CHAPTER 4

• Infancy

  • Development occurs more quickly in the first two years than at any other time after birth
• Physical development


  • Very rapid physical growth
  • Changes in body proportions follow two basic trends: cephalocaudal (head to tail), and proximodistal (near to far)
• Cephalocaudal trend


  Development from head to tail
• Proximodistal trend


  Development from near to far
• Motor development


  • Developmental norm: the average age at which half of children have mastered a particular skill
  • Most children follow the same sequence of motor development, but large individual differences exist in the rate of motor progress
  • Motor progress is due to a combination of maturation and environmental influences

  
• Brain development


  1. Connections between brain cells develop rapidly in the period of synaptic exuberance

  2. Connections that are not used die off (pruning)

  3. The brain also becomes larger and more efficient due to myelination

  4. Early experience plays an important role in determining which neural connections will form, remain, and die off
• Synaptic exuberance


  Rapid development of connections between brain cells
• Pruning


  Connections that are not used die off
• Myelination


  The brain becomes larger and more efficient
• Feeding and malnutrition


  • Adequate nutrition (e.g. breast milk) consumed in a loving environment is important for early growth of the brain and body
  • Malnutrition has negative effects on a child's physical, cognitive and social development
  • Nutritional supplements combined with therapeutic interventions for families can improve the outcomes for malnourished children
• Sleeping


  • The age at which infants take on adult sleep-wake cycles is influenced by maturation of the brain and the culture in which the infant grows up
  • Cultural differences in sleeping arrangements reflect different beliefs about babies, what they can do, and what they will need to do in the future
• Sensorimotor stage


  Infants learn to coordinate their sensations and perceptions with their movements and actions
• Object permanence


  The realisation that things continue to exist even when they are not being perceived
• Findings of violation-of-expectations research suggest that infants may develop at least some understanding of object permanence much earlier than Piaget claimed

  
• Violation-of-expectations research


  Research that suggests infants develop object permanence earlier than Piaget claimed

  
• Early memory


  1. Short carrot event

  2. Tall carrot event

  3. Possible event

  4. Impossible event

  5. Recognition and cued recall (by 2 months)

  6. Deferred imitation: By 6 to 9 months, infants can remember and imitate a sequence of behaviours that they learnt through observation alone, and have not practised (pure recall)
• Why, then, do most people remember so little of their first years of life (infantile amnesia)?
• The beginnings of language

  1. Crying

  2. Cooing

  3. Babbling

  4. Gestures
• Recognising language sounds


  • 6 – 12 months: Change from universal linguist to language specific listener
  • 8 months: Begin to detect word boundaries
• The first words


  1. 10–15 months: first word spoken

  2. 18 months: vocabulary spurt starts

  3. Overextension: the tendency to apply a word too broadly

  4. Underextension: the tendency to apply a word too narrowly

  5. 18– 4 months: two-word statements appear
• Overextension


  The tendency to apply a word too broadly
• Underextension


  The tendency to apply a word too narrowly
• Telegraphic speech


  Two-word statements
• Language acquisition device (LAD)


  Chomsky's theory that children are biologically 'prewired' to detect the features and rules of language
• Learning theory


  Language develops through imitation and reinforcement
• Today, most researchers believe that both biology and environment influence language development
• Caregivers can promote language development using

  • Child directed speech
  • Labelling
  • Expanding
• Temperament


  An individual's behavioural style and characteristic way of responding emotionally to events
• Categories of temperament


  • Easy infants
  • Difficult infants
  • Slow to warm up infants
• Dimensions of temperament


  • Surgency/extraversion
  • Negative affectivity
  • Effortful control
• Behavioural inhibition


  Uninhibited children are confident, eager and positive, whereas inhibited children are shy, timid and cautious
• Early temperamental differences in sociability, shyness and emotionality are rooted in inherited differences in brain chemistry and functioning
• A child's experiences also play an important role in shaping temperament-based behaviours
• Some evidence of stability in temperament, e.g. inhibited infants are more likely to be shy and quiet at age 11
• Not all inhibited infants become shy children
• Stability of temperament depends on the interaction of the infant's temperament and the environment over time
• Infants' early capacities


  • Newborn reflexes
  • Sensory capacities
  • Cute appearance
  • Crying
  • Smiling
• Attachment


  The close affectionate relationship between the infant and his/her caregiver(s)
• Patterns of attachment


  • Secure
  • Insecure-resistant
  • Insecure-avoidant
  • Disorganised/disoriented
• Influences on the attachment relationship

  • Quality of caregiving: sensitive? responsive?
  • Infant characteristics
  • The broader context