![Conservation2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Conservation2.jpeg)
Developmental psychology is the
scientific
Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...
study of how and why
human
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, culture, ...
s grow, change, and adapt across the course of their lives. Originally concerned with
infants
An infant or baby is the very young offspring of human beings. ''Infant'' (from the Latin word ''infans'', meaning 'unable to speak' or 'speechless') is a formal or specialised synonym for the common term ''baby''. The terms may also be used to ...
and
child
A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...
ren, the field has expanded to include
adolescence,
adult development
Adult development encompasses the changes that occur in biological and psychological domains of human life from the end of adolescence until the end of one's life. These changes may be gradual or rapid and can reflect positive, negative, or no c ...
,
aging
Ageing ( BE) or aging ( AE) is the process of becoming older. The term refers mainly to humans, many other animals, and fungi, whereas for example, bacteria, perennial plants and some simple animals are potentially biologically immortal. In ...
, and the entire lifespan. Developmental psychologists aim to explain how thinking, feeling, and behaviors change throughout life. This field examines change
across three major dimensions, which are
physical development
Developmental biology is the study of the process by which animals and plants grow and develop. Developmental biology also encompasses the biology of regeneration, asexual reproduction, metamorphosis, and the growth and differentiation of ste ...
,
cognitive development
Cognitive development is a field of study in neuroscience and psychology focusing on a child's development in terms of information processing, conceptual resources, perceptual skill, language learning, and other aspects of the developed adult bra ...
, and
social emotional development
Social emotional development represents a specific domain of child development. It is a gradual, integrative process through which children acquire the capacity to understand, experience, express, and manage emotions and to develop meaningful relat ...
. Within these three dimensions are a broad range of topics including
motor skills
A motor skill is a function that involves specific movements of the body's muscles to perform a certain task. These tasks could include walking, running, or riding a bike. In order to perform this skill, the body's nervous system, muscles, and br ...
,
executive functions
In cognitive science and neuropsychology, executive functions (collectively referred to as executive function and cognitive control) are a set of cognitive processes that are necessary for the cognitive control of behavior: selecting and suc ...
,
moral understanding,
language acquisition
Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive and comprehend language (in other words, gain the ability to be aware of language and to understand it), as well as to produce and use words and sentences to ...
,
social change
Social change is the alteration of the social order of a society which may include changes in social institutions, social behaviours or social relations.
Definition
Social change may not refer to the notion of social progress or socio ...
,
personality
Personality is the characteristic sets of behaviors, cognitions, and emotional patterns that are formed from biological and environmental factors, and which change over time. While there is no generally agreed-upon definition of personality, mos ...
, emotional development,
self-concept
In the psychology of self, one's self-concept (also called self-construction, self-identity, self-perspective or self-structure) is a collection of beliefs about oneself. Generally, self-concept embodies the answer to the question ''"Who am I? ...
, and
identity formation
Identity formation, also called identity development or identity construction, is a complex process in which humans develop a clear and unique view of themselves and of their identity.
Self-concept, personality development, and values are all clo ...
.
Developmental psychology examines the influences of nature ''and'' nurture on the process of human development, as well as processes of change in context across time. Many researchers are interested in the interactions among personal characteristics, the individual's behavior, and
environmental factor
An environmental factor, ecological factor or eco factor is any factor, abiotic or biotic, that influences living organisms. Abiotic factors include ambient temperature, amount of sunlight, and pH of the water soil in which an organism lives. Bi ...
s. This includes the
social context
The social environment, social context, sociocultural context or milieu refers to the immediate physical and social setting in which people live or in which something happens or develops. It includes the culture that the individual was educate ...
and the
built environment
The term built environment refers to human-made conditions and is often used in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, public health, sociology, and anthropology, among others. These curated spaces provide the setting for human ac ...
. Ongoing debates in regards to developmental psychology include biological
essentialism
Essentialism is the view that objects have a set of attributes that are necessary to their identity. In early Western thought, Plato's idealism held that all things have such an "essence"—an "idea" or "form". In ''Categories'', Aristotle sim ...
vs.
neuroplasticity
Neuroplasticity, also known as neural plasticity, or brain plasticity, is the ability of Neural circuit, neural networks in the brain to change through growth and reorganization. It is when the brain is rewired to function in some way that diffe ...
and
stages of development vs. dynamic systems of development. Research in developmental psychology has some limitations but at the moment researchers are working to understand how transitioning through stages of life and biological factors may impact our behaviors and development''.''
