Child Psych Chapter 1 Child development- an area of study devoted to understanding constancy and change from conception through

h adolescence. Child development is part of a larger, interdisciplinary field known as developmental sciences, which includes all changes we experience throughout the lifespan. The field of child development o development is often divided into three broad domains: physical-changes in body size, proportions, appearance, function of the body systems, perceptual and motor capacities, and physical health cognitive-changes in intellectual abilities, including attention, memory, academic and everyday knowledge, problem solving, imagination, creativity, and language Emotional and social-changes in emotional communication, self-understanding, knowledge about other people, interpersonal skills, friendships, intimate relationships, and moral reasoning and behavior. o The five periods of child development The prenatal period: from conception to birth- in this nine-month period, the most rapid time of change, a one celled organism is transformed into human body with remarkable capacities for adjusting the life and the surrounding world. Infancy and toddler hood: from birth to two years-this. Brings dramatic changes in the body and the brain that support the emergence of a wide array of motor, perceptual, in intellectual capacities; the beginnings of language; and first incident ties to others. Infancy spans the first year; toddler that spans the second, during which children take their first independent steps, marking the shift to greater autonomy. Early childhood: from 2 to 6 years-the body becomes longer and leaner, motor skills are refined, and children become more self-controlled and self-sufficient. Make-believe plays blossoms, supporting every aspect of physiological development. By language expand at an astounding pace, a sense of morality becomes evident, and children establish ties with peers. Middle childhood: from 6 to 11 years-children learn about the wider world and master new responsibilities that increasingly resemble those they will perform his adults. Hallmarks of this. Our improved athletic abilities, participation and organize games with rules, more logical thought processes, mastery of basic literacy skills , and advances in self-understanding, morality, and friendship. Adolescence: from 11 to 18 years-this. Initiates the transition into adulthood. He released an adult sized body and sexual maturity. Thought becomes abstract and idealistic, and schooling is increasingly directed toward preparation for higher education and the world of work. Young people begin to establish economy from family and define personal values and goals. o Emerging adulthood-18 to 25 years-a new period of development. Although emerging adults have moved beyond adolescence, they have not yet fully assumed adult roles this. Only surfaced during the past few decades, the researchers have just begun to study it. Basic Issues o theory- an orderly, integrated set of statements that describe, explain, and predicts behavior theories are vital tools for two reasons They provide organizing frameworks for observations of children. Theories that are verified by research often serve as a sound basis for practical action. Once a theory helps us understand development we are in a much better position to know how to improve the welfare and treatment of children. Three issues on which all theories take a stand is the course of development continuous or discontinuous does one course of development characterize all children, or are there many possible courses Are genetic or environmental factors more important in influencing development o The stage concept assumes that children undergo periods of rapid transformation as a step up from one stage the next, alternating with plateaus during which they stand solidly within the stage.

Child Psych Chapter 1 Contexts-unique combinations of personal and environmental circumstances that can result in different paths of change o resilience-the ability to adapt effectively in the face of threats to development four broad factors offered protection from the damaging effects of stressful life events personal characteristics of children a warm parental relationship social support outside the immediate family community resources and opportunities historical foundations o in the 16th century, the Puritan belief in original sin gave rise to the view that children were born evil and stubborn and had to be civilized o Children were dressed in stiff, uncomfortable clothing that held them in adult like postures, and disobedient students were routinely beaten by their schoolmasters. o Philosophies of the Enlightenment The 17th century Enlightenment brought new philosophies that emphasized ideals of human dignity and respect. Conceptions of childhood were more humane than those of the past John Locke viewed the child as tabula rasa according to this idea, children began as nothing at all; their characters are shaped entirely by experience Jean-Jacques Rousseau Viewed the child as noble savages, naturally endowed with a sense of right and wrong and with an innate plan for orderly, healthy growth. o Scientific beginnings Darwin's theory of evolution the theory emphasize to related principles: natural selection and survival of the fittest o Darwin explained that certain species survive in particular parts of the world because they have characteristics that fit with, or are adapted to, their surroundings o Other species die off because they are not as well suited to their environments. The baby biographies Scientist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries selected a child of their own or a close relative. Beginning in early infancy, they jotted down day by day descriptions and impressions of the child's behavior. By the 1890s, these paid biographies were being published regularly. These first investigators tended to be emotionally invested in the infants they observed, and they seldom began with a clear idea of what they wanted to find out. Not surprisingly, many of the records were eventually discarded as biased. o These baby biographies were a step in the right direction. Two 19th-century theorists, Darwin and Preyer, contributed to these early records of children's behavior. As a result of biographers pioneering efforts, the child became a common focus of scientific research o Normative approach-are measures of behavior that are taken on large numbers of individuals and agerelated averages are computed to represent typical development. Mid-20th century theories o the psychoanalytic perspective According to the psychoanalytic perspective, children move through series of stages in which they confront conflicts between biological drives and social expectations. How these conflicts are resolved determines the person's ability to learn, to get along with others, and to cope with anxiety. Freud's theory Psychosexual theory-emphasized how parents manage their child's sexual and aggressive drives in the first few years is crucial for healthy personality development. o

