Transcript Review for final exam

REVIEW FOR FINAL EXAM
Understanding the Life-Span

Nature-nurture issue
 Refers
to the questions of how biological and
environmental forces impact development

Assumptions of the life-span perspective
 Development
is lifelong
 Development is multidimensional and multidirectional
 Development is highly plastic
 Development is affected by multiple interacting forces
Understanding the Life-Span

Research designs

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Experimental: allows inferences about cause and effect because
researchers use random assignment of participants into two or
more conditions/groups
Cross-sectional: groups of people differing in ages are studied
at the same point in time or at different points in time
Longitudinal: participants are studied repeatedly, and changes
are noted as they get older
Sequential: several similar cross-sectional or longitudinal studies
are conducted at varying times
Behavioral observation***: uses both interviews and naturalistic
observation over a period of time to determine age related
changes
Understanding the Life-Span

Research design examples: Experimental
A
study of the effects of times spent reading on
preschoolers vocabulary
 A group of preschoolers are randomly assigned to 1 of
3 groups
 1)
reads for 2 hours per day for 2 weeks
 2) reads for 1 hour per day for 2 weeks
 3) does not read for 2 weeks
 At
the end of 2 weeks preschoolers are given a
vocabulary test
Understanding the Life-Span


Example: Longitudinal
A study on the development of contact initiation
behaviors
A group of preschoolers are interviewed and also observed
under natural conditions in order to study the ways in which
they initiate contact with their peers
 Every two years after the initial observations, the same
group of preschoolers are interviewed again and observed
in order to determine how their contact strategies change
over time
 The study is concluded when the children reach adolescence

Understanding the Life-Span


Example: Cross-sectional
A study of video game playing in children
 Different
age groups are assessed (5, 10, 15 yearolds) for the average number of hours per day spent
playing video games
 Assessment occurs at different times
5
year-olds are assessed in 2003
 10 year-olds are assessed in 2004
 15 year-olds are assessed in 2005
Understanding the Life-Span


Example: Sequential
A study examining the effects of low-SES on
children’s academic/professional success
 Sample
of 10 preschoolers are followed over a period
of at least 20 years
 After 5 years another group of preschoolers are
added to the study who will also be followed for 20
years
Theories of Human Development

Freud and Psychodynamics

Id – the largest portion of the mind, is the source of
biological needs and desires


Always wants to lash out in childlike ways, like throwing
a temper tantrum if your parent wont let you eat ice
cream after school
Ego – the conscious, rational part of personality,
redirects the id’s impulses in socially acceptable
ways


EGO
Compromises in socially acceptable ways, like
promising a parent that if you are allowed to eat ice
cream after school, you will eat double the normal
amount of veggies at dinner time
Superego – the conscience, represents the values of
society to which one must conform

Makes one aware of what is moral and immoral in the
eyes of society, knowing its not acceptable to hit a
playmate to get his toy
SUPEREGO
ID
Theories of Human Development

Classical conditioning

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Unconditioned stimulus – natural stimulus that produces a reflex
Unconditioned response – natural reflex to some natural stimulus
Conditioned stimulus – stimulus that, after being paired with an unconditioned
stimulus, now elicits a response similar to a reflex
Conditioned response – the response to a conditioned stimulus
Ex. On Monday, you are eating Oreos while watching TV and a creepy
clown on a commercial scares you really bad and you scream

Then on Tuesday you see Oreos in the grocery store and you get a scared
feeling

On Monday



Creepy clown = unconditioned stimulus
Scream = unconditioned response
On Tuesday


Oreos = conditioned stimulus
Scared feeling = conditioned response
Theories of Human Development

Operant conditioning


Basically states that the consequences that follow a behavior impact the
likelihood of the behavior to increase or decrease
Operant conditioning terms

Reinforcer: always increases the occurrence of a behavior

Positive reinforcer: something positive happens every time the target behavior occurs