Developmental psychology involves a range of fields,
such as
educational psychology
Educational psychology is the branch of psychology concerned with the scientific study of human learning. The study of learning processes, from both cognitive and behavioral perspectives, allows researchers to understand individual differences i ...
,
child psychopathology
Child psychopathology refers to the scientific study of mental disorders in children and adolescents. Oppositional defiant disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and autism spectrum disorder are examples of psychopathology that are ty ...
,
forensic developmental psychology
Forensic developmental psychology is a field of psychology that focuses on "children's actions and reactions in a forensic context" and "children's reports that they were victims or witnesses of a crime". Bruck and Poole (2002) first coined the ter ...
,
child development
Child development involves the Human development (biology), biological, developmental psychology, psychological and emotional changes that occur in human beings between birth and the conclusion of adolescence. Childhood is divided into 3 stages o ...
,
cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of mental processes such as attention, language use, memory, perception, problem solving, creativity, and reasoning.
Cognitive psychology originated in the 1960s in a break from behaviorism, which ...
,
ecological psychology
Ecological psychology is the scientific study of perception-action from a direct realist approach. Ecological psychology is a school of psychology that follows much of the writings of Roger Barker and James J. Gibson. Those in the field of Ec ...
, and
cultural psychology
Cultural psychology is the study of how cultures reflect and shape the psychological processes of their members.Heine, S. J. (2011). ''Cultural Psychology. ''New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
It is based on the premise that mind and culture are i ...
. Influential developmental psychologists from the 20th century include
Urie Bronfenbrenner
Urie Bronfenbrenner (April 29, 1917 – September 25, 2005) was a Russian-born American psychologist who is most known for his ecological systems theory.Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979).The ecology of human development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University ...
,
Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
,
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...
,
Anna Freud
Anna Freud (3 December 1895 – 9 October 1982) was a British psychoanalyst of Austrian-Jewish descent. She was born in Vienna, the sixth and youngest child of Sigmund Freud and Martha Bernays. She followed the path of her father and contribut ...
,
Jean Piaget
Jean William Fritz Piaget (, , ; 9 August 1896 – 16 September 1980) was a Swiss psychologist known for his work on child development. Piaget's theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemolo ...
,
Barbara Rogoff,
Esther Thelen, and
Lev Vygotsky
Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (russian: Лев Семёнович Выго́тский, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; be, Леў Сямёнавіч Выго́цкі, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; – June 11, 1934) was a Soviet psychologist, known for his work on ps ...
.
Historical Antecedents
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (, ; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer. His political philosophy influenced the progress of the Age of Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolu ...
and
John B. Watson
John Broadus Watson (January 9, 1878 – September 25, 1958) was an American psychologist who popularized the scientific theory of behaviorism, establishing it as a psychological school.Cohn, Aaron S. 2014.Watson, John B." Pp. 1429–1430 in ''T ...
are typically cited as providing the foundation for modern developmental psychology.
In the mid-18th century, Jean Jacques Rousseau described three stages of development: ''infants'' (infancy), ''puer'' (childhood) and ''adolescence'' in ''
Emile: Or, On Education''. Rousseau's ideas were adopted and supported by educators at the time.
Developmental psychology generally focuses on how and why certain changes (cognitive, social, intellectual, personality) occur over time in the course of a human life. Many theorists have made a profound contribution to this area of psychology. One of them,
Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
developed a model of eight stages of psychological development. He believed that humans developed in stages throughout their lifetimes and that this would affect their behaviors.
![Darwin restored2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Darwin_restored2.jpg)
In the late 19th century, psychologists familiar with the
evolutionary theory
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
of
Darwin began seeking an
evolutionary description of psychological development;
prominent here was the pioneering psychologist
G. Stanley Hall
Granville Stanley Hall (February 1, 1846 – April 24, 1924) was a pioneering American psychologist and educator. His interests focused on human life span development and evolutionary theory. Hall was the first president of the American Psy ...
,
who attempted to correlate ages of childhood with
previous ages of humanity.
