2410B - Chapter 4

• Increases in height and weight are not steady

  • rapid in the first year of life
  • steady through preschool and elementary
  • rapid in early adolescence
  • slows as you reach adulthood
• All of the body's muscle is present at birth

  • muscles become longer and thicker as individual fibers fuse together
• Fat appears under the skin near the end of the fetal period
• Cerebral Cortex: processing center for perceptions of patterns, execution of complex motor sequences, planning, and decision making
• Lateralization: The tendency for the left and right hemispheres of the brain to specialize in different functions.
• Two Major Classes of development

  1. Experience-expectant process
  2. Experience-dependent process
• Experience-Expectant Process: Development that occurs when an infant’s experiences match what would be expected based on age (e.g., infants begin babbling around six months)
• Experience-Dependent Process: Development that depends on specific environmental stimulation or experience (e.g., learning to walk).
• Puberty: the adolescent growth and sexual maturation
• In Puberty:

  1. Bones become longer and denser
  2. Body Fat increases
  3. Heart and lung capacities
• Malnutrition: inadequate nutrition that causes one to be small for one's age
• How do nature and nurture lead some girls to diet excessively?

  When children have a history of eating problems such as being a picky eater.

  • greater risk for anorexia and bulimia during adolescence
  • teens with negative self-esteem or mood/anxiety disorders also at risks
• Neuron: a cell that specializes in receiving and transmitting information
• Cell body: center of the neuron containing the basic biological machinery that keeps the neuron alive
• Dendrite: the receiving end of the neuron; looks like a tree with many branches
• Axon: The long, thin fibers that carry nerve impulses away from the cell body.
• Myelin: A fatty substance that insulates axons and speeds up the transmission of nerve impulses
• Terminal Buttons: small knobs at the end of the axon that release neurotransmitters
• neural plate: groups of cells formed a flat structure at three weeks of conception
• Body Image: Self-evaluation that the individual makes of his/her own body
• Anorexia Nervosa: A disorder characterized by an intense fear of gaining weight
• Bulimia: consists of binge eating and purging by vomiting or with laxatives
• Body Dysmorphic Disorder: A disorder in which a person is preoccupied with imagined defects in appearance