DevPsych - Prelim to Midterm

• Developmental psychology


  The scientific study of changes that occur in human beings over the course of their life span
• Developmental psychology


  • Examines the pattern of change that begins at conception and continues through the life cycle
  • Involves the examination of the ways people develop over the course of their lifespan as well as the evolution of cultures as a whole
  • Focuses on psychological phenomena that change at any point in the life span
• Early adulthood is not the endpoint of development; rather, no age period dominates development
• Concept of development


  Refers to the criteria (if any) for differentiating change from development; varies across approaches to developmental psychology
• Disagreements about whether developmental changes can or should be

  • Universal (i.e., occurring to all individuals)
  • Irreversible (i.e., not naturally reversible or even immune to intervention)
  • Qualitative (i.e., stage-like rather than step-like and gradual)
  • Goal directed (related or unrelated to a possible end state)
• Guiding assumptions of developmental psychology

  • The developmental perspective, or the notion that current behaviors are linked to past and present conditions and processes
  • Developmental research methods must direct attention to individual change
  • Important developmental changes may occur throughout the life span
• Development is Multidimensional


  • Development consists of biological, cognitive, and socioemotional dimensions
  • Even within a dimension, there are many components (e.g. attention, memory, abstract thinking, speed of processing information, social intelligence)
• Development is Multidirectional throughout Life


  • Some dimensions or components of a dimension expand, and others shrink
  • During adolescence, as individuals establish romantic relationships, their time spent with friends may decrease
  • During late adulthood, older adults might become wiser by being able to call on experience to guide their intellectual decision making, but they perform more poorly on tasks that require speed in processing information
• Developmental Science is Multidisciplinary
• Biological processes


  Produce changes in an individual's physical nature (e.g. genes, brain development, height/weight gains, motor skills, hormonal changes, cardiovascular decline)
• Cognitive processes


  Refer to changes in the individual's thought, intelligence, and language
• Socioemotional processes


  Involve changes in the individual's relationships with other people, changes in emotions, and changes in personality
• Biological, cognitive, and socioemotional processes are inextricably intertwined
• Periods of Development


  • Prenatal period
  • Infancy
  • Early childhood
  • Middle and late childhood
  • Adolescence
  • Early adulthood
  • Middle adulthood
  • Late adulthood
• Chronological age


  The number of years elapsed since a person's birth
• Biological age


  Age in terms of biological health, determined by the functional capacities of a person's vital organ system
• Psychological age


  An individual's adaptive capacities compared to those of other individuals of the same chronological age
• Social age


  The social roles and expectations related to a person's age
• Developmental Issues

  • Nature and Nurture
  • Stability and Change
  • Critical and Sensitive Periods
  • Continuity-Discontinuity
• Nature and Nurture


  The extent to which development is influenced by nature and by nurture
• Stability and Change


  The degree to which early traits and characteristics persist through life or change
• Critical and Sensitive Periods


  The presence of certain kinds of environmental stimuli are necessary for development to proceed normally
• Continuity-Discontinuity


  The extent development involves gradual, cumulative change (continuity) or distinct stages (discontinuity)
• Continuous change


  • Incremental improvements rather than developing entirely new processing capabilities
• Discontinuous change


  Development is viewed as occurring in distinct stages, where each stage brings about behavior that is qualitatively different from earlier stages
• Cognitive development experts have pointed out that our thinking changes in fundamental ways as we develop, not only quantitatively but also qualitatively
• Critical period


  A specific time during development when a particular event has its greater consequences, when the presence of certain environmental stimuli are necessary for normal development to proceed
• Sensitive period


  Organisms are particularly susceptible to certain kinds of stimuli in their environments, but the absence of those stimuli does not always produce irreversible consequences
• Theory


  A related set of concepts and principles about a phenomenon, the purpose of which is to explain or predict the phenomenon
• Concept


  A symbolic representation of an actual thing, like a tree, chair, or computer
• Construct


  A concept with no physical referent, like democracy, learning, or freedom
• Principle


  Expresses the relationship between two or more concepts or constructs
• Functions of concepts and principles

  • Help us understand or explain what is going on around us
  • Help us predict future events (can be causal or correlational)
• Purposes of theory


  • Provide concepts to name and explain relationships between observations
  • Justify reimbursement and funding
  • Enhance the growth of a professional area by identifying a body of knowledge
• Stages of theory development

  1. Speculative - attempts to explain what is happening

  2. Descriptive - gathers data to describe what is really happening

  3. Constructive - revises old theories and develops new ones based on continuing research
• Goals of developmental psychology

  • Describe development (both typical and individual variations)
  • Explain development
  • Optimize development
• Psychodynamic perspective


  Believes human behavior is motivated by inner forces, memories and conflicts of which the individual has little awareness and control
• Freud's psychoanalytic theory


  Suggests that unconscious forces determine personality and behavior, containing infantile wishes, desires, demands, and needs that are hidden from conscious awareness
• Id


  The raw, unorganized, inborn part of personality present at birth, representing primitive drives related to hunger, sex, aggression, and irrational impulses, operating on the pleasure principle
• Ego

  The rational and reasonable aspect of personality, acting as a buffer between the external world and the primitive id, operating on the reality principle