James Mark Baldwin
James Mark Baldwin (January 12, 1861, Columbia, South Carolina – November 8, 1934, Paris) was an American philosopher and psychologist who was educated at Princeton under the supervision of Scottish philosopher James McCosh and who was one o ...
, who wrote essays on topics that included ''Imitation: A Chapter in the Natural History of Consciousness'' and ''Mental Development in the Child and the Race: Methods and Processes'', was significantly involved in the theory of developmental psychology.
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...
, whose concepts were developmental, significantly affected public perceptions.
Theories
Psychosexual development
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies explained as originatin ...
developed a theory that suggested that humans behave as they do because they are constantly seeking pleasure. This process of seeking pleasure changes through stages because people evolve. Each period of seeking pleasure that a person experiences is represented by a stage of psychosexual development. These stages symbolize the process of arriving to become a maturing adult.
The first is the ''oral stage'', which begins at birth and ends around a year and a half of age. During the oral stage, the child finds pleasure in behaviors like sucking or other behaviors with the mouth. The second is the ''anal stage'', from about a year or a year and a half to three years of age. During the anal stage, the child defecates from the anus and is often fascinated with its defecation. This period of development often occurs during the time when the child is being toilet trained. The child becomes interested with feces and urine. Children begin to see themselves as independent from their parents. They begin to desire assertiveness and autonomy.
The third is the ''
phallic stage
In Freudian psychoanalysis, the phallic stage is the third stage of psychosexual development, spanning the ages of three to six years, wherein the infant's libido (desire) centers upon their genitalia as the erogenous zone. When children become ...
'', which occurs from three to five years of age (most of a person's personality forms by this age). During the phallic stage, the child becomes aware of its sexual organs. Pleasure comes from finding acceptance and love from the opposite sex. The fourth is the ''latency stage'', which occurs from age five until puberty. During the latency stage, the child's sexual interests are repressed.
Stage five is the ''
genital stage
The genital stage in psychoanalysis is the term used by Sigmund Freud to describe the final stage of human psychosexual development. The individual develops a strong sexual interest in people outside of the family.
In Freud and later thinkers
The ...
'', which takes place from puberty until adulthood. During the genital stage, puberty begins to occur. Children have now matured, and begin to think about other people instead of just themselves. Pleasure comes from feelings of affection from other people.
Freud believed there is tension between the conscious and unconscious because the conscious tries to hold back what the unconscious tries to express. To explain this, he developed three personality structures: id, ego, and superego. The id, the most primitive of the three, functions according to the pleasure principle: seek pleasure and avoid pain.
The superego plays the critical and moralizing role, while the ego is the organized, realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the superego.
Theories of cognitive development
Jean Piaget
Jean William Fritz Piaget (, , ; 9 August 1896 – 16 September 1980) was a Swiss psychologist known for his work on child development. Piaget's theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemolo ...
, a Swiss theorist, posited that children learn by actively constructing knowledge through hands-on experience.
He suggested that the adult's role in helping the child learn was to provide appropriate materials that the child can interact with and use to construct. He used
Socratic questioning
Socratic questioning (or Socratic maieutics) was named after Socrates. He used an educational method that focused on discovering answers by asking questions from his students. According to Plato, who was one of his students, Socrates believed t ...
to get children to reflect on what they were doing, and he tried to get them to see contradictions in their explanations.
Piaget believed that intellectual development takes place through a series of stages, which he described in his theory on cognitive development. Each stage consists of steps the child must master before moving to the next step. He believed that these stages are not separate from one another, but rather that each stage builds on the previous one in a continuous learning process. He proposed four stages: ''sensorimotor'', ''pre-operational'', ''concrete operational'', and ''formal operational''. Though he did not believe these stages occurred at any given age, many studies have determined when these cognitive abilities should take place.
Stages of moral development
Piaget claimed that logic and morality develop through constructive stages.
Expanding on Piaget's work,
Lawrence Kohlberg
Lawrence Kohlberg (; October 25, 1927 – January 19, 1987) was an American psychologist best known for his theory of stages of moral development.
He served as a professor in the Psychology Department at the University of Chicago and at the Gra ...
determined that the process of moral development was principally concerned with justice, and that it continued throughout the individual's lifetime.
