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Questions and Answers
What does the term 'teratogen' refer to in prenatal development?
Which of the following developmental theories is focused on moral development?
Which aspect of human development is characterized by both stability and change?
Which of the following stages is NOT part of the typical stages of development?
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What serious condition can result from a pregnant woman’s heavy drinking?
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What reflex responses do newborns exhibit that support their survival?
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What happens to up to 60-80% of an infant's energy?
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What term describes the period during which infants can best learn certain skills?
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What role does the environment play in motor skill development?
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What is one of the significant transitions in brain development noted during the first year of life?
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According to Piaget, how does the mind develop in children?
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How do infants demonstrate learning capabilities at three months old?
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What concept describes the adjustment of schemas in a child's cognitive development?
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What significant cognitive ability develops in children around the age of 4 to 5?
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How does Vygotsky view children's cognitive development?
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What is a key characteristic of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)?
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What happens during the lexical spurt that occurs at 18-20 months in children?
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What is one of the findings from Golubeva's study on problem-solving in young children?
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In what way do monkeys struggle with categorization compared to children?
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At what age do children typically start utilizing language as a tool to aid their cognition and behavior?
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What cognitive skill is associated with the 'false-belief task'?
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What is attributed as a primary underlying cause of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)?
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At what age do children typically begin to display stranger anxiety?
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What was the caregiver to child ratio in the Romanian orphanage mentioned in the content?
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What factor is reported to improve children's life outcomes?
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Which of the following attachment styles is characterized by emotional closeness to a caregiver?
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What recent trend has been noted regarding fathers’ involvement in child care compared to fathers in 1965?
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What primarily impacts a child's well-being according to research by the American Academy of Pediatrics?
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What does adolescence primarily represent?
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What is a primary role of parents during adolescence?
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What characterizes emerging adulthood?
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Which statement is true regarding physical development in early adulthood?
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What happens to female fertility during middle adulthood?
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In late adulthood, which of the following declines?
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Which stage of adulthood is characterized by significant memory retention for meaningful information?
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What is noted as a common experience during the last four years of life?
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What factor is more closely linked to physical vigor in middle adulthood?
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Study Notes
Developmental Psychology’s Major Issues
- Developmental psychology explores the interplay of nature and nurture in human development.
- This field investigates whether development unfolds in stages or is a gradual process.
- It also studies the stability and change of traits throughout the lifespan.
Stages of Development
- Development is categorized into four main stages: Prenatal Development, Infancy and Childhood, Adolescence, and Adulthood.
Prenatal Development
- Prenatal development commences with the zygote stage, lasting from 0-2 weeks.
- The embryo stage follows, persisting until approximately 9 weeks.
- From 9 weeks onward, the fetus stage begins.
- Teratogens, like chemicals or viruses, pose risks during prenatal development, potentially causing harm to the embryo or fetus.
- Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) results from heavy alcohol consumption by a pregnant woman, leading to physical and mental abnormalities in the child.
The Competent Newborn
- Newborns possess innate reflexes essential for survival, including sucking, tonguing, swallowing, and breathing.
- Crying serves as a signal for seeking help and comfort.
- Newborns demonstrate a preference for sights and sounds associated with other humans, especially their mother.
- They possess well-developed senses of smell and sight, utilized for learning.
- Newborns have a biologically defined temperament.
Infant Brain Development
- Neuronal growth and synaptic pruning experience a surge during the first year after birth.
- The frontal lobe undergoes rapid development between 3-6 months, continuing into adolescence and adulthood.
- Up to 60-80% of an infant's energy is allocated to brain function.
- Infants possess the capacity for learning and memory.
- Infantile amnesia might be attributed to the limitations of conscious memory.
- Learning throughout life modifies brain tissue.
Critical vs. Sensitive Periods in Development
- Critical periods highlight specific timeframes when experiences have a substantial, enduring impact on development.
- Sensitive periods highlight times when the brain is particularly susceptible to certain experiences, but the effects may not be as permanent as those during critical periods.
Infancy and Childhood: Motor Development
- Motor skills develop as the nervous system and muscles mature.
- While the sequence of motor development is generally universal, the timing can vary.
- Genes guide motor development, with environmental influences shaping its progression.
- The sequence of motor development is consistent across different cultures.
- Early walkers may also be early talkers.
Infancy and Childhood: Cognitive Development
- Piaget proposed that cognitive development occurs in stages, starting from simple reflexes and progressing to adult abstract reasoning.
- As the brain matures, children construct and adjust schemas, involving assimilation (fitting new information into existing schemas) and accommodation (modifying existing schemas to incorporate new information).
Object Permanence
- Object permanence, the understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of sight, emerges during infancy.
Piaget’s Test of Conservation
- Piaget's conservation tasks assess a child's ability to grasp that the amount of a substance remains constant even when its appearance changes.
Vygotsky and the Social Child
- Vygotsky emphasized the role of social interaction in cognitive development.
- Children learn and develop through engagement with their physical environment.
- By age 7, children utilize language for problem-solving.
- Parents and others provide a temporary scaffold to assist children in achieving higher-level thinking.
Language Development in Humans
- Language development is closely intertwined with cognitive development.
- Around 18-20 months, infants experience a "lexical (vocabulary) spurt" and a "conceptual explosion."
- These cognitive leaps are accompanied by the maturation of language areas in the brain.
- More complex behavioral patterns begin to emerge.
Adolescence: Physical Development
- Adolescence marks the transition period from puberty to social independence.
Adolescence: Parent and Peer Relationships
- Parents exert a significant influence on areas such as education, discipline, charitableness, responsibility, orderliness, and interactions with authority figures.
- Peers play a crucial role in fostering cooperation, navigating popularity, developing interaction styles among peers, and shaping self-expression.
What Happens Next? Emerging Adulthood
- This stage spans from 18 to the mid-twenties, characterized by a sense of being "in between" adulthood responsibilities and independence.
- Individuals may still rely financially and emotionally on their parents.
Adulthood: Physical Development
- Early adulthood witnesses peak levels of muscular strength, reaction time, sensory acuity, and cardiac output, typically reaching its zenith in the mid-twenties.
- In middle adulthood, physical vigor is more closely tied to health and exercise than age. Physical decline is gradual.
- Fertility declines gradually with age; women experience menopause, while men experience a decrease in sperm count, testosterone levels, and changes in erection and ejaculation speed.
- Late adulthood sees a gradual decline in physical capabilities, with a global life expectancy currently at 71 years.
- Telomere tips shorten, contributing to aging.
- Visual sharpness, distance perception, and stamina deteriorate.
- The immune system weakens, making individuals more susceptible to serious illnesses.
- Neural processing slows down, and brain regions associated with memory may begin to atrophy, resulting in slower speech.
- Engaging in exercise can mitigate the effects of aging, stimulate brain cell development, and enhance neural connections.
Adulthood: Aging and Memory
- Early adulthood is often considered the peak period for learning and memory.
- Middle adulthood is characterized by a greater decline in recall ability compared to recognition memory.
- Late adulthood is associated with better retention of meaningful information than meaningless information, although word production may take longer.
- Terminal decline, a significant decline in cognitive function, typically occurs within the last four years of life.
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Description
Explore the key concepts of developmental psychology, focusing on the major issues surrounding nature versus nurture and the stages of human development. Delve into prenatal development, teratogens, and the impact of early experiences on later stages of life. This quiz will deepen your understanding of how traits evolve over a lifetime.
