Module 1 Flashcards
(Module Notes AND Textbook Chapter)
1
Q
Define Developmental Psychology
A
the science of how and why people change over the life course.
2
Q
What is one of the most salient reasons to study developmental psychology?
A
to gain a better understanding of child rearing.
3
Q
Besides gaining a better understanding of child rearing, what are 2 other reasons to study developmental psychology?
A
1) To gain a better understanding of how our social policy decisions influence development. (Ie: intelligence testing and learning disabilities)
2) To gain insights into human nature more broadly. (Ie: attachment and relationships)
4
Q
Plato and Aristotle believed that the welfare of society depended on proper child rearing. However, how did they differ in how they believed that children developed and acquired knowledge?
A
Plato believed that children are born with innate, conceptual knowledge.
Aristotle believed that all knowledge arises from experience.
5
Q
John Locke viewed children as a “tabula rasa”. What does this term mean?
A
Blank slate.
(He viewed learning and development as the product of the environment and therefore that discipline was more important than individual autonomy or freedom, and this was crucial for human development.)
6
Q
In contrast to John Locke’s view of children, Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed that children learn best from _______________.
A
Their own interactions with the world.
(He argued that children should have no formal education before the age of 12, so they could have the space and freedom to explore and develop independently.)
7
Q
Research on children’s development was largely driven by what two societal forces?
A
Social Reform & Theory of Evolution.
8
Q
Which early philosopher believed that children came into the world as a “tabula rasa”?
A) Locke
B) Rousseau
C) Plato
D) Aristotle
A
A) John Locke
9
Q
Who wrote A Biographical Sketch of an Infant in 1877?
A
Darwin.
(with Darwin’s work, theorists began to speculate that studying child development might lead to insights into human nature more generally. Indeed, Darwin himself was very interested in child development and published detailed observations of his own children’s development in A Biographical Sketch of an Infant).
10
Q
Early psychologists, including ________ and _________, were early proponents of the importance of childhood and developmental theory.
A
Sigmund Freud, John Watson.
(Freud emphasized the importance of parenting in long-term development, while Watson was one of the first behaviourists to study learning in children.)
11
Q
What are the 7 key themes in developmental psychology?
A
1) Nature and nurture
2) The active child
3) Continuity vs. discontinuity
4) Mechanisms of development
5) Sociocultural context
6) Individual differences
7) Social impact of research
12
Q
Define Nature
A
Our biological endowment; the genes we receive from our parents.
13
Q
Define Nurture
A
The environments, both physical and social, that influence our development.
14
Q
What is interaction (in nature vs nurture)?
A
Epigenetics reflect the interaction of nature and nurture. That is, how changes in gene expression are mediated by the environment.
15
Q
What does the idea of the “active child” focus on?
A
How children shape and contribute to their own development.
(Children’s actions can evoke reactions from other people and the environment, further contributing to development. For example, Eye gaze and Interpreting experiences and self-regulation).
16
Q
What is one of the very earliest choices that children can make?
A
Eye gaze – Children choose where to direct their eyes, showing interest in different types of stimuli.
17
Q
Briefly describe the idea of Continuity vs. Discontinuity.
A
The idea here is the trajectory by which things change over time – is developmental change continuous like a growing tree, or discontinuous like the change from a caterpillar to a butterfly?
18
Q
Define Continuous.
A
Not much elemental change; incremental growth (e.g., getting bigger).
19
Q
Define Discontinuous.
A
Qualitatively different at different stages; changing in “steps” (e.g., changing forms).
20
Q
What are 4 underlying mechanisms that influence how children develop?
A
1) Biological: epigenetic changes, brain maturation
2) Behavioural: learning from the environment, rewards and punishments
3) Social: imitating and learning from others
4) Cognitive information-processing: gaining both general and specific knowledge
21
Q
What are some examples of Sociocultural Context in developmental psychology?
A
Children grow up in context. Development is influenced by children’s physical and social environment, culture, economic situation, and historical era.
Examples: Daycare, ethnic minority status, socioeconomic status (SES).