He suggested three levels of moral reasoning; pre-conventional moral reasoning, conventional moral reasoning, and post-conventional moral reasoning. The pre-conventional moral reasoning is typical of children and is characterized by reasoning that is based on rewards and punishments associated with different courses of action. Conventional moral reason occurs during late childhood and early adolescence and is characterized by reasoning based on rules and conventions of society. Lastly, post-conventional moral reasoning is a stage during which the individual sees society's rules and conventions as relative and subjective, rather than as authoritative.
Kohlberg used the Heinz Dilemma to apply to his stages of moral development. The Heinz Dilemma involves Heinz's wife dying from cancer and Heinz having the dilemma to save his wife by stealing a drug. Preconventional morality, conventional morality, and post-conventional morality applies to Heinz's situation.
Stages of psychosocial development
German-American psychologist
Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
and his collaborator and wife,
Joan Erikson
Joan Mowat Erikson (born Sarah Lucretia Serson; June 27, 1903 – August 3, 1997) was well known as the collaborator with her husband, Erik Erikson, and as an author, educator, craftsperson, and dance ethnographer."Joan Erikson, Life Cycles Theo ...
, posits eight stages of individual human development influenced by biological, psychological, and social factors throughout the lifespan.''
'' At each stage the person must resolve a challenge, or an existential dilemma. Successful resolution of the dilemma results in the person ingraining a positive virtue, but failure to resolve the fundamental challenge of that stage reinforces negative perceptions of the person or the world around them and the person's personal development is unable to progress.
The first stage, "Trust vs. Mistrust", takes place in infancy. The positive virtue for the first stage is hope, in the infant learning whom to trust and having hope for a supportive group of people to be there for him/her.
![Erik Erikson Photo2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Erik_Erikson_Photo2.jpg)
The second stage is "Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt" with the positive virtue being will. This takes place in early childhood when the child learns to become more independent by discovering what they are capable of whereas if the child is overly controlled, feelings of inadequacy are reinforced, which can lead to low self-esteem and doubt.
The third stage is "Initiative vs. Guilt." The virtue of being gained is a sense of purpose. This takes place primarily via play. This is the stage where the child will be curious and have many interactions with other kids. They will ask many questions as their curiosity grows. If too much guilt is present, the child may have a slower and harder time interacting with their world and other children in it.
The fourth stage is "Industry (competence) vs. Inferiority". The virtue for this stage is competency and is the result of the child's early experiences in school. This stage is when the child will try to win the approval of others and understand the value of their accomplishments.
The fifth stage is "Identity vs. Role Confusion". The virtue gained is fidelity and it takes place in adolescence. This is when the child ideally starts to identify their place in society, particularly in terms of their gender role.
The sixth stage is "Intimacy vs. Isolation", which happens in young adults and the virtue gained is love. This is when the person starts to share his/her life with someone else intimately and emotionally. Not doing so can reinforce feelings of isolation.
The seventh stage is "Generativity vs. Stagnation". This happens in adulthood and the virtue gained is care. A person becomes stable and starts to give back by raising a family and becoming involved in the community.
The eighth stage is "Ego Integrity vs. Despair". When one grows old, they look back on their life and contemplate their successes and failures. If they resolve this positively, the virtue of wisdom is gained. This is also the stage when one can gain a sense of closure and accept death without regret or fear.
Stages based on the model of hierarchical complexity
Michael Commons
Michael Lamport Commons (b. 1939) is a theoretical behavioral scientist and a complex systems scientist. He developed the model of hierarchical complexity.
Life and work
Michael Lamport Commons was born in 1939 in Los Angeles and grew up in Hol ...
enhanced and simplified
Bärbel Inhelder
Bärbel Elisabeth Inhelder (15 April 1913 – 17 February 1997) was a Swiss psychologist most known for her work under psychologist and epistemologist Jean Piaget and their contributions toward child development.
Born in St. Gallen, Switzerland, ...
and Piaget's developmental theory and offers a standard method of examining the universal pattern of development. The Model of Hierarchical Complexity (MHC) is not based on the assessment of domain-specific information, It divides the Order of Hierarchical Complexity of tasks to be addressed from the Stage performance on those tasks. A stage is the order hierarchical complexity of the tasks the participant's successfully addresses. He expanded Piaget's original eight stage (counting the half stages) to seventeen stages. The stages are:
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Calculatory
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Automatic
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Sensory & Motor
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Circular sensory-motor
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Sensory-motor
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Nominal
Nominal may refer to:
Linguistics and grammar
* Nominal (linguistics), one of the parts of speech
* Nominal, the adjectival form of "noun", as in "nominal agreement" (= "noun agreement")
* Nominal sentence, a sentence without a finite verb
* Nou ...
