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PS2517 Developmental Psychology Notes (2º)
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DECELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY NOTESLECTURE 1-Introduction.....................................................................................................................2
LECTURE 2–Precursors of attachment................................................................................................5
LECTURE 3-Measurement and consequences of attachment.............................................................9
LECTURE 4-Consequences of attachment and life events.................................................................13
LECTURE 5-Parenting........................................................................................................................18
LECTURE 6–Infant´s understanding of the physical world................................................................22
LECTURE 7-Information processing theories....................................................................................27
LECTURE 8-Theory of mind...............................................................................................................34
LECTURE 9-Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).............................................................40
LECTURE 10-Learning difficulties: disorder of mathematical development......................................47
,LECTURE 1-Introduction
1-What is developmental psychology?
Many aspects of psychology tend to deal with static phenomena. Developmental Psychology looks at change through the
lifespan in abilities, in structure and in understanding.
“Developmental psychology is the scientific study of how and why human beings change over the course of their life”
How things change? Trajectory and history of this changes.
Why things change? Underlying mechanisms. What causes the changes?
1.1-Short memory (an example)
An example of these changes taken from cognitive psychology.
Measurements of the performance of short-term memory suggest that we are able to retain
5-9 chunks of information approximately.
The theoretical outcome of this is that adults can rehearse and maintain 5-9 chunks of
information, telling us the working memory capacity.
From a developmental perspective, what matters is how the performance changes across
age ranges. And we find out a linear increase from 1 and 2 years through 4 and 5 years and
onwards.
In terms of theoretical outcomes, we might have different explanations for these changes. Perhaps younger kids cannot
rehearse and maintain information, so they do not have the cognitive capacity for rehearsal. On the other hand, maybe
younger kids do not rehearse and maintain, so they maybe have the capacity but have not learnt that that is a useful thing to
do yet.
We find that the capacity of short-term memory improves with cortical development, with increased myelination of the
cortex.
In terms of functional changes, such as:
The ease of operations increases available space.
Children just get better at using what space is there.
2-Everyday developmental questions
“How will it affect my child if I send her to school at 4 rather than 5?”
“What do I need to do for my child to do well at school?”
Evidence suggest that it is conditioned by:
o Genes (e.g., IQ)
o Treatment by caregivers and choice of environments: parents and peer´s good attitudes toward schools
improves performance (Luster & McAdoo, 1996).
“Should we argue in front of the children?”
“Why, suddenly, am I an embarrassment to my child?”
Differing effect on children of similar experiences make difficult to make determinant conclusions. For example,
different motivational patterns effect persistence (Cain & Dweck, 1995).
3-Approaches and themes in developmental psychology
3.1-Continuity or discontinuity
What shape does development take?
o Continuous: linear development. Example: plant growth.
Short term memory shows linear development, a classic sloping line of
development.
o Discontinuous: stages are qualitatively different. Example: butterfly
development.
, Cognition (thought) is considered to have clearly differenced stages: (e.g., Piaget´s stages). Children are different kinds
of thinkers at different stages of development.
3.2-Nature/Nurture
Biology and the Environment. What is the contribution of each?
Example: Aggression comes form:
o Social learning? Bandura’s Bobo doll experiment
o Innate Disposition? Book et al. (2001) found a weak positive correlation between testosterone and aggression. Ferguson
(2010) found that 56% of the variance in aggression can be explained through genetic influences.
Gene × Environment (Caspi et al., 2002):
Longitudinal study of aggressive behaviour: 953 individuals followed from age 3 to 26 years old, tested at 2 year intervals.
Tested for:
o Environmental influences: evidence of maltreatment
o Genetic influence: High or Low Monoamine oxidase – A activity (MAO-A activity) relates to aggression attitude.
MAO-A responsible for breaking down Monoamines in the brain (norepinephrine , epinephrine, serotonin, and dopamine)
Outcomes (DVs: dependent variables related to aggressive behaviour): convictions, disposition toward violence and
incidence of conduct disorders and anti-social disorders.
Results:
o Maltreatment increased the chances of violent behaviour Role of
environment
o This was increased in the low MAOA group Interaction between the
genes and the environment. As the levels of childhood maltreatment
increased in severity, children are more likely to be aggressive in both
groups (low and high MAOA), but kids with low levels of MAOA present
much higher levels of aggressive behaviour in the severe maltreatment
condition.
o Low MAOA and maltreated group was 17% of the group…but was
responsible for 44% of the group’s violent crime.
This suggest that having high MAOA activity is associated with better coping with maltreatment and shows us there might be
an interaction between genetic factors and environmental factors. There have been some supporting evidence studies from
replication, but also some evidences that have not replicated that, so it is still on ongoing research.
3.3Other things to cover
What drives development? Mechanisms of development
Different theories suggest different mechanisms. Example: Freud and the idea that sex drive leads to the development of ego,
id and superego which lead to Psycho-dramas.
How do children become so different? Individual differences
Influence of genes, treatment by parents and others, differing effect on children of similar experiences, children’s choice of
environments.
,
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