AP Psych Prep 9 - Developmental Psychology

8/13/2019 AP Psych Prep 9 - Developmental Psychology

1/74

DEVELOPMENTAL

PSYCHOLOGYAP Psych. Prep 9


2/74

DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCH.

Developmental Psychologists study

peoples psychology from birth to death.

How do we change over our lifespan?

Has many connections to other areas ofpsychology.


3/74

NATURE VS. NURTURE

A big question forpsychology.

How much of our

development is becauseof our nature (genes,

biology, etc.), and how

much is because of nurture (our environment,

experiences, etc.). No psychologists today think that the answer is

either one or the other, but some influence from

both.


4/74

DEVELOPMENTAL RESEARCH

METHODS We often use either cross-sectional or

longitudinal research in DevelopmentalPsych.

Cross-sectional Research - takes people ofdifferent ages and compares them. E.g.elementary school children, middleschoolers, and high schoolers.

This is fast, cheap, and easy, but we cant besure about our conclusions.


5/74

CROSS-SECTIONAL RESEARCH

We need to be careful because history canmean 10 year old kids now might be differentfrom 10 year olds from the past or future.

e.g. If education policy changes for earlyages, they might have been treateddifferently.

There are many possible confoundingvariables; we cant be sure the onlydifference is age.


6/74

RESEARCH

Longitudinal Research - study the same

people for a long time, so you can see how

they are changing over time.

Can give us confidence in the change of

those people. But historical effects should

affect all equally....

But takes a very long time, lots of money,

etc.


7/74

EARLY DEVELOPMENT -

PRENATAL Prenatal - before birth

Genetics - can affect our development;

genes guide the development of ourbodies, but can also influence ourpsychological / behavioural development.

Teratogens - chemicals, viruses, drugs, orother things that can cause hard todeveloping humans before birth.


8/74


9/74


10/74

FETAL ALCOHOL EFFECT

Similar to FAS (same cause), but not the

same symptoms.

Mental retardation is less likely, but other

developmental problems like learning

disabilities, behavioural problems, etc., can

occur.


11/74

OTHER DRUG EFFECTS

Other drugs can also affect growingbabies. Some drugs cause baby to also beaddicted, and withdrawal symptoms after

birth can seriously harm the baby; caneven cause death.

Nicotine during pregnancy can also harmthe baby, including seemingly causing lowbirth weights...


12/74

CRITICAL PERIODS FOR DEVELOPMENT


13/74

NEWBORNS SENSES

Babies hearing is one of their first used

senses; can hear even before birth.

Can taste and smell from birth, and seem

to like similar tastes and smells as adults

do.


14/74

NEWBORNS SENSES

Infants cant see as well as adults from birth.They can see close things well, but farthersight is not well developed.

Vision improves quickly; can see nearly aswell as an adult by about one year after birth.

Babies really like looking at faces, more thanany other thing in their environment.


15/74

DEPTH PERCEPTION


16/74

INFANTS MOTOR DEVELOPMENT

Our motor skills develop in a similar wayacross all humans.

These are approximate, but worldwide,

babies generally:Roll over - 5.5 months old

Stand up - 8-9 months old

Walk alone - 15 months old

Of course, there are individual

differences...


17/74

PARENTING

Relationship to parents or caregivers is

seen as a very important environmentalinfluence on our development.

e.g. animals like birds that imprint veryearly on something in their environment

(usually the parent, but sometimes if theres

a problem, another animal, person,

ob ect...


18/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY

Attachment - the relationship between the

child and parent or caregiver.

Harry Harlow and Baby Monkeys

Raised baby monkeys with two artificial

mothers.

One was metal and had a bottle that fed

the babies.


19/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY - HARLOW

The other was covered with a soft material.

If surprised or stressed, the babies went tothe soft mother.

Showed that attachment is based on more

than just basic feeding; monkeys looked

for physical comfort.


20/74


21/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY -

HARLOWMonkeys raised this way were never

socially adjusted, had troubles when they

lived with other monkeys.

This showed that relationship with early

caregivers is be very important for normal

development (mental, social, etc)


22/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY -

AINSWORTHMary Ainsworths Strange Situation

experiment

Infants brought into a new/novel room withparents. Parents would leave for a shorttime, and then come back.

Ainsworth watched the infants reactionsand divided them into three differentattachment style groups.