#
Sentential
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Preoperational
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Primary
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Concrete
Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most wi ...
#
Abstract
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Formal
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Systematic
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Metasystematic
#
Paradigmatic
In science and philosophy, a paradigm () is a distinct set of concepts or thought patterns, including theories, research methods, postulates, and standards for what constitute legitimate contributions to a field.
Etymology
''Paradigm'' comes f ...
#
Cross-paradigmatic
#
Meta-Cross-paradigmatic
The order of hierarchical complexity of tasks predicts how difficult the performance is with an R ranging from 0.9 to 0.98.
In the MHC, there are three main axioms for an order to meet in order for the higher order task to coordinate the next lower order task. Axioms are rules that are followed to determine how the MHC orders actions to form a hierarchy. These axioms are: a) defined in terms of tasks at the next lower order of hierarchical complexity task action; b) defined as the higher order task action that organizes two or more less complex actions; that is, the more complex action specifies the way in which the less complex actions combine; c) defined as the lower order task actions have to be carried out non-arbitrarily.
Ecological systems theory
![Bronfenbrenner's_Ecological_Theory_of_Development_(English)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9b/Bronfenbrenner%27s_Ecological_Theory_of_Development_%28English%29.jpg)
Ecological systems theory, originally formulated by
Urie Bronfenbrenner
Urie Bronfenbrenner (April 29, 1917 – September 25, 2005) was a Russian-born American psychologist who is most known for his ecological systems theory.Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979).The ecology of human development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University ...
, specifies four types of nested environmental systems, with bi-directional influences within and between the systems. The four systems are microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and macrosystem. Each system contains roles, norms and rules that can powerfully shape development. The microsystem is the direct environment in our lives such as our home and school. Mesosystem is how relationships connect to the microsystem. Exosystem is a larger social system where the child plays no role. Macrosystem refers to the cultural values, customs and laws of society.
The microsystem is the immediate environment surrounding and influencing the individual (example: school or the home setting). The mesosystem is the combination of two microsystems and how they influence each other (example: sibling relationships at home vs. peer relationships at school). The exosystem is the interaction among two or more settings that are indirectly linked (example: a father's job requiring more overtime ends up influencing his daughter's performance in school because he can no longer help with her homework). The macrosystem is broader taking into account social economic status, culture, beliefs, customs and morals (example: a child from a wealthier family sees a peer from a less wealthy family as inferior for that reason). Lastly, the chronosystem refers to the chronological nature of life events and how they interact and change the individual and their circumstances through transition (example: a mother losing her own mother to illness and no longer having that support in her life).
Since its publication in 1979, Bronfenbrenner's major statement of this theory, ''The Ecology of Human Development'', has had widespread influence on the way psychologists and others approach the study of human beings and their environments. As a result of this conceptualization of development, these environments—from the family to economic and political structures—have come to be viewed as part of the life course from childhood through to adulthood.
Zone of proximal development
Lev Vygotsky
Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (russian: Лев Семёнович Выго́тский, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; be, Леў Сямёнавіч Выго́цкі, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; – June 11, 1934) was a Soviet psychologist, known for his work on ps ...
was a Russian theorist from the Soviet era, who posited that children learn through hands-on experience and social interactions with members of their culture. Vygotsky believed that a child's development should be examined during problem-solving activities. Unlike Piaget, he claimed that timely and sensitive intervention by adults when a child is on the edge of learning a new task (called the "zone of proximal development") could help children learn new tasks. Zone of proximal development is a tool used to explain the learning of children and collaborating problem solving activities with an adult or peer. This adult role is often referred to as the skilled "master", whereas the child is considered the learning apprentice through an educational process often termed "
cognitive apprenticeship
Cognitive apprenticeship is a theory that emphasizes the importance of the process in which a master of a skill teaches that skill to an apprentice.
Constructivist approaches to human learning have led to the development of the theory of cogniti ...