22
Q
The average poverty rate for children in Canada is ______, but for Indigenous children this rate is _______.
A
15%, 40%.
23
Q
Developmental psychologist Sandra Scarr (1992) postulated what 4 factors through which individual differences are related to development?
A
1) Genetic differences: This is probably the most obvious mechanism behind individual differences.
2) Differences in treatment: Parents, teachers, and other socializing adults treat each child differently. This is often because of individual differences related to genetics, like temperament.
3) Differences in reactions: Even though the same event might happen, people interpret and react to those events differently. For example, think of all of the different ways a child might react to getting a disappointing grade on a spelling test.
4) Different choices on environments: Different children choose different environments, activities, friends, etc that in turn influence their development. For example, some children may be interested in soccer while others are interested in art classes.
24
Q
According to Sandra Scarr, which of the following is NOT an example of individual differences in development?
A) Genes that predispose one child to be shy while another is outgoing
B) Molly is more physically attractive than her younger sister, and evokes different reactions from their peers
C) Harry and Ron are identical twins. Harry enjoys playing basketball while Ron prefers football.
D) All of these examples reflect individual differences in development.
A
D) All of these examples reflect individual differences in development.
25
What is reliability?
The degree to which independent measurements of a given behaviour are consistent.
26
What is validity?
The degree to which a test measures what it is intended to measure.
27
What is Inter-Rater Reliability?
The amount of agreement in the observations of different raters who witness the same behaviour.
28
What is Test-Retest Reliability?
The degree of similarity of a participant’s performance on two or more occasions.
29
What is Internal Validity?
The degree to which effects observed within experiments can be attributed to the factor that the researcher is testing
(Can effects within the experiment be attributed to the variables that the researcher intentionally manipulated? For example, are improvements in children's behaviour related to a parenting intervention or something else like growth or time?)
30
What is external validity?
The degree to which results can be generalized beyond the particulars of the research.
(For example, research on children who have a diagnosis of Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is often completed in a one-on-one environment in a room with little to no distractions (and often no window!). How do these findings apply to their behaviour at school, which is full of distractions?)
31
What is the primary goal of studies that use a correlational design?
To determine whether children who differ in one variable also differ in predictable ways in other variables. That is, is there a relationship between two variables of interest?
32
The direction and strength of a correlation is measured by a statistic called the ______________.
Correlation coefficient.
33
A correlation is positive when........
high values of one variable are associated with high values of the other variable, as well as when low values of one are associated with low values of the other.
34
Acorrelation is negative when.......
high values of one are associated with low values of the other.
35
True or False?
Correlation does not equal causation.
True.
A significant correlation only tells us that two variables change in predictable ways together – no order to specified. Thus, we cannot say that one variable causes the other.
36
What is the third variable problem?
A relationship between two variables may in fact be the result of some unspecified third variable.
37
If correlational designs have so many limitations, what are 2 reasons why would we use them?
1) Influence of many variables of great interest—age, sex, race, and social class among them—cannot be studied experimentally.
2) Useful in describing relations among variables.
38
What are 3 research designs used in developmental psychology?
1) Cross-sectional Design
2) Longitudinal Design
3) Microgenetic Design
39
What is Cross-Sectional research design? List one pro and con of this method.
A research method in which participants of different ages are compared on a given behaviour or characteristic over a short period.
For example, a cross-sectional design could be used to examine differences in friendship between childhood and adolescence. In this case the researchers would collect data from a group of children and a group of adolescents separately.
Pros: Quick, easy
Cons: Unable to show relations over time, no patterns of change
40
What is Longitudinal research design? List one pro and con of this method.
A method of study in which the same participants are studied twice or more over a substantial length of time.
For example, we might follow the same group of children from preschool through to grade 5 to examine if early aggressive behaviour predicts bullying.
Pros: Can look at relationship between variables over time
Cons: Slow, expensive, attrition rates, practice effects!
41
What is Microgenetic research design? List one pro and con of this method.
A method of study in which the same participants are studied repeatedly over a short period.
