Developmental Psy

• The 4 stages of development are: Prenatal, Childhood, Adolescence and Adulthood
• Prenatal (conception to 2) - brain develops neural connections 16 days after birth, at 6 months the foetal can hear sounds inside the womb
• Childhood (2-12) - Senses improve, at the age of 3 prefrontal cortex develops
• Adolescence (13-19) - the limbic system develops eg emotions mature and prefrontal cortex still develops
• Adulthood (20+) - Prefrontal cortex fully develops eg decision making
• Synapses send electrical impulses to neurons where neurotransmitters are released which either have excitatory or inhibitory effect on the next neurone.
• Piagets Theory on Cognitive development:

  Sensori motor

  Pre-operational

  Concrete operational

  Formal operational
• Sensory motor (0-2) - babies learn about their environment via senses and movement
• Pre-operational (3-7) - children can't think logically but they do understand symbols eg words and pictures. (Object Permanence, Animism, Egocentrism)
• Concrete Operational (7-11) - Children can conserve, reversibility and Decentration (less egocentric)
• Formal operational (11+) - Children develop abstract thinking and think logically
• Criticisms of Piagets THEORY

  Reductionist, ignores complexities in human behaviours and reduces it down to stages

  Dont allow for individual differences eg moving through stages quicker or slower than others
• Assimilation - New information is fit into existing schemas eg knowing fathers are men but not all men are fathers
• Accommodation - new schema is created when information doesn't fit into existing schema eg realising not all men are fathers
• Piagets Congnitive STUDY - Conservation of Number

  - Young children

  • Natural experiment
• Criticisms of Piagets STUDY

  • Experimenter bias because he used his own children so results may be unreliable
  • Demand characteristics because he asked the question twice causing doubt
  • Swiss children only therefore culturally biased and unrepresentative
  • Artificial task so lacked construct validity
• Dweck's Mindset THEORY

  Believes mindsets can be changed either Growth or Fixed.

  Praise for effort rather than Praise for intelligence so that children can blame failure on lack of effort rather than intelligence
• Fixed mindsets - avoid challenging tasks, believe intelligence is fixed
• Willinghams THEORY

  • learning styles do not exist
  • children may express a preference
  • importance of meaning in learning
• Criticisms of Dweck and Willingham

  • Focuses on NURTURE, this means that learning experiences can have a postitive influence on childrens behaviour
  • Dweck does not have significant evidence on the impact
• Blackwell's STUDY - Fixed and Growth mindsets STUDY 1

  • longitudinal study (5 years)
  • 373 students in New York
  • Completed questionnaire (rating scales) at start of 7th Grade about learning goals and effort beliefs
  • Scores taken from 6th grade to measure progress
• Blackwell STUDY - fixed and growth mindsets STUDY 2

  • correlational study - theories of intelligence and achievement in math tests
  • IV - If the child was taught about growth mindsets
  • DV - Achievement on math test
  • 99 students in 7th grade New York
  • completed questionnaires at the start and end (8 weeks)
• Blackwell's Study CRITICISMS

  • culturally biased - based in New york
  • Use of independent groups in study 2 meant that the difference between effort and achievements could be down to individual differences
  • field experiment - hard to establish cause and effect
• Teachers should teach the idea that skills should be deeply learnt and not quickly, the best way is to learn through practice.

  Piaget - younger children should not be taught complex ideas as they are not mentally ready - invariant (stages of development)

  Dweck - importance of growth mindset and how it aids their learning and outcomes

  Willingham - Learning can be personalised through giving it meaning rather than different learning styles.
• IQ tests measure

  • memory
  • attention
  • problem solving skillss
• IQ tests could be used as a method of control - used to screen recruits for the army, alpha tests for the literate and beta tests for the illiterate

  • was unfair as many were immigrants who didnt know anything about american culture
  • results of the tests were used as evidence for people of low intelligence should not be allowed to immigrate to the USA