" Martin Hill stated that "The world of reality does not apply to the mind of a child." This technique is called "scaffolding", because it builds upon knowledge children already have with new knowledge that adults can help the child learn.
Vygotsky was strongly focused on the role of culture in determining the child's pattern of development, arguing that development moves from the social level to the individual level.
In other words, Vygotsky claimed that psychology should focus on the progress of human consciousness through the relationship of an individual and their environment.
He felt that if scholars continued to disregard this connection, then this disregard would inhibit the full comprehension of the human consciousness.
Constructivism
Constructivism is a paradigm in psychology that characterizes learning as a process of actively constructing knowledge. Individuals create meaning for themselves or make sense of new information by selecting, organizing, and integrating information with other knowledge, often in the context of social interactions. Constructivism can occur in two ways: individual and social. Individual constructivism is when a person constructs knowledge through cognitive processes of their own experiences rather than by memorizing facts provided by others. Social constructivism is when individuals construct knowledge through an interaction between the knowledge they bring to a situation and social or cultural exchanges within that content.
Jean Piaget, a Swiss developmental psychologist, proposed that learning is an active process because children learn through experience and make mistakes and solve problems. Piaget proposed that learning should be whole by helping students understand that meaning is constructed.
Evolutionary developmental psychology
Evolutionary developmental psychology is a research paradigm that applies the basic principles of Darwinian
evolution
Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...
, particularly
natural selection
Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the heritable traits characteristic of a population over generations. Charle ...
, to understand the development of human behavior and cognition. It involves the study of both the
genetic and environmental mechanisms that underlie the development of social and
cognitive
Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...
competencies, as well as the
epigenetic (
gene-environment interactions) processes that adapt these competencies to local conditions.
EDP considers both the reliably developing, species-typical features of ontogeny (developmental adaptations), as well as
individual differences
Differential psychology studies the ways in which individuals differ in their behavior and the processes that underlie it. This is a discipline that develops classifications (taxonomies) of psychological individual differences. This is distingui ...
in behavior, from an evolutionary perspective. While evolutionary views tend to regard most individual differences as the result of either random genetic noise (evolutionary byproducts) and/or idiosyncrasies (for example, peer groups, education, neighborhoods, and chance encounters) rather than products of natural selection, EDP asserts that natural selection can favor the emergence of individual differences via "adaptive developmental plasticity".
From this perspective, human development follows alternative life-history strategies in response to environmental variability, rather than following one species-typical pattern of development.
EDP is closely linked to the theoretical framework of
evolutionary psychology
Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evolv ...
(EP), but is also distinct from EP in several domains, including research emphasis (EDP focuses on adaptations of ontogeny, as opposed to adaptations of adulthood) and consideration of proximate ontogenetic and environmental factors (i.e., how development happens) in addition to more ultimate factors (i.e., why development happens), which are the focus of mainstream evolutionary psychology.
Attachment theory
Attachment theory, originally developed by
John Bowlby
Edward John Mostyn Bowlby, CBE, FBA, FRCP, FRCPsych (; 26 February 1907 – 2 September 1990) was a British psychologist, psychiatrist, and psychoanalyst, notable for his interest in child development and for his pioneering work in attach ...
, focuses on the importance of open, intimate, emotionally meaningful relationships. Attachment is described as a biological system or powerful survival impulse that evolved to ensure the survival of the infant. A threatened or stressed child will move toward caregivers who create a sense of physical, emotional, and psychological safety for the individual. Attachment feeds on body contact and familiarity. Later
Mary Ainsworth
Mary Dinsmore Ainsworth (; December 1, 1913 – March 21, 1999) was an American-Canadian developmental psychologist known for her work in the development of the attachment theory. She designed the strange situation procedure to observe early em ...
developed the
Strange Situation
The strange situation is a procedure devised by Mary Ainsworth in the 1970s to observe attachment in children, that is relationships between a caregiver and child. It applies to children between the age of nine and 30 months. Broadly speaking, the ...
protocol and the concept of the secure base. This tool has been found to help understand and surveillance attachment, such as the Strange Situation Test and the Adult Attachment Interview. Both of which help determine factors to certain attachment styles. The Strange Situation Test help finds "disturbances in attachment" and whether certain attributes are found to contribute to a certain attachment issue.
The Adult Attachment Interview is a tool that is similar to the Strange Situation Test but instead focuses attachment issues found in adults.