For example, we could repeatedly test children who are on the verge of understanding Piaget's conservation task.
Pros: Gives view of change process
Cons: Slow, expensive, difficult, practice effects!
42
True or False?
The term "microgenetic design" has to do with researching genetics.
False.
This name has nothing to do with genetics, it comes from "micro" meaning close up and "genesis" meaning beginnings.
43
What are 4 ways data can be collected with children?
1. Interviews and Questionnaires
2. Naturalistic and Structured Observations
3. Involuntary and Voluntary Responses
4. Psychophysiology
44
Describe the Interviews and Questionnaires research method and list one pro and con of this method.
Interviews and questionnaires involve asking individuals to report on their experiences. This might involve asking questions directly to the child, or asking parents to report on their child’s experiences. Interviews can be structured or unstructured.
Pros: Generally quick and easy. Can be tailored to the child’s age.
Cons: Desirability bias, lack of insight, and reliance on language. Remember that children are still developing - they generally do not understand why they think or feel the way that they do, and thus may not have the capacity to self-report on their own experiences.
45
Describe the Naturalistic and Structured Observations research method and list one pro and con of this method.
Naturalistic observations involve collecting data relatively unobtrusively. For example, researchers might observe how children learn to play games with each other on the playground.
Structured observations involved a more controlled environment in which the researchers use the same techniques to observe participants’ behaviours in a controlled environment. For example, a researcher may play the same game with a sample of children in order to compare their social skills.
Pros: High external validity, good for studying things we cannot experimentally manipulate (like social interactions)
Cons: Lack of control (especially naturalistic observations), can be difficult for infrequent target behaviour
46
Describe the Involuntary and Voluntary Responses research method and list one pro and con of this method.
One of the biggest challenges in developmental psychology research is how to conduct research with infants – they cannot respond to a questionnaire or an experimental task the same way as older children, given their lack of language and motor control.
Involuntary responses are those that require little cognitive effort – this research often involves eye gaze, which develops early. For example, researchers might want to see if infants can discriminate between two stimuli, and can use a looking-time habituation task to do so (more on this in later modules!)
Voluntary responses, of course, are those that require an active response. The possibilities here are really endless – for example, we could ask children to complete a memory task, label novel objects, or sort shapes into conceptual categories.
Pros: Quick and easy, high internal validity
Cons: External validity?
47
Describe the Psychophysiology research method and list one pro and con of this method.
In addition to behavioural and self-report data, developmental researchers can also collect information on things like heart rate, hormone levels, and brain activity. Psychophysiological measures are especially useful for studying the biological mechanisms associated with development.
Pros: Often considered more objective than self-report data
Cons: Can be expensive and time consuming. Can be difficult to obtain reliable measurements with children (e.g., how to get a child to lay still in an fMRI scanner?)
48
What are 3 ethical concerns researchers in developmental psychology must be attentive to?
Vulnerability: Unlike most adults, children are considered a vulnerable population when it comes to research. This is mainly related to issues involving the capacity to provide informed consent and be able to express a desire to stop participating in the research if desired.
Informed consent: Children cannot provided informed consent to participate in research, as they may not understand the risks and benefits of participating or be able to communicate their willingness to participate (especially young children). Thus, a parent or guardian will provide informed consent for their child to participate.
Assent: Even though children cannot provide informed consent, researchers must be sensitive to their needs. Generally, children older than 7 years old must provide verbal or written agreement (assent) that they want to participate in the research. This should be done using child-friendly language to facilitate understanding. Since young children may lack this ability, researchers must be diligent for signs that the child does not want to participate or wants to stop (e.g., tiredness, irritability).
49
Naturalistic observation would probably be the method of choice for a researcher interested in:
a) How children learn the meaning of a word
b) How preschoolers learn to count
c) The beliefs of children in an elementary school class about how smart their classmates are
d) The frequency of sexual harassment behaviour among adolescents
d) The frequency of sexual harassment behaviour among adolescents.