Child Psych Chapter 1 Freud psychosexual stages o Oral- birth to one-year-the new ego directs the baby sucking activities towards the breast or bottle. If oral needs are not met appropriately, the individual may develop such habits as thumb sucking, fingernail biting, and pencil chewing in childhood and overeating and smoking later in life. o Anal-1 to 3 years-toddlers and preschoolers enjoy holding and releasing urine and feces. Toilet training becomes a major issue between parent and child. If parents insist that children be trained before they are ready, or if they make too few demands, conflicts about anal control may appear in the form of extreme orderliness and cleanliness or messiness and disorder o Phallic-3 to 6 years-as preschoolers take pleasure in genital stimulation, Freud's Oedipus conflict for boys and Electra conflict for girls arises: children feel sexual desire for the other sex parent and hostility towards the same-sex marriage. To avoid punishment and loss of parental love, they suppress these impulses and, instead, adopt the same-sex parents characteristic and values. As a result, the superego is formed, and children feel guilty whenever they violate its standards. o Latency-6 to 11 years-sexual instincts die down, and the superego develops further. The child acquires new social values from adults and same sex peers outside the family. o Genital-adolescence-with puberty, the sexual impulses of the phallic stage reappear. If development has been successful during earlier stages, it leads to marriage, mature sexuality, and the birth and rearing of children. This stage extends through adulthood. Three parts of the personality o Id-the largest portion of the mind, is the source of basic biological needs and desires o Ego- the conscious, rational part of personality, emerges in early infancy to redirect the id impulses so they are discharged in acceptable ways o Superego-conscience-developed through interactions with parents, who insist that children conform to the value to society. Freud's theory was the first to stress the influence of the early parent child relationship on development. This perspective is eventually criticized. First it overemphasizes the influence of sexual feelings and development. Second, because was based on the problems of sexually repressed, well-to-do adults in the 19th century Victorian society, it did not apply to other cultures. Finally, Freud had not studied children directly.

Erickson in the psychosocial theory, Erickson emphasized that in addition to mediating between id impulses and superego demands, the ego makes a positive contribution to development, acquiring attitudes and skills of each stage that make the individual and active, contributing member of society. Eight stages of development o basic trust versus mistrust-birth to one-year o autonomy versus shame and doubt-1 to 3 years o initiative versus guilt-3 to 6 years o industry versus inferiority-6 to 11 years o identity versus identity confusion-adolescence o intimacy versus isolation-young adult o generativity versus stagnation-middle adulthood o integrity versus despair-old age

Child Psych Chapter 1 consistent with this view, psychoanalytic theorist except the clinical, or case study method, which synthesizes information from a variety of sources into detailed picture of the personality of a single child Psychoanalytic theorists may have become isolated from the rest of the field because they were so strongly committed to the in-depth study of individual children that they failed to consider other methods. In addition, many psychoanalytic ideas, such as psychosexual stages and ego functioning, are so vague that they are difficult or impossible to test empirically. o Behaviorism and social learning theory behaviorism-an approach that regards directly observable events-stimuli and responses-as the appropriate focus of study that views the development of behavior is taking place through classical and operant conditioning. Pavlov discovered classical conditioning A form of learning that involves associating a neutral stimulus with the stimulus that leads to reflexive response. Once the nervous system makes the connection between the two stimuli, the new stimulus will produce the behavior by itself. Watson wanted to find out if classical conditioning could be applied to children's behavior. o In a historic experiment, he taught Albert, an 11 month old infant, to fear neutral stimulus-a soft white rat-by presenting it several times with a sharp, loud sound, which naturally scared the baby. Another form behaviorism was Skinner's operant conditioning theory the frequency of the behavior can be increased by following it with a wide variety of reinforcers or decreased through punishment social learning theory modeling-imitation or observational learning Bandura found the diverse factors affect children's motivation to imitate-their own history of reinforcement or punishment for the behavior, the promise of future reinforcement or punishment, and even vicarious reinforcement or punishment. Behavior modification consists of procedures that combine conditioning and modeling to eliminate undesirable behaviors and increases the horrible responses. o piaget's cognitive developmental theory according to his cognitive developmental theory, children actively construct knowledge as they manipulate and explore their world four stages of cognitive development sensorimotor-birth to two years preoperational-2 to 7 years concrete operational-7 to 11 years formal operational-11 years on Central to his theory is the biological concept of adaptation The process of building schemes through direct interaction with the environment. Consists of two complementary activities: assimilation and accommodation equilibrium-balance between internal structures and information they encounter in their everyday lives to study childhood and adolescent thought, he adapted the clinical method of psychoanalysis, conducting open ended clinical interviews in which a child initial response to the task serves as the basis of his next question recent theoretical perspectives o information processing