Both tests have helped many researchers gain more information on the risks and how to identify them.
Theorists have proposed four types of attachment styles:
secure, anxious-avoidant, anxious-resistant,
and disorganized.
Secure attachment is a healthy attachment between the infant and the caregiver. It is characterized by trust. Anxious-avoidant is an insecure attachment between an infant and a caregiver. This is characterized by the infant's indifference toward the caregiver. Anxious-resistant is an insecure attachment between the infant and the caregiver characterized by distress from the infant when separated and anger when reunited.
Disorganized is an attachment style without a consistent pattern of responses upon return of the parent.
A child can be hindered in its natural tendency to form attachments. Some babies are raised without the stimulation and attention of a regular caregiver or locked away under conditions of abuse or extreme neglect. The possible short-term effects of this deprivation are anger, despair, detachment, and temporary delay in intellectual development. Long-term effects include increased aggression, clinging behavior, detachment, psychosomatic disorders, and an increased risk of depression as an adult.
Attachment is established in early childhood and attachment continues into adulthood. When involved in intimate relationships the way adults are able to handle relationship issues depends on their attachment styles that were formed during their childhood.
An example of secure attachment continuing in adulthood would be when the person feels confident and is able to meet their own needs. Having a secure attachment allows the adult to have a healthy trusting relationship.
An example of anxious attachment during adulthood is when the adult chooses a partner with anxious-avoidant attachment. Having an anxious/ ambivalent attachment style can affect an adult's trust issues in a committed relationship.
By understanding what attachment style an individual formed with their caregiver when they were children, we can better understand their interpersonal relationships as adults.
Nature vs nurture
A significant debate in developmental psychology is the relationship between innateness and environmental influence in regard to any particular aspect of development. This is often referred to as "
nature and nurture" or
nativism versus
empiricism
In philosophy, empiricism is an epistemological theory that holds that knowledge or justification comes only or primarily from sensory experience. It is one of several views within epistemology, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empir ...
. A nativist account of development would argue that the processes in question are innate, that is, they are specified by the organism's
genes
In biology, the word gene (from , ; "...Wilhelm Johannsen coined the word gene to describe the Mendelian units of heredity..." meaning ''generation'' or ''birth'' or ''gender'') can have several different meanings. The Mendelian gene is a ba ...
. What makes a person who they are? Is it their environment or their genetics? This is the debate of nature vs nurture.
An empiricist perspective would argue that those processes are acquired in interaction with the environment. Today developmental psychologists rarely take such polarized positions with regard to most aspects of development; rather they investigate, among many other things, the relationship between innate and environmental influences. One of the ways this relationship has been explored in recent years is through the emerging field of
evolutionary developmental psychology
Evolutionary developmental psychology (EDP) is a research paradigm that applies the basic principles of evolution by natural selection, to understand the development of human behavior and cognition. It involves the study of both the genetic and e ...
.
One area where this innateness debate has been prominently portrayed is in research on
language acquisition
Language acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive and comprehend language (in other words, gain the ability to be aware of language and to understand it), as well as to produce and use words and sentences to ...
. A major question in this area is whether or not certain properties of human language are specified genetically or can be acquired through
learning
Learning is the process of acquiring new understanding, knowledge, behaviors, skills, value (personal and cultural), values, attitudes, and preferences. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, animals, and some machine learning, machines ...
. The empiricist position on the issue of language acquisition suggests that the language input provides the necessary information required for learning the structure of language and that infants acquire language through a process of
statistical learning. From this perspective, language can be acquired via general learning methods that also apply to other aspects of development, such as
perceptual learning
Perceptual learning is learning better perception skills such as differentiating two musical tones from one another or categorizations of spatial and temporal patterns relevant to real-world expertise. Examples of this may include reading, seeing ...
.