50
magine that a researcher is interested in examining the stability of temperament (an individual difference) over infancy and early childhood. The most effective design for this research would be:
a) Cross-sectional
b) Longitudinal
c) Experimental
d) Microgenetic
b) Longitudinal
51
A researcher finds a correlation coefficient of -.35 between children's empathy and their aggressive behaviours. This means:
a) As empathy increases, aggressive behaviours also increase
b) As empathy increases, aggressive behaviours decrease
c) As empathy decreases, aggressive behaviours also decrease
d) Empathy and aggression do not vary in systematic ways
b) As empathy increases, aggressive behaviours decrease
52
Define meta-analysis.
A method for combining the results from independent studies to reach conclusions based on all of them.
53
What are nativists?
A major group of contemporary philosophers and psychologists who argues that evolution has created many remarkable capabilities that are present even in early infancy, particularly in areas of special importance, such as understanding basic properties of physical objects, plants and animals, and other people.
54
What are empiricists?
Another major group of philosophers and psychologists, who have argued that infants possess general learning mechanisms that allow them to learn a great deal quite quickly, but that infants and young children lack the specialized capabilities that nativists attribute to them.
55
What is the amygdala?
an area of the brain that is involved in emotional reactions.
56
Kagan (2000) concluded that children have an innate moral sense, encompassing what five abilities that even our closest primate relatives lack?
1) the ability to infer the thoughts and feelings of others,
2) to apply the concepts of good and bad to one’s own behaviour,
3) to reflect on past actions,
4) to understand that negative consequences could have been avoided, and
5) to understand one’s own and others’ motives and emotions.
57
The Earl of Shaftesbury’s effort at social reform brought partial success—a law forbidding employment of girls and of boys younger than what age?
a) 15
b) 5
c) 12
d) 10
d) 10
58
What is a genome?
Each person’s complete set of hereditary information.
59
Define epigenetics.
The study of stable changes in gene expression that are mediated by the environment.
(Stated simply, epigenetics examines how experience gets under the skin.)
60
What is methylation?
A biochemical process that influences behaviour by suppressing gene activity and expression.
61
When do children start to speak?
Usually between 9 and 15 months of age.
62
What is "crib speech"?
Toddlers (1- and 2-year-olds) often talk when they are alone in a room. Only if children were internally motivated to learn language would they practice talking when no one was present to react to what they are saying. This “crib speech” is entirely normal, and the practice probably helps toddlers learn language.
63
Starting at around age _______ years, children sometimes pretend to be different people in make-believe dramas.
2.
64
Researchers who view development as ____________ start from a common observation: children of different ages seem qualitatively
different.
Discontinuous.
65
What are stage theories?
Approaches proposing that development involves a series of large, discontinuous, age- related phases.
66
Define cognitive development.
The development of thinking and reasoning.
67
What is effortful attention?
It involves voluntary control of one’s emotions and thoughts.
(It includes processes such as inhibiting impulses (e.g., obeying requests to put all of one’s toys away, as opposed to putting some away but then getting distracted and playing with the remaining ones); controlling emotions (e.g., not crying when failing to get one’s way); and focusing attention (e.g., concentrating on one’s homework despite the inviting sounds of other children playing outside).
68
When people are controlling thoughts and emotions, brain activity is especially intense in connections between the ________ — a part of the brain that plays a large role in emotional reactions—and the _______ and _____________ —brain structures involved in setting and attending to goals
limbic area, anterior cingulate, prefrontal cortex
(Connections among these brain areas develop considerably during childhood, and their development appears to be one mechanism that underlies improving effortful attention during childhood.)
69
Developmental mechanisms can be behavioural, _______, or ___________.
neural, genetic
70
Define neurotransmitters.
Chemicals involved in communication among brain cells.
71
6-month-olds average how many hours of sleep per day?
14–15 hours.
72
What is the hippocampus?
A brain structure that is particularly important for learning and remembering.
73
What is the Active Systems Consolidation Theory?
It's a major theory of memory, which posits that two interconnected brain areas, the hippocampus and the cortex, simultaneously encode new information during learning.
