Ontwikkelingspsychologie
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1 The Study of Human Development
Human Development: An Ever-Evolving Field
human development:
Scientific study of processes of change and stability throughout the human life span.
life-span development:
Concept of human development as a lifelong process, which can be studied scientifically.
The Study of Human Development: Basic Concepts
physical development:
Growth of body and brain, including patterns of change in sensory capacities, motor skills, and health.
cognitive development:
Pattern of change in mental abilities, such as learning, attention, memory, language, thinking,
reasoning, and creativity.
psychosocial development:
Pattern of change in emotions, personality, and social relationships.
social construction:
A concept or practice that may appear natural and obvious to those who accept it, but that in reality is
an invention of a particular culture or society.
Influences on Development
individual differences:
Differences in characteristics, influences, or developmental outcomes.
heredity:
Inborn traits or characteristics inherited from the biological parents.
environment:
Totality of nonhereditary, or experiential, influences on development.
maturation:
Unfolding of a natural sequence of physical and behavioral changes.
nuclear family:
Two-generational kinship, economic, and household unit consisting of one or two parents and their
biological children, adopted children, or stepchildren.
extended family:
Multigenerational kinship network of parents, children, and other relatives, sometimes living together
in an extended-family household.
socioeconomic status (SES):
Combination of economic and social factors describing an individual or family, including income,
education, and occupation.
risk factors:
Conditions that increase the likelihood of a negative developmental outcome.
culture:
A society’s or group’s total way of life, including customs, traditions, beliefs, values, language, and
physical products - all learned behavior, passed on from parents to children.
,ethnic group:
A group united by ancestry, race, religion, language, or national origins, which contribute to a sense of
shared identity.
ethnic gloss:
Overgeneralization about an ethnic or cultural group that obscures differences within the group.
normative (influence):
Characteristic of an event that occurs in a similar way for most people in a group.
historical generation:
A group of people strongly influenced by a major historical event during their formative period.
cohort:
A group of people born at about the same time.
nonnormative (influence):
Characteristic of an unusual event that happens to a particular person or a typical event that happens
at an unusual time of life.
imprinting:
Instinctive form of learning in which, during a critical period in early development, a young animal
forms an attachment to the first moving object it sees, usually the mother.
critical period:
Specific time when a given event or its absence has a specific impact on development.
plasticity:
Range of modifiability of performance.
sensitive periods:
Times in development when a person is particularly open to certain kinds of experiences.
The Life-Span Developmental Approach
The principles of the life-span developmental approach:
1) development is lifelong; 2) development is multidimensional; 3) development is multidirectional; 4)
the relative influences of biology and culture shift over the life span; 5) development involves changing
resource allocations; 6) development shows plasticity; 7) development is influenced by the historical
and cultural context.
2 Theory and Research
Basic Theoretical Issues
1) Is development active or reactive?
2) Is development continuous or discontinuous?
theory:
Coherent set of logically related concepts that seeks to organize, explain, and predict data.
hypotheses:
Possible explanations for phenomena, used to predict the outcome of research.
mechanistic model:
Model that views human development as a series of predictable responses to stimuli.
organismic model:
Model that views human development as internally initiated by an active organism and as occurring in
a sequence of qualitatively different stages.
,quantitative change:
Changes in number or amount, such as in height, weight, size of vocabulary, or frequency of
communication.
qualitative change:
Discontinuous changes in kind, structure, or organization.
Theoretical Perspectives
1) Psychoanalytic:
Freud’s psychosexual theory; Erikson’s psychosocial theory.
2) Learning:
Behaviorism, or traditional learning theory (Pavlov, Skinner, Watson); Social learning (social
cognitive theory (Bandura)).
3) Cognitive:
Piaget’s cognitive-stage theory; Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory; Information-processing
theory.
4) Contextual:
Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological theory.
5) Evolutionary/sociobiological:
Evolutionary psychology; Bowlby’s attachment theory.
psychoanalytic perspective:
View of human development as shaped by unconscious forces that motivate human behavior.
psychosexual development:
In Freudian theory, an unvarying sequence of stages of childhood personality development in which
gratification shifts from the mouth to the anus and then to the genitals. (=oral->anal->phallic->latency-
>genital).
psychosocial development:
In Erikson’s eight-stage theory, the socially and culturally influenced process of development of the
ego, or self.
(= 1) basic trust vs mistrust; 2) autonomy vs shame and doubt; 3) initiative vs guilt; 4) industry vs
inferiority; 5) identity vs identity confusion; 6) intimacy vs isolation; 7) generativity vs stagnation; 8)
integrity vs despair).
learning perspective:
View of human development that holds that changes in behavior result from experience or from
adaptation to the environment.
behaviorism:
Learning theory that emphasizes the predictable role of environment in causing observable behavior.
classical conditioning:
Learning based on associating a stimulus that does not ordinarily elicit a response with another
stimulus that does elicit the response.
operant conditioning:
Learning based on association of behavior with its consequences.
reinforcement:
The process by which a behavior is strengthened, increasing the likelihood that the behavior will be
repeated.
punishment:
The process by which a behavior is weakened, decreasing the likelihood of repetition.
social learning theory (or “social cognitive theory”):
Theory that behaviors are learned by observing and imitating models.
reciprocal determinism:
Bandura’s term for bidirectional forces that affect development.
, observational learning (or “modeling”):
Learning through watching the behavior of others.
self-efficacy:
Sense of one’s capability to master challenges and achieve goals.
cognitive perspective:
View that thought processes are central to development.
cognitive-stage theory:
Piaget’s theory that children’s cognitive development advances in a series of four stages involving
qualitatively distinct types of mental operations.
(= sensorimotor->preoperational->concrete operations->formal operations).
According to Piaget, cognitive growth occurs through three interrelated processes:
1) organization:
The creation of categories or systems of knowledge.
schemes: organized patterns of thought and behavior used in particular situations.
2) adaptation:
Adjustment to new information about the environment, achieved through processes of assimilation (:
the incorporation of new information into an existing cognitive structure) and accommodation (:
changes in a cognitive structure to include new information).
3) equilibration:
The tendency to seek a stable balance among cognitive elements; achieved through a balance
between assimilation and accommodation.
sociocultural theory:
Vygotsky’s theory of how contextual factors affect children’s development.
zone of proximal development (ZPD):
Vygotsky’s term for the difference between what a child can do alone and what the child can do with
help.
scaffolding:
Temporary support to help a child master a task.
information-processing approach:
Approach to the study of cognitive development by observing and analyzing the mental processes
involved in perceiving and handling information.
contextual perspective:
View of human development that sees the individual as inseparable from the social context.
bioecological theory:
Bronfenbrenner’s approach to understanding processes and contexts of human development that
identifies five levels of environmental influence.
(= microsystem-mesosystem-exosystem-macrosystem-chronosystem).
evolutionary/sociobiological perspective:
View of human development that focuses on evolutionary and biological bases of behavior.
ethology:
Study of distinctive adaptive behaviors of species of animals that have evolved to increase survival of
the species.
evolutionary psychology:
Application of Darwinian principles of natural selection and survival of the fittest to individual behavior.
Research Methods
quantitative research:
Research that deals with objectively measurable data.
