Psychology Final

step parents

-remarriage of divorced parents has led to an increase in step-parenting (more than half of divorced parents re-marry within 10 years) -young children are more likely to accept step-parents than older children are -most step-parent research has been done with step-fathers and their children (conflicts particularly with pre-adolescent girls) -difficulty with discipline (more for step-mothers than step-fathers) -but step parents can be as protect against negative outcomes as biological parents (chances of delinquency lower among children of remarried mothers than among divorced mothers that do not remarry)

review

The conscience is believed to reflect internalized moral standards; it restrains the child from engaging in immoral behaviour and involves feelings of guilt for misbehaviour. Contrary to Freud's beliefs, the conscience emerges slowly over time, beginning before age 2. Children are more likely to internalize parental standards if they have secure attachments with their parents and if their parents use rational explanations in their discipline rater than excessive parental power. Factors that promote the development of conscience differ somewhat for children depending on their temperament and genetic inheritance

sexual minorities: the Kinsey scale

-Alfred Kinsey and American sexologist developed the Kinsey scale of sexual response/experience at a given time -sexuality is a spectrum ranging from exclusively heterosexual behaviour to exclusively homosexual behaviour -most curent sexologists argue that the Kinsey scale only encompasses one of three spectra: 1. sexual orientation 2. biological sex 3. gender identity -so the best illustration of sexual orientation would involve all three spectra -androphilic, ambiphilic gynephilic=person's sex is not specified -male, female=person's sexuality is not specified

same-sex parents

-Marriage Act (2005): marriage between two consenting adults regardless of sex -of same-sex couples in Canada: -16% of lesbian couples have children living with them -3% of gay men have children living with them -are there differences between kids raised by opposite-sex parents and same-sex parents? no in most ways they are identical -adjustment and personality are similar -sexual orientation and gender-typed behaviour are also not affected -social relationships are mostly unaffected except for some exclusion from peers in some communities -adjustment outcomes for children of same-sex parents follow the same logic as for children of opposite-sex parents -children have better outcomes when there is: 1. low parental conflict 2. sharing of parental responsibilities 3. high positive sexual identity

self-conscious emotions: embarrassment, pride, guilt, and shame

-during the second year of life children begin to show a range of new emotions: embarrassment, pride, guilt and shame -these emotions often are called self-conscious emotions because they relate to our sense of self and our consciousness of others' reactions to us -these emotions emerge in the second year because this is when children gain the understanding that they themselves are entities distinct from other people and begin to develop a sense of self -such a view implies an abrupt qualitative change in children's abilities to experience these emotions and suggests discontinuity in emotional development due to the emergence of an underlying cognitive awareness -the emergence of self-conscious emotions is fostered by children's growing sense of what adults and society expect of them and their acceptance of these external standards -at about 15 to 24 months some children start to show embarrassment when they are made the centre of attention -the first signs of pride are evident inc children's smiling glances at others when they have successfully met a challenge or achieved something new, like taking their first step -by three years of age children's pride is increasingly tied to the level of their performance; children express more pride when they succeed on difficult tasks than they do when they succeed on easy ones -guilt is associated with empathy for others and involves feelings of remorse and regret about one's behaviour as well as the desire to undo the consequences of that behaviour -shame does not seem to be related to concern about others; when children feel shame their focus is on themselves; they feel they are exposed and they often feel like hiding -in general the degree of association of guilt feelings with bator hurtful behaviour increases in the second to third year and the individual differences in children's guilt observed at 22 months remain relatively stable across the early preschool years -in everyday life the same situation often elicits shame in some individuals and guilt in others; which emotion children experience partly depends on parental practices -studies of North American children have found that they are more likely to experience guilt than shame if they have done something wrong, their parents emphasize the "badness of the behaviour (you did a bad thing) rather than of the child (you're a bad boy) -children are also more likely to feel guilt rather than shame if their parents help them understand the consequences their actions have for others, teach them the need to repair the harm they have done, avoid publicly humiliating them and communicate respect and love for their children even when disciplining them -the situations likely to induce self-conscious emotions in children vary across cultures as does the frequency with which specific self-conscious emotions are likely to be experienced e.g. Japanese tend to avoid bestowing praise on the individual because they believe that it encourages a focus on the self rather than on the needs of the larger social group -in many Asian cultures that emphasize the welfare of the group rather than the individual not living up to social or familial obligations is likely to evoke shame or guilt and children in these cultures report experiencing guilt or shame more than do children in the US -in such cultures parents' efforts to elicit shame from their young children are often direct and disparaging (I've never seen any 3-year-olds who behave like you); this kind of explicit belittling appears to have a more positive effect on children in these Asian cultures than it does on children in Western cultures

the child as an influence on parenting

-individual differences in children contribute to the parenting they receive, which in turn, contributes to differences among children in their behaviour and personalities

theme 6: individual differences

-if a newborn is female it is likely that, compared with males, she will be more self-revealing with friend, more vulnerable to depression, more inclined to prosocial behaviour, and more deposed to using relational aggression -children who do well on one measure of social or emotional functioning-relations with parents, relations with peers, relations with teachers, self-esteem, prosocial behaviour, and lack of aggression and lying-also tend to do well on others -two other crucial dimensions of individual differences are attachment and self-esteem -toddlers that are securely attached to their mother tend to be more enthusiastic and positive about solving problems with her, to comply more often with her directives and to obey her requests even when she isn't present; such children also tend to get along better with other toddlers and to be more sociable and more socially competent -similarly children and adolescents who are high in self-esteem also tend to be string on many other dimensions of social and emotional functioning; they tend to be generally hopeful and popular, to have many friends and mohave good academic and self-regulation skills -in contrast those with low self-esteem tend to feel hopeless and to be prone to problems such as depression, aggression and social withdrawal -stability over time: -people who have easy temperaments during infancy tend to continue to have easy temperaments in middle and later childhood -the reasons for such stability od psychological characteristics are to be found in the stability of both genes and environment -major changes such as divorce and unemployment, do occur and they affect children's happiness, self-esteem and other characteristics -secure early attachment provides a working mode; that influences subsequent relationships with other people -the relative stability of most children's environments contributes to these long-term continuities pd psychological functioning -if children;s environments change in important ways, the typical continuities may be disrupted accordingly; thus stressful events such as divorce, reduce the likelihood that children who were securely attached during infancy will continue to show the positive relations with peers usually associated with secure attachment -determinants of individual differences: -the degree of genetic influence on individual differences tends to increase over the course of development (IQs of adopted children and their biological parents steadily increase over time even if the children have no contact with their biological parents) -over the course of development children bemuse increasingly free to choose environments that are in accord with heir genetic predispositions individual differences reflect children's experiences as well as their genes -parents exert as large an influence other children's social and emotional development as on their intellectual development -the likelihood that children will adopt their parents' standards and values appears to be influenced by the type of discipline their parents use with them -similarly, parents influence their children's willingness to share especially if they discuss the reasons for sharing with their children and have good relationships with them -the effect of different types of parenting depends on the child -for fearful children the key factor determining whether the child internalizes the parents' moral values is gentle discipline; they may become so anxious in the face of rigorous discipline that they cannot focus in the moral values that the parents are trying to install -for fearless children the key factor is a positive relationship with one' parents; such children often so not respond to gentle discipline, they tend to internalize the parents' values only if they feel close to them

emotional development

-infants begin displaying clear emotion by about 8 weeks of age -by toddlerhood children begin exhibiting self-conscious emotions (shame, pride, guilt); the strength of these emotions begins to correlate with the size of the accomplishment/failure by about 3 years of age -children's understanding of emotion advances rapidly between 5 and 10 years of age -but even adolescents may not have complete emotional development

the development of emotional regulation

-is characterized by three general age-related patterns of change: 1. the transition from infants' relying almost totally on other people to help them regulate their emotions to them being increasingly able to self-regulate during early childhood 2. the increasing use of cognitive strategies and playful problem solving to control negative emotions 3. the increasing section and use of appropriate, effective regulating strategies

fetal alcohol spectrum disorders

-likelihood of acquiring FAS depends on frequency and intensity of drinking behaviour -FAS occurs in 2-5% of people in North America and Western Europe -effects of FAS on cognition: 1. reduced executive function 2. reduced language skill 3. IQ at or below the third percentile 4. attention deficits 5. social deficits -have a thin upper lip, minor ear abnormalities, indistinct philtrum (little indent above upper lip), low nasal bridge, flat midface and short nose

authoritarian parenting

-low in warmth/responsiveness -high in demandingness -enforce behaviour/thinking through parental power: 1. threats 2. punishment -believe that negative behaviour comes from the child -engage in psychological control -children of authoritarian parents tend to: 1. have low social and academic competence 2. experience more bullying 3. have difficulty coping with stress 4. have higher rates of depression, delinquency and substance abuse *these effects are not necessarily cross-culturally valid

depression

-major bouts of depression are much more common in adolescence than in childhood although a small percentage of preschoolers exhibit depressive symptoms that predict problems with depression in the school years -between 12 and 19 years of age rates of depression begin to increase -major or clinical depression is characterized by come combination of at least five of the following symptoms occurring nearly everyday for at least 2 weeks: 1. depressed mood most of the time 2. marked diminished interest or pleasure in almost all activities 3. significant weight loss 4. insomnia or excessive sleeping 5. motor agitation 6. fatigue or loss of energy 7. feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt 8. diminished ability to think or concentrate 9. recurrent thoughts of death -beside these specific diagnostic criteria social withdrawal and bodily complaints are common in depressed youth as is anxiety -adolescents from a lower socioeconomic level are especially prone to major depression there are many possible causes of depression, one is heredity -major depression often runs in families -children whose mothers are depressed tend to exhibit a pattern of activation in the prefrontal cortex and amygdala that is associated with greater reactivity to the environment, negative emotionality, and withdrawal; they also may have elevated hormone-based stress reactivity -these biological correlates are likely partly due to a genetic vulnerability but they also could be exacerbated by problems in parenting that often accompany maternal depression including insensitivity and disengagement -other family factors likely also contribute to depression in youth -in particular whether or not the mother is depressed, children's symptoms of depression are frequently associated with low levels of family engagement, support, and acceptance and with high levels of negativity -chronic stress and conflict in the family also predict depression in youth -depressed individuals tend to see themselves and others in an excessively negative way and thus feel incompetent, flawed and worthless and view the world as cruel and unfair -they may also fell that they cannot change things for the better because they believe that negative events are beyond their control and they often do not take credit for their accomplishments -depressed youth also tend to ruminate about the potential causes and negative consequences of their symptoms; this rumination can intensify their negative feelings without leading to productive problem solving and solutions (rumination=a perspective focus in one's own negative emotions and on their causes and consequences without engaging in efforts to improve one's situation. co-rumination=extensively discussing and self-disclosing emotional problems with another person) -other investigators argue that youth get depressed because they lack the skills needed for appropriate emotional regulation and positive social interactions -children and adolescents who experience depression frequently are low in regulation and exhibit behavioural problems such as aggression, stealing, delinquency, and substance abuse -this pattern may contribute to the difficulties depressed youth often tend to have in their relationships with peers -it has also been proposed that peer victimization and rejection contribute to depression an idea that seems supported by the finding that a sense of connection with peers and school is associated with less depression -in a recent study however it was found that children's depression contributes to peer victimization which in turn predicts low acceptance by peers and that problems with peers did not cause depression -in many cases depression is likely due to a combination of personal vulnerability and external stressful factors e.g. girls who were low in the regulation of sadness were prone to depressive symptoms in preadolescence if their parents were not especially caring and supportive -the combination of family difficulties (e.g. separation from parents) in early childhood and high levels of interpersonal stress later on may increase youth's vulnerability to depression perhaps because early stress can affect the child's ability to adapt physiologically years later -a common treatment for depression in youth us drug therapy but recent concerns have been raised about the possibility that antidepressants may increase the risk of suicidal thinking and behaviour for some adolescents -other effective treatments include cognitive-behviuoral therapy and programs designed to promote optimistic thinking and teach positive approaches to solving personal problems

moral development

-most researchers argue that intent is more important than content in determining morality -so most theories of morality have examined intent (Piaget, Kohlberg)

theme 1: nature and nurture: all interactions, all the time

-nature: biological characteristics -nuture: child-rearing experiences provided by parents, caregivers, and other adults -children are active participants in their own development -from birth onward children's nature influences the nature they receive -nature and nurture begin interacting before birth: -prenatal exposure to teratogens can cause a wide variety of physical and cognitive impairments; however whether a given baby will actually be affected depends on the genetics of the parents, genetic of the fetus and environmental factors such as the timing and amount of exposure -fetal learning occurs as well; the experience of hearing the mother's voice while the womb leads newborns to prefer her voice to that of other women -infants nature elicits nuture: -babies are cute so most people enjoy watching and interacting with them; their looking and smiling at other people motivates others to feel warmly toward them and and to acre for them -their attentiveness to sights and sounds that they find interesting encourages others to talk to them and provide the stimulus necessary for learning -timing matters: -if a pregnant women contracts rubella early in pregnancy when the developing visual and auditory systems are at a particularly sensitive point, her baby my be born deaf or blind -"use it or lose it"-for normal development to occur children must encounter the relevant experiences during a certain window of time e.g. immigrant children that learn English as a second language before age 7 acquire grammatical competence in English that eventually matches that of native-born English-speaking children; however individuals who immigrate at later ages rarely gain complete mastery of English grammar, even after many years of hearing and speaking the language of their adopted land -deaf children's learning offing language shows a similar pattern-early exposure results in more complete grammatical mastery -in many aspects of the development of perception, language, intelligence, emotions, and social behaviour, the timing of experience is crucial-normal early experience is vital for successful later development -nature does not reveal itself all at once: -many genetically influenced properties donate become evident until middle childhood, adolescence, or adulthood -physical changes that occur at puberty -nearsightedness-is realized with more reading during childhood -certain types brain damage ( sometime IQ test are comparable though age 6 but after that they fall considerably) -the development of schizophrenia-the only children with a substantial likelihood of becoming schizophrenic are those who have a biological parent who is schizophrenic and who grew up in troubled families -epigenetics-experience can enhance or silence gene expression-early stressful environments, such as those imposed by poverty, seem to especially influence later gene expression-some of these effects of the early environment on the genome are passed down to the next generation -everything influences everything: -the closer the biological relation between two children the more similar their degree of self-esteem is likely to be -reason, genes influence a wide range of other characteristics that themselves influence self-esteem including attractiveness, athletic talent, and academic success -support from one's family and peers also contribute in a positive way to self esteem (poverty and unpopularity contribute in a negative way) -children's nature-their genes, personal characteristics, and behavioural tendencies-interact with the future they receive from parents, teachers, peers, the broader society, and the physical environment inlays that shape their self-esteem, intellect and other qualities

characteristics of aggressive-antisocial children and adolescents

1. a difficult temperament 2. the tendency to process social information in negative ways

parenting styles and practices

-parenting styles are parenting behaviours and attitudes that set the emotional climate in regard to parent-child interactions, such as parental responsiveness and demandingness -researchers have identified two dimensions of parenting style that are particularly important: 1. the degree of parental warmth, support and acceptance 2. the degree of parenting control and demandingness -the pioneering research on parenting style was conducted by Diana Baumrind who differentiated among four styles of parenting related to the dimensions of support and control: 1. authoritative parenting: -they tend to be demanding but also warm and responsive -they set clear standards and limits for their children, monitor their children's behaviour and are firm about enforcing important limits -they allow their children considerable autonomy within those limits, are not restrictive or intrusive and are able to engage in calm conversation and reasoning with their children -they are attentive to their children's concerns and needs and communicate openly with their children about them -they are measured and consistent rather than harsh or arbitrary in disciplining them -they want their children to be socially responsible, assertive and self-controlled -children of authoritative parents: 1. tend to be competent, self-assured and popular with peers 2. are able to behave in accordance with adults' expectations and are low in antisocial behaviour 3. as adolescents they tend to be relatively high in social and academic competence, self-reliance, and coping skills and relatively low in drug use and problem behaviour 2. authoritarian parenting: -tend to be cold and unresponsive to their children's needs -they are also high in control and demandingness and expect their children to comply with their demands without question -they tend to enforce their demands through the exercise of parental power, especially the use of threats and punishment -authoritarian mothers tend to respond with more negative emotion than authoritative mothers -authoritarian mothers tend to view negative child behaviour as caused by the child but positive behaviour as caused by external events -children of authoritarian parents tend to: 1. be relatively low in social and academic competence, unhappy and unfriendly and login self-confidence, with boys being more negatively affected than girls' in early childhood 2. high levels of authoritarian parenting are associated with youths' experiencing negative events at school (e.g. being teased by peers, doing poorly on tests) and ineffective coping with everyday stressors, along with depression, aggression, delinquency, and alcohol problems -so far parents control of behaviour has been measured in terms of the setting and enforcing of limits -another type of control is psychological control-control that constrains, invalidates, and manipulates children's psychological and emotional experience and expression e.g. threatening to withdraw love and attention if they do not behave as expected, exploiting children's sense of guilt, etc. -these kinds of psychological control are more likely to be reported by children in relatively poor families -their use by parents predicts children's depression in late middle childhood and adolescence as well as externalizing problems (e.g. aggression and delinquency) -parental use of psychological control may not always be a causal factor in children's problem behaviours e.g. some adolescents who exhibit high levels of problem behaviours also engage in high levels of conflict with their mothers which in turn appears to elicit their mothers' use of psychological control 3. permissive parenting: -are responsive to their children's needs and wishes and are lenient with them -they do not require their children to regulate themselves or act in appropriate ways -children of permissive parents: 1. tend to be impulsive, lacking self-control, prone to externalizing problems and low in school achievement 2. as adolescents they engage in more school misconduct and drug or alcohol urethane do peers with authoritative parents 4. rejecting-neglecting parenting: -are disengaged parents low in both demandingness and responsiveness to their children -they do not set limits for them or monitor their behaviour and are not supportive of them -sometimes they are rejecting or neglectful to their children altogether -these parents are focused on their own needs rather than on their children's -children of rejecting-neglecting parents tend: 1. to have disturbed attachment relationships when they are infants or toddlers and problems with peer relationships as children 2. to in adolescence exhibit a wide range of problems from antisocial behaviour and low academic competence to internalizing problems (e.g. depression, social withdrawal), substance abuse, and risky or promiscuous behaviour -the negative effects of this type of parenting appear to continue to accumulate and worsen over the course of adolescence -in addition parenting styles establish an emotional climate that affects the impact of whatever specific parenting practices may be employed e.g. children are more likely to view punishment as being justified and indicating some serious misbehaviour when it comes from an authoritative parent than when it comes from a parent who generally is punitive and hostile -parenting style affects children's receptiveness to parents' practices; children are more likely to listen to and care about their parents' preferences and demands if their parents are generally supportive and reasonable than if they are distant, neglectful or expect obedience in all situations -children's behaviour sometimes shapes parents' typical parenting style e.g. in a recent study adolescents' reports of relatively high levels of externalizing problems (e.g. delinquency, loitering and intoxication) and internalizing problems (e.g. low self esteem, depressive symptoms) predicted a decline in parents' authoritative parenting styles two years later, whereas an increase or decline in authoritative parenting over the same two years did not predict a change in the adolescents' adjustment

abnormal emotional development

-20% of children in grades 6-10 report depressive symptoms -mood psychopathology diagnoses increase rapidly in adolescence -mood psychopathology is not the only emotional disorder but it is the most common

the special case of bisexuality

-bisexual youth (who self-identify as having erotic feelings toward both males and females) are at particular risk for mood psychopathology and suicidality -for some SMY bisexuality is a stage that is particularly difficult -for others bisexuality is life-long, but community acceptance may be lower -mental health outcomes for heterosexual and homosexual SMY are better than for bisexual SMY

