1. The Developing Person Through the Life Span 8e by Kathleen Stassen Berger
Chapter 5-7
The First Two Years:
Biosocial Development
Cognitive Development
Psychosocial Development

2. Body Changes
Body Size
Average weight: double the birthweight by month 4, triple it by age 1, much of it is fat
Average height: grow 14 inches from birth to age 2
Head-Sparing
If nutrition temporarily inadequate, body stops
growing but not the brain

3. Sleep Average newborn sleeps 16 hours per day
Ample sleep correlates with normal brain maturation, learning, emotional regulation, academic success and psychological adjustment
Between birth and 36 months total sleep time decreases

4. Brain Development
Neuron- the billions of nerve cells in the central nervous system.
Cortex- the outer layers of the brain.
Axon- a fiber that extends from a neuron and transmits electrochemical impulses from that neuron to the dendrites of other neurons.
Dendrite- a fiber that extends from a neuron and receives electrochemical impulses transmitted from other neurons via their axons.
Synapse- the intersection between the axon of one neuron and the dendrites of other neurons.
Neurotransmitter- a brain chemical that carries information from the axon of a sending neuron to the dendrites of a receiving neuron.

5. Transient Exuberance
The great but temporary increase in the number of dendrites in an infant’s brain from birth to age 2
Enables neurons to connect and communicate with other neurons
This is followed by pruning where unused neurons and misconnected dendrites die

6. Stress and the Brain
If it produces too many stress hormones in infants, the brain will not be able to have normal stress responses.
Occurs in infants who are terrified and experience other forms of stress.
Can continue to occur when the infant is an adult

7. Necessary and Possible Experiences
Experience-related aspects of brain function:
Experience-expectant : MUST happen for normal brain maturation. Require basic common experiences in to develop normally (i.e. people who love them)
Experience-dependent: these happen to some infants but not all, not necessary for brain function (i.e. language baby hears)

8. Brain Development
Prefrontal Cortex: the last part of the brain to mature. The area for anticipation, planning, and impulse control
Shaken baby syndrome- a life-threatening injury occurring when an infant is forcefully shaken back and forth, rupturing blood vessels and breaking neural connections .
Self-righting- inborn drive to fix a developmental deficit
All people have self-righting impulses for physical and emotional imbalances.

9. Sensation and Perception
Sensation- The response of a sensory system (eyes, ears, skin, tongue, nose) when it detects a stimulus.
Perception- The mental processing of sensory information when the brain interprets a sensation.
(i.e. “At First Sight”)

10. Sensation and Movement
Hearing develops during the last trimester of pregnancy and is already quite acute at birth; the most advanced of the newborn’s senses. Vision is the least mature sense at birth. Newborns focus only on objects between 4 and 30 inches away. Binocular vision, the ability to coordinate the two eyes to see one image, appears at 3 months.

11. Sensation and Movement
Gross motor skills- Physical abilities involving large body movements, such as walking and jumping.
Fine motor skills- Physical abilities involving small body movements, especially of the hands and fingers, such as drawing and picking up a coin.

12. Gross Motor Skills

13. Ethnic Variations
Cultural patterns of child rearing affect, perception, and motor skills

14. Breastfeeding Nutrition
For every infant disease (including SIDS), breast-feeding reduces risk and malnutrition increases it.
Breastfed babies are less likely to develop allergies, asthma, obesity, and heart disease.
As the infant gets older, the composition of breast milk adjusts to the baby’s changing nutritional needs.

15. Malnutrition
Protein-calorie: when not enough food of any kind is consumed
Stunting: being too short for your age due to severe and chronic malnutrition
Wasting: being very underweight due to malnutrition
Marasmus (muh-raz-muh): severe malnutrition during infancy where child stops growing, tissues waste away and then usually dies
Over 50 million children under 5 years old
Kwashiorkor (kwah-shee-awr-kawr): disease of chronic malnutrition resulting from a lack of protein during childhood where child becomes more likely to get other diseases such as measles, diarrhea and influenza

16. Cognitive Development First Two Years

17. Sensorimotor Intelligence
Piaget’s term for the way infants
think—by using their senses and motor skills—during the first period of cognitive development.
Begins at birth and
ends at about 24 months

18. Sensorimotor Stage Primary Circular Reactions
Piaget’s first stage involving Sensorimotor Intelligence
subdivided into six stages grouped into pairs:
Primary Circular Reactions
Stage One (birth – 1 month)
Stage Two (1 – 4 months)
Secondary Circular Reactions
Stage Three (4 – 8 months)
Stage Four (8 – 12 months)
Tertiary Circular Reactions
Stage 5 (12 – 18 months)
Stage 6 (18 – 24 months)

