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Children
The Nature
of
Children’s Development
1
© 2010 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Images of Children
• Stories of Ted Kaczynski and Alice Walker
– A child genius becomes a social misfit and a murderer.
– An impoverished and painful childhood leads to creativity and award-winning publications.
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Child Development
• Development – pattern of change from conception, throughout the life span
• Importance of studying development
– Improving children’s lives
– Improving health and well-being
– Learning better parenting
– Improving child education
– Better social policies affecting children
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Historical Views of Development
• Early views of childhood
– Medieval Europe
• No distinction from adults
– Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans
• Rich conceptions of childhood
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Historical Views of Development
• Three influential philosophical views
– Middle Ages
• Original sin view
– End of 1800s
• Tabula rasa (John Locke)
– Eighteenth century
• Innate goodness (Rousseau)
• Today: childhood is unique
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Modern Studies of Childhood
• Began in late 1800s
– Use of sophisticated science
– New ways of thinking about children
– Shift from philosophical view to systematic observation and experimentation
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Major Theories
• Evolutionary view – G.S. Hall
– Stages of distinct motives and capabilities
• Psychoanalytic theory – S. Freud
– Stage theory stressing parenting
– First 5 years influence later life
• Behaviorism – John Watson
– Environment influences behavior
Why Is Caring For Children Important?
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Biological, Cognitive, andSocioemotional Development
• Genetic epistemology (J. Baldwin)
– Child knowledge changes over development
• Biological processes
– Physical changes in a person
• Cognitive processes
– Changes in thought, IQ, and language
• Socioemotional processes
– Personality, emotions, relationships
What Characterizes Development?
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Periods of Development
• Prenatal – conception to birth
• Infancy – birth to 18-24 months of age
• Early childhood – infancy to 5-6 years
• Middle/late childhood – 6 to 11 years (elementary years)
• Adolescence – 10 or 12 until 18 years (may vary beyond these years)
What Characterizes Development?
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Issues in Development
• Nature-Nurture issue
– Nature
• Influences of biological inheritance
• Development seen as orderly
– Nurture
• Influences of environment
• Influenced by social experiences
• Deprivation or enrichment have impact
What Characterizes Development?
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Issues in Development
• Continuity-discontinuity issue
– Continuity
• Gradual, continuous changes
– Discontinuity
• Distinct stages, abrupt changes
• Early-later experiences
– Hotly debated
– Malleable or resilient to experiences?
What Characterizes Development?
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• Nature and nurture
• Continuity and discontinuity
Discontinuity
Continuity
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Importance of Research
• Scientific Method
– Conceptualize or identify a problem
– Refer to a theory (set of ideas that predict)
– Develop a hypothesis (testable assumption)
– Collect the data (to test the hypothesis)
– Analyze the data (by statistical methods)
– Draw conclusions
– Compare to other research outcomes
What Characterizes Development?
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Theories of Development
• Psychoanalytic theories
– Behavior affected by underlying emotions and unconscious mind
– Personality (S. Freud)
• Id (unconscious instincts)
• Ego (executive branch of mind, deals with reality)
• Superego (moral branch of mind, one’s ‘conscience’)
What Characterizes Development?
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Freud’s Stages
Oral: Birth to 18 monthsAnal: 18 months to 3 years
Phallic: 3 to 6 years(Oedipus complex)
Latency: 6 years to pubertyGenital: Puberty onward
What Characterizes Development?
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Theories of Development
• Psychosocial theory (E. Erikson)
– Change occurs over life span in 8 stages
– Each stage has unique crisis to resolve, not a catastrophe to future development if not resolved
– Each stage has developmental task
What Characterizes Development?