Negative reinforcer: removing something negative every time the behavior occurs


You get a cookie every time you put your dishes in the dishwasher after dinner, so you will
put your dishes away more frequently
When you have a headache, you take an Advil which makes the pain go away, thus you will
take an Advil every time you have a headache
Punishment: always decreases the occurrence of a behavior

Negative punishment: taking away something positive every time the behavior occurs


When you don’t put your cloths in the hamper, your mom takes a privilege away so you will
stop leaving cloths on the floor
Positive punishment: presenting something negative every time the behavior occurs

You are spanked every time you throw a tantrum in public so you will stop acting out in public
Genes, Environment and Development


Gene – segment of DNA along the length of the chromosome
Genetic inheritance

Two forms of each gene occur at the same place on the chromosomes, one
inherited from the mother and one from the father


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Only one allele affects the child’s characteristics
Dominant allele = X


Only when there are two recessive alleles will a recessive trait be inherited
Ex. Mom is xx, dad is Xx

Possible kids’ pairings: xX and xx


If a dominant allele is present it will always be the trait that is inherited
Recessive allele = x


Each form of a gene is called an allele
Means 50% of their kids would have the dominant trait
Ex. Mom is xx, dad is XX

Possible kids’ pairings: xX

Means 100% of their kids would have the dominant trait
Genes, Environment and Development

Heritability – the proportion of the differences in a
trait among a group of people that is due to genetic
differences among these people
 You
inherit traits from your genes, so the differences in a
group of people on a specific trait due to genetic
differences reflect how “inheritable” that trait is… thus
heritability
Genes, Environment and Development

Remember the genetic-environment correlation?
 It
means that our genes influence the environments to
which we are exposed

An active-genetic/environmental correlation is
when our disposition affects the sorts of
environments we find ourselves in
 Ex.
A shy child is probably going to have different
experiences than an extremely active/outgoing child
Prenatal Development and Birth

The 3 periods of prenatal development are (from earliest to latest):

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Teratogen – an environmental agent that causes a birth defect
How severely a teratogen affects the developing baby depends on
ALL 3 of these:

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Germinal > embryo > fetus
The length of exposure or “dose” of the teratogen
The timing of the exposure of the teratogen
The genetic make-up of the embryo or fetus
If a mother does not get adequate nutrition during pregnancy and
does not gain the appropriate amount of weight (25-30 lbs)

The most likely negative outcome for the baby is mental impairments
The Physical Self

Secular trends – are generational changes

Ex. In North America, people get taller with each generation
Dynamic systems perspective – mastery of motor skills
involves acquiring increasingly complex systems of action

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
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When motor skills blend together, each cooperating with others to
produce more effective ways of exploring and controlling the
environment
Ex. Control of the head and upper chest combine into sitting
Ex. Standing, stepping, and improved upright posture control
combine into walking
Ex. A 10 month-old realizes that rolling over doesn’t get him very
far, but then figures out how to crawl across a room to get a
favorite toy
The Physical Self

Benefits of physical fitness in older individuals


Enhances all areas of well-being: cognitive, physiological,
and psychological functioning
Cardiac reserve capacity - The work that the heart is
able to perform beyond that required of it under
ordinary circumstances
Decreases in reserve capacity occur in late adulthood
 This means that their maximum heart rate is lower
 Ex. Even if a 60 year-old is in top shape, his/her maximum
heart rated during exercise is still going to be lower than it
was in his/her 20s


The heart just cant beat as fast, meaning decreased reserve
capacity
Perception

Nativist perspective
 Basically
suggests that certain human abilities are
innate (that we are born with them already in place)
 So
if a parent believes their newborn already has the
capacity to understand certain things (like judging distance,
perceiving if something moving towards or away,
understanding of language, etc.), this would reflect the
nativist perspective
Perception

Speech perception
 Very
young infants are sensitive to all speech/language
sounds
 With age, we become more sensitive to sounds that are
relevant in our own language and less sensitive to
sounds that are irrelevant
 Ex.
Young infants can detect differences in vowel sounds of
different languages that sound the same to older children
and adults

