intro to dev psych

• Developmental psychology: the study of how people change

  physically, mentally, and socially throughout the lifespan.
• • Life-span Development - Concept of human development as a lifelong process, which can be studied scientifically
• • From "womb to tomb," comprising the entire human life span from conception to death.
• Heritability – how much do genetics influence behavior or a trait?
• Environmentability – how much the environment or culture influences a trait or behavior
• Genotype: the underlying genetic make-up of a particular individual
• Types of genotypes: 1. DNA 2. Gene 3. Chromosome
• Maturationism – children grow according to genetic instructions

  and environment plays a secondary role
• Domains of Development: 1. Physical development 2. Cognitive development 3. Psychosocial development
• • Physical Development - Growth of the body and brain, sensory capacities, motor skills, and health
• Cognitive Development - Learning, attention, memory, language, thinking, reasoning, and creativity
• Psychosocial Development - Emotions, personality, and social relationships
• • Heredity can be conceptualized as the genetic roll of the dice. It consists of the inborn traits and characteristics provided by a child's biological parents
• • Environment - influences stem from outside the body, starting at conception with the prenatal environment in the womb and continuing throughout life
• Epigenetics - the tendency of our genes to "change" as we develop or due to the influence of the environment
• Nature vs Nurture - The debate over whether human development is determined more by heredity (nature) or environmental factors (nurture)
• • Stability-change issue - which involves the degree to which early traits and characteristics persist through life or change.
• • Continuity-discontinuity issue - Focuses on the degree to which development involves either gradual, cumulative change (continuity) or distinct stages (discontinuity)
• Maturation - the unfolding of a natural sequence of physical changes and behavior patterns
• Nuclear Family - a household unit consisting of one or two parents and their children, whether biological, adopted, or stepchildren
• • Extended Family - a multigenerational network of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and more distant relatives— is the traditional family form.
• Socioeconomic Status - Combination of economic and social factors describing an individual or family, including income, education, and occupation
• • Culture - refers to a society's or group's total way of life, including its customs, traditions, laws, knowledge, beliefs, values, language, and physical products, from tools to artworks-all of the behavior and attitudes that are learned, shared, and transmitted among members of a social group
• Ethnicity - consists of people united by a distinctive culture, ancestry, religion, language, or national origin, all of which contribute to a sense of shared identity and shared attitudes, beliefs, and values
• Ethnic Gloss - an overgeneralization that obscures or blurs such variations
• Race - a socially defined category based on perceived differences in appearance (such as skin color) between groups of people
• • Normative age-graded influences (Peer/age-group) - highly similar for people in a particular age group. The timing of biological events is fairly predictable within a normal range.
• • Normative history-graded influences (historical generation) - significant events (such as the Great Depression or World War II or the 2020 Pandemic) that shape the behavior and attitudes of a historical generation
• • Cohort - a group of people born at about the same time
• • Nonnormative Influences - are unusual events that have a major impact on individual lives because they disturb the expected sequence of the life cycle
• • Sensitive Periods - when a developing person is especially responsive to certain kinds of experiences
• • Plasticity - Range of modifiability of performance.
• • Biological age - a person's age in terms of biological health.
• Psychological age - an individual's adaptive capacities compared with those of other individuals of the same chronological age
• Social Age - refers to social roles and expectations related to a person's age