23/74

STRANGE SITUATION


24/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY -

AINSWORTH

1. Secure Attachments (2/3 of children) -

Were brave and explored the environment

until the parent leaves. Then they get

upset, and when the parent comes back

the child goes to the parent for comfort.


25/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY -

AINSWORTH

2. Avoidant Attachments (1/5 of the

children) - like to explore the environment,

seem a bit uninterested in what the parent

is doing. They dont go to the parent for

comfort when they come back.


26/74

ATTACHMENT THEORY -

AINSWORTH

3. Anxious/Ambivalent (or Resistant)

Attachments (1/10 of the children) - may be

extremely upset when the parent leaves, butdoes not want comfort from the parent when

they return.

These are all very early in the childs life, and

there is not a lot of evidence that these styles

are connected to problems later in life.


27/74

PARENTING STYLES

The behaviour of parents has also been studied.

Different ways of parenting thought to influencehow the child develops.

Diana Baumrind describes 3 parenting styles:

1. Authoritarian Parents - strict rules and

punishments, want the child to obey. Punishmentmore common than reinforcement/reward. dontwant to discuss the rules or reasons with thechild.


28/74

PARENTING STYLES

2. Permissive Parents - dont have strictrules, rules are often ignored or changed.Children often feel like they can do what

they want.

3. Authoritative Parents - have reasonable,

well explained rules. Reasons for rules arediscussed with children. Use rewards aswell as punishments.


29/74

PARENTING STYLES

Children of authoritative parents are

generally more academically successful,

and do better with social interaction.

Children of permissive parents seem to be

more emotionally volatile/unpredictable

and dependent on others.

Authoritarian parents children can be moredistrustful and less socially capable.


30/74

PARENTING STYLES

Even though we have some research that

suggests effects of parenting styles, we

have to be careful.

These are only correlational, and we

know that parenting style is not the only

influence on what we become as adults.


31/74

STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT

Many diff. psychologists have describedour development in the form of stages. Wehave to be careful though...

Were not sure how continuous ordiscontinuous our psych. development is(stage theories tend to lean heavily on thediscontinuous side...)

As well, we dont need to pick just onecorrect stage theory.


32/74

ONE CONTINUOUS SIDE

EXAMPLEOne famous development

psych. thinker who leans onthe continuous side of the

debate is Lev Vygotsky.

He was interested in how people learn,

and thought we learned in a much morecontinuous way, and very strongly basedon social interactions.


33/74

LEV VYGOTSKY

Thought we have a zone of proximal

development - the things we are capable of

doing by ourselves or with the help of others.

Things we cant do alone but can do withsome help from others will be done together

at first, but with practice they will become

things we can do alone. In this way we will slowly increase the things

we are capable of doing.


34/74

ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT


35/74

LEV VYGOTSKY

The help we get from others that lets us

accomplish things we cant accomplish on

our own is called scaffolding.


36/74

SIGMUND FREUDS PSYCHOSEXUAL

STAGES

Freuds idea of psychosexual stages was

more broad than just sexual intercourse;

connected to where he imagined we were

focused or got pleasure at different ages.

Each stage was thought to be related to

important development, and if we haveproblems at a stage we become fixated or

trapped at that stage = psychological

problems


37/74

FREUDS PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGES

Oral Stage - feeding is important, andinfants are focused on their mouths.Fixation at this stage might cause us to eat

too much or smoke cigarettes. Can alsoresult in adults who are too dependent.

Anal Stage - toilet training age. Fixationmakes people too controlling (analretentive) or out of control (anal expulsive);Note: impossible to scientifically verify...


38/74

FREUDS PSYCHOSEXUAL

STAGES Phallic Stage - age when young children

realize they are male of female. Focus is on

genitals.

Freud thought boys go through OedipusComplex - a period of resenting the romantic

relationship between their father and mother

because they are (sort of) in love with theirmother.

Electra Complex is the same idea, but for

females.


39/74

FREUDS PSYCHOSEXUAL

STAGES Fixation in Phallic Stage would create

problems for the person later in life in

relationships with others (especially in

romantic relationships).

Latency Phase - A resting period (ages ~6

to puberty) where we dont have a lot ofpsychosexual anxiety.


