Brain development
What are the three main areas of the brain that form during early foetal development?
The forebrain, midbrain, and hindbrain.
A young child cannot understand a situation from another person's point of view. What is this called?
Egocentrism.
What is the difference between a fixed and a growth mindset?
A fixed mindset sees abilities as fixed and unchangeable; a growth mindset believes practice and effort can improve abilities.
What must come before skills such as problem-solving and reasoning can develop?
Factual knowledge.
How many children participated in the study?
100 children.
How many parent-child pairs participated in the study?
53 parent-child pairs.
Which part of the brain is responsible for regulating basic functions such as breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure?
The medulla oblongata.
A child calls a helicopter a "bird" because it flies. Which process is being used?
Assimilation – fitting new information into an existing schema.
A student says, "There's no point trying because I don't have the ability." Which mindset does this demonstrate?
A fixed mindset, because ability is seen as something that cannot be changed.
Why does having relevant factual knowledge help someone solve a problem?
It leaves more processing power in working memory for solving the problem.
What were the four age groups used in the study?
4–6.5, 6.5–8, 8–9.5 and 9.5–12 years.
What is process praise?
Praise directed at a child's behaviour, effort or actions, rather than the child as a person.
Which area develops rapidly during the first year and is particularly important for movement and balance?
The cerebellum.
A child learns that a helicopter is different from a bird and changes their existing schema. Which process is this?
Accommodation – changing a schema because new information does not fit it.
Why might saying "You're really good at maths" be less helpful than praising a child's effort?
Ability praise can encourage a fixed mindset, whereas effort praise encourages the belief that improvement is possible.
Why should a skill be practised until it becomes automatic?
Automatic skills use less working-memory capacity, leaving more capacity for other tasks.
What did children aged approximately 4–6.5 years typically do when asked to show what the doll could see?
They tended to choose their own view, demonstrating egocentrism.
Why were parents and children observed in their homes rather than in a laboratory?
To study praise in a natural setting, increasing ecological validity.
At approximately what age does the medulla oblongata form, and what does it connect?
At about 20 weeks of foetal development, it connects the rest of the brain to the spinal cord.
A child is shown two identical glasses containing the same amount of water. The water from one glass is poured into a taller, thinner glass. The child says the taller glass now contains more water. What feature of cognitive development is the child demonstrating?
Centration – the child focuses on one feature, the height of the liquid, and is unable to conserve quantity.
A student gets a poor test result, asks for feedback, and changes how they revise. Explain this using mindset theory.
This demonstrates a growth mindset because the student believes improvement is possible and responds to failure with effort and a new strategy.
A student practises multiplication tables so often that they can recall the answers without consciously thinking about them. According to Willingham’s theory, why could this help them solve more difficult maths problems?
The multiplication facts have become automatic, so they place fewer demands on working memory, leaving more capacity for solving the problem.
What developmental change was found between approximately 7 and 10 years of age?
Children increasingly understood that another person could have a different viewpoint; by around 9–10 years, they could understand the doll's perspective.
Researchers record a parent praising their child by saying, “You worked really hard on that puzzle.” What type of praise is this, and what type of motivational framework would it be expected to encourage?
Process praise. It would be expected to encourage an incremental/growth motivational framework, where the child sees ability as something that can change and improve.
Approximately how many new neural connections form every second in the brain between birth and age 3 years?
Around 700–1,000 new connections per second.
A child is given several sticks of different lengths and successfully arranges them from shortest to longest. Which cognitive ability is the child demonstrating, and which stage of development is it associated with?
Seriation, associated with the concrete operational stage.
Give one strength and one weakness of mindset theory.
Strength:it has practical applications because parents and teachers can encourage effort and persistence. Weakness:much supporting research uses artificial experiments, which may reduce validity.
A student is asked to solve a difficult physics problem but has very little knowledge of the topic. Even though they have good reasoning skills, they struggle. According to Willingham’s theory, why?
Factual knowledge precedes skill. Without enough relevant knowledge in long-term memory, the student has to process too much unfamiliar information in their limited working memory, making problem-solving more difficult.
A 5-year-old and a 10-year-old are both shown the Three Mountains model and asked to choose the picture showing what a doll on the opposite side can see. Predict how the two children are likely to respond.
The 5-year-old is likely to choose the picture showing their own view, demonstrating egocentrism. The 10-year-old is more likely to correctly choose the doll’s view, showing an ability to decentre and understand another perspective.
A parent knows that they are being filmed interacting with their child and deliberately gives the child more praise than they normally would. Explain one problem this creates for the study.
The parent's behaviour may not be natural because they have changed it due to being observed. This reduces the validity of the findings because the recorded behaviour may not accurately represent how the parent normally praises their child.