Piaget's theory of moral judgement

-Piaget observed children interacting with their peers -he theorized that younger children judge right and wrong based on content -older children judge right and wrong based on intent -cup breaking stories: -which little boy is naughtier? -younger children (under 6) believe that the boy that broke more cups is worse behaved -older children believe that the boy that broke one cup is worse behaved (because his intentions to get the treat out of the cupboard were bad) -Piaget divided children into three stages of moral development: 1. morality of constraint 2. transitional period 3. autonomous morality 1. morality of constraint (< 7 years): -corresponds to the pre-operational stage -rules are 'unchangeable' and 'real' (children at this age do not have the cognitive ability to know that rules are abstract and made-up) -justice is whatever adults say it is -'good' actions are those that obey rules -'bad' actions are those that disobey rules 2. the transitional period (7-10 years): -children increase their interactions with peers (not just with caregivers) -these peer interactions are more equal/egalitarian(equality of all people) than interactions with adults -as children play more games (and make up games themselves) they learn that rules are malleable and sometimes arbitrary 3. autonomous morality stage (after age 11): -children cease accepting authority blindly -understand that rules are made-up (rules should be fair and egalitarian) -believe that punishment should be proportional to offence -problems with Piaget's theory: -Piaget placed a lot of emphasis on peers in advancing moral development; but not all peers are helpful -the quality of peer interactions matters -Piaget's stories do not always produce the same results in younger children; specifically when kids watch the stories happening on video they are more likely to judge the one-cup breaker as more poorly behaved

factors affecting the development of conscience

-children develop a conscious slowly over time -by age 2 toddlers start to show an appreciation for moral standards and rules and begin to exhibit signs of guilt when they so something wrong -these two components of conscience ( the desire to comply with rules and feelings of guilt when failing to do so) are quite stable in their early development from 22 to 45 months of age -children;s growing understanding of others' emotions and goals and their increasing capacity for empathetic concern are likely contributors to the development of conscience -as they mature children are more likely to take on their parents' moral values and to exhibit guilt for violating those values, if their parents use disciplinary practices that de-emphasize parental power and and include rational explanations that help children understand and learn the parents' values -children's adoption of their parents values is also facilitated by a secure, positive parent-child relationship which inclines children to be open to and eager to internalize their parents communication of their values -children may develop a conscience in different ways according to their temperament -toddlers who are prone to fear (fearful of unfamiliar peopler situations) tend to exhibit more guilt at a young age than do less fearful children -for those infants who are prone to fear the development of conscience seems to be promoted by the mother's use of gentle discipline that includes reasoning with the child and providing non-material incentives for compliance -gentle discipline arouses fearful children just enough that they attend to and remember what their mothers tell them -in contrast gentle discipline seems to be unrelated tot he development of conscience in fearless young children, perhaps because it is insufficient to arouse their attention -what does seem to foster the development of conscience in fearless children is a parent-child relationship characterized by secure attachment and mutual cooperation -fearless children appear motivated more but the desire to please their mother than by fear of her -the effect of parenting on children's conscience also vary with their genes which affect temperament -this can be seen in the dynamic between maternal responsiveness-the mother's acceptance of and sensitivity to the child-and the child's genotype for the serotonin transporter gene SLC6A4 -a particular allele variant of SLC6A4 is believed to make children especially reactive to their rearing environment -for children with this allele variant high maternal responsiveness is associated with high levels of conscience at 15 to 52 months -this pattern is an example of differential susceptibility whereby some children are more reactive than others are to the quality of parenting they receive be it of high or low quality -the early development of conscience undoubtedly contributes ti whether children come to accept the moral values of their parents and society e.g. (children were led to believe that they had broken a valuable object) the children's level guilt at 22 and 45months of age predicted their morality at 54 months of age (e.g. violating rules about touching prohibited toys); this in turn predicted whether they engaged in hurtful or problematic social behaviour at 67 months e.g. children's internalization of parental rules at age 2 to 4 predicted their self-perceptions as being moral at 67 months -therefore the nature of early parent-child disciplinary interactions sets the stage for children's subsequent moral development

theme 2: children play active roles in their own development

-self-initiated activity: -infants display looking preferences that guide their attention to the most informative aspects of the environment that their processing abilities can handle and thus enhance their learning -at around 3 months most infants become able to follow moving objects fairly smoothly with their eyes, which improves their ability to learn about the actions occurring around them -at 6 or 7 months most become able to crawl -by 8 or 9 months most can hold up their heads which allows them to reach accurately for objects without being supported -by 13 or 14 moths most begin to walk independently -as development continues children's self initiated activity extends to additional domains such as language -as their language proficiency develops children become more skilled at initiating conversations that bring them information, allow them to express their feelings and desires and help them regulate their emotions -the effects of self-initiated activities also are seen at older ages in other areas such as self-socaliztion and antisocial behaviour -boys and girls choose to play predominantly with members of their own gender; the play patterns reflect the children's own choices (segregation arises from differences in the kinds of play that boys and girls tend to prefer) -in later childhood and adolescence, children's choices of friends and peer groups become important influences on their own behaviour, in that children tend to increasingly act like their friends and others in their social group in positive and negative ways -active interpretation of experience: -children's and adolescents' interpretation of their experience extends to inferences about themselves as well as about the external world -when some children fail on a task they feel sad and question their ability; others who also failed take the failure as a challenge and an opportunity to learn -similarly in ambiguous situations, aggressive children tend to attribute hostile intentions to others even when the others' motives are unclear; this interpretation sometimes leads the aggressive children to lash out before the other person can hurt them -thus subjective interpretations of experiences, as well as objective reality, shape development -self-regulation: -in the first few months after they are born infants rely almost totally on their caregivers to help them cope with fright and frustration -by 6 months they learn to cope with some upsetting situations by rubbing their bodies to soothe themselves -during the toddler and preschool periods children become increasingly adept at using physical strategies, such as looking away, when faced with stressors or temptations -during elementary school they increasingly use cognitive strategies such as reminding themselves that an unpleasant experience will be over soon, to cope with negative situations -across a wide range of ages, children who successfully regulate their emotions tend to be more popular and more socially competent than those who are less skilled at emotional regulation -these self-regulation skills are related to long term developmental outcomes including drug use -children;s early self-control also has been found to be a string predictor of their later grades in school and of occupational and economic success in adulthood -over the course of childhood and adolescence children increasingly regulate their development through their choice of activities -whether young children of to sports events, movies libraries, etc. depends mainly on whether their parents take them there -whether adolescents engage in the same activities depends mainly on their own preferences; selecting moral values, choosing a romantic partner, pursuing an occupation and deciding whether to have children are just a few of the major decisions that adolescents and young adults face -eliciting reactions from other people: -because children of all ages differ from one another in behaviour and appearance they evoke different reactions from other people -attractive children are less likely to suffer parental rejection and punishment than are less attractive ones e.g. when children encounter difficulty learning particular material teachers act in more caring ways if the child has generally been well behaved than if the child has been badly behaved in the past -most parents of children who are disobedient, angry and challenging try to be supportive but firm with them; however if the bad behaviour and defiance continue many parents become hostile and punitive -other parents faced with belligerence and aggression back down from confrontations and increasingly give in to their children's demands; once such negative cycles are established they are difficult to stop -if teenagers act disruptively and parents respond with hostility, problems generally worsen over the course of adolescence -at all ages children who are cooperative, friendly, sociable and sensitive to others tend to be more popular with their peers, whereas those who are aggressive or disruptive tend to be disliked and rejected -peer reactions to children's behaviour often have long-term consequences; rejected children are more likely than popular children to have difficulty later in school and to engage in criminal activity -in many ways, then, children influence their development, not only by initiating actions, interpreting their experiences, and regulating their emotions, but also by electing reactions from other people that shape their own subsequent behaviour

review

Children's tendencies in regard to experiencing and regulating emotions may be affected by differences in temperament among different groups people. These tendencies may also be influenced by differences in parenting practices which in turn are often affected by cultural differences in beliefs about what emotions are valued and when and where emotions should be expressed.

overview of parenting styles

authoritative-relationship is reciprocal, responsive; high in bidirectional communication authoritarian-relationship is controlling, power-assertive; high in unidirectional communication permissive-relationship is indulgent; low in control attempts rejecting-neglecting-relationship is rejecting or neglecting; uninvolved

birth order

intelligence: -probably not affected much at all -differences in intelligence are probably due to stereotype threat career: -first born children may be more successful overall because they have a self-perception that they should be -76% of adults believe that first-borns are more successful goals: -first borns may have different goals than second or third borns -first born goal tend to be more self-centred -later children tend to have other-centered goals sibling teaching: -first borns certainly teach their younger siblings -but the relationship appears to be bidirectional, with later born children teaching their older siblings

article review: Lewis et al.

question: -how do pride and shame vary in 3-year-olds as a function of task difficulty -is there a difference between boys and girls hypotheses: -3-year-olds will show greater pride when succeeding at difficult tasks and greater shame when failing at easy tasks population: -30 3-year-olds operationalization: -three different tasks (puzzle, drawing, basketball) -there was an easy version and a hard version of each -behavioural coding of facial expression/body language/verbal language (to measure pride/shame) results: -3-year-olds' pride and shame varied as a function of task difficulty -more shame at failing easy tasks -more pride at succeeding at hard tasks -pride was equal for males and females -shame was greater for females than for males

domains of social judgement

-moral judgements: pertain to issues of right and wrong, fairness and justice -social conventional judgements: pertain to customs or regulations intended to ensure social coordination and social organization , such as choices about of dress, table manners and forms of greeting -personal judgements: pertain to actions in which individual preferences are the main consideration (e.g. choice of friends or recreational activities)

cultural differences in emotional expression

-most basic emotions are expressed universally -but the degree to which emotions are expressed may differ by culture -a few examples: -by 11 months North American infants are more distressed by unfamiliar stimuli than are Chinese infants -American children are more prone to anger than Japanese children -Chinese children are more prone to shame than American children

coming out

-"coming out" is defined as the revelation of one's sexual identity to others (typically among sexual-minority youth, not sexual-majority youth) -consists of many different processes 1. first recognition 2. test and exploration 3. identity acceptance 4. identity integration -not all youth go through all steps and not all go through in the same order -most sexuality-minority youth do not reveal their sexual identity to others until after age 19 -typical North American progression of coming out: 1. first to close friends and/or sexual partners 2. then to siblings 3. then to parent (usually mother first) -not cross-culturally valid

theories on nature and emergence of emotion

-Charles Darwin argued that the facial expression for certain basic emotional states are innate to the species-and therefore similar across all peoples-and are found even in very young babies -discrete emotions theory: each emotion is innately packaged with a specific set of physiological, bodily, and facial reactions and that distinct emotions can be differentiated very early in life -other researchers maintain that emotions are not distinct from one another at the beginning of life and that environmental factors play an important role in the emergence and expression of emotions -infants only experience excitement and distress in the first few weeks of life and other emotions emerge at later ages as a function of experience -there are three basic affect systems: 1. joy/pleasure 2. anger/frustration 3. wariness/fear -these three systems undergo developmental change from primitive to more advanced forms during the early years of life -the role of the environment is also emphasized by theorists who take a functionalist approach to understanding emotional development -they propose that the basic function of emotions is to promote action toward achieving a goal in a given context e.g. the emotion of fear often causes one to flee or otherwise avoid a stimulus that represents a threat; this action helps achieve a goal of self-preservation -emotional reactions are affected by social goals, the immediate context, and the individuals involved in it, as well as others' interpretations of events and their reactions to them, both in a given context and in the past e.g. young children's experience of emotions such as shame and guilt is related to the values and standards communicated to them by their parents, the manner in which the values and standards are communicated and the quality of the children's relationships with their parents -cognition and experience shape emotional development -from the dynamic-systems theory perspective novel forms of functioning (emotional or otherwise) arise through the spontaneous coordination of components interacting repeatedly -in these interactions specific cognitions (including appraisals of events and objects), emotional feelings, and physiological and neural events tend to link together more closely with each repeated occasion, forming coherent "emotional interpretations" that become increasingly coordinated each time they are co-activated -emotional reactions develop differently for each person, based on an individual's emotion-related biology and cognitive capacities, his or her experiences, and how these factors tend to coalesce across time in an increasingly coherent and predictable manner look at page 387 for list of what emotions mean

theme 5: the sociocultural context shoes development

-Japanese culture places a higher value on hiding negative emotions; quite likely because of this cultural influence, Japanese preschoolers and school-aged children less often express anger and other negative emotions than do North American peers -cultural influences not only parents' actions but also children's interpretations of this actions; harsh parenting seen as caring in Asian families -far more children grow up with divorced parents than in the past and these children are at risk for many problems; they are more prone to sadness and depression, have lower self-esteem, do less well in school and are less socially competent; most children from divorced families do not have serious problems, only a minority do -maternal employment outside the home has increased -in almost all respects, children who receive care outside the home tend to develop similarly, both emotionally and cognitively to those that do not -economic influences: -children and adolescents from impoverished families more often are rejected as friends and more often are lonely -illegal substance use, crime, and depression also are more common among poor adolescents than among peers from wealthier backgrounds -poor children more often live in dangerous neighbourhoods; grow up in homes with one or no biological parents; attend inferior daycare centres and schools; have have few books and other intellectually stimulating material in their homes -influences of family and peers: -friends can provide companionship and feedback, contribute to self-esteem and serve as a buffer against stress; during adolescence they can be particularly important sources of sympathy and support -on the other hand friends can also have a negative influence, drawing children and adolescents into reckless and aggressive behaviour including crime, drinking and drug use

Kohlberg's theory of moral judgement

-Kohlberg built on Piaget's theory of moral judgement -20 year longitudinal study (starting at age 10) -like Piaget, Kohlberg told children stories and asked them moral questions -on the basis of his results Kohlberg developed six stages of moral judgement (these stages overlap and not all people reach the 5th and 6th stages) -preconventional level: 1. punishment and obedience orientation 2. instrumental and exchange orientation -conventional level: 3. mutual interpersonal expectations 4. social system and conscience -postconventional level: 5. social contract 6. universal ethical principles (look at figure on slide 31 of Nov. 26) (Heinz story video as well) Kohlberg stage 1 (childhood through early adolescence): -punishment and obedience orientation -obedience to authority -fear of punishment -Heinz story: -Heinz should steal the drug because he will get in trouble if he lets his wife die -Heinz should not steal the drug because he will go to jail for doing so Kohlberg stage 2 (early-through mid-adolescence): -instrumental and exchange orientation -what is right is what is in one's own best interest or involves equal exchange between persons -Heinz story: -Heinz should steal the drug because if he gets caught he can just give it back -Heinz should not steal the drug because it isn't his fault his wife has cancer Kohlberg stage 3 (mid-adolescnce through adulthood): -mutual interpersonal expectations -doing what is good is doing what people expect of you -being good is important for maintaining good relationships with other people -Heinz story: -Heinz should steal the drug because no one will think he's bad for doing so -Heinz should not stealth drug because everyone will think he's a criminal Kohlberg stage 4 (adulthood): -social system and conscious stage -doing what is good is fulfilling one's duties to society -keeping promises and keeping laws -prevent the breakdown of society -Heinz story: -Heinz should steal the drug because he has promised to look after his wife in sickness/health -if no one took care of their loved ones, society would break down -stage 4 provides no reason to not steal the drug Kohlberg stage 5 (some adults): -social contract stage -right behaviour involves upholding rules when they are in the best interest of the group -different from stage 4 because laws can be broken in stage 5 if they are unjust laws -Heinz story: -Heinz should steal the drug because the right to life is more important than the right to property -stage 5 provides no reason not to steal the drug -Kohlberg's is the most widely accepted theory of moral development but is isn't perfect: -Kohlberg's system is based on western values and a western legal system -Kohlberg studied boys only (did not discuss possible gender differences in moral judgement)

Kohlberg's stages

-Kohlberg proposed three levels of moral judgement: 1. preconventional -self-centered -focuses on getting rewards and avoiding punishment 2. conventional -is centred on social relations -it focuses on compliance with social duties and laws 3. postconventional -is centred on ideals -it focuses on moral principles -each of these three levels involves two stages of moral judgement; however so few people attain the highest stage (stage 6) of the post conventional level that Kohlberg eventually stopped scoring it as a separate stage and many theorists consider it an elaboration of stage 5 -people in all parts of the world move through the stages in the same order although they differ in how many stages they attain -as in Piaget's theory, age-related advances in cognitive skills especially perspective taking are believed to underlie the development of higher-level moral judgement -consistent with Kohlberg's theory people who have higher-level cognitive an perspective-taking skills and who are better educated exhibit higher-level moral judgement -when boys were 10 years old they used primarily stage 1 reasoning (blind obedience to authority) and stage 2 reasoning (self-interest) -thereafter reasoning in these stages dropped off markedly -for most adolescents aged 14 and older stage 3 reasoning (being good to earn approval or maintain relationships) was the primary mode of reasoning although some adolescents occasionally used stage 4 reasoning (fulfilling duties and upholding laws to maintain social order) -only a small number of participants even by age 36 ever achieved stage 5 (upholding the best interests of the group while recognizing life and liberty as universal values)

