1. Development Over the Life Span

2. Human development Developmental psychologists
Study physiological and cognitive changes across the life span
How these are affected by a person’s genetic predispositions, culture, circumstances, and experiences.
Socialization = The process by which children learn the rules and behavior expected of them by society.

3. Prenatal Development

4. Germinal stage Embryonic stage Fetal stage
Begins at fertilization, when the male sperm unites with the female ovum (egg); the fertilized single-celled egg is called a zygote.
Embryonic stage
2 weeks to 8 weeks gestation. Most major systems in early development
Fetal stage
8 weeks to birth.

5. Agents that cross the placenta
German measles X-rays and other radiation and toxic substances Sexually transmitted diseases Cigarette smoking Alcohol and other drugs

6. Infant
Development

7. Physical abilities Newborn reflexes Rooting Sucking Grasping Eye blink
Knee-jerk
Sneezing

8. Perceptual abilities Visual abilities
Quickly develops beyond initial range of eight inches
Can distinguish contrasts, shadows, and edges but not most colors
Other senses (hearing, touch, olfaction)
Allow the baby to discriminate between a caregiver and a stranger

9. Culture and maturation
Many aspects of development depend on customs
Ex. Differences in babies’ sleep arrangements reflect cultural and parental values. Some cultures believe in sleeping the baby close to the mother for a few years, while others value independent sleeping.

10. Attachment Contact comfort LINK (Take notes)
Harlow’s monkeys demonstrated the importance of contact.
Crucial for newborns, and continues being important throughout life

11. Attachment Separation anxiety
The distress that most children develop, at about 6 to 8 months, when their primary caregivers temporarily leave them with strangers
Tested using the Strange Situation procedure
A parent-infant “separation and reunion” procedure that is staged in a laboratory to test the security of a child’s attachment

12. Types of attachment Secure Insecure (avoidant) Insecure (anxious)
A parent-infant relationship in which the baby is secure when the parent is present, distressed by separation, and delighted by reunion
Insecure (avoidant)
A parent-infant relationship in which the baby doesn’t care if the parent leaves the room and does not seek contact when the parent returns
Insecure (anxious)
A parent-infant relationship in which the baby clings to the parent, cries at separation, and reacts with anger or apathy to reunion

13. Which is correct?
In the Strange Situation procedure, an infant cries when their primary caregiver leaves the room and is joyous upon being reunited with their primary caregiver. This describes which attachment style?
Avoidant
Secure
Anxious-ambivalent

14. What factors promote insecure attachment?
Abandonment and deprivation in the first year or two of life
Parenting that is abusive, neglectful, or erratic
The child’s own genetically influenced temperament
Stressful circumstances in the child’s family

15. Cognitive Development

16. Language development
Acquisition of speech begins in the womb - Infants are responsive to pitch, intensity, and sound at birth.
By 4-6 months of age, children can recognize their names and regularly spoken words.
By 6-12 months of age, children become familiar with sound structure of the native language and start babbling.
By one year of age, children may start to use their first word, and also rely heavily on symbolic gestures.
Between months, toddlers combine 2 to 3 words into telegraphic speech.

17. Noam Chomsky Innate capacity for language
chapter 3
Noam Chomsky Innate capacity for language
Language is too complex to be learned bit by bit.
Children are born with universal grammar and a sensitivity to the core features common to all languages.
Nouns and verbs, subjects and objects, negatives

18. Evidence supporting Chomsky’s view
chapter 3
Evidence supporting Chomsky’s view
Children. . .
in different cultures go through similar stages of linguistic development.
combine words in ways adults never would.
learn to speak or sign correctly without adult correction.
not exposed to adult language may invent a language of their own.
as young as 7 months can derive simple linguistic rules from a string of sounds.

19. Piaget

20. Two adaptive processes
Piaget - cognitive development consists of mental adaptations to new situations and experiences.
Two adaptive processes
Assimilation: absorbing new information into existing mental categories
Accommodation: modifying existing mental categories in response to new information

21. Piaget’s 4 Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor
Preoperational
Concrete Operations
Formal Operations

22. Sensorimotor stage Birth to 2 years
Infant learns through concrete actions: looking, touching, putting things in the mouth, sucking, grasping.
“Thinking” consists of coordinating sensory information with bodily movements.
Major accomplishment is object permanence.

23. Preoperational stage Ages 2 to 7
Children still lack the cognitive abilities necessary for understanding abstract principles and mental operations.
Are egocentric.
Cannot grasp concept of conservation.

24. Concrete operations Ages 7 to 12
Children’s thinking is still grounded in concrete experiences and concepts, but they can now understand conservation, reversibility, and cause and effect.
Children can categorize objects/ideas and can order things in a serial fashion.

25. Formal operations stage
Ages 12 to adulthood
Teenagers are capable of abstract reasoning.
Can reason about situations not experienced firsthand
Can think about future possibilities
Can search systematically for solutions
Piaget

26. Current views
Cognitive abilities develop in continuous, overlapping waves rather than discrete steps or stages.
Preschoolers are not as egocentric as Piaget thought.
Children, even infants, reveal cognitive abilities much earlier than Piaget believed possible.
Cognitive development is influenced by a child’s culture.

27. MORAL DEVELOPMENT

28. Moral reasoning: Kohlberg’s theory
Children’s ability to understand right from wrong is attached to cognitive development.
Morality is a stage-like process of development.
We start by avoiding punishment, move to conforming to rules and law, and then develop standards based on human rights.

