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Development: Psych
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Developmental Psychology | a branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social change throughout the life span |
| Nature/Nurture Issue | How do genetic inheritance (our nature) and experience (the nurture we receive) influence our development? |
| Continuity/Stages | Is development a gradual, continuous process or a sequence of separate stages? |
| Stability/Change | Do our early personality traits persist through life, or do we become different persons as we age? |
| Zygote | the fertilized egg; it enters a 2-week period of rapid cell division and develops into an embryo |
| Embryo | the developing human organism from about 2 weeks after fertilization through the second month |
| Fetus | the developing human organism from 9 weeks after conception to birth |
| Teratogens | (literally, "monster maker") agents, such as chemicals and viruses, that can reach the embryo or fetus during prenatal development and cause harm |
| Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) | physical and cognitive abnormalities in children caused by a pregnant woman's heavy drinking. In severe cases, symptoms include noticeable facial misproportions |
| Habituation* | decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimulation. As infants gain familiarity with repeated exposure to a visual stimulus, their interest wanes and they look away sooner |
| Maturation | biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience |
| Pruning Process | process in the brain that shuts down excess neural connections and strengthens others |
| Cognition | all the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating |
| Schema | a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information |
| Assimilation | interpreting our new experiences in terms of our existing schemas |
| Accommadation | adapting our current understandings (schemas) to incorporate new information |
| Sensorimotor Stage | in Piaget's theory, the stage (from birth to about 2 years of age) during which infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions and motor activities |
| Object Permanence | the awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived |
| Preoperational Stage | in Piaget's theory, the stage (from about 2 to about 6 or 7 years of age) during which a child learns to use language but does not yet comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic |
| Egocentrism | in Piaget's theory, the preoperational child's difficulty taking another's point of view |
| Symbolic Play | imaginative play; pretend play |
| Animism | contributing human-like qualities to inanimate objects (e.g. a bear is sad when we leave him alone) |
| Centration | children focus on one aspect of a bigger picture; in Piaget's conservation tasks, children focus on the height of the water but ignore the width of the glass |
| Conservation | the principle and understanding (which Piaget believed to be a part of concrete operational reasoning) that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects; preoperataional stage |
| Theory of mind | people's ideas about their own and others' mental states—about their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behaviors these might predict |
| Concrete Operational Stage | in Piaget's theory, the stage of cognitive development (from about 6 or 7 to 11 years of age) during which children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete events |
| Formal Operational Stage | in Piaget's theory, the stage of cognitive development (normally beginning about age 12) during which people begin to think logically about abstract concepts |
| Autism Spectrum Disorder* | a disorder that appears in childhood and is marked by deficient communication, social interaction, and understanding of others' states of mind |
| Stranger Anxiety | the fear of strangers that infants commonly display, beginning by about 8 months of age |
| Attachment | an emotional tie with another person; shown in young children by their seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress on separation |
| Critical Period* | an optimal period early in the life of an organism when exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produces normal development |
| Imprinting* | the process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical period very early in life |
| Basic Trust | according to Erik Erikson, a sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy; said to be formed during infancy by appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers |
| Self-Concept | our understanding and evaluation of who we are, "Who am I?" |
| Adolescence | the transition period from childhood to adulthood, extending from puberty to independence |
| Puberty | the period of sexual maturation, during which a person becomes capable of reproducing |
| Primary Sex Characteristics | the body structures (ovaries, testes, and external genitalia) that make sexual reproduction possible |
| Secondary Sex Characteristics | nonreproductive sexual characteristics, such as female breasts and hips, male voice quality, and body hair |
| Menarche | the first menstrual period (let's have a Moon Party!) |
| Identity | our sense of self; according to Erikson, the adolescent's task is to solidify a sense of self by testing and integrating various roles |
| Social Identity* | the "we" aspect of our self-concept; the part of our answer to "Who am I?" that comes from our group memberships |
| Intimacy | in Erikson's theory, the ability to form close, loving relationships; a primary developmental task in late adolescence and early adulthood |
| Emerging Adulthood | for some people in modern cultures, a period from the late teens to mid-twenties, bridging the gap between adolescent dependence and full independence and responsible adulthood |
| Strange Situation experiment | Mary Ainsworth experiment; observed children and mother during first six months and later observed the 1 year old infants in strange situation |
| secure attachment | in infant's mother's presence they play comfortably and explore new environment, but when she leaves they become distressed; when she returns they seek contact with her (Ainsworth experiment) |
| insecure attachment | Ainsworth experiment; avoid attachment, marked by anxiety or avoidance of trusting relationships ; less likely to explore strange situation and cling to mother or cry when mother leaves |
| temperament | person's characteristic emotional reactivity and intensity |
| Authoritarian parenting style | parents impose rules and expect obedience; "why because i said so" |
| permissive parenting style | parents submit to their children's desires. they make few demands and use little punishment |
| authoritative parenting style | parents are both demanding and responsive. They exert control by setting rules and enforcing them, but they also explain the reasons for rules; with older children they encourage open discussion when making the rules and allowing exceptions |
| preconventional morality | Kohlberg, before age 9; self-interest, obey only rules to avoid punishment or gain concrete rewards |
| conventional morality | kohlberg, early adolescence; uphold laws and rules to gain social approval or maintain social order |
| postconventional morality | kohlberg, adolescence and beyond; actions reflect belief in basic rights and self-defined ethical principles |
| menopause | time of natural cessation (stopping) of menstruation |
| cross-sectional study | a study in which people of different ages are compared with one another at the same time period |
| longitudinal study | research in which the same people are restudied and retested over a long period |
| crystallized intelligence | our accumulated knowledge and verbal skills; tends to increase with age |
| fluid intelligence | our ability to reason speedily and abstractly; tends to decrease during late adulthood |
| social clock | the culturally preferred timing of social events such as marriage, parenthood, and retirement |
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