But with age, we lose this ability as we become focused on
learning our own language
Perception

Sensory adaptation - occurs when sensory
receptors change their sensitivity to the stimulus
 Dark
 Like

adaptation - adaptation to reduced light intensity
going from a well lit area to a darker area
Ex. When an elderly person turns off the light in their living room,
and has more trouble finding their way to the bedroom in the
dark than they used to when they were younger, this indicates
slower dark adaptation ability
Cognition

Piaget’s concept of assimilation – when children
use their current schemes to interpret the world
 This
can lead to over generalizations of unfamiliar
things
 Ex.
An 18 month-old knows what fish are and has formed a
scheme that fish have fins and swim around in the water


The child goes to Sea World and sees a dolphin for the first time,
and then says “Look at the fish!”
The child applied the already formed “fish” schema to the
interpretation of his environment
Cognition

Circular reactions – when babies stumble onto a
new experience caused by the baby’s own motor
activity
 Tertiary
circular reactions – exploration of the
properties of objects by acting on them in novel ways
 Emerge
around 12-18 months of age
 Ex. A child is playing with blocks in a high chair, and begins
throwing them on the ground one at a time to see how each
one bounces
 Ex. A child shoves play-dough in his/her mouth, ears, and
hair and then throws some on the ground just to see what
happens
Cognition

Remember when we talked about how young children
fail conservation tasks?
After watching liquid being poured from a short, wide glass
to a tall, skinny glass, they believe there is now more liquid
 If 2 rows of quarters have the same number of quarters, but
one is stretched out longer, they believe there are more
quarters in the longer row


This happens because of centration – when children
focus on one aspect of a situation (usually the most
obvious) and ignore other important aspects
Ex. The child is centered on the height of the liquid in the
glass
 Ex. The child is centered on the length of the row of quarters

Memory and Information Processing

Memory strategies

Rehearsal – repeating things over and over again


Organization – grouping similar things together (chunking)


Ex. Repeating a new address over and over again
Ex. When trying to remember state capitals, grouping all state
capitals in the same part of the country together
Elaboration – creating a relationship, or shared meaning,
between two or more pieces of information that do not belong
to the same category
Ex. When trying to remember someone’s name, you associate what
that person was wearing when you met them with their name (“Mary
was wearing a purple jacket)
 Elaboration can include any elaboration on, or expansion of the
information to be remembered

Memory and Information Processing

Scripts for events include the sequence of events
that are supposed to happen
 Children
can have scripts for just about anything, going
grocery shopping, eating out, visiting grandparents,
packing to go on vacation, getting ready for bed,
getting in the car, etc.
 Ex. An 11 year-old has a script for eating in a
restaurant that includes going inside, sitting next to
mom, telling mom what you want to eat, eating, then
leaving
Intelligence and Creativity

Fluid intelligence – depends on basic information-processing skills, ability
to detect relationships among visual stimuli, speed of analyzing information,
and capacity of working memory


Fluid intelligence declines early (processing speed!) starting in the 20s
One of the ways it is tested is pattern recognition:
?


What comes next?
Crystallized intelligence – skills that depend on accumulated knowledge
and experience, good judgment, and mastery of social conventions


Gains over the life-span only declining in (very) late adulthood
Tested by asking individuals socially and culturally relevant information


Ex. What are the state capitols of Vermont and Mississippi?
Ex. What is the difference between pride and pied?
Intelligence and Creativity

The Flynn effect – the name given to the sustained rise in
intelligence test scores over the past several decades


This is just a name for the phenomenon of rising IQ scores since IQ
testing was invented
IQ score facts to know:
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The fear of “stereotype threat” (i.e. fear of being judged on the basis
of the negative stereotypes about the group you belong to) CAN help
explain the lower scores of African Americans on intelligence tests
Genetic factors CAN explain differences between IQ scores WITHIN
racial groups but NOT BETWEEN racial groups
Being exposed to the “culture of the tests” (i.e. the dominant social class)
and quality schools CAN lead to increases in IQ scores
An individual’s IQ CANNOT be accurately predicted simply on the basis
of their race
Language and Education