40/74

FREUDS PSYCHOSEXUAL

STAGES

Genital Stage - the last stage, where

people focus on their genitals again;

Fixation here is expected and normal, in

Freuds view; the normal adult interest in

procreation activities.


41/74

ERIK ERIKSONS PSYCHOSOCIAL STAGES

Erikson was a neo-Freudian (people who

expanded on or altered the ideas, but who

believed and were inspired by Freuds basic

ideas; people who came after him inpsychoanalysis field...)

Erikson thought our social world andexperience was really important for our

development, therefore psychosocial stages.


42/74

ERIKSONS PSYCHOSOCIAL

STAGES Eriksons Theory has 8 stages; each is a

social conflict we need to resolve. Each can

be resolved in a good or bad way, and all

these add up to make us who we are.

1. Trust vs. Mistrust - Babies have needs

(food, shelter, comfort, etc). If these are wellprovided by the caregivers, the baby will

develop a good sense of trust in the world.



43/74


STAGES

2. Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt -

Autonomy is control over ourselves,

including our body (happens at approx.toilet training age) and emotions. If we

learn to control these well, we move

forward in life with a good sense ofautonomy.



44/74


STAGES

3. Initiative vs. Guilt - Curiosity, desire to

understand the world. If we are

encouraged when we take initiative we willpass successfully. If not we may feel guilty

about asking questions or starting our own

projects.



45/74


STAGES 4. Industry vs. Inferiority - early school age,

we are starting to study, play with others,produce projects, etc.

If we feel we can do as well as our peers,we will end in a healthy way. If we feelothers are much better than us, we maydevelop an inferiority complex - feeling

worried and defensive about ourperformance; canresult in overcompensation....



46/74


STAGES 5. Identity vs. Role Confusion -

Adolescence, our biggest job is to find out

who we want to be as an adult. We might

try different fashion styles, groups offriends, interests, etc. so we can find out

who we want to become.

Finding a stable identity and fitting in withothers is the goal.



47/74


STAGES Failure can lead to an identity crisis later,

where person is unsure of identity, might

feel like they have no identity of their own.

This can even lead some to take on anegative identity like becoming a criminal

(a negative identity is seen as better than

no identity by these people...)



48/74


STAGES 6. Intimacy vs. Isolation - Young adults now

have an identity, but they need to work tofit it with other people, form and keep

relationships. Sometimes this is related to romance, but

not always; other social relationships too.

We want to end this stage feeling like wehave meaningful relationships, that we arenot alone.



49/74


STAGES 7. Generativity vs. Stagnation - long term life

and career goals; making sure our life is going

how we want it to go (in a large, general

sense)

Can we take control and make sure our lives

will be what we want (often work/career, family,

etc).

Ending this stage with feelings of failure or lack

of control will be a problem for the person...



50/74


STAGES 8. Integrity vs. Despair - near the end of

our life, we look back and think about if we

are satisfied / happy with our lives.

If we accomplished what we wanted wecan live peacefully and enjoy life (maybe

enjoy and help our children and

grandchildren). If not, we might live in regret over things

we didnt do, mistakes we made, etc.

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT JEAN


51/74

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - JEAN

PIAGET

A very famous scholar of

cognitive (thinking)

development.

Worked with Alfred Binet,who made the first IQ test.

Piaget noticed children making similar

mistakes at similar ages, so he thoughtthey were going through some common

stages.


52/74

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - JEAN PIAGET

Schemata are important to Piagets ideas

about how we learn.

Remember how schemata work:

THINKING AND CREATIVITY BASICS


53/74

THINKING AND CREATIVITY: BASICS

Concepts / Schemata- the category

structures in our minds; we use these to

make sense of the world

E.g. Schema for dog might include:

has hair

four legs

tail

is cute



54/74


Concepts / Schemata sometimes bring us to

the right answer:

We often easily assimilate new information

into our schemas - This is also a dog, it fits

with my schema and so our schemas get

more complicated and useful.



55/74


Sometimes its not easy, and we need to use

accommodation.

Change: Create New:

Maybe dogs arent Similar, but not dog

always cute... new schemata needed


56/74

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT - PIAGET

Sensorimotor Stage (birth to ~2 years old)- learning is based on sensory information

and motor movements at this stage; we

soon start developing schemata to explainwhat we sense in our world.

