Theoretical perspectives Flashcards
(24 cards)
Nature vs Nurture
Are we the products of our genes or our experiences.
False dichotomy: Always an interplay between nature and nurture
Gene expression can be modulated by experience (epigenetics)
Activity vs Passivity
Activity: Are we actively shaping our environments and contributing to our own development?
Passive: Or, are we shaped by biological and environmental forces beyond our control?
Self-efficacy: the belief that one can effectively produce desired outcomes in a particular area of life
Continuity vs DIscontinuity
Quantitative Change:
- Numerically different (tadpole growing)
Qualitative Change
- New Structure, ability, or process (transition into frog)
Universality vs Context Specificty
Universality: Is development similar from person to person and from culture to culture
Context Specificity: Or, do developmental pathways vary considerably depending on the social context?
Doman Specificity vs Doman Generality
Specificity: Are our minds supported by many specialised systems that evolved for specific domains (eg. Language)
Generality: Do we have a few general systems that can be used across many different domains?
Freud
Id, Ego, Superego
Libido: Psychic energy of the sex instinct
Psychosexual: oral, anal, phallic, latent, and genital
Defence mechanism: unconscious anxiety coping devices adopted by the ego.
Fixation: remain in earlier stages of development
Identifications: Individual models self after another person, particularly same-sex parent
Regression: Retreating to an earlier, less traumatic stage of development
Strengths::
- Brought attention to unconscious processes
- Emphasised importance of early experience for later development
- Highlighted role of emotions and conflict in personality development
Limitations:
- Vague, difficult to test
- Overemphasis on sexuality
Erkison
Built on Freud, argued that personality evolved through systematic stages
- Less emphasis on sexual urges, more on social influences (more balance between nature and nurture)
- Less emphasise on unconscious, irrational Id and more on ego
- More positive, adaptive view on humanity
- More emphasis on development beyond adolescence
- More discontinuity than continuity same as Freud
Strengths:
- Wider view of development
- Considers both nature and nurture
Limitations
- Vague, difficult to test
- More descriptive than explanatory
Classical conditioning
Behaviourisms: argues that psychological science should be based on objective observations of behaviour rather than unobservable (mental) phenomena)
John B. Watson
More on the nurture side
Unconditioned stimulus (UCS)
A stimulus that elicits a particular resonse withour prior learning
Unconditioned response
an unlearned response elciited by an UCS
Conditioned stimulus (CS)
A formally neutrall stimulus that elicits a particular response after it is paired with an unconditioned stimulus that elicits the response
Conditioned response (CR)
A learned response to a stimulus that did not originally produce the repones
Deconditioning
A process of reforming previously conditioned behavior
- Little Albert, testing may have been unethical
Operant conditioning
B.F.Skinner
A form of learning in which bheaviours (operants) become more ore less proably depending on the consequence they produce
Reinforcement
Consequence that strengthen a response
Positive: pleasent stimulus
Negative: Withdrawing an unpleasant stimulus
Punsihment
Consequence that weaken a response
Positive: adding unpleasant stimulus
Negate: Withdrawing positive stimulus
Social cognitive theory
Albert Bandura
Emphasis on the critical role that the active cognitive processing of social info plays in human learning, motivation, and self-regulation
- Steamed from operant conditioning
Development driven by:
- Observation learning imitation
- Vicarious reinforcement
- Latent learning
Other relevant concepts
- Human agency (self-efficacy)
- Process of reciprocal determinism
- Context specific and continuous\
- No “normal” course of development
Strengths:
- Testable
- Simple mechanisms
- Principles apply across life span
- practical applications
Limitations
- inadequate accounts of developmental change
- Insufficient emphasis on genetics and maturation - focus more on nurture
Humnanistic Theories
Abraham Maslow
Empahis the inherent ‘goodness’ in people
Self actualisation: an inante human need for reaching one’s full potential
Hierarchy needs
- Basic needs
- Growth needs
Strengths
- Focused on psychological wellness as more than simply obscene of disease
- Focus on positive dimensions
- Foundations for positive psychology
Limitations- Initial theories and concepts too broad and hard to measure
- Universality of hierarchy questioned
Cognitive theorist
Piaget
Going from reflexes to reasons
Constructivist:
- Child is not a blank state, but does not come “preloaded” with innate knowledge either
- Child activley “constucts” increasingly complex knowledge and abilities out of simpler compnonents (e.g. reflexes)
Stage-based
- Children travel through a series of stages forms the foundation for the next stage
- Development is about “leveling-up”
- Involves qualitative changes (eg. the emergences of new abilities
Cognitive theorist
Vygotsky
Sociocultural Theory-
- Children are entrenched din different to sociocultural contexts
- Cognitive development is advanced through social interaction with more skilled individuals
- Social constructivism: humans actively create their own understanding of the world through social interactions and cultural tools
- Disagreed with notion of universal stages
Information Processing
Computer metaphor of mind
- Hardware( brain) and software (knowledge, thought processes, logic)
- Development involves changes in capacity and speed
- “Hardware” improves incapacity and speed
“Software” improves with experience (Eg. new knowledge, better strategies)
Focus on: Attention, memory, decision-making, language
Strengths and weaknesses of cognitie theories
Strengths:
-Testable, well research, and generally supported by evidence
- Contribute to education and parenting practices
- Vygotsky highlight importance of social interaction and culture
Limitations
- Too little consideration of motivation/emotion
- Piaget underestimated albites at different ages, overemphasised abilities stage-like progressions
System theories
Argue that developmental changed arise from ongoing interrelationships between a changing organism and a changing system that contribute to larger, dynamic system
Think Bronfenbrenner model
Gottlieb
Epigenetic psychobiological systems perspective: Biological and environmental forces interact as part of a larger system that shapes development
Epigenesis: ‘over and above’ genes
- Process through which genes and environment jointly influence development, often in ways that are difficult to protect
Cultural evolution: Changes in a species stemming form learning and experience passed on across generations
