psy240 chapter 6

You interviewed a 4-year-old and a fourth grader for your class project in child development, but mixed up your interview notes. Which statement was made by the 4-year-old? a) "My friend Megan is better at math than me." b) "Sometimes I get mad at my friends, but maybe it's because I'm too stubborn." c) "I have a cat named Kit, and I'm the smartest girl in the world."

c - This child has clearly not left the preoperational bubble

Which statement about popularity in elementary school is true?

Some popular children are relationally aggressive.

Which child displays externalizing tendencies?

Ginny, who is impulsive

Pia is 8 years old. According to Piaget, Pia is MOST likely in the ______ stage of cognitive development.

concrete operations

Nine-year-old Nancy believes she is no scholar, but she is a star athlete, the life domain she really cares about. Nancy MOST likely has _____.

high self-esteem

When do MOST people master learning strategies such as rehearsal and selective attention?

in elementary school

Ten-year-old Bella has a best friend named Sophia. Which would be Bella's MOST likely description of why Sophia is her best friend?

"I can tell her anything, and I know she will stand up for me."

Rates of physical aggression _____ as children get older.

typically decrease significantly

Armando is in middle childhood. That means he is between the ages of _____.

7 and 12

Middle childhood refers to boys and girls from ages _____.

7 to 12

_____ is to externalizing tendencies as ______ is to internalizing tendencies.

Aggression; timidity

Alyssa wants to replace Brianna as Chloe's best friend, so she spreads horrible rumors about Brianna. Brianna overhears Alyssa dissing her and starts slapping Alyssa. Of the four types of aggression discussed in this section - direct, proactive, reactive, relational - which two describe Alyssa's behavior, and which two fit Brianna's actions?

Alyssa = proactive, relational; Brianna = direct, reactive

Observe a 6-year-old for a day and list specific examples of failures in inhibition and selective attention.

Answers are up to the students, but examples should center on not being able to focus on something that requires careful attention, and reacting impulsively when a child should be able to inhibit her responses.

Bakari argues that ADHD is being overdiagnosed. Make Bakari's case, referring to the information in this section.

Bakari might mention the fact that boys are more often diagnosed with this disorder and that exercise mutes the symptoms of this condition. Each phenomenon suggests that, rather than being an internal, biological "problem," ADHD results from a poor childhood-environment fit.

Why does self-esteem decline during elementary school?

Children have reached concrete operations and can realistically compare their abilities to their peers' abilities.

Laura's son has been diagnosed with ADHD. Based on this section, list some environmental strategies she might use to help her child.

Don't put your son in demanding situations that involve time management. When he studies, provide "white" background noise. Use small immediate reinforcers, such as prizes for good behavior that day. Get your son involved in sports or playing exciting games. Avoid power assertion (yelling and screaming), and go out of your way to provide lots of love.

When Steven played hide-and-seek with his 4-year-old nephew, he realized that while Ethan could run well, the child was having trouble not betraying his hiding place and understanding the rules of the game. The reason is that Ethan's ______ cortex is an early developmental timetable than his ______ lobes.

Ethan's motor cortex is on earlier developmental timetable than his frontal lobes.

Excellent motor skills are (crucially important/not very important) in adult fitness, and preschool (gross motor skills/fine motor skills) predict children's later academic abilities.

Excellent motor skills are not very important in adult fitness, and preschool fine motor skills predict children's later academic abilities.

Obesity can be easily cured by diet and exercise. (true/false)

False; it's difficult to cure childhood obesity by diet and exercise.

Lee is 10 years old. According to Piaget, which of the following is NOT a characteristic of Lee's cognition?

He can think abstractly in a scientific way.

Which statement about cyberbullying is FALSE?

It is less toxic than bullying IRL (in real life).

Which child is MOST apt to be prosocial?

Jake, a happy child

Which child is the LEAST likely to be prosocial?

Lizzie, an anxious and fearful child

Which fourth-grader is the LEAST apt to be the victim of bullying?

Luis, who is friendly and confident

Mario feels that everyone in the fifth grade is out to get him. What is the label for Mario's worldview?

Mario has a hostile attributional bias

_____ is the ability to observe one's abilities and actions from an outside frame of reference and to reflect on one's inner state.

Self-awareness

A teacher wants to intervene with a student who has been teasing a classmate. Identify which statement is guilt-producing, which is shame-producing, and which involves the use of induction. Then name which response(s) would promote prosocial behavior. a) "Think of how bad Johnny must feel." b) "If that's how you act, you can sit by yourself. You are nice enough to be with other kids." c) "I'm disappointed in you. You are usually such a good kid."

a = induction; good for promoting prosocial behavior b = shame; bad strategy c = guilt; good for promoting prosocial behavior

Personality theorist Harry Stack Sullivan believed that friendships in middle childhood are stepping-stones for _____.

adult romantic relationships

Ian goes to school and pulls the hair of a younger child. When Ian returns home, his brother's friends push Ian around and pretend they are going to punch him. The next day at school, Ian trips another child on the school bus. Ian's behavior appears to be that of a(n):

bully-victim.

