Psychology Over the Life Span

Psychology Over the Life Span

• Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes, one from each parent (one X and one X or Y chromosome)
• A chromosome is a strand of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) in the cell's nucleus
• Maturation is a developmental process of genetically programmed changes in the body, brain, or behaviour with increasing age

Conception

• At conception, a sperm penetrates an egg.
• The egg is not a passive recipient; it actively regulates the sperm's behavior.

Zygote, Embryo, Fetus

• Zygote: A fertilized egg
• Embryo: The developing baby from the stage where the body's major axis is present until all major structures are in place (weeks 2-8 after conception)
• Fetus: The developing baby during the final stage of development in the womb (weeks 8 until birth)

Learning in the Womb

• Fetuses are active from the start, exhibiting automatic and coordinated movements.
• Fetuses are sensitive to sound and light from weeks 20-25 of gestation.
• Discrimination of sounds (including human speech) occurs between weeks 25 and 34.
• Fetuses pay greater attention to music than non-musical sounds from week 33.
• Fetal behaviour in the womb can predict children's behaviours after birth.

Teratogens and Stressors

• Teratogen: Any external agent (chemical, virus, radiation) that harms a zygote, embryo, or fetus.
• Maternal illnesses (e.g., chicken pox, rubella) can disrupt brain development.
• Alcohol and drugs (e.g., alcohol, cocaine) can cause fetal abnormalities, like fetal alcohol syndrome.
• Caffeine and smoking during pregnancy increase the risk of miscarriage, low birth weight, and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
• Poor diet and pollution can impact brain cell development and lead to psychological disorders.
• Stress impacts maternal blood flow and increases cortisol levels, affecting the fetus.

Newborns

• The human brain is not fully developed at birth due to constraints of the birth canal.
• Babies are born sensitive to women's voices and possess a sensitive sense of smell.
• Infants have reflexes (automatic responses) to stimuli
• Babies show signs of individual personalities and temperament differences.

Physical and Motor Development

• Control progresses from head to trunk, arms, and then legs.
• Control extends from the body center to the extremities (hands, fingers, toes).
• By the age of two children usually have good control over all their limbs
• Infants have sophisticated brain systems for controlling movement, even if they cannot physically move.

Perceptual and Cognitive Development

• Infants can perceive depth, evident in visual cliff experiments (as early as 6-months-old)
• Other techniques (e.g., habituation) measure the amount of time infants look at different stimuli
• Face preference and whole object perception start developing between 2-5 days and 2-3 months of age.
• Preference for certain sound tones is seen in infants 4 months of age

Language Acquisition

• Language Acquisition Device (LAD): Hypothesized innate mechanism containing grammatical rules common to all languages.
• Child-directed Speech (CDS): Speech used by caregivers with short sentences, clear pauses, exaggerated intonation, and a high-pitched voice.

Language Acquisition: Further Points

• Infants are sophisticated in their ability to differentiate sounds, but this ability can be temporary.
• Children generally put words together to make the simplest sentences (two-word utterances) at the age of 2.
• Children may overextend (using a word too broadly) or underextend (using a word too narrowly).
• Overregularization errors occur when children apply known speech rules to cases where the rule does not apply
• There is a critical period for certain types of learning

Milestones in Language Acquisition

• Language acquisition typically progresses through a series of stages, progressing from perceiving certain sounds to complex grammar.

Cognitive Development - Piaget's Theory

• Cognitive development is the gradual transition from infancy to adulthood.
• Piaget suggests children begin with innate schemas (simple mental structures).
• Assimilation is the process of using existing schemas for interpreting new stimuli.
• Accommodation is the adapting or creating new schemas needed to cope with new stimuli.
• Object permanence is the understanding that objects still exist when not perceived directly.

Cognitive Development - Piaget's Theory: Stages

• Sensorimotor (0-2 years): Infants act on their world as they perceive it, no thinking of objects in their absence
• Preoperational (2-7 years): Symbolic thought, language, and symbolic play develop; thinking is tied to perceptions
• Concrete operations (7-11 years): Reasoning based on logic tied to what's observable, organizes and reverses mental operations
• Formal operations (11 years, onwards): Reasoning based on logic/abstraction; systematic thought

Preoperational Conservation - Piaget's Theory

• Conservation: Certain properties (amount, mass) remain the same despite changes.
• Egocentrism: Inability to take another person's perspective

Beyond Piaget's Theory

• Infants have capacities besides those Piaget identified.
• Piaget sometimes underestimates the sophistication of young children's thinking.
• Children may not master all skills that should involve similar reasoning at the same age.
• Not all children enter the formal operations stage at high school or even at all.

Social and Emotional Development

• Attachment: An emotional bond where a person wants to be with another and feels loss when separated.
• Attachment is an innate characteristic (the preference to seek out something soft)
• Separation anxiety; fear of being away from the primary caregiver, often occurs between 6 months and 2 years of age.
• Different types of attachment: secure, avoidant, resistant, and disorganized

Moral Development - Kohlberg's Theory

• Kohlberg's theory describes moral development stages.
• The Preconventional level emphasises the role of an authority figure, who determines correct action based on reward and punishment of behaviour
• The Conventional level focuses on social rules, with good behaviour being based on wanting to be viewed as a good person (e.g. by following the golden rule).
• The Postconventional level focuses on abstract principles for accepting or rejecting rules

Physical Development in Adolescence

• Puberty: Period where sex organs mature and secondary sexual characteristics (e.g. breasts, beard) emerge.
• Adolescence: Period between puberty and end of teenage years, with hormonal and physical changes.

Sociocognitive and Emotional Developments

• Adolescent cognitive development includes the ability to reason abstractly about topics like justice, politics, human behaviour and mathematical principles.
• Enhanced cognitive abilities allow for taking different perspectives and understanding one's self as others see them.
• Adolescents often experience conflict with parents, mood swings, and risk-taking behaviours

The Changing Body

• Sensory organs (especially eyes and ears) and the brain change, potentially impairing perception in older adults.
• Semantic memory is relatively stable while episodic memory declines.
• Frontal lobe functioning decreases, affecting tasks requiring working memory and strategies

Cognition in Aging

• Cognitive abilities are relatively stable in most of adulthood but decline in some areas by age 50.
• Fluid intelligence (reasoning in novel ways) shows decline whereas crystallized intelligence is preserved or may even increase

Explore the fascinating development of humans from conception through the stages of zygote, embryo, and fetus. This quiz covers key concepts including chromosome pairs, maturation, and sensory development in the womb. Test your knowledge about how life begins and progresses during these critical phases.