Claire struggles to fit in at school, she doesn’t make friends easily and is often alone.

Barry is off to Australia for his daughters wedding, he really wants to be there to give her away but every time he thinks about getting on a plane he starts to panic, his heart starts racing & he feels sick. He’s not sure he’ll be able to go through with it.

David is the school bully, he often swears at his class mates and is physically violent towards them. He will kick and do karate chops on anyone who gets in his way.

Jonny & Nigel are playing happily when Jonny’s mum brings them both a drink in identical short fat transparent beakers. Jonny starts to cry because he wants his special glass. His mum tips the juice from the original beaker into Jonny’s tall and narrow special glass which becomes full to the brim. Now it is Nigel’s turn to cry “now he’s got more than me”, he wails

Strengths: Acknowledges how people change and develop over time Helps us to understand the importance of childhood experience on adult behaviour Allows childhood developmental disorders to be understood and treated Uses a variety of research methods

Weaknesses Use of children in research raises many ethical concerns Children may not always understand the procedure of experiments and researchers may make assumptions about why the child has acted a certain way as they can articulate their own explanations

Contributions to Psychology Contributed to the work of educational psychologist Criminology Social development Cognitive development

Methods Used: Observations Experiments Case studies – detailed studies of one person or a small group Longitudinal studies – research that is carried out over a long period of time

Contributions to Society Psychodynamic therapy now widely used to treat patients Education – improving teaching and childcare Treating children with developmental disorders

Nature vs. Nurture The developmental approach acknowledges the strengths of both nature and nurture – some stages of development are invariant whilst others are maturational and change depending on the environment

Samuel & Bryant (1983) ‘Asking only one question in the conservation experiment’

Bandura (1961) ‘Transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive models’

Freud (1909) ‘Analysis of a phobia in a five year old boy’