29. Getting children to be good
Power assertion
Parent uses punishment and authority to correct misbehavior.
Induction
Parent appeals to child’s own resources, abilities, sense of responsibility, and feelings for others in correcting misbehavior.

30. Self-control and conscience
Self-regulation
The ability to suppress an initial wish to do something in favor of doing something else that is not as much fun
Is related to
the ability to delay gratification
control negative emotions
pay attention to the task at hand
do well in school

31. Adolescence

32. Physiology of adolescence
Period of life from puberty until adulthood
Puberty
The age at which a person becomes capable of sexual reproduction
Average age is 12 ½ years in white girls, and a few months earlier in black girls
Menarche
A girl’s first menstrual period

33. Timing of puberty
Onset of puberty depends on genetic and environmental factors.
For example, body fat triggers the hormonal changes.
Early vs. late onset
Early maturing boys have more positive views of their bodies and are more likely to smoke, drink alcohol, do other drugs, and break the law.
Early maturing girls are usually socially popular but also regarded by peer group as precocious and sexually active. They are more likely to fight with parents, drop out of school, and have a negative body image, and feel angry or depressed.

34. What do you think?
Over the past few decades, there has been an increase in adolescent violence.
True
False

35. What do you think?
Most teenagers experience a sudden drop in self-esteem.
True
False

36. What do you think?
Today’s teenagers are more narcissistic than their predecessors.
True
False

37. Adolescents: Media perception vs. reality
The rate of violent crimes committed by adolescents has been dropping steadily since 1993.
Very little change in narcissism levels over the decades
According to the National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, today’s teenagers are more sexually conservative than their parents were at their age.

38. Areas of adolescent turmoil
Conflict with parents
Mood swings and depression
Higher rates of reckless, rule-breaking, and risky behavior

39. Draw a timeline that begins with birth and ends with death
Draw a timeline that begins with birth and ends with death. Write every milestone you can possible think of that occurs throughout your life.
Identify whether each milestone is physical, emotional, social, or a combination.

40. Psychologists have studied the relationships between the milestones of human aging and emotional and social development.
Sigmund Freud ( ) believed an individual's personality development depends on the resolution of conflicts between childhood sexual urges and demands of society.

41. Modern psychologist Erik Erikson refined and expanded Freud's theories into eight stages of development. He focused on the influence of society and culture on human personality development.

42. Erik Erikson was born in Germany in 1902
Erik Erikson was born in Germany in In grammar school he was teased for being Jewish. At an early age Erikson did not feel comfortable as a German or as a Jew. This feeling was the basis for his notion of an "identity crisis."
In the 1920s he met Anna Freud, a psychoanalyst and Sigmund Freud's daughter. He studied child psychoanalysis under her in Vienna. In 1933 he moved to the United States, where taught at Harvard, Yale, University of California at Berkeley, and other institutions. Erikson died in 1994.

43. Erikson’s eight stages
Trust versus mistrust
Infancy (Ages 0 -1)
Autonomy versus shame & doubt
Toddler (Ages 1 – 3)
Initiative versus guilt
Preschooler (Ages 3 – 5)
Competence versus inferiority
School-age (Ages 5 – 12)
Identity versus role confusion
Adolescence (Ages )
Intimacy versus isolation
Young adulthood (Ages 18 – 40)
Generativity versus stagnation
Middle adulthood (Ages 40 – 65)
Ego integrity versus despair
Late adulthood (Ages 65+)

44. Use the Web sites listed below to research the stages.
Record the following facts:
Name of stage
Age range
Crisis or conflict
Description
Positive outcome (also called virtues)
Negative outcome (also called maladaptations)
Significant relationships
Discuss one example—ideally from your own lives—that illustrates a particular stage-specific crisis. Describe a positive and negative outcome for your example.

46. Web sites
Erik Erikson - Eight Stages of Psychosocial Development
Stages of Social-Emotional Development In Children and Teenagers
Erik Erikson(scroll down to chart of stages)

47. Identity Crisis
What are some examples of teenagers struggling to define their own identity?
Why do you think an identity crisis occurs for most people during their teenage years?
What are basic skills and values that are necessary to successfully resolve an identity crisis?

48. The transitions of life
Emerging adulthood (ages 18-25)
Phase of life distinct from adolescence and adulthood
In some ways an adult, in some ways not
The middle years (ages 35-65)
Perceived by many as the prime of life
Menopause: the cessation of menstruation and the production of ova, usually a gradual process lasting several years
Frequently received with relief

49. Old age Some types of thinking change, others stay the same.
Fluid intelligence: the capacity for deductive reasoning and the ability to use new information to solve problems; relatively independent of education and declines in old age
Crystallized intelligence: cognitive skills and specific knowledge of information acquired over a lifetime; depends heavily on education and remains stable over lifetime

50. Intellectual changes over the life span
Some intellectual abilities dwindle with age. Numerical and verbal abilities relatively stable

51. Old age Apparent senility often caused by combination of medications
Depression and passivity are result of loss of meaningful activity, intellectual stimulation, and control over events.
Weakness and frailty caused by sedentary lifestyles

52. Are adults prisoners of childhood?
Research psychologists have questioned the psychodynamic assumption that childhood traumas have emotional effects that inevitably continue into adulthood. Considerable evidence disputes this claim.

53. Challenging your assumptions
Resilience was very high for people who demonstrated:
Recovery from the effects of war
Recovery from living with abusive or alcoholic parents
Recovery from sexual abuse