Exploring Lifespan Development - Chapter 1

Traditional Behaviorism

Directly observable events, stimuli and responses began in America with John Watson Watson was inspired by Pavlov's dogs and Classical Conditioning: UCS - Meat unconditioned stimulus UCR - Salivate unconditioned response CS - conditioned stimulus - bell CR - conditioned response - salivate

Development is Lifelong

Lifespan perspective A leading dynamic systems approach. Four assumptions make this broader view. 1) lifelong 2)multidimensional and multidirectional 3) highly plastic 4)affected by multiple, interacting forces 5) continued~Influenced by biology, history, social, and cultural

G. Stanley Hall

One of the most influential American psychologists and founder of childhood study movement - The Normative period

Psychoanalytical Perspective

People move through a series of stages in which they confront conflicts between biological drives and social expectations. How these are dealt with determines the persons ability to grow and learn and get along with others Freud founder of psychoanalytical movement and Erikson were strongly influential with this

correlation coefficient

a number that describes how two measures, variables are associated with eachother

Sensitive period

a time that is optimal for certain capacities to emerge and when the individual is especially reponsive to environmental influences. However, boundaries are less well defined than those of the critical period. Development can occur later but it is harder to induce.

Naturalistic observation

go into the field or natural environment and record the behavior of interest

Nature

inborn traits from genetics, born with tendencies to repsond certain ways

Clinical interviews

researchers use a flexible conversational style to probe for the participants point of view

Human Development

scientific study of age related changes in behavior, thinking, emotion and personality

Information Processing

the human mind might also be viewed as a symbol manipulating system through which information flows called -information processing

Age related changes classified in 3 categories

1 Universal Changes 2 Group Specific Changes 3 Individual Differences

Continuity Vs Discontinuity

Are age-related changes primarily about quantitative (continuity) or qualitative changes (discontinuity)?

Piagets - theory

As the brain develops and children's experiences expand they move through 4 broad stages: 1 - sensorimotor 2 - preoperational 3 - concrete operational 4 - formal operational

Developmental Science & Early Scientific Theories

A field of study devoted to understanding constancy and change throughout lifespan

Context example

A shy individual who fears social encounters develops in a very different context from those of an outgoing agemate who readily seeks company

Darwin: forefather of scientific child study

Adaptation to environment; 1 survival of the fittest 2 natural selection (certain species adapt to environment)

Multidimensional

Affected by intricate blend of biological, physiological, and social forces

Nonnormative influences

Age graded and history graded influences are normative and nonnormative events are irregular They have become so powerful and Age-graded influences less so in contemporary adults development Examples of nonnormative include things such as piano lessons and diversity, delayed marriage, things that differ in history and age graded influences from separate age groups that strongly affect a person's development. It's not nonnormative because the events that take place in the individuals life isn't predictable as well as the history that will appear in that time is unpredictable

Group Specific influences

Changes shared by all individuals who grow up together. Cultural, Historical share same experiences, that effect generation. Explain why people born around the same time tend to be alike in ways that separate them from other people born at different times

Piagets Cognitive developmental theory

Children actively construct knowledge as they manipulate and explore their world

Universal influences

Common to every individual, wrinkles, social clock etc Events that are strongly related to age and time. Fairly predictable in when they occur and how long it will last

Ethology

Concerned with adaptive or survival cause of behavior and it's evolutionary history

Microsystem

Consists of activities and interaction patterns in the persons immediate surround (1st level of Branfenbrenners theory)

Behavior modification

Consists of procedures that combine conditions and modeling to eliminate undesirable behaviors and increase desirable responses

Macrosystem

Cultural values like, laws, customs, and resources (4th)

Vygotskys sociocontrust theory

Culture, values, beliefs, of a social group were transmitted to the next generation. Necessary for children to adopt these to keep the community's culture alive

Freud's Psychosexual theory

Emphasizes development based on sexual growth Three parts Id, ego, super ego integrated into five parts oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital

Social learning theory Albert Bandura

Emphasizes modeling aka imitation or observational learning, as a powerful source of development

Mesosysyem

Encompasses connections between microsystems (2nd level)

Eriksons Psychosocial theory

Eriksons theory. The ego makes a positive contribution to development acquiring attitudes and skills that make the individual an active contributing member of society.

Common Research Methods

Experiments, searching for the cause and effect relationships

Multidirectional

Good then bad then good again. Growth and decline of given variables

Nature / Nurture controversy

Heredity versus environmental factors. Both aid in development but differ in how a person develops

Freud's Three parts of the Personality; Three levels of consciousness:

ID-unconscious; Largest portion of the mind, present at birth source of biological needs/desires Ego-conscious; Current thoughts, rational part of mind emerges in early infancy redirects id impulses acceptably Superego-the conscience, develops from ages 3-6 from interactions with caregivers

Structured Interview

Including test and questions in which each participant is asked the same set of questions

Structured observations

Investigators set up laboratory observations that evoke the behavior of interest so that every participant as equal opportunity to display response

Philosophical Roots

Long history early philosophers trying to explain Human Development: Why do some grow up good/bad? Internal/external factors? Original sin/Christian doctrine? Innate goodness (jean-jacques rousseau)? Bad behavior is learned from others or happens in efforts to express innate goodness? The blank slate (tabula raza) john locke Experience and forms are imprinted/ external environmental factors

Normative approach

Measures of behavior are taken on large numbers of individuals, age related

Development is Plastic

Plasticity Change throughout life

Discontinuity

Qualitative change involves reorganiztaion and emergence of new strategies, qualities or skills 10 year old friendships can have new levels of intimacy Qualitative changes in thinking, feeling, and behaving that characterize specific periods of development

Continuity

Quantitative change (in amount) 2 year old has no individual friends in her playgroup

BF Skinner Operant conditioning

Reinforcers and punishments Positive/negative reward to change behavior

Exosystem

Social setting that do not Contain the developing persons but nevertheless affecting g experience in immediate settings (3rd level)

Watson's little Albert experiment;

UCS - White furry rat USR - no fear CS - Loud noise when rat was in view CR - Fear

Contexts

Unique combinations of personal and environmental circumstances that can result in different paths of change

Ecological systems theory

Views the person as developing withing a complex system of relationships affected by multiple levels of the surrounding environment (bronfenbrenner)

Self Reports

ask participants to provide information about their perceptions

Clinical or case study method

brings together a wide range of information on one person, including interviews, observations and test scores

Developmental cognitive neuroscience

brings together researchers from psychology, biology, neuroscience and medicine to study the relationship between changes in the brain and developing persons cognitive processing and behavior patterns

Continuous or Discontinuous Development?

continuous a process of gradually augmenting the same types of skills that were there to begin with discontinuous a process in which new ways of understanding and responding to the world emerge at specific times

Nurture

learned traits from the environment internal models of experience, how you are effected depends on how you intrepret interpretations of experience is organized into sets of assumptions/expectations person has about themself and another person ecological - school, neighborhood, parents upbringing

ethnography

like the clinical method, research is a descriptive qualitative technique, but instead of aiming to understand a single indiv it is directed toward understanding a culture or distinct social group

Chronosystem

prefix means time: chronosystem is what Bronfenbrenner called the temporal dimensions of his model

Correltional Design

researchers gather information on individuals generally in natural life circumstances without alter their experiences

Domains of Development

scientist use four broad categories 1 Physical Domain-changes in size, shape, characteristices of the body 2 Cognitive Domain-thinking, memory intellectual skills 3 Social Domain-Relationship of individual to others 4 Emotional Domain- Understanding expression of emotions

Goal of Psychology

to describe, explain, predict and control (influence) behavior and mental processes