Development

• Explain growth and fixed mindset

  Growth mindset: Believing that practice and effort can improve abilities Fixed mindset: Believing that your abilities are fixed and unchangeable
• What is mindset

  A set of beliefs someone has that guides how to respond to or interpret a situation
• Explain Damon's ideas about developing empathy and how it links to a child's level of understanding at different ages

  Early infancy:Children's feelings towards others are the same as feelings towards themselves. There is global empathy 1-2 yo:Children understand that others are upset which makes them feel bad but they don't know what to do about it Early childhood:Understand others can have different views than theirs and may react differently in situations so are more responsive to others' distress 10-12 yo:Understand that other people have difficulties like poverty and disabilities
• What are nativist theories

  Theories that view morality as a part of human nature
• Explain Damon (1999) on developing a moral self

  Children develop an idea of their moral self that links to their morality and morals.

  Talks about how some explain moral development through biology and others from environment or development of intelligence.

  Nativist theories say that emotions are within us like babies being able to have empathy from birth.

  Damon says babies having these emotions emphasises 'nature' arguments while social influences show 'nurture'.

  Says moral identity is comes from social experiences so children must have a consistent message about morality to develop moral understanding.
• Weaknesses of Piaget and Kohlberg's theory of moral development

  Lack of ecological validity: Piaget and Kohlberg used stories that were artificial and there was no real consequences from decisions that were made in the story

  Limited sample: Gilligan criticised Kohlberg's male-only sample which lowers generalisability
• Explain Kohlberg's theory of moral development

  Level 1: Pre-conventional morality (0-9yo)Stages 1 and 2: Children believe that rules cannot be changed and the consequences of actions determines a good or bad action. Stage 1 is about obeying order to avoid punishment. Stage 2 is about self-interest and how actions can benefit themselves.Level 2: Conventional morality (young people and adults)Stages 3 and 4: Young adults see themselves as good members of society. Reasoning comes from norms (a society's values and customs). Stage 3 is about following norms and wanting to be liked. Stage 4 is about maintaining social order by obeyin authority.Level 3: Post-conventional morality (10% of people)Stages 5 and 6: Have their own ideas about morality. Understand moral principles are universal and not just for one society. Stage 5 is about laws being social contracts people agree to. Stage 6 is about underrstanding morality is abstract and there are some principles that are universal.
• Explain Piaget's theory of moral development

  Believed that moral understanding develops through the stages of development.

  At ages 5-10 children's morals come from those around them like parents. They believe rules cannot be changed. This stage is heteronomous (rules put in place by others)

  10 and onwards, they know the intentions of actions are important. Understand that rules can be changed if it is beneficial and is in agreement. This stage is autonomous (rules can be decided by an individual)
• What is moral development

  Children's growing understanding about right and wrong
• What are morals

  Standards of what is right and wrong that can differ between cultures and depend on situation
• Strengths of Gunderson

  Strengths:

  Validity: Gunderson et al conducted their research in naturalistic settings. This increases the ecoglogical validity of the study.

  Validity: The researchers who videotaped and analysed the data did not know what the study was on. This means the interpretation is less likely to be influenced by bias.

  Generalisability: There were a mixture of participants cultures.
• Conclusions of Gunderson

  Clear relationship between parents use of process praise and a child's later use of incremental motivational framework (ability being changeable)

  Did not find that parental use of person praise led to an entity motivational framework (ability to fixed)
• Gunderson parental praise and frameworks

  There is a relationship between process praise and believing effort is worthwile (correlation of 0.35)

  Person praise did not lead to any set type of framework
• Results of Gunderson

  - 3% of all parental comments was praise

  - Process praise was 18% and person praise was 16%

  - 24.4% of praise to boys was process

  - 10.3% of praise to girls was process
• Gunderson's children later beliefs

  At 7-8 years, children were asked to answer 2 questionnaires about intelligence and what led people to act morally.

  There were 18 items covering children's ideas
• Describe procedure for Gunderson

  Partcipants, parents, and those collecting data did not know the experiment was about praise.

  At each visit, participants went about an average day.

  Parent-child interactions were recorded in 90 minute sessions.
• What type of study is Gunderson

  Longitudinal study - Children were assessed using a questionnaire at 14 months, 26 months and 38 months. Five years later their motivation was reviewed. The questionnaire included a range of questionnaires about their motivation, morality, beliefs and intelligence
• What is a longitudinal study?

  The same people are tested over a period of time to investigate changes
• Participants of Gunderson

  Sample included 29 boys and 24 girls:

  - 64% were white

  - 17% were African American

  - 11% were Hispanic

  - 8% were multiracial
• Aims of Gunderson

  1. Are children affected by different types of parental praise?

  2. Do parents give more person praise to girls than boys?

  3. Does the use of parents praise predict their motivation in later life?
• Describe the types of frameworks

  Entity motivational framework: Behaviour and ability is fixed and based on a child's nature.

