WEEK 3 Flashcards
Infancy (31 cards)
Two key growth patterns…
-Cephalocaudal Principle: top to bottom
-Proximodistal principle: centre to extremities
Overproduction (exuberance):
defined as a burst in the production of dendritic connections between neurons.
Myelination…
refers to the process of the growth of the myelin sheath around the axon of a neuron.
Synaptic pruning…
a process in brain development, in which dendritic connections that are used become stronger and faster, and those that are unused wither away.
What are the three major regions of the brain
-Hindbrain
-Midbrain
Both structures mature early and perform basic biological functions
-Forebrain: Limbic system- hypothalamus, thalamus, hippocampus; cerebral cortex, lobes
Cephalocaudal Principle growth chart…
-growth begins at the head and continues downward to the rest of the body
-Newborn: head is 1/4 of the body
- 2 y/o: head is 1/5 of the body
-6 y/o: head is 1/6 of the body
-12 y/o: head is 1/7 of the body
-25 y/o: head is 1/8 of the body
Neurotransmitter…
chemical that enables neurons to communicate across synapses
Myelin Sheath…
an envelope of fatty material that increases the speed of communication between neurons
Lobes of the brain…
Frontal, parietal, occipital, temporal
Frontal lobe…
Highest processes, including planning for the future, making decisions
Parietal lobe…
Processes bodily sensations
Occipital lobe…
Process visual information
Temporal lobe…
processes auditory information, including language
How often, on average, does a newborn sleep per day?
Around 16-17 hours on average, with a range of 10-20 hours.
In short bursts of 2-3 hours per sleep
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome
-Leading cause of death for infants 1-12 months in developed countries
-Infants 2-4 months have highest risk for SIDS
SIDS Risk factors…
-Sleeping on stomach instead of back
-Low birthweight or Apgar Score
-Having a mother who smoked during pregnancy, or around the infant during infancy
-Soft bedding
-Sleeping in an overheated room or wearing two or more layers during sleep
Gross Motor Skills..
-involve large muscles, such as the torso, arms and legs, for activities such as moving arms and walking.
-these activities assume postural control, where posture provides the foundation for movement.
-Involves integrating information from the skin, the joints and the muscles, which tell us where we are in space.
-Information from the inner ear helps regulate our balance, as well as information related to vision and hearing.
Fine Motor Skills…
-Involve small muscles and relate to finely tuned movements, such as finger dexterity. For example, grasping a toy, using a spoon and picking up small objects.
-Infants develop two types of grasps: One is the palmer grasp, where infants initially grip things with their whole hand. The second is the pincer grasp, where infants grip with their thumb and forefinger.
Depth perception…
refers to our ability to judge the distance of objects from each other and from ourselves.
- In a classic experiment by Eleanor Gibson and one of her colleagues, they constructed a visual cliff with a dropoff covered by glass. They placed infants on the edge of the visual cliff and had their mothers encourage them to crawl onto the glass.
-most infants, especially experienced crawlers, would not crawl onto the visual cliff, which was interpreted as depth perception. They instinctively recognised that they may potentially fall. Younger infants were interested but not fearful of the glass, showing that it is babies who are old enough to crawl who show significant fear of the visual cliff.
- One theory to explain this is that crawling around has allowed them to perceive distances more accurately than before.
Intermodal perception…
the ability to relate and integrate information from two or more sensory modalities, such as vision and hearing.
-An example refers to lip movements, and how these are coordinated with sound.
-An early form of intermodal perception involves infants turning their heads and eyes towards a sound or a rattle in their environment.
-one month olds match things in mouth to things they touch
-By 8 months, can match unfamiliar faces with correct voices and gender
Piaget’s theory of cognitive development…
-Based much of his theory of cognitive development on observations of his own three children and his observations of other children.
-Piaget states that children go through stages of cognitive development, as they actively construct their understanding of the world. That is, as individuals, we organise our experiences into mental models that help us adapt to new environmental demands.
-Piaget argued that each stage is age-related, and consists of a distinct way of thinking and a different way of understanding the world.
-Piaget divided cognitive development into four stages as seen in the following table:
Stage 1, 0–2 years: Sensorimotor.
Stage 2, 2–7 years: Pre-operational.
Stage 3, 7–11 years: Concrete operations. Stage 4, 11–15 years: Formal operations.
Criticisms of Piaget’s theory…
-There is speculation or discussion as to whether object permanence refers to a memory deficit or a failure to understand to understand an object’s properties.
-cultural limitations of this approach and that, for the most part, Piaget’s theory is based on one culture.
-One overarching criticism of Piaget is that his approach to cognitive development (in particular the sensorimotor stage) is that infants are more capable than Piaget gave them credit for, and research and different experimentation that uses different methods make this clear to us now.
Information Processing Model…
-Views cognitive changes as continuous
-Historically, brain was compared to a computer, but has since been found to be far more complex
-Human thinking is divided into capacities for attention, processing, and memory
Attention (IPM)…
-Attention: Studied using habituation and dishabituation
-Habituation: refers to a gradual decrease in attention
-Dishabituation: is the revival of attention with a new stimulus