Piaget's theory of moral judgement

-Piaget believed that interactions with peer, more than adult influence, account for advances in children's moral reasoning -Piaget concluded that there are two stages of development in children's moral reasoning as well as a transition period between the stages

children's understanding of emotion

-a child's understanding of emotion is their understanding of how to identify to identify emotions, as well as their understanding of what emotions mean, their social functions and what factors affect emotional experience -since an understanding of emotion affects social behaviour it is critical to the development of social competence

factors affecting divorce

-a variety of interacting factors seem to predict whether the painful experience of divorce and remarriage will cause children significant or lasting problems 1. parental conflict: -not only is parental conflict distressing for children to observe but it almost cause them to feel insecure about their own relationship with their parents, even making them fear that their parents will desert them or stop loving them -inaddition when there is parental conflict fathers tend to have lower quality relationships with their children which may contribute to children's adjustment problems -in contrast when parents are cooperative and communicate with each other children exhibit fewer behaviour problems and are closer with their non-resident father -conflict between parents often increases when the divorce is being negotiated and may likely continue for years after the divorce -this ongoing conflict is especially likely to have negative effects on children if they feel caught in the middle of it -similar pressures may arise if children feel the need to hide from one parent information about, or their loyalty to the other parent, or if the parents inappropriately disclose to them sensitive information about the divorce to each other -adolescents who feel that they are caught up in their divorced parents' conflict are at increased risk for being depressed or anxious an for engaging in problematic behaviour such as drinking, stealing, cheating at school, fighting, or using drugs 2. stress: -a second factor that affects children's adjustment to divorce is the stress experienced by the custodial parenting children in the new family arrangement -not only must custodial parents juggle household, child care, and financial responsibilities that usually are shared by two parents but they often must do so isolated from those who might otherwise help -this isolation typically occurs when custodial parents have to change their residence and lose access to established social networks or when friends and relatives (especially in-laws) take sides in the divorce and turn against them -in addition custodial mothers usually experience a substantial drop in their income and this financial stress is often associated with problems in their physical health -the quality of parenting as well as children's adjustment tends to be highest when the parents are married and are the biological parents of the children -as a result of all these factors the parenting of newly divorced mothers and fathers can be less than optimal -e,g the parenting of newly divorced mothers compared with that of mothers in two-parent families often tends to be characterized by more irritability and coercion and less warmth, emotional availability (e.g. parental sensitivity, structuring, non-intrusiveness, and non-hostility), consistency and supervision of children -this is unfortunate because children tend to be most adjusted during and after the divorce if their custodial parents is supportive, is emotionally available and uses authoritative parenting -making parenting even more difficult for the mother, non-custodial fathers often are permissive and indulgent with their children increasing the likelihood that children will resent and resist their mother's attempts to control their behaviour (on an optimistic note intervention efforts among divorced mothers and children that focus on improving mother-child interactions and establishing the mother's use of consistent discipline have been found to enhance the quality of the mother-child relationship and improve the children's adjustment) -thus stressful life experiences during and after divorce often undermine the quality of parenting and of family interactions which affect children's adjustment -these stressful life experiences can also have a direct effect on the child's adjustment e.g. having to change residences because of reduced household income may mean that at a time of high emotional vulnerability a child also has to go through a wrenching transition to a new home, neighbourhood, school and peer group -disruptions such as these due to reduced family income are likely to contribute to the problems some children of divorce experience including declines in school performance 3. age of the child: -younger children have more trouble understanding the cases and consequences of divorce ;they are especially more likely to be anxious about abandonment by their parents and to blame themselves for the divorce -although older children and adolescents are better able to understand a divorce than are younger children they are nonetheless particularly at risk for problems with adjustment, including poor academic achievement and negative relationships with their parents -adolescents who live in neighbourhoods characterized by a high crime rate, poor schools, and an abundance of antisocial peers are ate especially high risk, most likely because the opportunities to get into trouble are amplified when there us only one parent (who most likely is at work during the day) to monitor the child's activity -college and university students are less reactive to their parents' divorce probably because of their maturity and relative independence from the family -with regard to their parents' remarriage young adolescents appear to be more negatively affected than younger children -one possible explanation for this is that young adolescents' struggles with the issues of autonomy and sexuality are heightened by the presence of a new parent who has authority to control them and is a sexual partner of their biological parent 4. contact with non-custodial parents: -what does seem to affect children's adjustment after divorce is the quality of the contact with the non-custodial father: children who have contact with competent, supportive, authoritative non-custodial fathers show better adjustment and do better in school than children who have frequent but superficial or disruptive contact with their non-custodial fathers -in contrast contact with non-residential fathers who have antisocial traits (e.g. who are vengeful, prone to getting into fights, manipulative, discourteous) predicts an increase in children's non-compliance with their fathers -non-custodial mothers provide more emotional support for their children than non-custodial fathers do and are more likely to maintain contact through text messages, phone calls, and overnight visits; the more the non-custodial mothers maintain such involvement with heir children the better adjusted their children are 5, the contribution of long-standing characteristics: -it is important to recognize that the greater frequency of problem behaviours in children in divorced and remarried families may not be solely due to the divorce and remarriage; rather it sometimes may be related to characteristics of the parents or the children that existed long before the divorce e.g. the parents may have difficulty with stress or forming positive social relationships as suggested by he fact that parents who divorce are more likely than non-divorced parents to be depressed, alcoholic, or antisocial; to hold dysfunctional beliefs about relationships; or to lack skills for regulating conflict and negative emotion -any of these characteristics would be likely to undermine the quality of parenting the child receives -this idea that the greater frequency of problem behaviours in children of divorce may be related to long-standing characteristic of the children themselves is supported by he finding tact children of divorce tend to be more poorly adjusted prior to the divorce than are children from non-divorced families e.g. a longitudinal study showed that children whose parents divorced over the course of the study showed higher levels of anxiety and depression even before the divorce than children in intact families; the subsequent divorce led to a further increases in these symptoms likely in response tot he divorce itself -this difference may be due to stress in the home, poor parenting, or parental conflict prior to divorce -additionally it may be due to the children's own inherited characteristics such as a lack of self-regualtion or a predisposition to negative emotion; such characteristic would not only underlie children's adjustment problems but when expressed in both children and their parents, would also increase the likelihood of divorce -children with difficult personalities and limited coping capacities may also react more adversely to the negative events associated with divorce than would other children

depression and mood psychopathology

-after age 10 one of the biggest changes that occurs in emotional development is the emergence of negative and depressive symptoms -in early adolescence positive emotions decrease and negative emotions increase -this shift ends by about age 15/16 and the emotions are evenly distributed -but rates of mood psychopathology increase between 12 and 19 years of age -2 to 4% of the youth population in Canada has been diagnosed with a mood or bipolar disorder -20% of children in grades 6-10 report depressive symptoms at least once a week -depression and other mood psychopathologies are caused predominantly by genetics -they can be exacerbated by environmental pressures: 1. maternal depression 2. low family engagement/support 3. chronic stress 4. low school success 5. low peer acceptance -treatments for mood psychopathology in adolescence: 1. psychopharmaceuticals -effective for some individuals -may increase suicidality for some adolescents 2. cognitive-behavioural therapy -thoughts, feelings, and behaviours all influence each other -CBT is problem-focused and action-oriented 3. other therapy to increase positive thinking and problem-solving

emotional knowledge development

-at the same time as emotional expression changes, emotional knowledge also develops -2-year-olds can identify happiness on someone's face -3 to 4-year-olds begin differentiating between anger, fear, and sadness on faces -4 to 5-year-olds begin differentiating between surprise and disgust on faces -a child's understanding of the cases of emotion increases simultaneously with their ability to identify emotions -when told stories 3-year-olds can pick out those stories that would make a character happy -4-year-olds can pick out sad events in stories -5-year-olds can identify situation that would cause anger, fear, and surprise -after 7-years-old children can pick out pride, guilt, came, and embarrassment -mixed feelings after age 10

older parents

-age at childbirth has increased for both men and women in Canada -this may be the result of: 1. older marriage age 2. family planning techniques -live births after mother is 35: -4% of all Canadian births in 1987 -19% of all Canadian births in 2010 -older parents are more likely to have higher education levels than younger parents: -adolescents' standardized test scores correlate highly with parental education -college students' degree expectations are higher when they have more educated parents -but: -college students with less educated parents have the same success in college as children of educated parents -GPA and college satisfaction are the same in both groups -older parents tend to be more affluent than younger parents -more likely have financial resourced for raising a family -high SES protects against a number of outcomes: 1. malnutrition (fruit and vegetable intake; obesity) 2. depression (low SES children are 2.5x more likely to be depressed) 3. antisocial behaviour 4. low language development 5. low IQ -older parents also have: 1. lower rates of harsh parenting 2. more satisfaction with parenting: -older mothers have more positive emotions, more sensitivity to infant's needs -older fathers are more responsive, affectionate, and verbally stimulating -but many of these effects have been studied with older parents of only children; benefits decrease when they have more than one child

the development of aggression and other antisocial behaviours

-aggression is behaviour aimed at harming others and it is behaviour that emerges quite early -instances of aggression over the possession of objects occur between infants before 12 months of age (does not involve bodily contact such as hitting more just tugging of objects) -at around 18 months physical aggression such as hitting and pushing (particularly over the possession of objects) increases in frequency until about age 2 or 3 -then with the growth of language skills physical aggression decreases in frequency -as physical aggression decreases verbal aggression such as insults and taunting increases -conflict over possessions often is an example of instrumental aggression, that is aggression motivated by desire to obtain a concrete goal such as gaining possession of a toy -relational aggression is intended to harm others by damaging their peer relationships; among preschoolers this typically involves excluding peers from a play activity or a social group -this relational or indirect aggression has been linked to theory-of-mind skills particularly for this children with low levels of prosocial skills -the drop in physical aggression in the preschool years is due to the development of language skills and the use of this skills to resolve conflicts (talk about it) -whereas aggression in young children is usually instrumental, aggression in elementary school children is hostile, arising from he desire to hurt another person or the need to protect oneself against a perceived threat to self-esteem -children who engage in physical aggression tend to also engage in relational aggression with the degree to which they use one or the other tending to be consistent across childhood -overall the frequency of overt aggression decreases for most teenagers at least after mid-adolescence -in childhood covert types of antisocial behaviours such as stealing, lying, and cheating also occur with considerable frequency and begin to be characteristic of some children with behavioural problems -in mid-adolescence serious acts of violence increase markedly as do property offences and status offences such as drinking and truancy -adolescent crime peaks at age 17 with more males that females reporting committing at least one serious violent offence -im addition male adolescents and adults engage in much more violent behaviour and crime than do females

social cognition

-aggressive children and to interpret the world through an "aggressive" lens -they are more likely than non-aggressive children to attribute hostile motives to others in contexts in which the other person's motives and intentions are unclear (the hostile attributional bias) -their goals in such social encounters are also more likely to be hostile and inappropriate to the situation typically involving attempts to intimidate or get back at a peer -aggressive children are also more inclined to evaluate aggressive responses more favourably and competent prosocial responses less favourably especially as they get older -this is because they feel more confident in their ability to perform acts of physical and verbal aggression and they expect their aggressive behaviour to result in positive outcomes (e.g. getting their way) as well as to reduce negative treatment by others -this aggressive behaviour in turn appears to increase children's subsequent tendency to positively evaluate aggressive interpersonal behaviours, further increasing the level of future antisocial conduct -children who are prone to emotionally driven, hostile aggression (labelled reactive aggression) are particularly likely to perceive others' motives as hostile, to initially generate aggressive responses to provocation, and to evaluate their responses as morally acceptable -in contrast children who are prone to proactive aggression (which like instrumental aggression is aimed at fulfilling a need or desire) tend to anticipate more positive social consequences for aggression

prosocial behaviour

-all children are capable of prosocial behaviours but children differ in how often they engage in these behaviours and in their reasoning for doing so -there is some developmental consistency in children's readiness to engage in prosocial behaviour such as sharing, helping and comforting e.g. children who spontaneously engage in prosocial behaviour were more likely to assist other people even when doing so involved a cost to themselves; as young adults they reported that they felt responsible for the welfare of others and that they usually tried to suppress aggression toward others when angered -in contrast children that do not share at all or care if other children are upset are unlikely to be concerned with others' needs and feelings when they are older -of course not all prosocial behaviours are of equal worth -sometines children help or share to get something in return, to gain social acceptance from peers or to avoid their anger -however most parents and teachers want children to perform prosocial behaviours not for rewards or social approval but for altruistic motives -altruistic motives initially include empathy or sympathy for others and at later ages, the desire to act in ways consistent with one's own conscience and moral principles

ongoing conflict

-although divorce correlates with negative outcomes for children, ongoing conflict without divorce may be worse -parents are less emotionally involved -children feel less physically secure -children have higher rates of negative emotion, behavioural problems, and abnormal stress response

authoritative vs. authoritarian parenting

-authoritative parents tend to exert behavioural control, over their children when necessary -authoritarian parents tend to exert both behavioural and psychological control over their children

culture and children's emotional development

-although people in all cultures appear to experience most of the same basic emotions there is considerable cultural variation in the degree to which certain emotions are expressed -one reason for this may be genetic in that people in different racial or ethnic groups tend on average to have somewhat different temperaments -a more obvious contributor to cross-cultural differences in infants' emotional expression is the diversity of parenting practices e.g. American preschoolers express more anger and aggression in response to negative situations than do Japanese children; this difference may have to do with the fact that American mothers appear to be more likely than Japanese mothers to encourage their children to express their emotions in situations such as these; these tendencies are in keeping with the high value European-American culture places on independence, self-assertion and expressing one's emotions even negative ones; in contrast Japanese culture emphasizes interdependence, the subordination of oneself to one's group and correspondingly the importance of maintaining harmonious interpersonal relationships -cultures also differ in the degree to which they promote or discourage specific emotions and these differences are often reflected in parents' socialization of emotion e.g. Chinese culture strongly emphasizes the need to be aware of oneself as embedded in a larger group and to maintain positive image within that group; thus shame would be expected to be a powerful emotion, important for self-reflection and self-perfection and particularly useful for inducing compliance in children; in fact Chinese parents frequently try to induce shame in their pre schoolchildren when they transgress typically pointing out that the child's behaviour is judged negatively by people outside of the family and that the child's shame is shared by other family members; because of this cultural emphasis it is likely that children in this society experience shame more frequently than do children in many Western cultures -parents' ideas about the usefulness of various emotions also vary in different cultural and regional groups e.g. African-American mothers living in dangerous neighbourhoods valued and promoted their daughters' readiness to express anger and aggressiveness in situations related to self-protection because they wanted their daughters to act quickly and decisively to defend themselves when necessary; it is unlikely that mothers in a less difficult and dangerous neighbourhood would try to promote the readiness to express aggression in their children especially in their daughters -thus the norms, values, and circumstances of a culture or subcultural group likely contribute substantially to differences among groups in the expression of emotion

children's understanding of real and false emotions

-an important component in the development of emotional understanding is the realization that the emotions people express do not necessarily reflect their true feelings -the beginnings of this realization are seen in 3 year olds occasional (and usually transparent) attempts to mask their negative emotions when they receive a disappointing gift or prize -by age 5 children's understanding of false emotions has improved considerably -between 4 and 6 years of age children increasingly understand that people can be mislead by others' facial expressions -part of the improvement in understanding false emotions involves a growing understanding of display rules-a social group's informal norms about when, where, and how much one should show emotions and when and where displays of emotion should be suppressed or masked -over the preschool and elementary school years children develop a more refined understanding of when and why display rules are used -e.g. they increasingly understand that people use verbal and facial display rules to protect others' feelings or their own as when they pretend to like someone's cooking so as not to hurt the cook's feelings (labelled a prosocial motive) or hide their emotions when they themselves are being teased or lose a contest (labelled a self-protective motive) -with age children also better understand that people tend to break eye contact and avert their gaze when lying and they are increasingly able to use this knowledge to conceal their own deception -social factors seem to affect children's understanding of display rules e.g. in most cultures display rules are somewhat different for males and females and reflect societal beliefs about how males and females should feel and behave; elementary school girls in the U.S. are more likely than boys to feel that openly expressing emotions such as pain is acceptable (girls are more likely both to try and protect others' feelings and to be more emotional than boys) -parent's beliefs and behaviours, which often reflect cultural beliefs, likely contribute to children's understanding and use of display rules -thus children seem to be more attuned to display rules that are valued in their culture or that serve an important function in the family

antisocial behaviour

-antisocial behaviour is: 1. actions that harm others 2. actions that are inconsiderate of others -examples: 1. aggression 2. stealing 3. lying/cheating -sever, persistent antisocial behaviour is characterized as Antisocial Personality Disorder by the DSM-5 -aggression is perhaps the most evident form of antisocial behaviour because it is overt (physical or non-physical actions aimed at harming others) -instrumental aggression is aggression motivated by the desire for a concrete goal -relational aggression is aggression motivated by harming another's peer relationship -when does physical aggression develop?: -non-conatct aggression occurs quite early (before 12 months)-infants take things away from each other -contact aggression (e.g. hitting, pushing) emerges around 18 months-increases in frequency through toddlerhood -decrease in physical aggression as verbal complexity increases-a child's physical aggression is negatively correlated with his verbal capabilities relational aggression development: -as children learn to use language relational aggression takes the place of most (not all) physical aggression -emerges as early as preschool -increased verbal skill leads to increased verbal aggression -but increased verbal skill leads to less aggression overall because children now have other ways of solving problems -by about age 4 a child's aggression type remains relatively constant throughout development-physically aggressive 4 year olds turn out to be physically aggressive 11 year olds -why are some children more antisocial than others?: -just like prosocial individual differences 1. biological factors 2. socialization: -patental punitiveness -ineffective discipline -parental conflict -SES -peers

the potential impact of divorce

-as adults children of divorced and remarried families are at greater risk for divorce than are their peers from intact families -within this group, women but not men appear to also be at rick for poorer-quality intimate relationships, lower self-esteem and lower satisfaction with social support from friends, family members and other people -being less likely to have completed high school or college or university, children of divorce often earn lower incomes in early adulthood than do peers from intact families -as adults they are also at slightly greater risk for serious emotional disorders such as depression, anxiety, and phobias -despite all these greater risks most children whose parents divorce do not suffer significant, enduring problems as a consequence -in addition the differences between children from divorced families and children from intact families often reflect an extension of the differences in the children's and/or their parents' psychological functioning that existed for years prior to the divorce

identifying emotions of others

-by 3 months of age infants can distinguish facial expression of happiness, surprise and anger -by 7 months infants appear to discriminate a number additional expression such as fear,sadness and interest -by about this age infants also start to perceive others' emotional expressions as meaningful e.g. if infants at this age are shown a video in which a person's facial expression and voice are consistent in their emotional expression and a video which a person's facial expression and voice are emotionally discrepant they will attend more to the presentation that is emotionally consistent -also at about this age some children begin to demonstrate that they can relate facial expressions of emotion an emotional tones of voice to events in the environment -such skills are evident in children's social referencing that is their use of a parent's or other adult's facial expression or vocal cues to decide how to deal with novel, ambiguous or possibly threatening situations -by 14 months the emotion-related information obtained through social referencing has an effect on children's touching objects even an hour later -children seem to be better at social referencing if they receive both goal and facial cues of emotion from the adults and goal cues seem to be more effective than just visual cues -by the age of 3 children in lab studies demonstrate a rudimentary ability tolerable a fairly narrow range of emotional repressions displayed in pictures -young children, even as young as 2, are skilled at labelling happiness (usually by pointing to pictures of faces that reflect happiness) -the ability to label anger, fear, and sadness emerges and increases in the next year or two with the ability to label surprise and disgust gradually appearing in the late preschool and early school years -most children cannot label more complex emotions such as pride, shame and guilt until early to mid-elementary school but the scope of accuracy of emotion labelling improves thereafter into adolescence -the ability to discriminate and label different emotions helps children respond appropriately to their own and others' emotions e.g. if a child understands that he is experiencing guilt the child may understand the need to make amends to diminish the guilt -children who are more skilled than their peers at labelling and interpreting others' emotions are also higher in social competence and lower in behaviour problems or social withdrawal

the stage of autonomous morality

-by about age 11or 12 children no longer accept blind obedience to authority as the basis of moral decisions -they fully understand that rules are the product of social agreement and can be changed if the majority of a group agrees to do so -in addition they consider fairness and equality among people as important factors to consider when constructing rules -they believe that punishments should "fit the crime" and that punishment delivered by adults is not necessarily fair -they also consider individuals' motives and intentions when evaluating their behaviour (breaking one cup while trying to sneak jam is worse than accidentally breaking 15 cups) -all normal children progress from the morality of constraint to autonomous moral reasoning -individual differences in the rate of their progress are due to numerous factors including differences in children's cognitive maturity, in their opportunities for interactions with peers and for reciprocal role taking and how authoritarian and punitive their parents are