Object permanence develops - the ideathat objects exist, even if we cant see

them (we dont have this cognitive ability at

birth)


57/74


Preoperational Stage (~2 to 7 years old) -stage where we start using symbols to

represent things in the real world. Biggest

example is language.

Our symbolic thinking develops in this

stage: language, math, etc.


58/74


Preoperational children are egocentric -they can only see the world from their own

perspective

One test of this is the Sally Anne Test.

(included)


59/74


Concrete Operations Stage (~8 to 12 yearsold) - we start to have intellectual abilities

of conservation - the idea that properties of

objects stay the same, even if the shapechanges. Thinking grows more logical.

e.g. conservation of volume, area, number


60/74


61/74


Formal Operations (~12 +) - final stage,adult level reasoning powers. During this

stage we become able to use abstract

reasoning - not connected to real worldobjects, etc.

Can reason about hypothetical situations,counterfactual situations.


62/74


We also gain the ability to think about our

own thinking (metacognition); very useful

for evaluating and improving our ownthinking.

Piaget thought that not everyone would

reach formal operations level of reasoning.


63/74

CRITICISMS OF PIAGET

Some other psych. think Piagets timingcould be too slow; that children seem to

move through stages faster and earlier

than he thought. (Possible methodology problem - older

kids have better language skills... maybe

they can explain more easily what they cando with their cognitive powers).


64/74

CRITICISMS OF PIAGET

Another criticism is that maybe the stagesarent so separate; might be more of acontinuous development.

One example of this is the Information-Processing Model - that we graduallygetbetter at mental skills (like our attentionspan), and not really jump from stage tostage.


65/74

MORAL DEVELOPMENT

Psychologists are interested in other formsof development as well.

One of these is moral development; how

do our moral reasoning skills change aswe grow?

One way to study this was to give moralproblems to children of different ages andstudy their answers. (e.g. Heinz Dilemma)

MORAL DEV LAWRENCE


66/74

MORAL DEV. - LAWRENCE

KOHLBERG Found three general levels of moral

reasoning.

1. Preconventional - the youngest group;

reasoning centerd on the self - often on

how to avoid punishment or gain reward....


67/74

MORAL DEV. - LAWRENCE KOHLBERG

2. Conventional - reasoning based more onhow others will view and think about the choice

maker; looking for praise, approval, trying to be

seen as the good child

3. Postconventional - based on abstract ideasabout justice, rights, values, etc. People at this

level can question societys moral rules; justice

comes from more complicated reasoning.

CRITICISM OF KOHLBERG CAROL


68/74

CRITICISM OF KOHLBERG - CAROL

GILLIGAN

Kohlberg originally just looked at boysresponses; later when girls were studied,

their answers were often judged to be at

the low levels of moral development...

Carol Gilligan thought Kohlbergs stages

were gender biased. Maybe men andwomen use a different type of moral

reasoning.

MORAL REASONING - CAROL


69/74

MORAL REASONING - CAROL

GILLIGAN Thought males might use more absolute rules,

applying them to every situation in a similar way.

But females might take situational factors and

relationships more into account when they didmoral reasoning tasks.

Her version not well supported by evidence, but

showed us we need to consider possible bias.


70/74

GENDER AND DEVELOPMENT

Psychologists often interested in how wedevelop our ideas about gender roles -

what we think men and women are like,

how they should act, etc.Gender roles are veryculturally

dependent.

A few different perspectives provide ideas

about gender roles.


71/74

GENDER - BIOPSYCHOLOGY

Lots of research into how men and womenare different.

One big finding - corpus callosum is

different size. Womens is statisticallysignificantly larger. They have more

connections between the two

hemispheres. Exactly how this affects us is not

understood yet.


72/74


73/74

GENDER - PSYCHODYNAMIC

Psychodynamic = psychoanalytic (e.g.Freud)

Oedipus Complex, Electra Complex - we

compete with our same sex parent for theaffection of our opposite sex parent;

But eventually we stop competing and start

to identify with the same sex parent. Theybecome our gender role model, so we try

to be manly or womanly like them.

GENDER - SOCIAL-COGNITIVE


74/74

GENDER - SOCIAL-COGNITIVE

THEORY Study effects of society, like how we treat

boys and girls differently.

Gender Schemata - our concepts of how

men and women should act; built from our

experience with society, media, parents,

family schools friends etc

Documents

AP Psych Prep 9 - Developmental Psychology