most people in a society in a similar ways and events that touch only certain individuals a. Normative Age-Graded Influences b. Normative History-Graded Influences ▪ Historical Generation – group of people who experience the event at a formative time in their lives ▪ Age Cohort – group of people born at about the same time o Nonnormative – unusual events that have major impact on individual lives because they disturb the expected sequence of the life cycle o Imprinting – instinctively follow the first moving object they see o Critical Period – specific time when a given event, or its absence, has a specific impact on development o Sensitive Periods – when developing person is especially responsive to certain kind of experience o Plasticity – modifiability of performance Theory – set of logically related concepts or statements that seek to describe and explain development and to predict the kinds of behavior that might occur under certain conditions o Hypothesis – explanations or predications that can be tested by further research o John Locke – Tabula Rasa o Jean Jacques Rousseau – children are born “noble savages” who develop according to their own positive natural tendencies if not corrupted by society o Mechanistic Model – people are like machines that react to environmental input (reactive) o Organismic Model – people as active, growing organisms that set their own development in motion; initiate events, and do not just react (active) o Continuous – gradual and incremental o Discontinuous – abrupt or uneven o Quantitative Change – change in number or amount, such as height, weight, or vocabulary size o Qualitative Change – emergence of new phenomena that could not be easily predicted on the basis of the past basic functioning o Evolutionary Psychology – emphasized the importance of adaptation, reproduction, and “survival of the fittest” in shaping behavior o Nativist Perspective – genes o Empiricist Perspective – environment o Noam Chomsky – all children acquire language in the same way Research Methods in Developmental Psychology and Ethics Ethics o APA General Principles: General Principles A. Beneficence and Take care to do no harm; Nonmaleficence minimize harm B. Fidelity and Establish relationships of Responsibility trusts, upholding professional standards of conduct, cooperate with other professionals if needed to serve the best interests of the client, and strive to contribute their professional time, compensated or not. C. Integrity Promote accuracy, honesty, and truthfulness o Fairness and justice to all person to access and benefit from the contributions of psychology E. Respect for People’s Respect the dignity and Rights and Dignity worth of all people by exercising their rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination o PAP General Principles: General Principles I. Respect for Dignity of - Respect for all human Persons and Peoples beings, diversity, culture, beliefs - free and informed consent - privacy, fairness, and justice II. Competent Caring - working for their benefit for the Well-being of and do no harm Persons and Peoples III. Integrity - honesty, truthfulness, open and accurate communication - appropriate professional boundaries, multiple relationships, and conflicts of interest IV. Professional and - contributing knowledge Scientific about human behavior Responsibilities to - conducting affairs within Society society with highest ethical standards o Must provide accurate information and obtain approval prior to conducting the research o Informed consent is required, which include: ✓ Purpose of the research ✓ Duration and procedures ✓ Right to decline and withdraw ✓ Consequences of declining or withdrawing ✓ Potential risks, discomfort, or adverse effects ✓ Benefits ✓ Limits of confidentiality ✓ Incentives for participation ✓ Researcher’s contact information o Researchers who study vulnerable population should obtain informed consent both from the individual and guardian ▪ D. Justice o o o o o o o o o Seek individual’s assent, provide an explanation, consider their best interest, and obtain permission from their guardians ▪ Must appropriately document written or oral consent, permission or assent Permission for recording images or vices are needed unless the research consists of solely naturalistic observations in public places, or research designed includes deception ▪ Consent must be obtained during debriefing Dispense or Omitting Informed consent only when: 1. Research would not create distress or harm ▪ Study of normal educational practices conducted in an educational settings ▪ Anonymous questionnaires, naturalistic observation, archival research ▪ Confidentiality is protected 2. Permitted by law Avoid offering excessive incentives for research participation that could coerce participation DO not conduct study that involves deception unless they have justified the use of deceptive techniques in the study ▪ Must be discussed as early as possible and not during the conclusion of data collection They must give opportunity to the participants about the nature, results, and conclusions of the research and make sure that there are no misconceptions about the research Must ensure the safety and minimize the discomfort, infection, illness, and pain of animal subjects ▪ If so, procedures must be justified and be as minimal as possible ▪ During termination, they must do it rapidly and minimize the pain Must no present portions of another’s work or data as their own ▪ Must take responsibility and credit, including authorship credit, only for work they have actually performed or to which they have substantially contributed ▪ Faculty advisors discuss publication credit with students as early as possible After publishing, they should not withhold data from other competent professionals who intends to reanalyze the data ▪ Shared data must be used only for the declared purpose Researchers who study cultural influences on development or racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic differences in development must work hard to keep their own cultural values from biasing their perceptions of other groups ▪ Ethnocentrism: one’s group is superior than the other groups o Do not conduct studies that involves deception unless deceptive techniques are justified ▪ If ever, deception must be explained as early as feasible during the conclusion of the participation and participants have the right to withdraw if they want to do so Basic Research Designs Descriptive – aims to observe and record behavior Case Study – study of a certain individual or group - Useful in rare cases - Offers useful, in-depth information - Can explore sources of behavior, test treatments, and suggest directions for further research - Cannot be easily generalized to other population - Cannot make strong causal statements - low external validity Ethnographic Studies – seek to describe the pattern of relationships, customs, beliefs, technology, arts, and traditions that make up a society’s way of life - Case study of the culture - Open to observer bias - Help overcome cultural biases in theory and research - Debunks the logic of western developed theories can be universally applied Correlational Study – determine whether a correlation exist between variables, phenomena that change or vary among people or can be varied for purposes of research - Study of the relationship between one variable and another without manipulation - No random assignment - Lack of control over extraneous variables - Cannot establish causation - Used to study many important issues that cannot be studies experimentally for ethical reasons - Can study multiple influences operating in natural settings - high external validity Experiment – controlled procedure which the experiment manipulated variables to learn how one affects another - Establish cause-and-effect - Permit replication - Manipulation - Could encounter ethical issues - Can be artificial - high internal validity Quasi-Experiment – natural experiment; compares people who have been accidentally assigned to separate groups by circumstances of life - Actually, a correlational study Differentiating Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Studies Developmental Research Designs Cross-Sectional - children of different ages are assessed at ONE point of time - more economical - no cases of attrition (dropping out of the study) or repeated testing (practice effect) - individual differences and trajectories may be obscured - results can be affected by differing experiences of people born at different times Longitudinal - study the SAME GROUP or PERSON more than once, or even years apart - can track individual patterns of continuity and change - time-consuming and expensive - repeated testing could result to practice effect - attrition could be a problem - turnover of research personnel, loss of funding, or the development of new measures or methodologies Sequential - data are collected on successive cross-sectional or longitudinal samples - track people of different ages over time - allows researchers to separate age-related change from cohort effects and provides more complete picture of development - drawbacks: time, effort and complexity - requires large number of participants and collection and analysis of huge amounts of data over a period of years - Cohort Effects: important because they can powerfully affect the dependent measures in a study ostensibly concerned with age Developmental Theories (25) Psychosexual Theory by Freud (3) o humans were born with a series of innate, biologically based drives such as hunger, sex, and aggression early experiences shaped later functioning o people are driven by motives and emotional conflicts of which they are largely unaware that they are shaped by their earliest experiences with the family