children's use social conventional judgement

-by age 3 children generally believe that moral violations (e.g. stealing another child's possession or hitting another child) are more wrong than social conventional violations (e.g. not saying "please" when asking for something) -by age 4 they believe that moral transgression but not social conventional transgressions are wrong even if an adult does not know about them and even if adult authorities have nit said that they are wrong -children tend to justify their condemnation of moral violations by referring to violations of fairness and harm to others' welfare -with regard to both moral and social conventional issues in the family, children and to a lesser degree adolescents believe that parents have authority unless the parent gives commands that violate moral and conventional principles -with respect to matters of personal judgement however even preschoolers tend to believe that they themselves should have control and older children and adolescents are quite firm in their belief that they should control choices in the personal domain (e.g. their appearance, how they spend their money) at home and at school -at the same time parents usually feel that they should have authority over their children's personal choices; so parents and teenagers frequently do battle in this domain

divorce

-children of divorce are more likely to experience depression and sadness, to have lower self-esteem and to be less socially responsible and competent -in addition children of divorce, especially boys, may be prone to higher levels of externalizing problem behaviours such as aggression and antisocial behaviour, both soon after divorce and years later -adolescents whose parents divorce exhibit a greater tendency toward dropping out of school, engaging in delinquent activities and substance abuse and having children out of wedlock

children's behaviours and temperaments

-children who are disobedient, angry or challenging make it more difficult for parents to use authoritative parenting than do children who are compliant and positive in their behaviour -differences in children's behaviours with their parents including the degree to which they are emotionally negative, unregulated and disobedient, can be due to a number of factors; the most prominent of these are genetic factors related to temperament -at the same time studies with twins indicate that environmental factors, likely including social interactions with family members, also affect infants' and children's temperament -in addition there appear to be genetically based differences in how children respond to their environment including their parents caregiving -some children may be more reactive to the quality of parenting they receive than are others (differential susceptibility) -e.g. children with a difficult temperament often react worse (e.g. have more problems with adjustment or are less socially competent) when they receive non-supportive or non-optimal parenting; however these same children sometimes respond better when they receive supportive parenting -children's non-compliance and externalizing problems offer further insight into the complex ways in which children can affect their parents' behaviour toward them e.g. in resisting their parents; demands children may become so whiny, aggressive, or hysterical that their parents back down leading the children to resort to the same behaviour when resisting future demands -by adolescence those youths who are non-compliant and acting out, in part due to their heredity appear to evoke negativity from their parents to a greater degree than their parents' negativity affects the youths' externalizing problems -over time the mutual influence or bidirectionally of parent-child interactions reinforces and perpetuates each party's behaviour e.g. children's low self-regulation at age 6 to 8 (which may have been influenced by maternal behaviours at an earlier age) predicted mothers' punitive reactions (e.g. scolding and rejection) to their children's expressions of negative emotion at age 8 to 10; in turn mothers' punitive reactions when their children were age 8 to 10 predicted low levels of self-regualtion in the children age 10 to 12 -a similar self-reinforcing and escalating negative patterns is common when parents are hostile and inconsistent in enforcing standards of conduct with their adolescent children; their children in turn are hostile, insensitive, disruptive, and inflexible with them and exhibit increased levels of problem behaviour -bidirectional interaction is also a likely key factor in parent-child relationships that exhibit a pattern of cooperation, positive affect, harmonious communication and coordinated behaviour, with the positive behaviour of each partner eliciting analogous positive behaviour from the other

temperament and personality

-children who develop problems with aggression and antisocial behaviour tend to exhibit a difficult temperament and a lack of self-regulatory skills from a very early age e.g. preschoolers who exhibit lack of control, impulsivity, high activity level, irritability, and distractibility are prone to fighting, delinquency and other antisocial behaviour at ages 9 through 15; to aggression and criminal behaviour in late adolescence; and in the case of men, to violent crime in adulthood -soe aggressive children and adolescents tend to feel neither guilt nor empathy or sympathy for others -they are often charming but insincere and callous -the combination of impulsively, problems with attention, and callousness in childhood is especially likely to predict aggression, antisocial behaviour and run-ins with the police in adolescence and perhaps in adulthood as well

parents' discussion of emotion

-children's emotional understanding is a key part of their emotional development and self-regulation -family conversations about emotion are therefore important aspect of children's emotional socialization -parents who discuss emotions with their children teach them about the meanings of emotions, the circumstances in which they should and should not be expressed and the consequences of expressing or not expressing them -an additional help in emotional socialization is emotion coaching in which parents not only discuss emotions with their children but also help them learn ways of coping with their emotions and expressing them appropriately -children who receive these types of guidance tend to display better emotional understanding than children who do not -mothers' references to others' mental states predicted children's emotion understanding better than did mothers' references to emotions themselves perhaps because references to mental states help children understand the thoughts that accompany and motivate emotional states -children whose parents use emotion coaching are more socially competent with peers, more empathetic, and less likely to exhibit problem behaviours or depression than are children who do not receive such guidance -children's own characteristics such as their ability to sustain attention and their initial understanding of emotions may affect the degree to which adults talk about emotion with them -a study found that parents' emotional style (i.e. whether they took more of a coaching versus a dismissing approach) and children's temperament together predicted children's coping styles

attractiveness

-children's physical appearance can influence the way their parents respond to them -e.g. mothers of very attractive infants are more affectionate and playful with their infants than are mothers of infants with unappealing faces -e.g. mothers of unappealing infants are more likely to report that their infants interfere with their lives -thus from the first months of life unattractive infants may experience somewhat different parenting than attractive infants; and this pattern continues throughout childhood, with attractive holder tending to elicit more positive responses from adults than unattractive children do

abnormal language development

-communication disorders are defined differently by different sources (here we will be using the DSM-Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders -communication disorders are often the first disorders detected in childhood -DSM communications disorders: 1. language disorder -difficulties learning and using language -syntax and/or semantics -productive and/or receptive 2. speech sound disorder -problems with articulation or comprehension of sounds 3. stuttering 4. social (pragmatic) communication disorder 5. unspecified communication disorder -deaf children: -deaf children with signing parents have relatively normal language outcomes -as do deaf children whose hearing is evaluated early and who signs from early life -deaf children who do not sign often have various language disorders (there were such things as deaf no-sign schools but they were not helpful) -sign language: -has its own 'phonology', semantics, and syntax Nicaraguan sign language video

the early development of conscious

-conscious is an internal regulatory mechanism that increases the individual's ability to conform to standards of conduct accepted in his or her culture -it is likely that the conscience of a young child reflects primarily internalized parental standards (the standards of both parents) -the conscience restrains antisocial behaviour or destructive impulses and promotes a child's compliance with adults' rules and standards even when no one is monitoring the child's behaviour -the conscious can also promote prosocial behaviour by causing the child to feel guilty when engaging in uncaring behaviour or failing to live up to internalized values about helping others

theme 3: development is both continuous and discontinuous

-continuity/discontinuity of individual differences: -IQ scores increase in stability with increasing age -individual differences in social and personality characteristic also show some continuity over time -shy toddlers tend to grow into shy children, fearful toddlers into fearful children, aggressive children into aggressive adolescents, generous children into generous adults, etc. -although there is some continuity of individual differences in social, emotional and personality development the degree of continuity is generally lower than in intellectual development e.g. children who are popular in grade 5 may or may not be popular in grade 7 but their reading and math achievement will remain relatively constant; in addition aspects of temperament such as fearfulness and shyness often change considerably over the course of early and middle childhood -the stability of individual differences is influenced by the stability of the environment e.g. an infant's attachment to his or her mother correlates positively with the infant's long-term security but the correlation is higher if the home environment stays consistent than if serious disruptions occur -thus continuities in individual differences reflect continuities in children's environments as well as in their genes -continuity/discontinuity of overall development: questions of stages: -Piaget's theory of cognitive development, Freud'd their of psychosexual development, Erikson's theory of psychosocial development and Kohlberg's theory of moral development all describe development as a stage theory -throughout childhood and adolescence there are continuous increases in the ability to regulate emotions, make friends, take other people's perspectives, remember events, solve problems, and engage in many other activities -there are discontinuities as well such as before age 7 months infants rarely fear strangers but thereafter wariness of them develops quickly; after acquiring about one word per week between the ages 12 and 18 months toddlers undergo a vocabulary explosion in which the number of words they know and use expand rapidly for years thereafter -whether development appears to be continuous or discontinuous often varies whether the focus is on behaviour or on underlying processes; behaviours that emerge or disappear quite suddenly may reflect continuous underlying processes -over the course of development children understand more and more about themselves; milestones characterize each period of development -during infancy children come to distinguish between themselves and other people but they rarely if ever see themselves from another person's perspective -during the toddler period children increasingly view themselves as others might, which allows them to feel such emotions as shame and embarrassment -during the preschool period children realize that certain of their personal characteristics such as their gender are fundamental and permanent and they use this knowledge to guide their behaviour -during the elementary school years children increasingly think of themselves in terms of their competencies relative to other children's (intelligence, athletic skill, popularity, and so forth) -during adolescence they come to recognize how different they themselves act in different situations -thus any statement about when a given competency emerges is somewhat arbitrary, nonetheless identifying the milestones helps us to understand roughly when they emerge

article review: Rose et al. 2007

-corumination: -talking about problems/challenges to same-sex friends -higher among girls than among boys -effects of corumination: -increase in positive friendship adjustment -increase in problematic emotional adjustment -Rose and colleagues knew the concurrent (simultaneous) effects of crimination but they were interested in knowing whether crimination predicted future: 1. mood psychopathy 2. friendship strength -and whether these effects were stringer in girls or boys -large longitudinal design: -1,383 students at time 1 -999 students at time 2 -grades 3, 5, 7, and 9 in the Midwestern U.S. -operationalization: -gender -friendship nomination -friendship quality -depression -anxiety -co-ruminatin questionnaire -corumination questionnaire focused on discrete areas: -frequently discussing problems -discussing problems instead of engaging in other activities -encouragement to discuss problems -discussing the same problem repeatedly -speculation about the problem's causes -speculation about the problem's consequences -speculation about aspects of the problem that are not understood -focusing on negative feelings -results: -corumination at time 1 predicted increases in feelings of closeness between friends for both boys and girls at time 2 -corumination at time 1 predicted increases in mood psychopathy for girls only at time 2 -corumination can be a good thing for friendship and resilience but it can lead to a masking of internalizing disorders such as anxiety and depression for girls

the family

-culture as well as social and economic events can have a tremendous effect on the structure of families and interactions among family members -in industrialized Western societies as well, a variety of social changes in the past 50 years have had marked effects on the structure the family e.g. families are smaller than in the past and many more people are choosing to have children outside of marriage; in addition it is not uncommon today for children to e reared by biological parent or live in a family that has experienced one or more divorces; such changes in the family can affect the resources available to the child as well as the parents' child rearing practices and behaviour

down syndrome

-down syndrome is caused by the presence of a third copy of the 21st chromosome (trisomy) -individuals with down syndrome typically have lower then normal IQ (they average at about 50) -moderate to severe language delay -delays in onset of crawling (8 months) and onset of walking (21 months) -for much of the 21st century little intervention was provided for children with down syndrome -outcomes for children with down syndrome improve with: 1. speech therapy/hearing aids 2. sign language 3. inclusive education

economic stress and parenting

-economic pressures tend to increase the likelihood of marital conflict and parental depression, which in turn make parents more likely to be uninvolved with, or hostile to, their children and less likely to cooperate and support each other's parenting -for both children and adolescence the non-supportive, inconsistent parenting associated with economic hardship and living in a poor neighbourhood correlates with increased risk for depression, loneliness, unregulated behaviour, delinquency, academic problems and substance use -the quality of parenting and family interactions is especially likely to be compromised for families at the poverty level; at one time or another a substantial number of families in poverty experience homelessness which obviously makes effective parenting extremely difficult -one factor that can help moderate the potential impact of economic stress on parenting is having supportive relationships with relatives, friends, neighbours or others who can provide material assistance, child care, advice, approval, or a sympathetic ear -such positive connections can help parents feel more successful and satisfied as parents and actually be better parents -although social support for parents is generally associated with better parental functioning and child outcomes, it may be less beneficial for low income parents in the poorest most dangerous neighbourhoods and for depressed parents -it is important to bear in mind that individuals contribute to their own socioeconomic situations through their traits, dispositions, and goals and these same traits, dispositions and goals are likely to influence their relations with their children and their children's behaviour e.g. youths with personality characteristics that reflected positive social skills, regulation, goal-setting and hard work were more likely to attain a higher income and educational level at an older age than were youths who lacked those traits; and their children in turn, exhibited high levels of positive development -such findings support an interactionist model of socioeconomic influence on human development in which the association between SES and developmental outcomes reflects both social causation (SES influences developmental outcomes) and social selection (individual characteristics influence SES)

regulation of emotion

-emotional self-regulation is a complex process that involves initiating, inhibiting, or modulating the following aspects of emotional functioning: 1. internal feeling states (the subjective experience of emotions) 2. emotion-related cognitions (e.g. thoughts about one's desires or goals; one's interpretation of an evocative situation; self-monitoring of one's emotional states) 3. emotion-related physiological processes (e.g. heart rate and hormonal or other physiological reactions, including neural activation, that can change as a function of regulating one's feelings and thoughts) 4. emotion-related behaviour (e.g. actions or facial expressions related to one's feelings) -emotions often have a regulatory function in that they affect the nature of children's thoughts and behaviours in specific situations, for instance, whether children approach or avoid novel objects or people -the emergence of emotional regulation in childhood is a long, slow process -young infants are not good at controlling their emotional reactions; they are easily overwhelmed by loud noises, abrupt movements, hunger, and pain and must rely on their caregivers to settle them down -older infants also have difficulty dealing with intense emotions such as fear of strangers, or being left alone and they often run to parents for comfort -it takes year for children to develop the abilities to reliably regulate their emotions and control the behaviours associated with them

family dynamics

-family dynamics is the way in which the family operates as a whole -families are complex social units whose members are all interdependent and who reciprocally influence one another -all family members influence one another both directly and indirectly through their behaviours -family functioning is influenced by the social support that parents receive from kin, friends, neighbours, and social institutions such as schools and places of worship and is undermined by economic stresses -socio-cultural context is important for understanding family dynamics and their possible effects on children -family dynamics must be looked at developmentally; as children get older the nature of parent-child interactions changes -family dynamics may also be altered by changes in parents (e.g. in their beliefs about child-rearing), in the marital relationship (e.g. how well the parents are getting along), or in the relationships of other family members (e.g. in the level of conflict between siblings) -alternations in the family structure due to births, deaths, divorce,remarriage, or other factors can also influence interactions among family members and may affect family routines and norms as well as children's emotional well being -in many cases the effects of such shifts in family dynamics are gradual and continuous; however a single event such as a traumatic divorce or death of a parent may cause a fairly dramatic change in a child's behaviour and emotional adjustment -it is important to keep in mind that the biological characteristics (e.g. temperament) of both children and parents, as well as parental behaviours contribute to the nature of family interactions e.g. mothers' negativity toward their children and the degree of parenting control they use appear to be affected partly by children's heredity (including their tendency to experience and express negative emotion), where as the degree to which mothers are close and affectionate with their children appear to be partly due to the mothers' own genetic inheritance

two working parents

-family structure is not all that has changed in Canada: -40 years ago only 40% of mothers worked -today approximately 70% of mothers work outside the home -the proportion of fathers working outside the home has not changed -for the most part having two working parents does not seem to affect child development much -working parents spend a greater proportion of they childcare time in social interactions -children of single mothers who have full-time jobs report higher self-esteem than children of single mothers with part-time work -there seems to be little cognitive, linguistic, or social disadvantage to having working parents (evening shift work may be an exception) -having a working mother has specific effects on female children -girls with working mothers are more likely to: 1. reject traditional gender roles 2. see benefuts of maternal employment 3. espouse gender equality in family structure

the transitional period

-from about age 7/8 to 10 -during this period children typically have more interactions with peers than previously and these interactions are more egalitarian with more give-and-take than are their interactions with adults -in games with peers children learn that rules can be constructed and changed by the group -they also learn to taken another's perspective and to cooperate -as a consequence children start to value fairness and equality and begin to become more autonomous in their thinking about moral issues -Piaget viewed children as taking an active role in this transition using information from their social interactions to figure out how moral decisions are made and how rules are constructed

abnormal gender and sexuality development

-gender, sex and sexuality are spectral and variations within those spectra are normal -gender dysphoria is the feeling of discontentment related to a mismatch between one's gender and one's sex (DSM-5 emphasizes the discontentment) (gender dysphoria is no longer classified with sexual disorders but is a category of its own) -children suffering from gender dysphoria may experience: 1. social isolation/loneliness 2. depression 3. displeasure with their own genitalia -some researchers suggest that most if these effects are caused by society and are not biologically driven -treatments for gender dysphoria: 1. hormonal treatment -delay the onset of puberty for children that are not yet old enough to make an informed decision 2. psychological treatment -psychotherapy to deal with negative feelings associated with gender dysphoria -NOT to reverse gender! 3. biological treatment -altering of primary and secondary sex characteristics -should be completed along with psychotherapy

lesbian and gay parents

-generally children of lesbian and gay parents report low levels of stigmatization and teasing although they sometimes fell excluded or gossiped about by peers -just as in families with heterosexual parents the adjustment of children with lesbian or gay parents seems to depend on family dynamic including the closeness of the parent-child relationship, how well the parents get along, parental supportiveness, regulated discipline, and the degree of stress parents experience in their parenting -in addition children of lesbian parents are better adjusted when their mother and her partner are not stressed, when they report sharing childcare duties evenly and when they are satisfied with the division of labour in the home -when gay adoptive fathers have low levels of social support and a less positive gay identity, they experience more stress regarding parenting and are more likely to have poor relationships with their children (responses that are likely to affect there children' adjustment -in families with a gay father and his partner a son's happiness with his family is related to the inclusion of the partner in family activities and the son's having a good relationship with the partner as well as his biological father

authoritative parenting

-high in warmth/responsiveness -high in demandingness -set clear standards for their children's behaviour -allow children autonomy within their limits -pay attention to their children's concerns 0are consistent and measured in their disciplining of the child -children of authoritative parents tend to be: 1. more competent, self-assured, and popular with their peers 2. better verbalizers 3. more prosocial 4. good at academics and in employment 5. low in drug abuse and problematic behaviour

permissive parenting

-high in warmth/responsiveness -low in demandingness -lenient with their children (little to no discipline) -responsive to their wishes and desires -do not require their children to act in appropriate ways -children of permissive parents tend to: 1. be lacking in self-control 2. exhibit greater externalizing problems 3. have lower academic achievement 4. have worse behaviour and are at increased risk for substance abuse 5. have lower self-esteem (self-esteem based on external approval)