The hippocampus can learn details of new information after one or two experiences; the cortex produces abstraction of general patterns over many experiences. The theory posits that in older children and adults, hippocampal memories are replayed during sleep, which allows opportunities for the cortex to extract general patterns from the specific memories stored in the hippocampus. The mechanism works in the opposite direction as well; learning general patterns improves the retention of details of new experiences of the same type.
74
Active Systems Consolidation Theory led Werchan and Gómez (2014) to hypothesize that the benefits of sleep on infants’ memory for general patterns reflect functioning of the _________, whereas the benefits of sleep on preschoolers’ memory for specific experiences reflect functioning of the ___________.
*Hint: both blanks are areas of the brain.
cortex, hippocampus
(They proposed that prior to 18 to 24 months of age, the hippocampus is too immature to enable the rapid learning of the details of specific experiences; therefore, sleeping does not benefit memory for these specifics. However, the cortex is mature enough at this age to extract general patterns.)
75
True or False:
Sleep is essential for learning and for healthy development in general.
True.
76
Define sociocultural context.
The physical, social, cultural, economic, and historical circumstances that make up any child’s environment.
77
What are the most obviously important components of children’s sociocultural contexts ?
1) The people with whom they interact (parents, grandparents, siblings, day-care providers, teachers, friends etc)
2) The physical environment in which they live (house, childcare centre, school etc)
Other important (but less tangible) influences:
-Institutions (educational systems, religious institutions, sports leagues, social organizations)
-General characteristics of the child’s society (its economic and technological advancement; its values, attitudes, beliefs, and traditions; its laws and political structure)
78
Define socioeconomic status (SES).
A measure of social class based on income and education.
79
What is cumulative risk?
The accumulation of disadvantages over years of development.
80
Resilient children are more likely than others to have what three characteristics?
1) positive personal qualities, such as high intelligence, an easygoing personality, and an optimistic outlook on the future;
2) a close relationship with at least one parent; and
3) a close relationship with at least one adult other than their parents, such as a grandparent, teacher, coach, or family friend
81
What is the scientific method?
An approach to testing beliefs that involves choosing a question, formulating a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis, and drawing a conclusion.
82
Define hypotheses.
Testable predictions of the presence or absence of phenomena or relations.
83
What are the 4 basic steps of the scientific method?
1. Choosing a question to be answered
2. Formulating a hypothesis regarding the question
3. Developing a method for testing the hypothesis
4. Using the resulting data to draw a conclusion regarding the hypothesis
84
What is a structured interview?
A research procedure in which all participants are asked to answer the same questions.
85
What is a a clinical interview?
A procedure in which questions are adjusted in accord with the answers the interviewee provides.
(In this approach, the interviewer begins with a set of prepared questions, but if the child says something intriguing, the interviewer can depart from the script to follow up on the child’s lead.)
86
What is a structured observation?
A method that involves presenting an identical situation to each participant and recording the participant’s behaviour.
87
What is a naturalistic observation?
An examination of ongoing behaviour in an environment not controlled by the researcher
88
What are variables?
Attributes that vary across individuals and situations, such as age, sex, and popularity.
89
What is the direction-of-causation problem?
The concept that a correlation between two variables does not indicate which, if either, variable is the cause of the other.
90
What are experimental designs?
A group of approaches that allow inferences about causes and effects to be drawn.
91
What two techniques are crucial to experimental designs?
Random assignment and experimental control.
92
What is random assignment?
A procedure in which each participant has an equal chance of being assigned to each group within an experiment.
93
What is experimental control?
The ability of researchers to determine the specific experiences of participants during the course of an experiment.
94
What is the difference between an experimental group and a control group?
Experimental group = the group of participants in an experimental design who are presented the experience of interest.
Control group = the group of participants in an experimental design who are not presented the experience of interest but in other ways are treated similarly.
95
What is an independent variable?
The experience that participants in the experimental group receive and that those in the control group do not receive.
96
What is a dependent variable?
A behaviour that is measured to determine whether it is affected by exposure to the independent variable.
