Prenatal Development and the Newborn  Developmental Psychology

Prenatal Development and the Newborn Life is sexually transmitted

Prenatal Development and the Newborn  Zygote  The..  enters a 2 week period of rapid cell division  develops into an embryo  Embryo  The…  Fetus  The…

Prenatal Development and the Newborn 40 days 45 days 2 months 4 months

Prenatal Development and the Newborn  Teratogens  agents, such as…  Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS)

Infant Abilities 6

Prenatal Development and the Newborn

Infant Reflexes Rooting – Sucking – Babinski - 8

Infant Reflexes Moro – Grasping - 9

Methods for Studying Infants  Researchers observe habituation to assess what infants see and remember.  Habituation = 10

Infancy and Childhood: Physical Development  Maturation  Biological…  relatively uninfluenced by experience At birth3 months15 months Cortical Neurons

Infancy and Childhood: Physical Development  Babies only 3 months old can learn that…

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development  Cognition  All the mental activities associated with…  Schema  A…

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development  Assimilation  Interpreting…  Accommodation  adapting one’s…

Piaget’s approach Primary method was to ask children to solve problems and to question them about the reasoning behind their solutions Discovered that children think… Proposed that development occurs as…

Sensorimotor Stage (birth - 2) Information is gained through… In this stage child perceives and manipulates but does not… Symbols become internalized… Object permanence is acquired

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development  Object Permanence  The…

Preoperational Stage (2-7 years) Lack of… Emergence of symbolic thought through… Egocentrism Lack the concept of conservation

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development  Egocentrism (during pre-operational stage)  the inability…  Theory of Mind (beginning in pre-operational stage)  Autism

Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development  Conservation (developed during concrete operational phase)  the principle that

Concrete Operational Stage (7-12 years) Understanding of mental operations leading to… Classification and categorization Less egocentric Inability to reason abstractly or hypothetically Can conserve Can understand mathematical operations.

Formal Operational Stage (age 12 - adulthood) Abstract reasoning using imagined realities and symbols. Potential for mature moral reasoning. Understanding of religion develops. Can spot hypocrisy.

Typical Age Range Description of Stage Developmental Phenomena Birth to nearly 2 yearsSensorimotor Experiencing the world through senses and actions (looking, touching, mouthing) Object permanence Stranger anxiety About 2 to 6 years About 7 to 11 years About 12 through adulthood Preoperational Representing things with words and images but lacking logical reasoning Pretend play Egocentrism Language development Concrete operational Thinking logically about concrete events; grasping concrete analogies and performing arithmetical operations Conservation Mathematical transformations Formal operational Abstract reasoning Abstract logic Potential for moral reasoning Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Piaget’s Theory Challenged New studies indicate infants do more than sense and react Receptive language is much larger than previously believed. One study had 1 month old babies suck one of two pacifiers without ever seeing them When shown both pacifiers, infants stared more at the one they had felt in their mouth This requires a sort of reasoning

Critique of Piaget’s Theory

Social Development  Stranger Anxiety  fear of…  beginning by about 8 months of age  Have schemas for faces they know and can’t assimilate new faces causing distress.  Attachment  An…  shown in young children by their seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress on separation

Social Development  Critical Period  Imprinting

Social Development  Harlow’s Surrogate Mother Experiments

Social Development

 Basic Trust (Erik Erikson)  a sense…  said to be formed during infancy by appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers

Erikson’s Stages of Psychosocial Development Approximate ageStage Description of Task InfancyTrust vs. mistrust If needs are dependably met, infants (1st year) develop a sense of basic trust. ToddlerAutonomy vs. shame Toddlers learn to exercise will and (2nd year)and doubt do things for themselves, or they doubt their abilities. PreschoolerInitiative vs. guilt Preschoolers learn to initiate tasks (3-5 years) and carry out plans, or they feel guilty about efforts to be independent. ElementaryCompetence vs. Children learn the pleasure of applying (6 years-inferiority themselves to tasks, or they feel puberty) inferior.