Semantics – word meanings


Underextension – vocabulary error in which a word is applied too
narrowly, to a smaller number of objects and events than is
appropriate


Semantics problem ex. Mom says to Dad “Could you pass the salt
dear?” 3 year-old says to Mom “But Mommy, Daddy isn’t a 4-legged
brown animal!”
Ex. Toddler only calls his stuffed dog toy “doggie” and doesn’t refer to
his new puppy as “doggie”
Overextension – vocabulary error in which a word is applied too
broadly, to a wider collection of objects and events than is
appropriate

Ex. Toddler calls all vehicles (trucks, SUVs, trains, motorcycles, vans, etc.)
as “car”
Language and Education

Achievement motivation – motivation to achieve
goals, academic, social, financial, occupational
 In
childhood achievement is motivated by factors such
as parenting practices, peer relationships, and personal
goals (which are age related)
 Ex.
You don’t have the same goals in kindergarten as you do
in in middle school and high school
 In
adulthood, social contexts are more important in
affecting achievement motivation than actual age
 Ex.
Adults must be in a social context that gives them both
the opportunity and the motivation to achieve new life goals
Self and Personality

Erikson vs. Freud

Freud

Psychosexual theory – emphasizes that how parents manage their child’s
sexual and aggressive drives in the first few years is crucial for healthy
personality development



Id, ego, and superego parts of personality
Oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital stages
Erikson

Psychosocial theory – emphasized that in addition to mediating between id
impulses and superego demands, the ego makes a positive contribution to
development, acquiring attitudes and skills at each stage that make the
individual an active, contributing member of society

Emphasized the social factors that affect personality development more than
Freud
 Believed that normal development must be understood in relation to each
culture’s life situation
 Suggested that child rearing can be understood only in relation to the
competencies valued and needed by an individual’s society
Self and Personality

Personality and Identity

Identity moratorium – exploration without having reached commitment

Considered healthy, experimenting and exploring alternatives before settling on a choice


Identity achievement – commitment to values, beliefs, and goals following a
period of exploration

Considered healthy, committing to a path after a period of moratorium and exploring
options


Ex. After taking classes in psychology, biology, and history, you decide you want to pursue a
career teaching history
Identity foreclosure – commitment in the absence of exploration

Considered unhealthy, settling on a life path without exploring options


Ex. Trying out different majors and career choices before settling on an occupation
Ex. Deciding to be a farmer or a lawyer or a politician just because your parents tell you to
Identity diffusion – an apathetic state characterized by lack of both exploration
and commitment

Considered the most unhealthy, you are generally apathetic to exploration or settling on a
life path and are not exploring options

Ex. A 30 year-old is perfectly content living in his parents home and being unemployed
Self and Personality

Changes in personality over time
Personality experiences the most changes from adolescence
to early adulthood
 There are specific changes/shifts that occur during middle
age and old age, personality generally stable over the
later years


Midlife crisis
In spite of the stereotype of the middle aged adult, few
report having a “midlife crisis”
 Research has shown that while adults do report some
“turning points” during midlife, very few report experiencing
a “midlife crisis”

Gender Roles and Sexuality

Gender typing – refers to any association of
objects, activities, roles, or traits with one sex or the
other in ways that conform to cultural stereotypes
 Gender
typing occurs when parents or other social
partners emphasize behavior, roles, activities etc. with
one sex or the other
 Ex.
Tommy has just come to realize that he his a little boy,
over the next few years, his father will teach him about all
the kinds of behaviors that are expected of boys, such as
playing sports, hiding emotions, and driving trucks
Gender Roles and Sexuality

Differences in the treatment of boys and girls begin
as soon as the child is born
 Reports
from parents as early as a few hours after the
birth of a child show that:
 Parents
describe sons as “stronger,” “braver,” and more active
than average
 Parents describe daughters as more “delicate,” “soft,” and
“cuddly” than average infants
Gender Roles and Sexuality