theme 7: child-development research can improve children's lives

-implications for parenting: -parents can maximize the likelihood of a baby's becoming securely attached by maintaining a positive approach in their caregiving and being responsive to the baby's needs -other dimensions of a baby's temperament as well as the parents' attitude and responsiveness influence the quality of attachment ' -implications for helping children at risk: -parents who are stressed economically have few friends, use alcohol and illegal drugs, or are being abused by their partner are the most likely to mistreat their children -children who are maltreated tend to have difficult temperaments, to have few friends, to be poor in physical or mental health, to do poorly in school, and to show abnormal aggression or passivity -adolescents who are maltreated may be depressed or hyperactive, use drugs or alcohol, and have sexual problems such as promiscuity or abnormal fearfulness -biology and environment work together to produce all behaviour -improving social policy: -children who attend good-quality childcare programs develop similarly to children who receive care at home from their parents

parental socialization of children's emotional responding

-in addition to being affected by the overall parent-child relationship, children's emotional development is influenced by parents' socialization of their children that is their direct and indirect influence on their children's standards, values, and ways of thinking and feeling -parents socialize their children's emotional emotional development through: 1. their expression of emotion with their children and other people 2. their reactions to their children's expression of emotion 3. the discussions they have with their children about emotion and emotional regulation -these avenues of socialization which are often interrelated can affect not only children's emotional development but also their social competence

the stage of the morality of constraint

-is most characteristic of children who have not achieved Piaget's stage of concrete operations (that is children younger than 7 years) -children in this stage regard rules and duties to others as unchangeable "givens" -justice is whatever authorities (adults, rules, or laws) say is right and authorities' punishments for non-compliance are always justified -acts that are not consistent with rules and authorities' dictates are "bad" -acts that are consistent with them are "good" -children believe that what determines whether an action is good or bad are the consequences of the action not the motives behind it -Piaget suggested that young children's belief that rules are unchangeable is due to two factors one social and one cognitive: 1. parental control of children is coercive and unilateral leading to children's unquestioning respect for rules set by adults 2. children's cognitive immaturity causes them to believe that rules are "real" things like chairs or gravity, that exist outside people and are not the product of the human mind

the process of coming out

-it begins with the first recognition-an initial realization that one is somewhat different from others, accompanied by feelings of alienation from oneself and others; at this point there generally is some awareness that same-sex attractions may be the relevant issue but the individual does not reveal this to others -a number of sexual-minority youth have some awareness of their sexual attractions by middle childhood but there is great variability in the age at which same-sex attractions are first noticed -women are much more likely than men to be in the middle and late-onset groups; they have a somewhat later onset of same-sex attractions -the length of time between recognition of same-sex attractions and self-identification as gay, lesbian, or bisexual varies; usually somewhere between 5 and 8 years after initial recognition -sometime self-identifiaction as gay, lesbian, or bisexual does not occur until after the individual has engaged in same-sex sexual-activates (yes and exploration period) -this contact may eventually lead to identity acceptance which is marked by a preference for social and sexual interaction with other sexual-minority individuals and the person's coming to feel more positive about his or her sexual identity and disclosing it for the first time ti heterosexuals -evidence regarding the sequencing of self-identification as a sexual-minority member and the commencement of same-sex sexual activity is mixed -the final step for some youth and adults is identity integration, in which gay, lesbian and bisexual individuals firmly view themselves as such, feel pride in themselves and their particular sexual community and publicly come out to many people

the real problems behind divorce

-it is clear that divorce is negatively correlated with many different negative outcomes for children -but is divorce the cause of these outcomes? -other variables might explain the problems: 1. pre-divorce marital conflict 2. the number of family structure changes 3. pre-exiting characteristics

sexual minority youth: prevalence

-it is difficult to estimate the number of sexual-minority youth in North America -2-4% of high school students in North America identify themselves as sexual minorities; actual figures are significantly higher -high level of sexual identification instability (especially for females)

custody of children after divorce

-it is increasingly common for divorced parents in Canada to have joint custody of their children (associated with better adjustment than is sole custody) -when parents cooperate with each other and keep the children's best interests in mind, children are unlikely to feel caught in the middle -unfortunately mutually helpful parenting is not the norm: researchers have found that once parents have been separated of a while most either engage in conflict or do not deal much with each other

understanding the causes and dynamics of emotion

-knowing the causes of emotions is also important for understanding one's own and others' behaviour and motives -it is likewise a key for regulating one's own behaviour and hence for social competence -studies have shown rapid development over the preschool and school years in children's understanding of the kinds of emotions that certain situations tend to evoke in others -by age 3 children are quite good at identifying situations that make people feel happy -at age 4 they're fairly accurate at identifying situations that make people sad -at age 4 to 5 they can identify situations likely to elicit anger, fear, or surprise -children's ability to understand the circumstances that evoke social emotions such as pride, guilt, shame, embarrassment, and jealousy often emerges after age 7 -from age 4 until at a least age 10 children are better at identifying emotions from stories depicting the case of an emotion than from pictures of facial expression; this is probably because facial expressions of emotions such as anger,fear, sadness and disgust are often interpreted as indicating more than one emotion -another way to assess children's understanding of the causes of emotions is to record what they say about emotions in their everyday conversations and to ask them to discuss and explain others' emotions -in this kind of research even 28 month olds mention emotions such as happiness, sadness, anger, fear, crying, and hurting in appropriate ways in their conversations and sometimes even mention their causes -by age 4 to 6 children can give accurate explanations for why their peers expressed negative emotions in their preschool (e.g. because they were teased) -children get more skilled at explaining the causes of emotion across the preschool and school years -with age children also come to understand that people can feel particular emotions brought about by reminders of past events -similarly from ages 3 to 5 children increasingly can explain that when people are in a situation that reminds them of a past negative event they may worry and change their behaviour to avoid future negative events -understanding that memory cues can trigger emotions associated with past events helps children explain their own and others' emotional reactions in situations that in themselves seem emotionally neutral -in the elementary school years children become increasingly sophisticated in their understanding about how, when and why emotions occur -they become more aware of cognitive processes related to regulating emotion and of the fact that emotional intensity wanes over time -they also come to recognize that people can experience more than one emotion at the same time including both positive and negative emotions arising from the same source -in addition they increasingly understand how the mind can be used to both increase and reduce fears and that thinking positively can improve one's emotion while thinking negatively can worsen it -at around age 10 children begin to understand emotional ambivalence and realize that people can have mixed feelings about events, others, and themselves -taken together these developments allow children to better understand the complexities of emotional experience in context

rejecting-neglecting parenting

-low in warmth/responsiveness -low in demandingness -do not set limits and do not monitor behaviour -focus on their own needs (or other events) and not their children -may be completely neglectful -children of rejecting-neglecting parents tend to: 1. have disturbed relationships with other children 2. exhibit antisocial or problematic externalizing behaviour 3. exhibit internalizing problems such as depression and social anxiety 4. have higher rates of substance abuse and risky sexual behaviour 5. have problems that get worse in adolescence

changes in Canadian families

-many changes have occurred in Canadian families in the last 50-60 years: 1. age of parents: -adults in Canada are older when they marry -parental age has increased 2. marriage: -marriage rates have gone down -more children born to unmarried parents 3. divorce: -Divorce Act (1986) -rates of divorce in Canada are higher 4. multiple partnerships: -more common to marry/partner more than once -more children have step-parents than before 5. same-sex marriage: -Marriage Act (2005) -children grow up with same-sex parents

when do emotions develop

-many emotions are observable in young infants after 8 weeks -social smile (restricted to familiar people after about 7 months) -happiness at controlled events -sadness and anger are visually separable -when a child is 2 years old she begins to develop self-conscious emotions: 1. shame 2. pride 3. guilt 4. embarrassment -but they are not always based in reality -by 3 years old pride is tied more closely to a child's level of achievement -much change after 3 years of age -children begin to experience positive emotions based primarily on: 1. acceptance by peers 2. achieving goals -jokes/games -and negative emotions based on: 1. imaginary threats (before elementary school) 2. real life issues/challenges at school 3. others' perspectives (theory of mind)

mothers and fathers

-much of the work on parenting practices is done with mothers -most children are still raised primarily by mothers -testing mothers allows for more scientific control studies -paternal involvement is increasing in Canada though; this is due in part to the Canadian paternal leave policy -mothers tend to spend more time with their children and engage in: 1. emotional care 2. physical care -fathers may spend less time with their children but engage in more play (especially physical) -the amount of play that a child has with his/her father predicts positive outcomes in childhood/adolescence (this is true for both boys and girls)

Kohlberg's theory of moral judgement

-on the basis of a 20 year longitudinal study Kohlberg proposed that moral development proceed through a specific series of stages that are discontinuous and hierarchical (that is each new stage reflects a quantitively different more adequate way of thinking than the one before it) -Kohlberg assessed moral judgement by presenting children with hypothetical moral dilemmas and then questioning them about the issues these dilemmas involved (the most famous of these dilemmas concerns man named Heinz whose wife was dying from a rare form of cancer) -for Kohlberg the reasoning behind choices of what to do in the dilemma, rater than the choices themselves is what reflects the quality of children's moral reasoning

critique of Kohlberg's theory

-one criticism is that Kohlberg did not sufficiently differentiate between truly moral issues and issues of social convention -another criticism pertains to cultural differences; in many non-Western, non-industralized cultures children's moral judgement does not advance as far within this system as their Western peers -this finding has led to the objection that Kohlberg's stories and scoring system reflect an intellectualized conception of morality that is biased by Western values -another criticism has to do with Kohlberg's argument that change in moral development is discontinuous -research has shown that children and adults alike often reason at different levels on different occasions, or even on the same occasion -children and adolescents may gradually acquire the cognitive skills to use increasingly higher stages of moral reasoning but they may also use lower stages when it is consistent with their goals, motives belief in a particular situation -a hotly debated issue regarding Kohlberg's theory is whether there are gender differences in moral judgement -there is little evidence that boys and girls score differently on Kohlberg's stages of moral judgement -however during adolescence and adulthood females focus somewhat more on issues of caring about other people in their moral judgement -differences in males' and females' moral reasoning seem to be most evident when individuals report on moral dilemma in their own lives -although Kohlberg's stages probably are not as invariant in sequence nor as universal as he claimed they do describe changes in children's moral reasoning that are observed in many Western societies-these changes are important because people with higher-level moral reasoning are more likely to behave in a moral manner and to assist others and they are less likely to engage in delinquent activities -thus understanding developmental changes in moral judgement provides insight into why, as children grow older, they tend to engage in prosocial behaviour

parents' reactions to children's emotions

-parent's reactions to their children's negative emotions also seem to affect children's emotional expressivity as well as their social competence and adjustment -parents who dismiss or criticize their children's expressions of saddened and anxiety communicate to their children that their feelings are not valid -parents send similar messages when they react to their children's anger with threats, belligerence or dismissive comments -in turn their children are likely to be less emotionally and socially competent than are children whose parents are emotionally supportive; they tend to be lower in sympathy for others, less skilled at coping with stress, and more prone to negative emotions and problem behaviours such as aggression -parents who are supportive when their children are upset help their children to regulate their emotional arousal and to find ways to express their emotions constructively -their children tend to be better adjusted and more competent both with peers and academically -parents' supportive reactions to their younger children's emotional upsets may be especially helpful in reducing problem behaviours for those children who have difficulty regulating their physiological responses to challenges

evaluation of Piaget's theory

-parental punitiveness which would be expected to reinforce a morality of constraints has been associated with less mature moral reasoning and moral behaviour -consistent with Piaget's belief that cognitive development plays a role in the development of moral judgement, children's performance on tests of perspective taking skills, Piagetian logical tasks, and IQ tests have all been associated with their level of moral judgement -there is little evidence that peer interaction per se stimulates moral development; rather it seems likely that the quality of peer interactions (for example whether or not they involve cooperative interactions) is more important than mere quantity of interactions with peers -Piaget also underestimated young children's ability to appreciate the role of intentionality in morality;when Piagetian moral vignettes are presented in ways that make the individuals' intentions more obvious such as by using videotaped dramas, preschoolers and early elementary school children are more likely to recognize individuals with bad intentions (it os probable that in Piaget's research young children focused primarily on the consequences of the individuals' actions because consequences were very salient in his stories) -in addition many 4 and 5 year olds do not think that a person caused a negative outcome "on purpose" if they have been explicitly told that the person had no foreknowledge of the consequences of his or her action or believed that the outcome of the action would be positive rather than negative -even younger children seem to use knowledge of intentionality to evaluate others' behaviour e.g 21 month olds were more likely to help an adult who had tried (but failed) to assist them in retrieving a toy than an adult who was unwilling to help them

parenting and families

-parenting practices are typically divided into four types -authoritative parenting is typically the most effective in Western cultures -authoritarian parenting may also be effective, particularly in non-Western families -permissive and rejecting-neglecting parenting typically produce adverse outcomes regardless of location -many changes in the Canadian family have occurred in the last 50 years -some but not all of these changes may affect child development significantly 1. divorce: -effects are typically negative -increase in mood psychopathology, low self-esteem, low academic achievement, abnormal peer relationships -divorce itself may not be responsible for these changes 2. increase in parental age: -increase in parental wealth and resources -warmer parenting -lower energy with more than two children 3. step-parenting: -can cause conflict with adolescents -can be as protective/effective as biological parenting 4. same-sex parenting: -no psychological effects 5. daycare: -good daycare=better for kids than staying home -bad daycare=worse for kids than staying home

ethnic and cultural influences on parenting

-parenting styles and practices may vary somewhat across ethnic groups -particular parenting styles and practices may have different meanings and different effects in different ethnic groups and cultures e.g. in Chinese culture children (but perhaps not adolescents) view parental strictness and emphasis on obedience as signs of parental involvement and caring and as important for family harmony -consistent with this idea, parents' directiveness with their preschoolers (e.g. telling the child what to do) is positively related to parental warmth/acceptance in China whereas it is negatively it is negatively related to this dimension in the US -because of variations in culture, findings regarding parenting styles in North America cannot automatically be generalized to other cultures or subcultures -rater the relation of parenting to children's development must be considered in terms of cultural in which it occurs -nonetheless there are probably more similarities than differences in the parenting values and behaviours of various ethnic groups

pre-existing problems

-parents that get divorced are more likely than non-divorced parents to: 1. have abnormal stress responses 2. have fewer positive relationships 3. be depressed, antisocial or alcoholic -these in turn may affect children's development and/or be genetically transmitted to children study: -Strohschein (2005) conducted a longitudinal study with ~3000 children (1994, 1996, 1998) -all parents were married at the start of the study -indicates that problematic internalizing and externalizing behaviour may exist before divorce

socioeconomic influences on parenting

-parents with low SES are more likely than higher SES parents to use authoritarian and punitive child-rearing styles; higher SES parents tend to use a style that is more authoritative, accepting and democratic -e.g. higher SES mothers are less likely than low SES mothers to be controlling, restrictive, and disapproving in their interactions with their young children even in non-Western cultures -higher SES mothers talk more to their children and they more readily discuss emotion; they also elicit more talk from their children and follow up more directly on what their children say -this greater use of language by higher SES mothers may foster better communication between parent and child as well as promote the child's verbal skills -some of the SES differences in parenting style and practices are related to differences in parental beliefs and values -higher SES parents are more likely than lower SES parents to view themselves as teachers rather than as providers or disciplinarians and to feel more capable as young parents -in Western countries parents from lower SES families often promote conformity in children;s behaviour whereas higher SES parents are more likely to want their children to become self-directed and autonomous -it is likely that the level of education is an important aspect of SES associated with differences in parental values and knowledge -highly educated parents have more knowledge about parenting and tend to hold a more complex view of development than do parents with less education e.g. they are more likely to view children as active participants in their own learning and development -such a view may make high SES parents more inclined to allow children to have say in matters that involve them such as family rules and the consequences for breaking them -SES difference in parenting styles and practices may partly reflect differences in the environments in which families live -many low SES parents may adopt a controlling, authoritarian parenting style to protect their children from harm in poor, unsafe neighbourhoods especially those with high rates of violence and substance abuse -correspondingly it may be that higher SES parents being less economically stresses and freer of the need to protect their children from violence, have more time and energy to focus on complex issues in child-rearing and may be in a better position to adopt an authoritative style, interacting with their children in a controlled yet flexible and stimulating manner

cultural and socioeconomic differences

-people in different cultures sometimes vary in whether they view decisions as moral, social conventional or personal -these differences sometimes arise from religious beliefs e.g. devout Hindus believe that if a widow eats fish she has committed an immoral act; for most other people in the world a widow eating fish would be considered a matter of personal choice -thus beliefs regarding the significance and consequences of various actions in different cultures can influence the designation of behaviours as moral, social conventional or personal -even within a given culture different religious beliefs may affect what is considered a moral or social conventional issue (for religious children God determines everything) -SES can also influence the way children make such designations -children of lower income families are somewhat less likely than middle class children to differentiate sharply between moral and social conventional actions and prior to adolescence, are also less likely to view personal issues as a matter of choice -these differences may be due to the tendency of individuals of low SES both to place a greater emphasis on submission to authority and to allow children less autonomy -this social class difference may evaporate as youths approach adolescence

prosocial moral judgement

-prosocial behaviour is voluntary behaviour intended to benefit others, such as helping, sharing with and comforting others -to determine how children resolve prosocial moral dilemmas researchers present children with stories in which the character must choose between helping someone or meeting their own needs -on these tests children and adolescents use five levels of prosocial moral reasoning delineated by Eisenberg that resemble Kohlberg's stages

prosocial behaviour

-prosocial behaviour is: 1.voluntary 2. intended to help another -it is sometimes altruistic (empathy, sympathy) -can also be egotistic/practical -in order to be altruistically prosocial children must have at least a basic theory of mind; and according to Piaget's position children do not develop a theory of mind until 6-7 years old but new data suggests that it is much earlier than this -children become prosocial at 4 moths or perhaps even earlier (Kiley Hamlin studies; yellow triangle and blue square below and above the red circle) -increasingly in toddlerhood: 1.toddlers help adults complete tasks (think monkey and baby video) 2. but are less likely to share their own possessions -how does the type of prosocial behaviour change across development: -response to instrumental need by 2 years (helping pick up a dropped pen) -response to emotional distress increases between 2 and 4 years (comforting a sad or hurt peer) -response to material desire not evident at this age (giving a peer stickers/food) -by adolescence prosociality is relatively stable (there is a url with launchpad with this slide, look at it!)

