Transcript Introduction to Psychology - Monona Grove School District

1st Environmental
Influence - Prenatal
 One arrangement –
two separate
placentas
One may have a
better placement
Separate placentas
can make babies
dissimilar in traits
such as social
competence and selfcontrol
1st Environmental
Influence - Prenatal
 Second arrangement –
twins share a placenta
Environmental
Influence
 Experience affects brain development
Impoverished
environment
Rat brain
cell
Enriched
environment
•Implications for humans?
Rat brain
cell
Benefits of “Handling”
Touching and holding results in
faster weight gain and
neurological development for
both babies and animals
Experience produces a bundle
of neural connections
Language development is easy
really early, almost impossible
after adolescence
Environmental
Influence
 A trained brain
Environmental
Influence - Parenting
 Blame on parents is often
overstated
 Hindsight example in
separated twin study – “Why
are you so cleanly?”
 Parents DO matter –
evidence is in the extremes
 Parenting amounts to less
than 10% of personality
differences
Environmental Influence
- Peers
Peer influence is STRONG
Preschoolers will eat food around other kids
that they will otherwise refuse to eat at home
Children will adapt accents of peers of
accents of their parents
Teens who start smoking typically do so
BECAUSE they have friends who model
smoking… parental influence is not as
important
Peer vs. Parent
Influence
Parents more strongly
influence:
Education
Discipline
Responsibility
Orderliness
Charitableness
Ways of interacting
with authority figures
Peers more strongly
influence:
Learning cooperation
Finding popularity
Inventing styles of
peer interaction
Young people find peers more interesting, but look to parents when
contemplating their own futures.
Environmental
Influence
 Culture
 the behaviors, ideas, attitudes, and
traditions shared by a group of people
and transmitted through generations
 Norm
 an understood rule for accepted and
expected behavior
Environmental
Influence
 Personal Space
 the buffer zone we
like to maintain
around our bodies
 Memes
 self-replicating ideas,
fashions, and
innovations passed
from person to person
Culture and Self
 Individualism – giving priority to one’s
own goals over group goals and defining
one’s identity in terms of personal
attributes.
 Collectivism – giving priority to goals of
one’s group (extended family, work group,
etc) and defining one’s identity
accordingly.
Culture and Self
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 X Chromosome
 the sex chromosome found in both men and
women
 females have two; males have one
 an X chromosome from each parent produces
a female child
 Y Chromosome
 the sex chromosome found only in men
 when paired with an X chromosome from the
mother, it produces a male child
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 Testosterone
 the most important of the male sex hormones
 both males and females have it
 additional testosterone in males stimulates:
 growth of male sex organs in the fetus
 development of male sex characteristics during
puberty
 Role
 a set of expectations (norms) about a social position
 defining how those in the position ought to behave
Gender and Social Connection
 Females are more interdependent than males.
 Teen girls – more time with friends.
 Late adolscents – more time social networking
 Adults – prefer face-to-face conversation, use
conversation to explore relationships
 Males prefer conversation to communicate solutions
 Stark enough difference to predict gender of email
author.
 Evolutionary connection – human evolution
based on social connectedness.
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 Gender Role
 a set of expected
behaviors for males and
females
 Gender Identity
 one’s sense of being male
or female
 Gender-typing
 the acquisition of a
traditional masculine or
feminine role
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 Gender and Culture
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 Social Learning Theory
 theory that we learn social behavior by
observing and imitating and by being
rewarded or punished
 Gender Schema Theory
 theory that children learn from their cultures
a concept of what it means to be male and
female and that they adjust their behavior
accordingly
The Nature and
Nurture of Gender
 Two theories of gender typing