  Incremental motivational framework: Behaviour and ability can be changed with effort
• What is a framework

  A basic understanding of ideas and facts that is used when making decisions
• What type of framework can person and process praise lead to

  Person praise (praising the individual) can lead to a child developing an entity motivational framework.

  Process praise (praising the child's behaviour) can lead to a child developing an incremental motivational framework.
• Strengths and weaknesses of Piaget and Inhelder (1956)


  Strengths:

  • Validity: Piaget provided a lot of detail about children's development. We know when children stop being egocentric.
  • Reliability: Piaget used careful controls in his study. The same mountain was used every time.
  • Validity: Piaget used qualitative data. Data is in detail and from the individual which makes it valid.
  • Validity: Children were from Switzerland and familiar with mountain scenery so the task is argued to be a natural task.
• Conclusions for Piaget


  Children up to 7 were egocentric

  Older children were non egocentric

  The 'three mountains' task supports Piaget's stages of development

  Older children can coordinate different perspectives
• Results of Piaget

  Pre-operational stage (4-6.5 years): Chooses pictures and shows picture for what they can see and not what doll can see

  Concrete operational stage (7-9 years): Start to understand that others see the model differently. Children 9-10 years old understand the doll has a different view.
• How were children questioned in Piaget and Inhelder

  1. Asked to use the cardboard sheets to show what they could see, then what the doll would see at different positions

  2. Shown pictures and asked to pick out what they could see at different position, then what the doll would see at diff positions

  3. Chose a picture and had to place the doll so it would see that
• Equipment for Piaget and Inhelder

  A model of 3 mountains

  Lowest mountain - green w a house and path

  Second tallest - brown w a red cross and stream

  Tallest - grey w snow

  Ten pictures were taken of the mountains from different positions

  3 pieces of card the same colour as the mountains so children could use it to represent the mountains

  Wooden doll (3cm) with no facial features
• Participants for Piaget and Inhelder

  100 children studied:

  4 - 6.5 years = 21 children

  6.5 - 8 years = 30 children

  8 - 9.5 years = 33 children

  9.5 - 12 years = 16 children
• Aims of Piaget and Inhelder (1956)

  1. The extent to which children of different ages were able to take the view of another person

  2. Children's overall system of putting together a number of different views of what they see
• Strengths and weaknesses of Willingham's learning theory

  Strengths:

  1. Has practice application

  2. Studies support Willingham's theory and against Piaget's development stages

  Weaknesses:

  1. Does not emphasise individual differences in learning (but some theories relate to genes)

  2. Theory comes from many areas of cognitive science (can be strength) but his idea cannot be tested by gathering data as it is not a singular theory
• How to support social development

  1. Build on childrens' ability to decentre (believed that children can decentre from 18 months)

  2. Demonstrate good behaviour - social learning

  3. Stop impulsive behaviour - energy can be used for more productive things

  4. Encourage practice - requires self-regulation

  5. Delay rewards to encourage self-control
• How to support physical development

  1. Focus on what movement is suitable and what order they need to be carried out

  2. Practice movements in the order to make them automatic

  3. Use conscious effort and challenge yourself
• How to support cognitive development

  1. Use new problems that students can solve but require some effort

  2. Understand students' stage of development

  3. Know student's abilities can change

  4. Consider factors other than development level
• Why is practice and effort important from learning skills

  Leaves more space in working memory to learn new things if we can do things automatically
• What is working memory

  Has different parts for processing info from our senses and involves a decision making part
• Willingham's theory about factual knowledge and skill

  Believed that knowledge helps build skills

  Knowledge can free up space in working memory for us to use mental skills like problem-solving

  Knowing more=more processing power to solve problems
• Strengths and weaknesses of Piaget's theory

  Strengths:

  1. Has practical applications

  2. Has lots of research to back-up

  Weaknesses:

  1. Does not look at influence of culture or social interaction - Pierre Dasen found Aboriginal children conserve later than Swiss children

  2. Piaget's research comes from interviews and observations which can be subjective and lacks validity
• Explain assimilation, accommodation, and equilibrium

  Assimilation - when new experiences are incorporated into existing schemas

  Accommodation - schema can no longer be used to explain what the child experiences and must be changed

  Equilibrium - when a child's schemas explains all they experience (a state of mental balance)
• Piaget's theory and development of intelligence

  Believed that intelligence is developed through building knowledge and skill

  Intelligence is acquired through the stages

  Intelligence is developed through adaptation