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Psychosocial theory
Initiative vs. guilt
Generativity vs. stagnation
Early childhood
Integrity vs. despair
Intimacy vs. isolation
Industry vs. inferiority
Autonomy vs. shame and doubtInfancy: 1 to 3 years
Middle adulthood
Late adulthood
Middle and late childhood
Early adulthood
Trust vs. mistrustInfancy: 1st year of life
Identity vs. identity confusionAdolescence
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Strategies Based on Erikson’s Theory
• Nurture infants, develop trust, encourage and monitor autonomy
• Encourage initiative
• Promote industry in elementary years
• Stimulate adolescent identity exploration
Caring for Children
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Cognitive Theories
• Cognitive development theory (J. Piaget)
– Children actively construct their understanding of the world
• Accommodation and Assimilation
– Four stages of cognitive development
– Two underlying processes:
• Organization
• Adaptation
Caring for Children
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Cognitive Development Theory
Birth to 2 yrs
Sensorimotor Uses senses and motor skills, items known by use; object permanence
2 - 7 yrs Pre-operational Symbolic thinking, language used; egocentric thinking, imagination/ experience grow, child de-centers
7 - 11 yrs Concrete operational
Logic applied, objective/rational interpretations; conservation, numbers, ideas, classifications
11 yrs on
Formal operational
Thinks abstractly, hypothetical ideas; ethics, politics, social/moral issues explored
Caring for Children
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Cognitive Theories
• Sociocultural theory (L. Vygotsky)
– Social and cultural interaction guide cognitive development
– Child needs interaction with more skilled adults and peers
– Interactions teach adaptive skills for success
– Knowledge is situated and collaborative
– Memory, attention, reasoning involves learning to use society’s inventions
Caring for Children
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Cognitive Theories
• Information processing theory
– Capacity is gradually developed (no stages)
– Comparing computer to human brain
• Hardware analogous to brain
• Software analogous to cognition
– Emphasizes how individuals manipulate information, monitor it, and strategize about it
Caring for Children
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Information Processing Theory
Sensory information
economics
history
religionculture science
literatureInformation is taken into brain
Information gets processed, analyzed, and stored until use
RETRIEVALInformation is used as basis of behaviors and interactions
INPUT
math
STORAGE
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Behaviorism
– Development is observable behavior
– Behavior is learned from environmental experiences
– Scientific measurements possible
– Change environment to affect behavior
• Four major theorists: Skinner, Pavlov, Bandura, and Watson
Caring for Children
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Classical Conditioning (I. Pavlov)
– Neutral stimulus acquires ability to produce response originally produced by another stimulus
• Dogs salivated to food
• Pairing food with bell produces salivation
• Sound of bell will produce salivation without food
Caring for Children
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Classical conditioning (J. Watson)
– Experiment: Little Albert and the white rat
– Generalizing fear as an involuntary response
• Operant Conditioning (B.F. Skinner)
– Consequences of behavior change probability of behavior’s occurrence
– Use of punishments and rewards shapes behavior and development
Caring for Children
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Social Cognitive Theory (A. Bandura)
– Observational learning: use imitation or modeling to adopt behaviors
– Behavior, environment, and cognition are key factors in development
– Most recent model of learning
• Three elements: behavior, environmental, and person/cognitive operate together
Caring for Children
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Social Cognitive Model
Caring for Children
EnvironmentPerson/ Cognitive
Behavior
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Ethological theory
– Ethology stresses behavior influenced by biology
– Critical (sensitive) periods for learning
– Lorenz experiment: imprinting
– Bowlby: attachment to caretaker is important in first year of life
• Can be positive or negative
Caring for Children
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Behavioral and Social Cognitive Theories
• Ecological theory (U. Bronfenbrenner)
– Development influenced by several environmental systems
– Current modification
• Added biological influences
• Renamed Bioecological theory
– Has merits and criticisms
Caring for Children
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Ecological TheoryCaring for Children
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Research Methods
• Observation
– Laboratory or naturalistic observation
• Survey and interview
• Standardized test – uniform procedures
• Case study – in-depth on individual
• Physiological measures
– fMRI (electromagnetic waves used)
Caring for Children
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Research Methods
• Research designs (for data collection)
– Descriptive research: observe and record
– Correlational research: measure strength of association
• Correlation coefficient – shows strength and direction, not causality
• Statistical number
Caring for Children
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Research Methods
• Experimental research
– Behavior manipulated, change measured
– Demonstrates cause and effect
– Independent variable (gets manipulated)
– Dependent variable (gets measured)
– Control group (forms baseline measure)
– Experimental group (gets manipulated)
– Random assignment (assignment by chance)
Caring for Children
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Research Methods
• Time span of research
– Cross-sectional approach
• Several groups (usually different ages) compared at one time
– Longitudinal approach
• Follows same group over long period of time (usually years)
Caring for Children
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Research Challenges
• Conducting ethical research
– Protect rights of research subjects
– Do no harm (?) and adhere to code of ethics
• Use of informed consent
• Respect confidentiality
• Conduct debriefing
• Avoid deception (controversial here)
Caring for Children
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Minimizing Bias
• Gender bias – preconceived ideas about female and male abilities, magnifying differences found
• Cultural and ethnic bias – excluding minorities, preconceived ideas of not being ‘average’
• Ethnic gloss – use of ethnic label portraying ethnic groups as more homogeneous than they really are
Caring for Children
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The End
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