Psychology module 14 Flashcards
(29 cards)
What is the difference between infancy and childhood?
During infancy, a baby grows from newborn to toddler. During childhood, he grows from toddler to teenager.
How does the brain develop during infancy and childhood?
In humans, the brain is immature at birth. As the child matures, the neural networks grow increasingly more complex, following a sequence of biological growth processes called maturation.
What is maturation?
Maturation is the biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience.
Why do preschoolers display a rapidly developing ability to control their attention and behavior?
From ages 3 to 6, the most rapid growth is in the frontal lobes, which enables rational thinking.
What is the relation between brain development and physical development (motor)?
It is a positive relation as the developing brain enables physical coordination.
Does the sequence of physical development differ from a baby to another?
With occasional exceptions, the sequence of physical (motor) development is universal. Babies roll over before they sit unsupported, and they usually creep on all four before they walk.
What is cognition?
Cognition is all mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.
From the perspective of Piaget, how does a child’s mind develop?
Piaget’s studies led him to believe that a child’s mind develops through a series of stages; the brain builds schemas, mental molds into which we pour our experiences.
What is schema?
A concept or framework that organizes and interprets information.
How do we use and adjust our schemas according to Piaget?
To explain how we use and adjust our schemas, Piaget proposed two concepts: a) First, we assimilate new experiences – we interpret them in terms of our current understanding. b) Second, we accommodate our schemas to incorporate information provided by new experiences.
What is assimilation?
Assimilation is interpreting our new experiences in terms of our existing schemas.
What is accommodation?
Accommodation is adapting our current understanding (schemas) to incorporate new information.
Give an example to explain how we use and adjust our schemas.
Two-year-old Gabriella has learned the schema for dog from her picture books. Gabriella sees a cat and calls it a ‘dog.’ She is trying to assimilate this new animal into an existing schema. Her mother tells her, ‘No, it’s a cat.’ Gabriella accommodates her schema by separating the ‘cat,’ and even different types of ‘dogs’ into separate schemas.
What are Piaget’s stages of cognitive development?
Piaget proposed that children progress through four stages of cognitive development, each with distinctive characteristics: 1) Sensorimotor (Birth to nearly 2 years), 2) Preoperational (2 to about 6 or 7 years), 3) Concrete operational (About 7 to 11 years), 4) Formal operational (About 12 through adulthood).
Describe the features of the sensorimotor stage.
In the sensorimotor stage, from birth to nearly age 2, babies know their world through their senses and actions. Before the age of 6 months, infants seldom understand that things continue to exist when they are out of sight. They lack object permanence.
What do researchers think about Piaget’s theory that infants lack object permanence before the age of 6 months?
Researchers believe that Piaget and his followers underestimated young children’s competence. They discovered that: a) Infants can discriminate between possible and impossible objects. b) Babies have a head for numbers: If infants accustomed to a puppet jumping three times on stage, they show surprise if it jumps only twice.
Describe the features of the preoperational stage.
In the preoperational stage, from 2 to about 6 or 7, children are too young to perform mental operations. Preoperational children lack the principle of conservation of substance. When milk is poured into a tall, narrow glass, it suddenly seems like ‘more’ than when it was in the shorter, wider glass.
What is conservation?
Conservation is the principle that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects.
What is egocentrism in preschool children?
Piaget contended that preschool children are egocentric: They have difficulty perceiving things from another’s point of view.
Describe the features of the concrete operational stage.
From about 6 or 7 to 11 years of age, children enter the concrete operational stage. Children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete events. They begin to grasp conservation; they understand that change in form doesn’t mean change in quantity.
Describe the features of the formal operational stage.
By age 12, our reasoning expands from the purely concrete to encompass abstract thinking. As children approach adolescence, many become capable of solving hypothetical propositions and deducing consequences.
How do parent-infant attachment bonds form?
From birth, babies in all cultures are social creatures, developing an intense bond with their caregivers. At about 8 months, they develop stranger anxiety. By 12 months, infants typically cling tightly to a parent when they are frightened or expect separation.
What is attachment?
Attachment is an emotional tie with another person, shown in young children by seeking closeness to the caregiver.
What are the origins of attachment?
a) Body contact: human infants become attached to parents who are soft and warm. Much parent-infant emotional communication occurs via touch. b) Familiarity: children do become attached to what they’ve known.