19. Primary Circular Reactions
The first of three types of feedback loops in sensorimotor intelligence Involves the infant’s responses to its body Stage 1: (Birth – 1 month) stage of reflexes (i.e. sucking, grasping, staring, listening) Stage 2: (1 – 4 months) stage of first habits Adaptation & Accommodation

20. Secondary Circular Reactions
The second type of feedback loops in sensorimotor intelligence
Involves the infant’s responses to objects and people
Stage 3: (4 – 8 months)
Making interesting sights last:
responding to people and objects
(i.e. clap hands when told)
Stage 4: (8 – 12 months)
new adaptation and anticipation
(i.e. putting dad’s hands together in order to make him start playing patty-cake)

21. Secondary Circular Reactions
Stage 4
new adaptation and anticipation…means to an end
Goal Directed Behaviors
1. enhanced awareness of cause and effect
2. Memory for actions already completed
3. Understanding other’s intentions
These coincide with
new motor skills
(i.e. crawling, grabbing)

22. Secondary Circular Reactions
Object permanence:
the realization that objects (including people) still exist when they can no longer be seen, touched, or hear.

23. Secondary Circular Reactions
Separation Anxiety:
An infant’s distress when a familiar caregiver leaves, most obvious between 9 and 14 months

24. Tertiary Circular Reactions
The third type of feedback loops in sensorimotor intelligence
Most creative, first with action then with ideas
Stage 5: (12 – 18 months)
New means through active experimentation
“little scientist” using trial & error
Stage 6: (18 – 24 months)
New means through mental combinations
(i.e. considering before acting)
Deferred Imitation: when infants copy behavior they noticed hours or days earlier

25. Piaget and Modern Research
Habituation The process of getting used to an object or event through repeated exposure to it Evidence of habituation is loss of interest By using habituation and then introducing a new stimulus, we can find more of what babies know and learn

26. Information Processing
Information-processing Theory
Modeled on computer functioning
Information-processing theorists believe that a step-by-step description of the mechanisms of thought adds insight to our understanding of cognition at every age.
Contrast with Piaget’s stages
advances occur faster
Affordances
Memory

27. Affordances
The environment affords opportunities for interactions with what is perceived based on
sensory awareness
motivation
development
past experiences

28. Affordances
The visual cliff was designed to provide the illusion of a sudden drop-off between one horizontal surface and another.
Mothers were able to urge their 6-month-olds to wiggle forward over the “cliff”, but 10-month-olds fearfully refused.

29. Memory
Early Memory
According to classic developmental theory, infants store no memories in their first year.
Developmentalists now agree that very young infants can remember if the following conditions are met:
Experimental conditions are similar to real life.
Motivation is high.
Special measures aid memory retrieval.

30. Language: The Universal Sequence
Child-directed speech: the high-pitched, simplified, and repetitive way adults speak to infants (called baby talk)
Babbling: the extended repetition of certain syllables, such as ba-ba-ba, that begins when babies are between 6 and 9 months old
At about 1 year, babies speak a few words.
Spoken vocabulary increases gradually (about one or two new words a week).
Holophrase- A single word that is used to express a complete, meaningful thought.
All new talkers say names and utter holophrases.

31. First Words
Naming explosion- A sudden increase in an infant’s vocabulary, especially in the number of nouns, that begins at about 18 months of age.

32. Psychosocial Development First Two Years

33. Emotional Development
Smiling and Laughing
Social smile (6 weeks): Evoked by viewing human faces
Laughter (3 to 4 months): Often associated with curiosity
Anger
First expressions at around 6 months
Healthy response to frustration
Sadness
Indicates withdrawal and is
accompanied by increased
production of cortisol
Stressful experience for infants

34. Emotional Development
Fear: Emerges at about 9 months in response to people, things, or situations
Stranger wariness:
Infant no longer smiles at any friendly face but cries or looks frightened when an unfamiliar person moves too close
Separation anxiety:
Tears, dismay, or anger when a familiar caregiver leaves.
If it remains strong after age 3, it may be considered an emotional disorder.

35. Emotional Development
Toddlers’ Emotions
Anger and fear become less frequent and more focused
Laughing and crying become louder and more discriminating
New emotions appear: pride, shame, embarrassment, guilt
Require an awareness of other people
Emerge from family interactions, influenced by the culture

36. Emotional Development
Self-awareness
The realization that one’s body, mind, and actions are separate from those of other people.
First 4 months: Infants have no sense of self; may see themselves as part of their caregiver
5 months: Begin to develop an awareness of themselves as separate from their mothers.

37. Emotional Development
Mirror Recognition
Classic experiment (M. Lewis & Brooks, 1978)
Babies aged 9–24 months looked into a mirror after a dot of rouge had been put on their noses.
None of those younger than 12 months old reacted as if they knew the mark was on them.
15- to 24-month-olds showed self-awareness by touching their own noses with curiosity.