mood psychopathology and suicidality: terminology

-psychopathology: -mental disorders, including mood disorders -psychopathy: -a type of psychopathology -a personality disorder characterized by antisocial behaviour, reduced empathy/remorse and disinhibition -major depressive disorder (MDD): -a type of psychopathology -a mood disorder characterized by low mood, low self-esteem and loss of interest/pleasure -general anxiety disorder (GAD): -a type of psychopathology -an anxiety disorder characterized by excessive, uncontrollable and often irrational worry -suicidality (suicidal ideation): -a symptom of various psychopathologies -characterized by unusual preoccupation with suicide

abnormal emotional and moral development: psychopathy

-psychopathy: -reduced empathy -disregard for the rights of others -not a diagnosis in the DSM -usually diagnosed as antisocial personality disorder in the DSM (cannot be diagnosed in childhood or adolescence) -antisocial personality disorder diagnosis: -three or more of the following: 1. failure to conform to social norms for behaviour 2. deception/lying 3. impulsivity 4. irritability/aggressiveness 5. disregard for safety of self or others 6. irresponsibility (work/financial) 7. lack of remorse -although antisocial personality disorder cannot be diagnosed in youth, there are precursors to the disease -specifically conduct disorder in childhood may predict antisocial personality disorder in adulthood: 1. lack of empathy 2. lack of fear 3. may be comorbid with substance use disorders (important to determine whether conduct disorder is caused by substance use)

family structure changes

-rather than divorce per se, it may be the number of family structure changes that negatively affect children -the number of family changes is more highly correlated with negative outcomes than divorce itself -it may be that this instability is what is harmful not the actual divorce

sexual-minority youth and developmental psychopathology

-recall that SMY psychological development is typically indistinguishable from sexual-majority children's development but: -greater prevalence of mood psychopathology and suicidality among SMY males and females -higher rates of eating disorders among SMY males -higher rates of substance abuse among SMY males and females e.g. the 1995 YRBS studies found that SMY youth were 4 times as likely to experience suicidality; likely due to increased experiences of negativity from social groups

abnormal self development

-self-awareness requires a working theory of mind -many children do not fully develop a theory of mind: (e.g. Autism spectrum disorders, Schizophrenia-onset is typically not until early adulthood for Schizophrenia) -attention deficit hyperactivity disorder: -reduction in executive function -makes perspective-taking and self-awareness more difficult -deaf non-signing chidlren

sexual identity or orientation

-sexual orientation is a person's preference in regard to erotic feelings toward males or females -puberty is the most likely time for youth to begin experiencing feelings of sexual attraction to others -whether this feelings are inspired by members of the other sex or one's own is based primarily on biological factors (identical twins are more likely to exhibit similar sexual orientation than are fraternal twins), although the environment may also be a contributing factor -sexual-minority youth are young people who experience same-sex attractions -growing up sexual-minority youth often feel "different" and some even display cross-gender behaviour (e.g in regard to preferences for toys, clothes or leisure activities) from a relatively early age -however it sometimes takes them a longer time to recognize that they are lesbian, gay or bisexual -females are more likely to describe themselves as bisexual or "mostly heterosexual" that are males; male youth who have engaged in same-sex sexual experiences show an increasing preference for males from adolescence to early adulthood -since being gay, lesbian, or bisexual is viewed negatively by many members of society, it is often difficult for sexual minority youth to recognize or accept their own sexual preferences -it is usually even more difficult for them to reveal their sexual identity to others (that is "come out") (media is making this process a bit easier though)

sexual minority youth: terminology

-sexual orientation: -a person's preference in regard to males or females as objects of erotic feelings -sexual-minority youth (SMY): -youth that experience same-sex attractions -coming out: -the revelation of sexual identity to others, usually a developmental process -transgender: -mismatch between gender identity and biological sex -can include genderqueer, individuals whose gender identity is not exclusively masculine or feminine -independent of sexual orientation

sexual-minority youth: gender roles

-sexual-minority youth differ psychologically from sexual-majority youth in very few ways -one way: -sexual-minority youth are more likely to exhibit cross-gendered behaviour than are sexual-majority youth (may lead to differences in relationships with same and opposite sex peers and with same and opposite sex parents) -but cross-gendered behaviour is not an accurate predictor of later sexual-minority status (many SMY will never exhibit cross-gendered behaviour; many children that exhibit cross-gendered behaviour are not SMY)

siblings

-siblings can be a positive influence on children's development -positively: 1. playmates 2. sources of security, support, instruction and surrogate caregiving -positive effects are more abundant when: 1. parents have a good relationship 2. children grow up in a safe environment -but siblings can also have a negative influence on children's development: 1. source of conflict and irritation 2. can contribute to disobedience, substance abuse, and delinquency 3. can contribute to depression and anxiety (especially in situations of parental favouritism and parental discord)

sibling relationships

-siblings influence one another's development and the functioning of the larger family system in many ways both positive and negative -they serve not only as playmates for one another but also as sources of support, instruction, security, assistance and caregiving -the quality of the sibling relationship plays a key role in the influence that siblings have on one another e.g. siblings with a positive relationship are more likely to compromise with one another when resolving a conflict than siblings who've a less positive relationship -siblings also can be rivals and sources of mutual conflict and irritation and in some cases they can contribute to the development of one another's undesirable behaviours such as disobedience, delinquency and drinking especially if they live in disadvantaged neighbourhoods -low quality sibling relationships also are associated with higher levels of siblings' depression, anxiety, and social withdrawal -in addition sibling aggression and conflict are related to children's lack of self-regulation and risky sexual behaviour as well as externalizing problems -siblings' relationships tend to be less hostile and more supportive when their parents are warm and accepting of them -siblings also have closer, more positive relationships with one another their parents treat them similarly; if parents favour one child over another the sibling relationship may suffer and the less favoured child may experience distress, depression, and other problems with adjustment especially if the child does not have a positive relationship with his or her parents -different treatment by parents is particularly influential in early and middle childhood with less favoured siblings being likelier to experience worry, anxiety or depression than are their more favoured siblings; by early adolescence however children often view parents' differential treatment of them as justified because of differences they perceive between themselves and their siblings in age, needs, and personal characteristics -when children view differential treatment by parents as justified they report more positive relationships with there sibling and their parents than when they feel that differential treatment is unfair -cultural values may play a role in children's evaluations of and reactions to differential parental treatment e.g. in a study of Mexican-Amwerican families older siblings who embraced the cultural value of familism, which emphasized interdependence, mutual support and loyalty among family members were not put at risk of higher levels of depressive symptoms or risky behaviour by their parents' preferential treatment of younger siblings -another factor that can affect the quality of sibling's interactions is the nature of the parents' relationship with each other -siblings get along better if their parents are getting along with each other -in contrast siblings whose parents fight with each other are likely to have more hostile interactions because their parents not only model negative behaviour for their children but also may be less sensitive and appropriate in their efforts to manage their children's interactions with one another -rivalry and conflict between siblings tend to be higher in divorced families and in remarried families than in non-divorced families, even between biological siblings -although some siblings turn to one another for support when their parents divorce or remarry, they may also compete for parental affection and attention which often are scarce in these situations -relationships between half siblings can be especially emotionally charged perhaps because the older sibling may resent the younger sibling whois born to both parents in the new marital relationship -in general the more a child in a blended family perceives a parent's preferential treatment of a sibling (whether a full sibling or a half sibling) the worse the child's relationship with that sibling -thus the quality of sibling relationships differs across families depending on the ways that parents interact with each child and with each other and children's perceptions of their treatment by other family members; such differences highlight the fact that families are complex, dynamic social systems and that all members contribute to one another's functioning

the role of parental socialization

-socialization is the process through which children acquire the values, standards, skills, knowledge, and behaviours that are regarded as appropriate for their present and future roles in their particular culture -parents typically contribute to their children's socialization in at least 3 different ways: 1. parents as direct instructors: parents may directly teach their children skills, rules, and strategies and explicitly inform or advise them on various issues 2. parents as indirect socializers: parents provide indirect socialization through their own behaviours with and around their children; for instance in everyday actions parents unintentionally demonstrate skills, communicate information and rules and model attitudes and behaviours toward others 3. parents as social managers: parents manage their children's experiences and social lives including their exposure to various people, activities and information especially when children are young; if parents decide to place their child in a daycare centre for example, the child's daily experience with peers and adult caregivers will likely differ dramatically from that of children whose daily care is provided at home

socioeconomic influences

-socioeconomic status appears to predict parenting practices -higher SES mothers engage in more authoritative parenting; they: 1. talk more to their children 2. are more democratic -lower SES mothers engage in more authoritarian parenting; they: 1. are more controlling and disapproving 2. are less democratic -reasons why parenting styles might be affected by SES: 1. time 2. education about parenting practices 3. belief systems 4. danger in the community

an alternative to divorce: ongoing marital conflict

-sustained marital conflict has negative effects on children at all ages -infants and children can be harmed by marital conflict because it may cause parents to be less warm and supportive, undermining their emotional involvement with the child and the security of the early parent-child attachment -preschoolers and older children are especially likely to feel threatened and helpless when there is ongoing parental conflict (more so if the conflict involves high levels of verbal and physical aggression -even adolescents often feel threatened by and responsible for parental conflict -perhaps as a consequence of these negative effects, interpersonal conflict and aggression are associated with children's and adolescents' reduced attentional skills, negative emotion, behavioural problems and abnormal cortisol responses to distress -all these outcomes are likely to be exacerbated if the sustained conflict leads (as it frequently does) to parental hostility toward the children themselves -the relation between marital conflict and children's problem behaviour seems to be partly due to genetic factors that affect both parents' and children's behaviour and partly due to the link between marital conflict and comprised parenting behaviour -it was found that among children raised in high-conflict families those whose parents were divorced were better adjusted than those whose parents stayed together, whereas the reverse was true for low-conflict families

emotional intelligence

-the ability to delay gratification in one situation in preschool is able to predict social, emotional and academic competence many years later -emotional intelligence refers to the set of abilities that are key to competent social functioning; these abilities include being able to motivate oneself and persist in the face of frustration, control impulses and delay gratification, identify and understand one's own and others' feelings, regulate one's moods, regulate the expression of emotion in social interactions, and empathize with others' emotions -more than almost any other measure emotional intelligence predicts how well people do in life especially in their social lives -our emotions and how we deal with them play a huge role in the quality of our lives and in our relationships with others

changes in families in Canada

-the average age at which people first get married has risen -more women with children now work outside of the home -the average age at which women bare children has increase especially within marriages -two of the most far-reaching changes in the Canadian family in the past half-century have been the upsurge in divorce and decrease in the number of marriages -in 1986 a change to Canada's Divorce Act allowed for divorce after only one year of separation (previously 3 years of separation had been necessary -the decline in marriage is likely related to an increase in common-law relationships -as a reflection of changes in families the percentage of children living with two parents is declining and the percentage of children living in lone-parent families is increasing -although people are more likely to divorce than in the past most people also re-partner after divorce either marrying again or entering into a common-law relationship -thus the number of families including children from one or both parents' prior marriages has increased substantially

typical emotional development in childhood

-the basis of children's self-esteem or self-evaluation changes with cognitive development and experience and events that make children feel happiness and pride tend to change accordingly e.g. from early to middle childhood acceptance by peers and achieving goals becomes increasingly important and success in these areas become key sources of happiness and pride -as a child's cognitive ability to represent imaginary phenomena develops in the preschool years children often start to fear imaginary creatures such as ghosts or monsters; such fears are uncommon in elementary school children probably because children of this age have a better understanding of reality then do younger children -instead school aged children's anxieties and fears are generally related to important real-life issues such as challenges at school, health, and personal harm -the causes anger also change as children develop a better understanding of others' intentions and motives e.g in the early preschool years a child is likely to feel anger when harmed by a peer whether or not the harm was intentional -the frequency with which certain emotions are experienced also may change in childhood and adolescence -negative emotion increases after middle childhood -typically early to middle adolescence is marked by an increase in the frequency or intensity of negative emotions and a decrease in positive emotions -for most youths the increase is mild but for a minority it is quite sharp often in their relations with their parents -this negative shift in average emotions generally appears to end by Grade 10 and older adolescents also experience less emotional ability (i.e. day to day change) than do younger adolescents -of course children's emotional states are highly influenced by the world around them with negative emotions being intensified by stressful conditions

the relation of emotional self-regulation to social competence and adjustment

-the development of emotional self-regulation has important consequences for children especially with regard to their social competence -social competence refers to a set of skills that help individuals achieve their personal goals in social situations while maintaining positive relationships with others -children who have the ability to inhibit inappropriate behaviours, delay gratification, and use cognitive methods of controlling their emotion and behaviour tend to be well adjusted and liked by their peers and by adults -children and adolescents who are ale to deal constructively with stressful situation (negotiating with others to settle conflicts, planning strategies to resolve upsetting situations, seeking social support, etc.) generally are better adjusted than are children who lack these skills, including those who avoid dealing with stressful situations altogether -well regulated children also do better in school than their less regulated peers do, likely because they are better able to pay attention, are better behaved and better liked by teachers and peers, and consequently like school better

children's emotional development in the family

-the dimensions of temperament related to emotional development are linked to heredity -twin and adoption studies show that compared with fraternal twins identical twins are more similar in the intensity of their emotional reactions, shyness, and sociability as well ad in other aspects of temperament and personality -it is estimated that genes account for a substantial portion of the variation in some aspects if temperament -recent studies of specific genes have shown connections between an individual's genes and aspects of temperament such as self-regulatory capacities and emotionality e.g. genes related to to the functioning of dopamine and other neurotransmitters that affect voluntary attentional processes (executive attention) appear to be especially relevant for self-regulaiton -the expression of these genes appears to be affected by environmental factors such as the quality of parenting or stress -sometimes genetic tendencies toward certain temperamental traits (and related behaviours) are most likely expressed when the environment is suboptimal, for example when parenting is unsupportive or harsh and sometimes when the environment is optimal -various environmental factors play an important role in shaping individual differences in temperament generally -chief among these factors are children's relationships with their parents and their parents' socialization practices

parents' expression of emotion

-the emotions expressed in the home may influence children's views about themselves and others int heir social world e.g children exposed to a lot of anger and hostility may come to view themselves as individuals who anger people and may eventually believe that most people are hostile -parents' expression of emotion provides children with a model when and how to express emotion -this modelling may also effect children's understanding of what types of emotional expressions are appropriate and effective in interpersonal relation -in families in which parents tend not to express emotions children may get the message that emotions are basically bad and should be avoided or inhibited -the parental emotions to which children are exposed may affect their general level of distress and arousal in social interactions, in turn affecting their ability to process important information about the interactions (e.g. others' verbal and nonverbal cues) that would help them moderate their behaviour -the consistent and open expression of positive or negative emotion in the home is associated with specific outcomes for children -when positive emotion is prevalent in the home children tend to express positive emotion themselves; they are socially skilled, well adjusted, low in aggression and able to understand others' emotions (at least in childhood) and they tend to have high self-esteem -when negative emotion is prevalent in the home especially intense and hostile emotion children tend to exhibit low levels of social competence and and to experience and express negative emotion themselves, including depression and anxiety -even when the conflict and anger in the home involves the adults rather than the children directly, these is an increased likelihood that the children will develop anger, behaviour problems, and deficits in social competence and self-regulation; these outcomes are also more likely when children are exposed to high levels of parental depression -parental depression of emotion is not always causally related to positive or negative outcomes in children; children themselves undoubtedly influence the expression of emotion in the home e.g. children who have difficult temperaments or are unmanageable are likely to evoke negative emotion from their parents -genetic factors may contribute to some of the associations between parental emotion and children's emotions or behaviour -because of heredity both parent and child may be prone to anger and impulsive behaviour which affects the quality of both parenting and children's socioemotional competence -thus both heredity and kind of emotions children see and experience in the home undoubtedly play roles in children's emotional and social development

cultural differences in parenting

-the information about the effects of parenting styles cannot be well generalized to the entire population (most of these studies were conducted with European-Canadian and European-Canadians) -authoritative parenting may look different in other culture (outside North America and Europe demandingness tends to be higher) -high strictness predicts negative outcomes in European-Canadian children -but not in Chinese/Chinese-Canadian children, Latino children or African-Canadian children -scolding shame and guilt do not predict negative outcomes in these populations -excessive physical punishment still predicts negative outcomes -higher cultural value placed on parental strictness (seen as a sign of warmth/closeness/protectiveness) -but urban areas outside of North/America/Europe are beginning to shift toward western parenting practices

intelligence and academic achievement

-the mean intelligence score at all ages is 100 (with a standard deviation of 15) -children who score lower than 70 (2 standard deviations below the mean) are considered to have an intellectual disability -causes of intellectual disability: -about 25-35% of intellectual disabilities are caused by known genetic abnormalities (e.g. down syndrome, Williams syndrome) -additional sources of intellectual disability include family/cultural experience and teratogens in utero (e.g. alcohol)

moral judgement

-the morality of a behaviour is based partly on the cognitions (including conscious intentions and goals) that underlie the behaviour -changes in moral reasoning form the basis of moral development

the development of prosocial behaviour

-the origins o altruistic prosocial behaviour are rooted in the capacity to feel empathy and sympathy (empathy is an emotional reaction to another's emotional state that is highly similar to the other person's state or condition) -to experience empathy children must be able to identify the emotions of others and understand that another person is feeling an emotion or insane some kind of need -sympathy is a feeling of concern for another in reaction to the other's emotional state or condition -what distinguishes sympathy from empathy is the element of concern: people who experience sympathy for another are not merely feeling the same emotion as the other person -an important factor contributing to empathy or sympathy is obviously the ability to take the perspective of others -by 10 to 14 months of age children sometimes become disturbed and upset when they view other people whir upset -of course it may be that infants are not really sympathizing with others' distress; they may become upset merely because they do not differentiate clearly between another person's emotional distress and their own -by 18 to 25 months toddlers in lab studies sometimes share a personal object with an adult whom they have viewed being harmed by another -they will also sometimes help an adult retrieve a dropped object -such behaviours are especially likely to occur if the adult explicitly and emotionally communicates his or her need -in studies like these toddlers seem particularly likely to help adults achieve a task or goal like retrieving a dropped object but are much less likely to share one of their own objects -in the second and third years of life the frequency and variety of young children's prosocial behaviours increase e.g. (a study of prosocial behaviours in 2, 3 and 4 year olds) -all three groups were consistent in helping an experimenter complete a puzzle by handing her pieces (instrumental need) -between 2 and 3 there was an increase in children's tendency to help someone experiencing emotional distress -across all three ages children are least likely to share their food or stickers with the experimenter (material desire) -young children do not regularly act in prosocial ways -between the ages of 2 and 3 children most often ignore their siblings' distress or need; occasionally they even ,make the situation worse with teasing or aggression -children's prosocial behaviours such as helping, sharing and donating increase in frequency in the toddler years and from the preschool years through childhood; however prosocial behaviour seems to stabilize or even decline in early to mid-adolescence and rebounds somewhat in late adolescence and early adulthood

quality of these child's relationships with parents

-the quality of a child's relationship with his or her parents can affect the child's emotional development in several ways -the parent-child relationship seems to influence children's sense of security and how they feel about themselves and other people; in turn these feelings affect children's emotionality -children who are securely attached that is who have high-quality trusting relationships with their parents tend to show more positive emotion and less social anxiety and anger than do children who are insecurely attached that is whose relationships with their parents are low in trust and support -securely attached children also tend to be more open and honest in their expression of emotion as well as more advanced in their understanding of emotion perhaps because their parents are more likely to discuss feelings and other mental states with them -this enhanced understanding of emotion is likely to help these children recognize when and how to regulate their emotion

