Summary PSY1004F Exam Notes. Developmental Psychology (Chapters 12&13)

Physical & Cognitive Development
Goals of DP
 Examine & describe Behavioral changes as they occur
o Biological
o Physical
o Psychological
o Social
o Behavioral
 Find out what causes/ drives these changes

,The 4 Broad issues of DP
Issues describing developmental change
1. Stability vs. Change
 Is there any development or do we remain constant
o Can be asked specifically to one period of time/stages
 General trend
o Most changes happen is the first 5 years of life
o Long periods of stability when we are adults

2. Continuity vs. Discontinuity
 Development is continuous
o Supported by early psychologists
 Influenced by behaviorists
 Development happens in distinct stages
o Jean Piaget proposed this ides

Issues identifying what drives these changes
3. Nature vs. Nurture
 To what extent development is a product of genetics or environment
 How nature & nurture interact
 Psychologists today agree that both nature & nurture interact to produce
specific developmental patterns & outcomes
 Genetics (Nature)
o Provide the potential for particular behaviours or traits to emerge
o Limits the emergence of behaviour or traits.
o Defines people’s general level of intelligence
 Setting an upper limit that people cannot exceed.
o Also places limits on physical abilities.
o Example
 Maturation
 Environment (Nurture)
o Play a critical role in enabling people to reach the potential
capabilities
o Example
 Learning
 If Einstein hadn’t received intellectual stimulation as a child
he probably wouldn’t have reached his genetic potential.

4. Critical periods vs. Sensitive periods
 Critical Period
o Age range during which certain experiences must occur for
development to proceed normally
 Sensitive period
o Optimal age range for certain experiences to happen
o If experiences don’t happen in this time normal development is
still possible

,Investigation Designs
Cross-sectional designs
 Compares people of different ages at the same time
 Problems
o Different generations may differ
o Newer generations more intelligent because of better schooling

Longitudinal Design
 Repeatedly tests the same people as they age
 Problems
o Time consuming
o Sample group may shrink
 Dropouts
 Relocation
 Death

Sequential Design
 Does both cross-sectional & longitudinal
 Positives
o Most comprehensive
 Problems
o Costliest
o Most time consuming

Microgenetic design
 Longitudinal method but over a short period of time
 “Genetic” in the word “Microgenetic”
o Refers to genesis (the development itself)

,Prenatal Development
3 Stages of Prenatal Development

Germinal stage
 First two weeks of development
 when a sperm fertilizes an egg (ovum)
 Fertilized egg = zygote
 Zygote becomes a mass of cells that attaches to uterus
o Through repeated cell division the
o About 10 -14 days after conception.

Embryonic stage
 Weeks 2-8
 Cell mass is now called an embryo
 Placenta & umbilical chord develop at the start of this stage
 By the end of week 8
o The heart of the embryo is beating
o The brain is forming
o Facial features such as eyes can be recognized

Foetal stage
 From week 9 onwards
 Muscles strengthen & other bodily systems develop
 24 weeks the eyes open
 Age of viability = 27 weeks
o Likely to survive outside the womb in case of premature birth after
this time

,Threats to Prenatal Development
Environmental factors
 can influence development even before birth.
Teratogens
 Maternal diseases
 Agents that cause abnormal prenatal development
o Tobacco
o Drugs
o Environmental toxins
o Alcohol
 Foetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)
 Stunted growth
 Physical abnormalities
 Physiological abnormalities
 Mental retardation
 Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD)
 Group of abnormalities
 Results from prenatal exposure to alcohol
Characteristics of the mothers
 Age
 Diet
 Emotional state

,Infancy (02 Years)
Reflexes
 Newborns are equipped with a number of reflexes.
o Automatic, inborn behaviours
o Occur in response to specific stimuli
 Can perceive, understand & interact with their environment after just a
few days
 Don’t have a reflex for every action/interaction with our environment.
 Reflexes increase the baby’s ability to feed & survive.
 Examples of newborn reflexes
o Rooting reflex
 When you stroke a baby’s cheek, he will turn his head
towards the location in which he was touched, & open his
mouth.
o Sucking reflex:
 When you place something in an infant’s mouth, he will
suck on it.

Learning
 Learning mechanisms are change & adapt behaviours to new stimuli
 Ways newborns learn
o Habituation
o Classical conditioning
o Operant conditioning


Sensory Capabilities & Perceptual Preferences
Visual Preference Technique
 No matter how old, infants prefer complex patterns to simple ones
Visual Habituation Technique
 Infants prefer new images that they haven’t seen before
 Novelty factor

Face Perception in Early Infancy
 Infants can discriminate faces from other stimuli
 They also prefer faces to other stimuli
 Demonstrate face preference just minutes after birth
o Not a learned, but rather innate

,Perceptual Development in Early Infancy
Discrimination of angles
 1½ Month olds discriminate on the basis of orientation
 3½ Month olds discriminate on the basis of shape configuration
Discrimination of sounds
 In their home language
o 6-12 month olds all performed the same
 In a foreign language
o Younger children performed better
 Perceptual narrowing
 Lose ability to discriminate between tings they don’t
experience in their first year

, Infants’ Physical Development
Physical & motor development trajectories
Cephalocaudal trajectory
 Development in a head-to-foot direction.
o Head of the foetus & infant is disproportionately large
 because physical growth concentrates first on the head.
o Also applies to motor skills
 maintain postural balance of the head & neck first

Proximodistal trajectory
 Development begins along the inner-most parts of the body & continues
outward.
o Arms will develop before the hands & fingers.

Physical development of the brain
 Size devlopment
o At birth the brain is about 25% of its eventual adult weight.
o By 6 months the brain is at 50% of its adult size.
 Development speed
o Grows rapidly during childhood
o Slows by adolescence.
 What develops when
o Neural networks develop rapidly
o Form the basis for cognitive & motor skills
o frontal lobe is one of last areas to develop
 responsible for highest-level cognitive functioning.