38. Social Impulses Emotional Self-regulation
Directly connected to maturation of the cortex
(anterior cingulate gyrus)
Particular people begin to arouse specific emotions
Toddlers get angry when teased by an older sibling or react with fear when entering the doctor’s office.
Memory triggers specific emotions based on previous experiences.

39. Stress Hypothalamus Abuse (form of chronic stress)
Regulates various bodily functions and hormone production
May grow more slowly if an infant is often stressed
Abuse (form of chronic stress)
Potential long-term effects on a child’s emotional development
Excessive stress in infants must be prevented

40. Temperament Temperament 4 categories of temperament Easy (40%)
Inborn differences between one person and another in emotions, activity, and self-regulation
Temperament is epigenetic, originating in the genes but affected by child-rearing practices
4 categories of temperament
Easy (40%)
Difficult (10%)
Slow to warm up (15%)
Hard to classify (35%)
Additional findings:
Parenting practices are crucial, temperament can change or be changed

41. Goodness of Fit
A similarity of temperament and values that produces a smooth interaction between an individual and his or her social context
includes family, school, and community.
With a good fit
parents of difficult babies build a close supportive relationship
parents of exuberant, curious infants learn to protect them from harm
parents of slow-to-warm-up toddlers give them time to adjust

42. Proximal and Distal Parenting
Proximal parenting
Caregiving practices that involve being physically close to the baby, with frequent holding and touching
Distal parenting
Caregiving practices that involve remaining distant from the baby, providing toys, food, and face-to-face communication with minimal holding and touching

43. Synchrony
A coordinated, rapid, and smooth exchange of responses between a caregiver and an infant
Synchrony in the first few months
Becomes more frequent and more elaborate
Helps infants learn to read others’ emotions and to develop the skills of social interaction
Synchrony usually begins with parents imitating infants

44. When Synchrony Disappears
Experiments using the still-face technique
An experimental practice in which an adult keeps his or her face unmoving and expressionless in face-to-face interaction with an infant
Babies are very upset by the still face and show signs of stress
Conclusions:
A parent’s responsiveness to an infant aids psychological and biological development
Infants’ brains need social interaction to develop to their fullest

45. Secure and Insecure Attachment
1. Secure attachment: An infant obtains both comfort and
confidence from the presence of his or her caregiver.
2. Insecure-avoidant attachment: An infant avoids
connection with the caregiver, as when the infant seems not to
care about the caregiver’s presence, departure, or return.
3. Insecure-resistant/ambivalent attachment: An infant’s anxiety and uncertainty are evident, as when the infant becomes very upset at separation from the caregiver and both resists and seeks contact on reunion.
4. Disorganized attachment: A type of attachment that is marked by an infant’s inconsistent reactions to the caregiver’s departure and return.

46. Measuring Attachment Strange Situation Key behaviors to observe:
A laboratory procedure for measuring attachment by evoking infants’ reactions to the stress of various adults’ comings and goings in an unfamiliar playroom.
Key behaviors to observe:
Exploration of the toys. A secure toddler plays happily.
Reaction to the caregiver’s departure. A secure toddler misses the caregiver.
Reaction to the caregiver’s return. A secure toddler welcomes the caregiver’s reappearance.

47. Measuring Attachment

48. Measuring Attachment

49. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
Psychoanalytic Theory
Freud: Oral and Anal Stages
Oral stage (first year): The mouth is the young infant’s
primary source of gratification
Anal stage (second year): Infant’s main pleasure comes from
the anus (e.g. sensual pleasure of bowel movements and
the psychological pleasure of controlling them)
Potential conflicts:
Oral fixation: If denied the infant urge to suck, may become
an adult who is stuck (fixated) at the oral stage (e.g. eats,
drinks, chews, bites, or talks excessively)
Anal personality: Overly strict or premature toilet training
may result in an adult with an unusually strong need for
control, regularity and cleanliness

50. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
Erikson: Trust and Autonomy
Trust versus mistrust
Infants learn basic trust if the world is a secure place where their basic needs are met
Autonomy versus shame and doubt
Toddlers either succeed or fail in gaining a sense of self-rule over their actions and bodies
Early problems can create an adult who is suspicious and pessimistic (mistrusting) or who is easily shamed (insufficient autonomy)

51. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
Behaviorism
Parents mold an infant’s emotions and personality through reinforcement and punishment
Social learning
The acquisition of behavior patterns by observing the behavior of others
Demonstrated in the classic Bobo Doll study by Bandura

52. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
Cognitive Theory
Working model: a set of assumptions used to organize perceptions and experiences
The child’s interpretation of early experiences is more important than the experiences themselves.
New working models can be developed based on new experiences or reinterpretation of previous experiences.

53. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development
Ethnotheory
A theory that underlies the values and practices of a culture but is not usually apparent to the people within the culture.