The androgyny shift in middle adulthood
 Increase
in “feminine” traits in men
 Increase in “masculine” traits in women
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Kohlberg’s stages of moral development

Preconventional level – morality is externally controlled




Conventional level – individuals continue to regard conformity to external social rules as
important, but not for reasons of self interest



They believe that actively maintaining the current social system ensure positive relationships and social
order
Ex. An individual decides not to steal a candy bar because if everyone resorted to stealing when they
were hungry there would be no social order
Postconventional level – individuals move beyond unquestioning support for their own
society’s rules and laws



Children accept the rules of authority figures and judge actions by their consequences
Behaviors that result in punishment are viewed as bad and behaviors that result in rewards are viewed
as good
Ex. A child decides not to steal a candy bar for fear of being punished
They define morality in terms of abstract principles and values that apply to all situations and societies
Ex. Stealing is viewed as wrong because it is taking something that doesn’t belong to you and that
violates the owners personal rights
A variety of factors are associated with advancement to higher stages of moral
development, the most important of which being the development of perspective-taking
skills
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Dodge’s social information-processing model – a person’s behavioral response to a
situation occurs in a sequence of five steps



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1) Encoding information – the way we selectively attend to and store social cues from a situation
2) Mental representations – made when the encoded cues are given a meaning and are
interpreted
3) Response assessment – the mental representation evokes a behavioral response.
4) Response evaluation – the individual’s choice of whether or not to enact the accessed response



Here the individual evaluates the interpersonal, intrapersonal, instrumental, and moral consequences of the
accessed response
5) Enactment – takes place when an individual selects a response and transforms it into a
behavior
A person’s judgments about the behaviors, thoughts, and feelings of others and their
limited response repertoire for dealing with adversities can lead to a reliance on
aggression



In other words, if individuals display maladaptive ways of processing information they will be
more likely to interpret ambiguous situations as an attack to the self and, consequently, use
violence as a means to resolve the conflict because they are unable to access an appropriate
response.
Thus, it can be said that maladaptive ways of processing information can increase violence.
Ex. Dodges model would suggest that teenagers who commit violent, antisocial acts incorrectly
interpret and process the social cues of others as being aggressive towards them
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Attachment styles
 The
strange situation
 Assesses
quality of attachment of a caregiver (usually
mother) in 1-2 year-olds
 Takes the baby through 8 short episodes in which brief
separations from and reunions with the parent occur
 When the parent leaves an unfamiliar adult sometimes
enters the room
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Secure attachment

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Avoidant attachment

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
Child seems unresponsive to the parent when she is present
When parent leaves, the child is usually not upset and reacts to a stranger in much the same way as to the parent
When parent returns, the child avoids her and are slow to greet her; when picked up they do not cling to the parent
Resistant attachment





Use parent as a secure base from which to explore the room
When separated, the child may or may not cry, but if they do, it is because the parent is absent and they prefer the
parent to the stranger
When the parent returns, the child actively seeks contacts, and crying is immediately reduced
Before the parent leaves, the child seeks closeness to her and does not explore around the room
When the parent leaves, the child is usually distressed
When the parent returns the child is usually clingy but also angry towards the parent
When picked up by the parent may be resistant to affection and does not stop crying
Disorganized/disoriented attachment




Usually show little to no response when the parent leaves or when the stranger enters the room
At reunion, the child shows confused, contradictory behaviors
The child may look away while the parent is holding them or may approach the parent with little emotion or depressed
emotion
Most display a “dazed” facial expression
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Cultural variations in attachment
 Attachment
patterns have to be interpreted differently
in different cultures
 A secure attachment is best defined by cultural
standards which can vary from country to country
 Ex.
In Germany, parents value independence and encourage
their infants to be nonclingy, thus their infants tend to show
more avoidant attachment than American infants do
 Ex. In Japan, parents view infant dependency as a positive
thing, reflective of their collectivist culture; thus, Japanese
infants rarely show avoidant attachment and more
frequently show resistant attachment
Social Cognition and Moral Development