SMY and resilience

-the story is improving in much of North America -SMY are at lower risk for mood psychopathy, substance abuse and suicidality when they have: 1. positive representations in media 2. family acceptance 3. school and peer support/ acceptance 4. school-based policies

older parents

-there has been a significant increase in the number women in Canada having their fist child after age 35 -within limits having children at a later age has decided parenting advantages -older first-time parents tend to have more education, higher-status occupations, and higher incomes than younger parents do -older parents are also more likely to have planned the birth of their children and to have fewer children overall; thus they have financial resources for raising a family -they are also less likely to get divorced within 10 years if they are married -older parents also tend to be more positive in their parenting of infants than younger parents are (unless they already have several children) e.g. compared with people who became parents between the ages of 18 and 25, older mothers and fathers had lower rates of observed harsh parenting with their 2 year olds which in turn predicted fewer problem behaviours a year later e.g. older mothers express greater satisfaction with parenting and commitment to the parenting role, displayed more positive emotion toward the baby and showed greater sensitivity to the baby's cues; however, these positive outcomes did not extend to mothers who already had two or more children;perhaps because they had less energy to deal with so many children, these mothers tended to exhibit less positive affect and sensitive behaviour with their infants than did younger mothers with two or more other children -men who delay parenting until approximately age 30 or later are likewise more positive about the parenting role than are younger fathers -on average they tend to be more responsive, affectionate, and cognitively and verbally stimulating with their infants -they are also more likely to provide a moderate amount of child care -these differences may be partly due to older fathers' more secure establishment in their careers allowing them to focus on their role as father and to be more flexible in their beliefs about acceptable roles and activities for fathers

differences in mothers' and fathers' interactions with their children

-there has been growing attention to the importance of fathers and their interactions with their children -to support the interactions programs have been designed to increase father involvement and changes to social policies have promoted fathers' engagement in childcare e.g. in 1990 Canadian maternity leave policies were changed to a parental benefits program allowing either parent to claim partial leave after childbirth or adoption -in most Western cultures today spouses share child-care responsibilities to some degree; however in the majority of families mothers (including those who work outside the home) still spend considerably more time with their children than fathers do -fathers' participation in child care differs from that of mothers not only in amount but also in kind -mothers are more likely to provide physical care and emotional support than are fathers -in contrast fathers spend a greater proportion of the available time playing with their children than do mothers both in infancy and childhood and the type of play they engage in differs from mothers play as well e.g. fathers are more likely to engage their children in physical and outdoor activities (e.g. rough and tumble play and playing ball) than are mothers -mothers are more likely to play more reserved games with their children (e.g. peekaboo), to read to them and to join them in play with toys indoors -although these general patterns prevail in many cultures there are also cultural variations e.g. fathers in India do nit report playing much at all with their children -mothers and fathers in some cultures simply play less with their children than North American parents do -the degree of maternal and paternal involvement in parenting and the nature of parents' interactions with children doubtlessly vary as a function of cultural practices and such factors as the amount of time parents work away from home and children spend at home -economic and educational factors also seem to be related to the degree to which mothers engage in various caregiving activities e.g. mothers in countries that have higher levels of education and higher gross national product are more likely to engage in caregiving activities that are cognitively stimulating (e.g. reading books, counting, naming objects) and are less likely to leave their children alone or in the care of another child younger than 10 -it is likely that cultural differences in the importance placed on literacy and cognitive growth account for these differences in mothers' caregiving activities

consistency of aggressive and antisocial behaviour

-there is considerable consistency in both girls' and boys' aggression across childhood and adolescence -many children who are aggressive from early in life have underlying neurological deficits (i.e. bring dysfunctions) such as difficulty in paying attention and hyperactivity -these deficits which may become more marked with age can result in troubled relations with parents, peers, and teachers that further fuel the child's aggressive, antisocial pattern of behaviour -problems with attention make it difficult for aggressive children to carefully consider all the relevant information in a social situation before deciding how to act thus their behaviour is often inappropriate for the situation -in addition callous, unemotional traits which often accompany aggression and conduct disorder appear to be associated with a delay in cortical maturation in brain areas involved in decision making, morality, and empathy -early onset conduct problems are also associated with a range of family risk factors -these include: the mother's being single at the time of her child's birth, the mother's being stresses prenatally and during the child's preschool years; the mother's being psychologically unavailable int he preschool years; parental antisocial tendencies; low maternal education and poverty; and child neglect and physical abuse -adolescents with a long childhood history of troubled behaviour represent only a minority of adolescents who engage in the much broader problem of "juvenile delinquency" -most adolescents who perform delinquent acts have no history of aggression or antisocial behaviour before 11 years old -the onset of antisocial behaviour in adolescence is predicted by economic disadvantage, being a member of an ethnic minority, interacting both deviant peers, having a difficult, irritable temperament from infancy onward, an attempt to assert independence from adults or win acceptance from their peers -youths who develop problem behaviours in adolescence typically stop engaging in antisocial behaviour later in adolescence or early adulthood -oppositional defiant disorder: a disorder characterized by age-inappropriate and persistent displays of angry, defiant and irritable behaviours -conduct disorder-a disorder that involves severe antisocial and aggression behaviours that inflict pain on others or involve destruction of property or denial of the rights of others

factors affecting children's adjustment in stepfamilies

-very young children tend to accept step-parents more easily than do older children and adolescents -children generally adjust better and do better academically when all the children are full siblings -in adolescence children born into blended families have higher rates of delinquency, depression, and detachment from school tasks and relationships than do full siblings living with their biological parents, perhaps because there may be more sibling conflict in blended families -the challenges in stepfamilies may differ somewhat for families with stepfathers and those with step mothers -most step fathers generally feel less close to their stepchildren than do fathers in intact families -conflict between stepfathers and step children tends to be greater than that between fathers and their biological children,perhaps in part because stepfathers are more likely to see the children as burdens than their biological fathers are -children with stepfathers tend to have higher rates of depression, withdrawal, and disruptive problem behaviour than do children in intact families -preadolescent girls in particular are likely to have problems with their stepfathers; often the difficulty arises from the fact that prior to the remarriage divorced or separated mothers have had a close, confiding relationship with their daughters and the entry of the stepfather into the family disrupts this relationship -these changes can lead to resentment in the daughter and conflict with both her mother and the stepfather -despite these potential difficulties the presence of an involved stepfather can enhance children's wellbeing, substantially improve family finances and serve as a welcome source of emotional support and assistance for the custodial parent -a new stepfather may be especially helpful both in parenting his stepson and in providing a male role model -the increase of delinquency associated with children of divorce is often lessened if the adolescent's parent remarries -for adolescents having a close relationship with both their stepfather and their biological father and believing that they matter to both is associated with better adolescent outcomes -step mothers generally have more difficulty with their step children than do stepfathers and are at risk for depressive symptoms -often fathers expect stepmothers to take an active role in parenting, including and monitoring and disciplining the child, although the children frequently resent the stepmother;s being the disciplinarian and may reject her authority or accept it grudgingly -despite these problems when it is possible for stepmothers to use authoritative parenting successfully stepchildren may be better adjusted -children of both sexes are most adjusted in stepfamilies when there custodial parent is authoritative in his or her parenting style and the stepparent is warm and involved and supports the custodial parent's decisions rather than trying to exert control over the children independently -an additional factor in children's adjustment in stepfamilies is the attitude of the non-custodial parent toward the stepparent and the level of conflict between the two -if the non-custodial parent has hostile feelings toward the new stepparent and communicates these feelings to the child the child is likely to feel caught in the midd;e increasing his or her adjustment problems -children in stepfamilies fare best when the relations between the non-custodial parent and the stepparent are supportive and the relations between the biological parents are cordial

consequences of coming out

-when they do come out sexual-minority youth usually disclose their same-sex preferences to a best friend, to a peer to whom they are attracted, or to a sibling and they do not tell their parents until a year or more later, if at all -they usually tell their mothers before telling their fathers if they do come out to their parents -if sexual-minority youths are from communities or religious or ethnic backgrounds that are relatively low in acceptance of same-sex attractions they are less likely to disclose their sexual preference to family members -it is not unsocial for parents to initially respond to such disclosure with anger, disappointment and especially denial -sexual-monority youth whose parents are accepting of their child's sexual orientation report higher self-esteem and lower levels of depression and anxiety -fear of being harassed or rejected outside the home os one reason many sexual-minority youth hide their sexual identity from heterosexual peers -for a variety of reasons, sexual-minority youths are vulnerable to a number of social and psychological problems; including depression, low self-esteem, homelessness because they have run away or have been kicked out of their home, and higher rates of attempted suicide -it is likely that what contributes to these social and psychological problems can be attributed to the consequences of being in the sexual minority rather than to same-sex attraction in itself

the shift from caregiver regulation to self-regulation

-when young infants are distressed, frustrated or frightened their parents typically try to help them regulate their emotional arousal by attempting to soothe or distract them -by 6 months of age infants show signs of rudimentary emotional self-regulation -in aversively arousing or uncertain situations they may reduce their distress by unselectively averting their gaze from the source of distress -occasionally 6 month olds can self soothe, that is engage in repetitive rubbing or stroking of their body or clothing -sometimes they can also distract themselves by looking specifically at neutral or positive persons or objects rather than at what has upset them (increasingly used between ages 1 and 2) -such changes in young children's behaviour are probably made possible by their growing ability to control both their own attention and their movements -over the course of the early years children develop and improve their ability to distract themselves by playing on their own when distressed -they also become less likely to seek comfort from their parents when they are upset -an because of their growing ability to use language when they are upset by parental demands they are more likely to discuss and negotiate the situation with the parent than to engage in an emotional outburst -these changes in children's self-regulation are at least partly due to the increasing maturation of the neurological systems including the portion of the frontal lobes that are central to effortfully managing attention and inhibiting thoughts and behaviours -they are also partly due to changes in what adults expect of children; as children age adults increasingly expect them to manage their own emotional arousal and behaviour -at about 9 to 12 months of age children start to show awareness of adults' demands and begin to regulate themselves accordingly -their compliance grows rapidly in the second year of life making them increasingly likely to heed simple instructions such as to not touch dangerous objects -in the second year of life children also show increases in the ability to inhibit their motor behaviour when asked to do so such as slowing down their walking -across the early years children's ability to regulate their attention improves; as a result children are increasingly able to conform to adult's expectations -in adolescence the neurological changes that occur in the cortex further contribute to self-regualtion and other cognitive functioning; they also likely contribute to the decline in risk taking and the improvement in judge meant that often occur in the transition form adolescence to young adulthood

the use of cognitive strategies to control negative emotion

-where as younger children regulate their negative emotions primarily by using behavioural strategies (e.g. distracting themselves with play) older children are also able to use cognitive strategies and problem solving to adjust to emotionally difficult situations -finding themselves caught up in unpleasant or threatening circumstances they may rethink their goals or the meaning of events so that they can adapt gracefully to the situation -this ability helps children avoid acting in ways that might be counterproductive e.g. when older children are tease by peers they may be able to defuse the situation by downplaying the importance of the teasing rather than reacting to it in a way that would provoke more teasing

determinants of sexuality

-whether erotic feelings are directed at others of the same sex, another sex, or more than one -causes: -mostly biological (identical twins are more likely to have the same sexual orientation than are fraternal twins or non-twin siblings) -the environment may also contribute (prenatal hormone levels and birth order; parenting but the directionality is unclear)

parenting styles and effects

-who is the child's most influential teacher: the child herself first and then the parents -parents effect their children in many ways: 1. direct instruction 2. indirect socialization 3. social management -but parenting styles vary widely -parenting styles differ in warmth/responsiveness and demandingness -researcher have identified these two key areas of parenting that make a big difference in raising children =parenting styles can be described as being high or low in responsiveness and demandingness -these variables result in four types of parenting or parenting styles : 1. authoritative 2. authoritarian 3. permissive 4. rejecting-neglecting -these four parenting styles were first defined by Diana Baumrind in the 1970's -Baumrind typically considered authoritative parenting to be the best style and rejecting-neglecting parenting to be the worst style -all four styles have effects on child development

prosocial behaviour: individual differences

-why are some children more prosaically than others: -high variability among children's frequency and types of prosocial behaviour; some children share very readily, other children are resistant to sharing -individual differences in prosocial behaviour are driven by: 1. biological factors 2. socialization: -modelling prosociality -opportunities for prosociality -discipline/parenting style

the selection of appropriate regulatory strategies

-with age children are more aware that the appropriateness of a particular coping behaviour depends on their specific needs and goals as well as on the nature of the problem e.g. children are increasingly likely to realize that it is better to try to find an alternative ways to obtain a goal rather than simply giving up in frustration when their initial efforts fail -another reason is that planning and problem-solving skills which likely contribute to the selection and use of appropriate strategies improve across childhood and across adolescence -children's improving ability to use appropriate strategies for dealing with negative situations is also aided by their growing ability to distinguish between stressors that can be controlled (such as homework) and this that can't be controlled (such as painful but necessary medical procedures) e.g. older children are more aware than younger children that in situations they cannot control it is easier to manage their emotions by simply adapting to the situation rather than trying to change it

divorce

-with the change of the Divorce Act is 1986 divorce rates in Canada have increased (35-42% currently) -divorce can produce a number of effects on children: 1. higher rates of depression/anxiety 2. lower self-esteem 3. higher levels of externalizing behaviour problems 4. lower academic achievement 5. future divorce -but how much divorce affects a child is related to a number of other factors: 1. parental conflict: -level of parental conflict before and after divorce 2. stress: -stress for custodial parent post-divorce -stress levels are increased for custodial parents after divorce; loss of social network; reduced income; loss of shared responsibility for children -divorced single parents that exhibit support, emotional warmth, and authoritative parenting have children with better outcomes -non-ustodial parents that are permissive/indulgent may complicate the situation 3. child's age: -different outcomes for children at different ages -younger children have difficulty understanding divorce; they more frequently blame themselves; they are more anxious about abandonment by their parents -but adolescents struggle more with remarriage than do children -college/university-aged individuals struggle less with parental divorce 4. non-custodial parent contact: -parenting styles may be different between parents

daycare

-with the increase of families with two working parents (or single-parent families), enrolment in daycare has also increased -more than half of children between 6 months and 5 years are in daycare -what effects might daycare have on children's development: 1. social development: -for low SES families daycare reduces externalizing problem among children -in countries in which daycare is of high quality social outcomes are positive -in countries with lower-quality daycare outcomes are more negative 2. cognitive and linguistic development: -high quality daycare has a modest positive effect on cognitive development -low quality care may have a negative effect -positive effects may be greater for low SES families

theme 4: mechanisms of developmental change

1. biological change mechanisms: 2. behavioural change mechanisms: -behavioural change mechanisms describe responses to environmental contingencies that contribute to development -habituation, conditioning, statistical learning and rational learning: -habituation motivated babies to seek new stimulation when they have learned from an experience and thus helps them learn more -like older children infants also learn through instrumental conditioning; behaviours that are rewarded become more frequent and behaviours that do not lead to reward become less frequent -social learning: -children (and adults) learn a great deal from observing and interacting with other people (not really present with chimpanzees) -among the crucial contributors to this social learning are imitations,social referencing, language and guided participation -by 6 months infants begin to imitate novel behaviours that they never make spontaneously -by 15 months toddlers not only learn novel behaviours but can remember them and continue to produce them for at least a week -social learning influences socioemotional development as well as acquisition of knowledge -when an unfamiliar person enters the room, 12 months olds look to their mother for guidance; if the mother' face or voice shows fear the baby tends to stay close to her; if the mother smiles the baby is more likely to approach the stranger (cross the visual cliff in lab if mother smiles) -social learning also shoes children's standards and values -from the second year of life toddlers internalize their parents' values and standard and use them to guide and evaluate thrown conduct -later in development peers, teachers and other adults also influence children's standards and values through social learning (peers in particular play a steadily increasing role over the course of childhood and adolescence) -another mechanism of social learning is social scaffolding 3. cognitive change mechanisms: -the cognitive control involved in executive functioning, such as inhibiting tempting but counter productive actions, being cognitively flexible, and considering other people's perspectives is a type of metacognition -virtually everyone quickly and easily acquires abilities that are important to survival -possessing a basic understanding of key concepts-such as inertia and solidity for inanimate objects; goal-directed movement and growth for living things; and intentions, beliefs and desires for people-helps children act appropriately in new situations e.g. when preschoolers meet an unfamiliar child they assume that the child will have intentions, beliefs, and desires- an assumption that helps them understand the other child's actions and react to them appropriately -these assumptions about other people's minds aids the social understanding of children in all societies

origins of individual difference in prosocial behaviour

1. biological factors: -on the basis of heritability estimates derived from twin studies it appears that the role that genetics factors play in children's prosocial concern for others and in their prosocial behaviour increases with age --certain genes are associated with individual differences in oxytocin a hormone that plays a role in a variety of social behaviours and emotions including pair bonding and parenting and that have been associated with parental attachment, empathy and prosocial behaviour -differences in temperament -differences in children's ability to regulate emotion are related to children's empathy and sympathy -children who tend to experience emotion without getting overwhelmed by it are especially likely to experience sympathy and to enact prosocial behaviour -regulation is also related to children's theory of mind and theory of mind predicts children's prosocial behaviour -thus the effect of heredity on sympathy and prosocial behaviour might be through individual differences in children's social cognition 2. the socialization of prosocial behaviour: -the primary environmental influence on children's prosocial behaviour probably is their socialization in the family -there are three ways in which parents socialize prosocial behaviour in their children: 1. through their modelling and teaching of prosocial behaviour 2. through their arranging opportunities for their children to engage in prosocial behaviour 3. through their methods of disciplining their children and eliciting prosocial behaviour from them -parents also communicate and reinforce cultural beliefs about the value of prosocial behaviour -just as they imitate many other behaviours children tend to imitate other people's helping and sharing behaviour including even that of unknown peers or adults -children are also more likely ti imitate the prosocial behaviour of adults with whom they have a positive relationship -the values parents convey ti their children may influence not only whether children are prosocial but also towards whom they are prosocial (e.g. just to family and community or to Jews as well) -one effective way for parents to teach their children prosocial values and behaviours is to have discussions with them that appeal to their ability to sympathize e.g. poor children would be so happy and excited if they could buy food and toys; more likely that the child donates money 3. opportunities for prosocial behaviour: -providing children with opportunities to engage in helpful activities can increase their willingness to take on prosocial tasks at a later time e.g. performing household tasks that benefit others -participation in prosocial activities may also provide opportunities for children and adolescents to take others' perspectives', to increase their confidence that they are competent to assist others, and to experience emotional rewards for helping -even mandatory school-based community service has been associated with future prosocial values as well as with increased voluntary service at a later date for those youths who were not initially inclined to engage in such activities -however forcing older adolescents into community service can sometimes backfire and undermine their motivation to help 4. discipline and parenting style: -when parents are involved with and are close to their children, children are higher in sympathy and regulation which in turn predicts higher levels of prosocial behaviour -not only might supportive, authoritative parenting promote sympathy and prosocial behaviour, but prosocial, sympathetic children might also elicit more support from their parents -the way in which parents attempt to elicit prosocial behaviour frothier children is also important -if children are regularly punished for failing to engage in prosocial behaviour they may start to believe that the reason for helping others is primarily to avoid punishment -similarly if children are given material rewards for prosocial behaviours they may come to believe that the helped solely for the rewards and thus may be less motivated to help when no rewards are offered -discipline that involves reasoning fosters children's voluntary prosocial behaviour; especially when the reasoning points out the consequences of the child's behaviour for others, encourages perspective taking and is used by parents who generally are warm and supportive -emotion in the mother's voice likely catches her toddler's attention and communicates that she is very serious about what she is saying -children tend to be more prosocial when their parents are not only warm and supportive but also model prosocial behaviour, include reasoning and references to moral values and responsibilities int heir discipline, and expose their children to prosocial models and activities (i.e. authoritative parenting) -experience in helping and cooperating with others and exposure to prosocial values and behaviours jointly contribute to the development of prosocial behaviour

