Chapter 1
What is the definition of developmental psychology?
Analysis, evaluation, and modification of varying life movements or changes starting at conception and continuing through the life span
What are benefits of twin and adoption studies?
Examine impacts of nature vs nurture
Analyze different family dynamics (sibling relationships, step-family origins)
Define SIDS
"the term used to describe the sudden death of a baby younger than 1 year of age that doesn't have a known cause, even after a full investigation. Healthcare providers, law enforcement, and others investigate infant deaths to figure out what caused them"
What’s temperament in your own words
Individual differences in behavioral styles, emotions, and characteristic ways of responding
What is the mental skill that assists younger kids in making choices, planning, and goal setting?
Executive function
What are the different research designs and timeframes?
Descriptive
Observational
Experiment
- Cross sectional & longitudinal
What's a teratogen and examples of them?
Alcohol, hard drugs, pollution, psychiatric medication, STIs, cat boxes, stress
Difference between gross & fine motor skills? An example of each?
Gross motor skills pertain to skills involving large muscle movements, such as independent sitting, crawling, walking, or running. Fine motor skills involve use of smaller muscles, such as grasping, object manipulation, or drawing
What’s attachment and the famous experiment (and now standardized procedure) to test toddler attachment?
a close emotional bond between two people (usually parents and their kids)
Strange situation experiment
Vygotsky hypothesized a ZPD, what is it?
the range of tasks too difficult for the child alone but that can be learned with guidance
How does Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model theorize development?
How whole systems or circumstances interact with each other influencing development vs individual traits.
What are the different kinds of prenatal testing?
Ultrasound sonography- physical imaging of developing embryo/fetus
Amniocentesis- Analyzing amniotic sac fluid
Maternal blood screening- Blood test for mom
What's a Language Acquisition device and where is it “located”?
a biological endowment enabling a child to detect the features and rules of language, including phonology, syntax, and semantics
What’s the 4 attachment styles and how do infants under each one present to the world?
Securely attached babies: use the caregiver as a secure base from which to explore the environment.
Insecure avoidant babies: show insecurity by avoiding the caregiver.
Insecure resistant babies: cling to the caregiver, then resist the caregiver by fighting against the closeness.
Insecure disorganized babies: appear disoriented, showing strong patterns of avoidance and resistance.
What's conservation and how can it be tested?
awareness that altering an object or substance’s appearance does not change its basic properties
Number, Matter, & Length
What are the periods of development? (the life stages we're studying in this class?)
Prenatal period: conception to birth.
Infancy: birth to 18 or 24 months.
Toddler: 18 months to 3 years of age.
Early childhood: 3 to 5 years of age.
Middle and late childhood: about 6 to 10 or 11 years old.
Adolescence: 10 to 12 years old, to 18 to 21 years old.
Emerging adulthood: 18 to 25 years of age.
Early adulthood: early twenties through the thirties.
Middle adulthood: forties and fifties.
Late adulthood: sixties or seventies, until death
New moms can certainly be depressed, but how can the term postpartum depression be sometimes misleading?
Physical body changes return prior to pregnancy
Hormonal rebalances
Emotional processing of birth/being a new parent
How to test for object permanence?
Hide and seek, peek a boo, "where did it go?"
What's goodness of fit and its implications on parenting?
the match between a child’s temperament and the environmental demands with which the child must cope
What's egocentrism and how can it be tested?
the inability to distinguish between one’s own perspective and someone else’s
3 mountains/buildings/rocks task
What are Erikson’s proposed psychosocial stages and accompanying goals?
Trust versus mistrust: first year of infancy.
Autonomy versus shame and doubt: 1 to 3 years.
Initiative versus guilt: 3 to 5 years.
Industry versus inferiority: 6 years to puberty.
Identity versus identity confusion: 10 to 20 years.
Intimacy versus isolation: twenties and thirties.
Generativity versus stagnation: forties and fifties.
Integrity versus despair: sixties to death.
At what point(s) does a developing fertilized set of gametes called a zygote, embryo, and fetus?
Zygote: Conception to 4 weeks
Embryo: 8-12 weeks
Fetus: 12+ weeks
What's a schema and what 2 mechanisms cause them to change?
Actions or mental representations that organize knowledge
Assimilation: Using existing schemes to analyze new information/experiences
Accommodation: Kids adjust schemes to fit new information/experiences
Implications of childcare here in the US vs the rest of the world?
Paid vs unpaid leaves, rates of family caregiving has gone up, daycare services are very $$$
What's myelination and why is it important?
It accelerates the speed of neuron communication
- If neuron gets damaged it can impair or completely remove function (Alzheimer's or MS)