Hurtful behavior that one initiates in order to get something or reach a goal is called _____ aggression.

proactive

In mathematics education, the abstract concept of the variable, usually represented as "x" or "y," is often introduced when children are about 12 years old, marking the transition from the _____ stage to the _____ stage in Piaget's theory of cognitive development.

concrete operations; formal operations

Which neurotransmitter has been implicated in ADHD?

dopamine

Arthur has _____ because he tends to act on his immediate emotions and behave aggressively.

externalizing tendencies

Children with _____ tend to act on their immediate emotions and behave aggressively.

externalizing tendencies

"Imagine how hurt you would feel if your friend treated you that way." This type of child-rearing intervention is called _____.

induction

Personality theorist Harry Stack Sullivan believed that friendships in middle childhood attempt to fulfill which developmental need?

intimacy

Effective interventions to reduce bullying center on:

making bullying a socially unacceptable activity.

Brandon is in the third grade. What stage of development is he in?

middle childhood

Bryce is celebrating his ninth birthday. Bryce is in the _____ stage of life.

middle childhood

People who feel sympathy instead of empathy are _____ likely to help people in need because _____.

more; empathy can cause anxiety and paralysis

Long-term weight problems can be detected as early as:

preschool.

Shame is the _____ feeling when people are personally humiliated, while guilt is a more _____ emotion people feel when they have violated a moral standard or hurt someone else.

primitive; sophisticated

Chinyelu is 9 years old. He is extremely athletic and can run and jump almost as well as his older siblings. However, he has great difficulty in controlling his impulses. This is because _____ has just begun in the frontal lobes, unlike the visual and motor cortices in which the process began much earlier.

pruning

A hostile or destructive act carried out in response to being frustrated or hurt is called _____ aggression.

reactive

After a visiting-team hockey player slams a home-team player into the boards lining the rink, the home-team player shoves the visiting player. This home-team player's action illustrates _____ aggression.

reactive

Which environmental intervention is helpful in relieving attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms?

regular recess breaks

Eleven-year-old Sarah loves to tattle on her older sister. Last week, Sarah told her sister's boyfriend that her sister had kissed another boy. Sarah showed _____ aggression.

relational

Joshua ignores the advertisements on a website so that he can focus on information the site provides. In this example, Joshua is demonstrating _____.

selective attention

A child's ability to filter out extraneous information and focus on what he or she needs to know is called:

selective attention.

Drawing on Erikson's and Piaget's theories, name the qualities that make childhood (and human beings) special.

Our ability to transcend immediate appearances and control our emotions to work for a goal make middle childhood (and humanity) special.

Personality theorist Harry Stack Sullivan believed that children's friendships fulfill the developmental needs of self-validation and intimacy. Which child is Sullivan MOST likely describing?

Reece, age 10

Carl, a fourth grader, is faced with the dilemma of whether to stand up for a bullied classmate. Which consideration does not predict he will reach out? a) Carl has the skills to help. b) Carl believed that the child deserves his help. c) Carl is incredibly sensitive to other people's emotions.

c - being intensely sensitive to others' emotions does not predict behaving prosocially

Imagine transporting yourself to the 1950s and watching fourth graders in your neighborhood. Which observation is false? a. children were better coordinated than they are today. b. children were more physically active than they are today. c. parents spent more time monitoring children's outdoor play than they do today.

c. (parents used to be less micromanaging or heavily involved)

A male's frontal lobes do NOT mature physiologically until he reaches _____.

his twenties

Samantha can observe her own actions and abilities from an outside frame of reference and is able to reflect on her feelings. Samantha has _____.

self-awareness

In information-processing theory, _____ is a limited-capacity gateway system containing all the material that one can keep in awareness at a single time.

working memory

Rhashan, a 3-year-old, is continually testing his abilities in the wider world. Josh, a second grader, is learning that he has to work for what he wants. Pick Erikson's psychosocial stages for each boy.

Rhashan = initiative; Josh = industry

After a stroke, Reginald has difficulty ordering problem-solving steps in a logical sequence. Moreover, he is noticeably more impulsive than he had been in the past. Reginald appears to have suffered damage to the _____ lobe.

frontal

This is the area at the uppermost front of the brain.

frontal lobe

Pruning in the frontal lobes starts _____ in other brain regions.

later than

When asked to explain why Josie is her best friend, Shareese answers, "Because she makes me laugh and is nice to me." These girls are MOST likely _____ children, because they describe their friendship in terms of _____qualities.

older; internal

Identify which of the following boys has internalizing or externalizing tendencies. Then, for one of these children, design an intervention using principles spelled out in this section: Ramon sees himself as wonderful, but he is having serious trouble getting along with his teachers and the other kids; Jared is a great student, but when he gets a B instead of an A, he decides that he's "dumb" and gets too depressed to work.

Ramon = externalizing tendencies; Jared = externalizing tendencies. Suggested intervention for Ramon: point out his realistic problems ("You are having trouble in X, Y, Z areas"), but cushion criticisms with plenty of love. Suggested intervention for Jared: continually point our reality ("No one can always get A's. In fact, you are a fabulous student"). Get Jared to identify his "hopeless and helpless" ways of thinking, and train him to substitute more accurate perceptions.