97
The “turtleshell” technique is an example of a successful intervention that helps preschoolers cope with what?
a. The sense of isolation
b. Feelings of embarrassment
c. Bullying from peers
d. Their own anger
d. Their own anger
98
Studies have shown that children’s testimony is usually accurate when which of the following conditions are met?
a. The interviewer does not ask leading questions.
b. One of the child’s parents is present.
c. The child and the interviewer are alone when the testimony is given.
d. The child is repeatedly prompted during the interview.
a. The interviewer does not ask leading questions.
99
According to developmentalists, which of the following is true?
a. Development is most heavily influenced by nature.
b. Development is most heavily influenced by nurture.
c. Development is influenced by the joint workings of nature and nurture.
d. Nature and nurture are essentially the same.
c. Development is influenced by the joint workings of nature and nurture.
100
What is meta-analysis?
a. The reproduction of a past study in order to confirm or debunk the results.
b. A philosophical exploration of an experiment or case study.
c. A method for combining and analyzing the results from several independent studies.
d. A list of all published articles related to a specific area of research.
c. A method for combining and analyzing the results from several independent studies.
101
The concept of the "active child" refers to:
a. Observations of children at play.
b. Whether an infant sleeps through the night.
c. The importance of physical activity to child development.
d. How children contribute to their own development.
d. How children contribute to their own development.
102
In recent decades, researchers have come to the conclusion that, after infancy, most developmental changes occur:
a. Gradually
b. Suddenly
c. Discontinuously
d. Externally
a. Gradually
103
In the context of mechanisms of developmental change, the study of the development of "effortful attention" provides insights into:
a. Continuous versus discontinuous development.
b. The role of brain activity, genes, and learning experiences.
c. The complexity of the child's sociocultural environment.
d. The role of the researcher in judging the validity of a study.
b. The role of brain activity, genes, and learning experiences.
104
The physical, social, cultural, economic, and historical circumstances that make up a child’s environment are known as the:
a. Developmental foundation
b. Sociocultural context
c. Developmental stage
d. Socioeconomic status
b. Sociocultural context
105
The first basic step in using the scientific method involves:
a. Developing a research plan.
b. Choosing a question.
c. Formulating a hypothesis.
d. Drawing a conclusion.
b. Choosing a question.
106
In order to generalize her findings beyond the individuals who participated in her study, Dr. Liu needs to conduct additional research using participants from a variety of backgrounds. What quality of behavioral research is Dr. Liu addressing?
a. Interrater reliability
b. Internal validity
c. Test–retest reliability
d. External validity
d. External validity
107
The experience that children in an experimental group receive—and which children in a control group do not receive—is referred to as the:
a. Dependent variable
b. Independent variable
c. Random assignment
d. Correlational design
108
A team of researchers is studying whether stable individual differences exist in sleeping behavior at various ages. They decide to test 3-month-olds, 6-month-olds, and 9-month-olds. What type of design are they using to examine this question?
a. Longitudinal
b. Cross-sectional
c. Naturalistic observation
d. Microgenetic
b. Cross-sectional
109
Which type of design is used to study developmental change as it is occurring by observing participants numerous times over a relatively short span of time?
a. Longitudinal
b. Cross-sectional
c. Structured observation
d. Microgenetic
d. Microgenetic
110
By administering the same test to the same group of participants under similar conditions two or more times, a researcher can measure __________ reliability.
a. Internal
b. External
c. Test–retest
d. Interrater
c. Test–retest
111
According to the Tri-Council guidelines, which of the following is not a stated ethical principle for conducting research with children?
a. Information about the child uncovered through the course of the study must not be revealed to the parent or guardian, regardless of its importance for that child’s welfare.
b. Unforeseen consequences must be dealt with when they arise during research.
c. Researchers must correct any inaccurate impressions that the child may develop as a result of the study.
d. The research must not harm the child, physically and psychologically.
a. Information about the child uncovered through the course of the study must not be revealed to the parent or guardian, regardless of its importance for that child’s welfare.