the origins of aggression

1. biological factors: -twin studies suggest that antisocial behaviour runs in the families and is partially due to genetic factors -one genetically influenced contributor to aggression is difficult temperament -hormonal factors are also assumed to play a role in aggression (e.g. testosterone) -another biological contributor to aggression is neurological deficits tat affect attention and regulatory capabilities; children who are not well regulated are likely to have difficulty controlling their tempers and inhibiting aggressive impulses -whatever the specific role, the biological correlates of aggression probably are neither necessary nor sufficient to cause aggressive behaviour in most children -genetic, neurological or hormonal characteristics may put a child at risk for developing aggressive and antisocial behaviour but whether the child becomes aggressive will depend of numerous factors including experiences in the social world 2. socialization of aggression and antisocial behaviour: -the development of aggression can be tracked back to socialization in the home -the quality of parenting experienced by antisocial children is proem that that experienced by other children -although it is unclear to what degree poor parenting and chaotic homes in and of themselves may account for children's antisocial behaviour, it is clear that they comprise several factors that can promote such behaviour -parental punitiveness: -many children whose parents often use harsh but non-abusive physical punishment are prone to problem behaviours in the early years, aggression in childhood, and criminality in adolescence and adulthood -this is especially true when the parents are cold and punitive in general, when the child does not have an early secure attachment and when the child has a difficult temperament and is chronically angry and unregulated -the relation between physical punishment and children's antisocial behaviour varies across racial, ethnic and cultural groups -in some cultures physical punishment and controlling parental behaviours are viewed as part of responsible parenting -when this is the case parental punishment tends not to be associated with antisocial behaviour because children see authoritarian parenting as protective and caring -in contrast abusive punishment is likely to be associated with the development of antisocial tendencies regardless of the group in question -very harsh physical discipline appears to lead to the kinds of social cognition that are associated with aggression such as assuming that others have hostile intentions, generating aggressive solutions to interpersonal problems, and expecting aggressive behaviour to result in positive outcomes -in addition parents who use abusive punishment provide salient models of aggressive behaviour for their children to imitate -there is probably a reciprocal relation between children's behaviour and their parents' punitive discipline -children who are high in antisocial behaviour exhibit psychopathic traits (e.g. are callous, unemotional, manipulative, remorseless), or are low in self-regualiton tend to elicit harsh parenting; in turn harsh parenting increases the children's problem behaviour -the relation between punitive parenting and children's aggression can have a genetic component -partens whose children are antisocial and aggressive often are that way themselves and are predisposed to punitive parenting -ineffective discipline and family coercion: -parents who are inconsistent in administering discipline are more likely than other parents to have aggressive and delinquent children -so too are parents who fail to monitor their children's behaviours and activities (monitoring reduces the likelihood that older children and adolescents will associate with deviant, antisocial peers) -parents of difficult, aggressive youth sometimes find that monitoring leads to such conflict with their children that they are forced to back off -the aggression of children who are out of control may be unintentionally reinforced by parents who, once their efforts to coerce compliance have failed give into children's fits of temper and demands -parental control: -children who are frequently exposed to verbal and physical violence between their parents tend to be more antisocial and aggressive than other children -embattled parents model aggressive behaviour for their children -children whose mothers are physically abused tend to believe that violence is an acceptable, even natural part of family interactions -embattled spouses also tend to be less skilled and responsive, and more hostel and controlling in their parenting which in turn can increase their children's aggressive tendencies -socioeconomic status and children's antisocial behaviour: -children from low income families tend to be more antisocial and aggressive than children from more prosperous homes -one major factor is the greater amount of stressors experienced by children in poor families, including stress in the family (illness, domestic violence, divorce, legal problems) and neighbourhood violence -in addition low SES tends to be associated with living in a single-parent family or being an unplanned child of a teenage parent; stressors of these sorts are linked to increased aggression and antisocial behaviour -because of the many stressors that economically disadvantaged parents face, they are more likely than other parents to be rejecting and low in warmth; to use erratic, threatening and harsh discipline and to be lax in supervising their children -inaddition to all these low-SES risk factors, conditions such as the presence of gangs, the lack of jobs for juveniles and few opportunities to engage in constructive activities (e.g. clubs and sports) also likely contribute to the antisocial behaviour of many youths in economically disadvantaged neighbourhoods -peer influence: -aggressive children tend to socialize with other aggressive children and often become more delinquent over time of they have close friends who are aggressive -associating with delinquent peers tends to increase delinquency because these peers model and reinforce antisocial behaviour in the peer group -peer approval of relational aggression increases in middle school and students in peer groups supportive of relational aggression become increasingly aggressive -peers play less of a role in promoting antisocial behaviour for adolescents who are embedded in a traditional culture oriented toward adult's expectations (e,g, deference and courtesy toward adults and adherence to adult values) -gangs: gangs tend to be composed of young people whoa re similar in ethnic and racial background (typically between 17 and 18 years if age) -adolescents are more likely to join gangs if they come from a neighbourhood with a rate of resident turnover, if they have an antisocial personality and if they have psychopathic tendencies such as a combination of high hyperactivity, low anxiety, and low prosociality -adolescents who join gangs also tend to have engaged in antisocial activities and to have had delinquent friends before they joined; however benign a gang appears to increase adolescent's delinquent and antisocial behaviour above their prior levels biology and socialization: their joint influence on children's antisocial behaviour: -it is the combination of genetic and environmental factors that predict children's antisocial, aggressive behaviour and some children are more sensitive to the quality of parenting than are others -children with certain gene variants related to serotonin or dopamine, which affect neurotransmission, appears to be more reactive to their environment than are children with different variants -the degree of aggression is affected by a combination of heredity and and the environment

review

Adults are marrying rater and having children later; more children are born to single mothers; and divorce is a more common occurrence. Parental divorce and remarriage or new common-law relationships have been associated with enduring negative outcomes such as behavioural problems, for only a minority of children. The major factor contributing to negative outcomes for children of divorce is dysfunctional family interactions in which parents deal with each other in hostile ways and children feel caught in the middle. Parental depression and upset as well as economic pressures and other types of stress associated with lone parenting often compromise the quality of parents' interactions with each other and with their children. Stepfamilies present special challenges. Conflict is common in stepfamilies especially when the children are adolescents and stepparents usually are less involved with their stepchildren than are biological parents. Children do best if all parents are supportive and use an authoritative parenting style. An increasing number of children live in families in which at least one parent is lesbian or gay. Research indicates that the children of lesbian or gay parents are very similar in their development to children heterosexual parents in terms of adjustment, personality, relationships with peers, sexual orientation, gender-typed behaviour, romantic involvements and sexual behaviour as adolescents.

review

Aggressive behaviour emerges but he second year of life and increases in frequency during the toddler years. Physical aggression starts to decline in frequency in the preschool years; in elementary school, children tend to exhibit more non-physical aggression (e.g. relational aggression) than at younger ages, and some children increasingly engage in antisocial behaviours such as stealing. Early individual differences in aggression and conduct problems predict antisocial behaviour in later childhood, adolescence and adulthood. Children who first engage in aggressive, antisocial acts in early to mid adolescence are less likely to continue their antisocial behaviour after adolescence than are children who are aggressive and antisocial at a younger age. Biological factors including those related to temperament and neurological problems, likely affect children's degree of aggression. Social cognition is also associated with aggressiveness in a variety of ways including the attribution of hostile motives tooters, having hostile goals, constructing and enacting aggressive responses in difficult situations and evaluating aggressive responses favourably. Children's aggression is affected by a range of environmental factors as well as by heredity. In general low parental support, poor monitoring, or the use of disciplinary practices that are abusive or inconsistent are related to high levels of children's antisocial behaviour. Parental conflict in the home and many of the stressors associated with family transitions (e.g. divorce) and poverty can increase the likelihood of children's aggression. In addition involvement with antisocial peers likely contributes to antisocial behaviour, although aggressive children also seek out antisocial peers. Cultural values and practices as communicated in the child's social world, also contribute to differences among children in aggressive behaviour. Intervention programs can be used to reduce aggression which provides evidence of the role of environmental factors in children's aggression.

review

Although in most respects, sexual-minority youths differ little from their peers, they may face special challenges in regard to their identity and disclosing their same-sex preferences to others. Typically, but not always, they move through the milestones of first recognition, test and exploration, identity acceptance (the order of the second and third milestones varies), and identity integration. Most sexual-minority youth have a sense of their sexual attractions by late adolescence, although some individuals report that they first experienced same-sex attractions in middle childhood or ad late as in their 30s. Because many sexual-minority youth initially have difficulty accepting their sexuality and fear revealing their sexual identity to others, they often do not tell others about their sexual preferences until mid to late adolescence or older.

review

Children's efforts to regulate their emotions and emotionally driven behaviour change with age. Whereas young infants must rely on adults to among their emotions, older infants and young children increasingly regulate their own emotions and behaviour through such methods as averting their attention, self-soothing, and distracting themselves with activities. Their ability to inhibit their actions also improves with age. Improvements in children's regulatory capacities likely are based on increases in brain maturation that allow them to better control their attention and their own bodies, as well as changes in adults' expectations of them. In contrast to young children, who often try to cope with their emotions by taking direct action, older children are also able to use cognitive modes of coping, such as focusing on positive aspects of a negative situation or trying to think about something else altogether. In addition they are increasingly able to select and use ways of regulating themselves and coping with stress that are appropriate to the requirements of specific situations. The abilities to regulate one's emotions and related behaviour and to deal constructively with stressful situations, are associated with high social competence and low levels of problem behaviour.

review

Children's emotional development is influenced by their relationship with their parents: children who have secure relations with their parents tend to show more positive emotion and greater emotional understanding than do children who have insecure relations with their parents. Another influence on children's emotional development is their parents' socialization of emotional responding including what emotions parents express with their children and others and how they express them; how parents respond to their children's negative emotions; and whether and how parents discuss emotions with their children.

review

Children's understanding of emotions plays an important role in their emotional functioning. Although infants can detect differences in various emotional expression such as happiness and surprise by 3 to 7 months of age it is not until they are about 6 months of age that they start to treat others' emotional expressions as meaningful. At about 5 and a half to 12 months of age children begin to connect facial expressions of emotion or an emotional tone of voice with other events in the situation as evidenced by their use of social referencing. By age 3 children demonstrate a rudimentary ability to label facial expressions and understand simple situations that are likely to cause happiness. As children move through the preschool and elementary school years their understanding of emotions and situations that cause emotions grows in range and complexity. In addition they increasingly appreciate that the emotions people show may not reflect their true feelings.

review

Emotions are fundamental for much of human functioning and undergo change in the early months of life. Smiles emerge early but do not become social until the second to third month of life, and what makes children smile and laugh changes with age and cognitive development. It is hard to know exactly when anger emerges because distress/pain and anger are difficult to differentiate early in life. Children may experience anger in the second month of life in response to loss of control. In the first months it is similarly difficult to differentiate fear from distress but fear likely has emerged by 6 or 7 months of age, when some children appear to display fear to strangers. Young children also exhibit sadness especially when they are separated from loved ones for extended periods. The self-conscious emotions emerge somewhat later then do most emotions, probably in the second year of life. Their emergence is tied in part to the development of a rudimentary sense of self and to an appreciation of others' reactions to the self. Situations that evoke these emotions vary across cultures. Emotions continue to change in their occurrence an causes in childhood and adolescence. Depression increases markedly in adolescence, especially for girls. Age-related cognitive, biological, and experimental factors likely account for these changes.

review

Families are complex social units that serve diverse functions, including helping offspring to survive, to acquire the skills needed to be economically productive adults and to learn the values of culture. Family members' behaviours influence one another and can alter the functioning of the entire family. Moreover family dynamics are affected by a number of factors including changes in the parents, chammies in the child over the course of development and changes in family circumstances

review

Mothers typically interact with their children more than fathers do. The nature of mother-child and father-child interactions also tends to differ although differences are decreasing. Parent-child interactions differ across culture; for example in some cultures parents play little or not at all with their children. Siblings are important contributors to one another's socialization and development. They can be sources of learning and support as well as rivalry and conflict. Siblings get along better if they have good relationships with their parents and if they do not feel that their parents treat them differently. Sibling relationships are, on average, more hostile and conflicted in divorced and remarried families than in non-divorced families. Thus, siblings relationships, like all family relationships, must be viewed in the context of the larger family system.

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Prosocial behaviours emerge by the second year if life an increase in frequency during the toddler years. At least some types of prosocial behaviour continue to increase in frequency and sensitivity in the preschool and elementary school years. Early individual differences in prosocial behaviour predict differences among children in these behaviours years later Prosocial behaviour may increase with age in childhood partly because of children's developing abilities to sympathize and take others' perspectives. Differences among children in their empathy, sympathy, distress reactions to others' distress, and perspective taking also contribute ti individual differences in children's prosocial behaviour. Furthermore biological factors which may contribute to differences among children in temperament, likely affect how empathetic and prosocial children become. The development of prosocial behaviour also is related to children's upbringing. In general a positive relationship between parents and children is linked to prosocial moral development, especially when supportive parents use effective parenting practices. Authoritative, positive discipline-including the use of reasoning by parents and teachers and exposure to prosocial models, values and activities-is associated with the development of sympathy of sympathy and prosocial behaviour. Cultures differ in the degree to which they value and tech prosocial behaviour and these differences are reflected in how much children help, share with, and are concerned about other people and perhaps whom they assist. Intervention programs in schools designed to foster prosocial behaviour sometimes have been found to increase children's prosocial behaviour and prosocial moral reasoning; whether a given intervention is effective probably depends on its content, length, and the degree to which it is effectively administered. Such findings convincingly demonstrate that social factors (as well as heredity) contribute to the development of prosocial tendencies

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Styles of parenting are associated with important developmental outcomes. Researchers have delineated four basic parenting styles varying in parental warmth and control: authoritative (relatively high in control and high in warmth); authoritarian (high in control but low in warmth); permissive (high in warmth and low in control); and rejecting-neglecting (low in both warmth and control). Particular styles of parenting can affect the meaning and impact of specific parenting practices as well as children's receptiveness tot these practices. In addition the significance and effects of different parenting styles or practices may vary somewhat across cultures. Education and income are associated with variation in parenting. Economic stressor can undermine the quality of marital interactions and parent-child interactions. Children in economically disadvantaged and homeless families are at greater risk for serious adjustment problems, such as depression,academic failure, disruptive behaviour at school and drug use.

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come back to this if time (page 566)

the development of emotions in childhood

developmentalists see emotions in terms of several components: 1. neural responses involved in emotion 2. physiological factors including heart and breath rate and hormone levels 3. subjective feelings 4. the cognitions or perceptions that cause or are associated with the aforementioned neural and physiological responses and subjective feelings 5. the desire to take action including the desire to escape, approach or change people or things in the environment -in addition emotions can involve expressive behaviour and cognitive interpretations of, or reactions to, the feeling state

emotion

examples of emotion-inducing events: 1. neural response: -recognition -association 2. subjective feelings 3. cognitive response 4. physiological response 5. desire for action meta-theories to define emotion: 1. discrete emotions theory: -first proposed by Darwin -facial expressions are evolved responses to specific stimuli and are species universal -e.g. what does fear look like on the face? -emotions are innate and are distinguishable from each other from early in life -there are 8-12 basic emotions -Silvan Tomkin's 8 emotions 1. surprise 2. interest 3. joy (or happiness) 4. anger (or rage) 5. fear 6. disgust 7. shame 8. anguish (or sadness) -one hallmark of discrete emotions theory: emotions can be described in terms of physical reactions -facial feedback hypothesis: facial expressions actually mediate emotional states e.g. smiling makes us happier e.g. holding a pen in your teeth increases happiness; reducing frown lines via botox reduces depression -computers can group emotional faces into categories with norther information; almost as well as humans can 2. functionalism theory: - emotions are evolved to promote action toward a certain goal e.g. fear is evolved to encourage running away; anger is evolved to remove an obstacle to a goal -these emotions are not different because they look different but because they have different goals -some evidence in support of functionalism: 1. smiles are not reserved only for joy 2. physical manifestation of emotions is not meaningful -how emotions are expressed in individuals is the result of life experience e.g. anger does not manifest itself in the same way across individuals (differs from discrete emotions theory in this aspect) 3. dynamic-systems theory -emotions are comprised of many sub-systems that cannot be separated -examples are: 1. appraisals 2. goals 3. actions 4. expressions -emotion is not any one of these subsystems but all of them working together

levels of prosocial behaviour

levels 1: hedonistic, self-focused orientation -the individual is concerned with his or her own interests rather than with moral considerations -reasons for assisting or not assisting another include the prospects of direct personal gain or future reciprocation and whether one needs or like the other person -predominant mode primarily for preschoolers and younger elementary school children level 2: needs-based orientation -the individual expresses concern for the physical, material, and psychological needs of others even when those needs conflict with his or her own -this concern is expressed in the simplest terms, without clear evidence of self-reflective role taking, verbal expression of sympathy, or reference to such emotions as pride or guilt level 3: approval and/or stereotyped orientation -the individual justifies engaging in prosocial behaviour on the basis of others' approval or acceptance and/or on stereotyped images of good and bad persons and behaviour -predominant mode for some elementary school and high school students level 4a: self-reflective empathetic orientation -the individual's judgements include evidence of self-reflective sympathetic responding or role taking, concern with other's humanness, and/or guilt or positive emotion related to the consequences of one's actions -predominant mode for a few older elementary school children and many high school students level 4b: transition level -the individual's justifications for helping or not helping involve internalized values, norms, duties, or responsibilities -they may also reflect concerns for the condition of the larger society or refer to the necessity of protecting the rights and dignities of other persons -these ideals however are not clearly or strongly stated -predominant mode for a minority of people of high school age or older level 5: strongly internalized stage -the individuals justifications for helping or not helping are based on internalized values, norms, or responsibilities; the desire to maintain individual and societal contractual obligations or improve the condition of society; and the belief in the rights, dignity and equality of all individuals -this level is also characterized by positive or negative emotions related to whether one succeed in living up tone's own values and accepted norms -predominant mode for only a small minority of high school students -in general this pattern of changes in prosocial moral reasoning has been found cross-culturally -nevertheless children from different cultures do vary somewhat in their prosocial moral reasoning -in nearly all cultures reasoning that reflects the needs of others and global concepts of good and bad behaviour (Kohlberg's stage 3 and Eisenberg's level 3) emerges at somewhat younger ages on prosocial dilemmas than on Kohlberg's moral dilemmas -with age children's prosocial moral judgement, like their reasoning on Kohlberg's moral dilemmas, becomes more abstract and is based more on internalized principles and values -paralleling the case with moral reasoning on Kohlberg's measure in numerous cultures those children, adolescents, and young adults who use higher-level prosocial moral reasoning tend to be more sympathetic and prosocial in their behaviour than do peers who use lower-level prosocial moral judgement