Social theories of late adulthood
 Socioemotional
selectivity theory – asserts that social
interaction does not decline suddenly in late age,
rather, that it reflects a continuing selectivity in personal
relationships
 Thus,
the shrinking social networks of older adults are by
choice
 Elders just aren’t as willing to spend time with people that
they don’t enjoy being around
The Family


Parenting styles are described by 3 consistent features: 1) acceptance and involvement; 2) control
3) autonomy granting
Parenting styles

Authoritative – the most successful approach, involves high acceptance and involvement, adaptive control
techniques, and appropriate autonomy granting




Authoritarian – low acceptance and involvement, high in coercive control, and low in autonomy granting





Parents are cold and rejecting
To exert control, the yell, command, criticize, and threaten (“Do it because I said so!”)
Parents make decisions for the children and expect the child to accept their word unquestioningly
Child resistance is met with force and punishment
Permissive – warm and accepting but uninvolved, engage in little control, and, instead of gradually
granting autonomy, allow children to make many of their own decisions at an age when they are not yet
capable of doing to



Rules are clear and are explained to the child
Parents have a warm supportive relationship with the child but at the same time exercise firm, reasonable control
Parents engage in gradual and appropriate autonomy granting
Children can basically do whatever they want (eating meals, going to bed, watching TV, etc.)
The “my little angel is just so perfect” parent…
Uninvolved – low acceptance and involvement with little control and general indifference to issues of
autonomy

Parents are often emotionally detached and depressed, so overwhelmed by life stress that they have little time
and energy for children
The Family

Effects of children on parents


In general, marital satisfaction tends to decrease with each
additional child for both mothers and fathers
After children “leave the nest” and parents retire

Marriages tend to become more equitable


Due to the “androgyny shift” as well as to the participation of
husbands in more household chores
Sandwich generation or the “middle generation squeeze”
– refers to the idea that middle-aged adults must care for
multiple generations above and below them at the same
time

Middle-aged adults who are simultaneously caring for both older
(their parents) and younger (their children) generations
Developmental Psychopathology

Autism
 New
research suggests that unusual behaviors
displayed by autistic children may result from:
 Small
head size at birth
 Abnormally rapid and excessive head/brain growth during
the first year after birth that results in improperly
interconnected neurons
Developmental Psychopathology

In adolescence there is a heightened vulnerability
for some forms of psychological disorders
 Increase
vulnerability for depression, anxiety, eating
disorders, etc.
 However, adults are still more likely to suffer from
disorders
Developmental Psychopathology

Alzheimer’s disease – the most common form of
dementia, in which structural and chemical brain
deterioration is associated with gradual loss of
many aspects of thought and behavior
 First
sign of Alzheimer’s disease is typically trouble
learning and remembering verbal material
 Ex.
Forgetting names, problems interpreting and forming
spoken and written language
Death and Dying

The Hayflick limit – the number of times that a cell
can divide/double itself before it stops
 Suggests
that, in old age, a person’s cells reach the limit
and can no longer duplicate, as a result cell damage
can no longer be repaired and bodily systems break
down
Death and Dying


Bereavement – the experience of losing a loved one by death
Parkes/Bowlby model of bereavement

Includes 4 stages:

Numbness – phase immediately following loss


Yearning and protest – characterized by the grieving person longing or yearning for the
deceased to return
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Feelings of yearning become less intense while periods of apathy and despair increase
Reorganization – final phase, the grieving person begins to return to a new state of
“normal”
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Many emotions are expressed during this time and may include weeping, anger, anxiety, and
confusion
Disorganization and despair – the grieving person now desires to withdraw and
disengage from others and activities they regularly enjoyed
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The grieving person feels numb, which is a defense mechanism that allows them to survive
emotionally
Energy levels increase, weight loss experienced during grieving may be regained, and interest to
return to activities of enjoyment returns and positive memories of the deceased take over
This model suggests that a grieving adult is much like an infant experiencing
separation anxiety