Child Psych Chapter 1 Information processing perspective-an approach that views the human mind as a symbol manipulating system through which information flows and that regards cognitive development as a continuous process. The great strength of the information processing approach is its commitment to rigorous research methods. Because it has provided precise account of how children of different ages engage in many aspects of thinking, its findings have led to teaching methods that help children approach academic tasks in more advanced ways. Information processing has fallen short in some respects. It has been better at analyzing and thinking into its components that putting them back together into a comprehensive theory. And it virtually ignores aspects of children's cognition that are not linear and logical, such as imagination and creativity o ethology and evolutionary development psychology ethology-an approach concerned with the adaptive, or survival, value behavior and its evolutionary history imprinting-the early following behavior of certain baby birds which ensures that the young will stay close to the mother and be fed and protected from danger. Imprinting takes place during an early, restricted period of development. Critical period- A limited time during which the child is biologically prepared to acquire certain adaptive behaviors that need support of an appropriately stimulating environment Sensitive period- a time that is optimal for certain capacities to emerge in which the individual is especially responsive to environmental influences Evolutionary developmental psychology-an approach that seeks to understand the adaptive value of species wide cognitive, emotional, and social competencies as those competencies change with age. o Vygotsky's sociocultural theory Vygotskys perspective, known as sociocultural theory, focuses on how culture-the values, beliefs, customs, and skills of the social group-is transmitted to the next generation o ecological systems theory Bronfenbrenner Ecological systems theory abuse the child is developing within a complex system of relationships affected by multiple levels of the surrounding environment. 4 levels of the environment the microsystem the mesosystem the exosystem the macrosystem o new directions: development of a dynamic system Dynamic systems perspective-according to this view, the child's mind, body, and physical and social worlds form an integrated system that guides mastery of new skills. The system is dynamic, constantly in motion. A change in any part of it-from brain growth to physical and social surroundings-disrupts the current organism-environment relationship. When this happens, the child actively recognizes her behavior to the components of the system work together again but in a more complex, effective way comparing child development theories o how major theoretical perspectives differ they focus on different domains of development every theory contains a point of view about child development every theory has strengths and limitations applied directions: child development and social policy o US and Canadian public policy safeguarding children and youth have lagged behind policies and other developed nations. Striking indicator is that about 18% of US and 12% of Canadian children are poor-rates

Child Psych Chapter 1 that climbed to 32% for Native American children, 34% for African-American children and Hispanic children, and as high as 30 to 40% per Canadian aboriginal children, depending on the specific poverty measure used. More than 6% of US children live in deep poverty (well below the poverty threshold, the income level judge necessary for minimum living standard), compared with 2.5% in Canada. These circumstances are worrisome in both countries because the earlier poverty begins, the deeper it is, and the longer it lasts, the more devastating are the effects children of poverty are more likely than other children to suffer from lifelong poor physical health, persistent deficits in cognitive development and academic achievement, high school dropout, mental illness, and antisocial behavior The United States is the only industrialized nation in the world that does not have universal, publicly funded healthcare system. Hence, approximately 11% of US children-most of them in low income families-have no health insurance. The US for welfare program is strictly time-limited. A family can be on welfare for only 24 continuous months, with a lifetime limit of 60 months, and the states can further restrict these benefits For example, as they can prevent humans from increasing recipients have more children, and it could deny teenage single mothers any benefits. In some research, families who moved from welfare to a combination of welfare and work experience a greater reduction in young children's behavior problems and families who moved to total reliance on work.

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