The nativist position argues that the input from language is too impoverished for infants and children to acquire the structure of language. Linguist
Noam Chomsky
Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American public intellectual: a linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is ...
asserts that, evidenced by the lack of sufficient information in the language input, there is a
universal grammar
Universal grammar (UG), in modern linguistics, is the theory of the genetic component of the language faculty, usually credited to Noam Chomsky. The basic postulate of UG is that there are innate constraints on what the grammar of a possible hu ...
that applies to all human languages and is pre-specified. This has led to the idea that there is a special cognitive
module
Module, modular and modularity may refer to the concept of modularity. They may also refer to:
Computing and engineering
* Modular design, the engineering discipline of designing complex devices using separately designed sub-components
* Mo ...
suited for learning language, often called the
language acquisition device
The Language Acquisition Device (LAD) is a claim from language acquisition research proposed by Noam Chomsky in the 1960s. The LAD concept is a purported instinctive mental capacity which enables an infant to acquire and produce language. It is ...
. Chomsky's critique of the behaviorist model of language acquisition is regarded by many as a key turning point in the decline in the prominence of the theory of behaviorism generally.
But Skinner's conception of "Verbal Behavior" has not died, perhaps in part because it has generated successful practical applications.
Maybe there could be "strong interactions of both nature and nurture".
Continuity vs discontinuity
One of the major discussions in developmental psychology includes whether development is discontinuous or continuous.
Continuous development is quantifiable and quantitative, whereas discontinuous development is qualitative. Quantitative estimations of development can be measuring the stature of a child, and measuring their memory or consideration span. "Particularly dramatic examples of qualitative changes are metamorphoses, such as the emergence of a caterpillar into a butterfly."
Those psychologists who bolster the continuous view of improvement propose that improvement includes slow and progressing changes all through the life span, with behavior within the prior stages of advancement giving the premise of abilities and capacities required for the other stages. "To many, the concept of continuous, quantifiable measurement seems to be the essence of science".
Not all psychologists, be that as it may, concur that advancement could be a continuous process. A few see advancement as a discontinuous process. They accept advancement includes unmistakable and partitioned stages with diverse sorts of behavior happening in each organization. This proposes that the development of certain capacities in each arrange, such as particular feelings or ways of considering, have a definite beginning and finishing point. Be that as it may, there's no correct time at which a capacity abruptly shows up or disappears. Although some sorts of considering, feeling or carrying on could seem to seem abruptly, it is more than likely that this has been developing gradually for some time.
Stage theories of development rest on the suspicion that development may be a discontinuous process including particular stages which are characterized by subjective contrasts in behavior. They moreover assume that the structure of the stages isn't variable concurring to each person, in any case, the time of each arrangement may shift separately. Stage theories can be differentiated with ceaseless hypotheses, which set that development is an incremental process.
Stability vs change
Main article: Stability an
Change
This issue involves the degree to which one becomes older renditions of their early experience or whether they develop into something different from who they were at an earlier point in development. It considers the extent to which early experiences (especially infancy) or later experiences are the key determinants of a person's development. Stability is defined as the consistent ordering of individual differences with respect to some attribute. Change is altering someone/something.
Most
''human development'' lifespan developmentalists recognize that extreme positions are unwise. Therefore, the key to a comprehensive understanding of development at any stage requires the interaction of different factors and not only one.
Theory of mind
Theory of mind is the ability to attribute mental states to ourselves and others. It is a complex but vital process in which children begin to understand the emotions, motives, and feelings of not only themselves but also others. Theory of mind allows people to understand that others have unique beliefs and desires that are different from our own. This enables people to engage in daily social interactions as we explain the mental state around us. If a child does not fully develop theory of mind within this crucial 5-year period, they can suffer from communication barriers that follow them into adolescence and adulthood. Exposure to more people and the availability of stimuli that encourages social-cognitive growth is a factor that relies heavily on family.
Mathematical models
Developmental psychology is concerned not only with describing the characteristics of psychological change over time but also seeks to explain the principles and internal workings underlying these changes. Psychologists have attempted to better understand these factors by using
models
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
. A model must simply account for the means by which a process takes place. This is sometimes done in reference to changes in the
brain
A brain is an organ that serves as the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. It is located in the head, usually close to the sensory organs for senses such as vision. It is the most complex organ in a v ...
that may correspond to changes in behavior over the course of the development.
Mathematical modeling is useful in developmental psychology for implementing theory in a precise and easy-to-study manner, allowing generation, explanation, integration, and prediction of diverse phenomena. Several modeling techniques are applied to development:
symbol
A symbol is a mark, sign, or word that indicates, signifies, or is understood as representing an idea, object, or relationship. Symbols allow people to go beyond what is known or seen by creating linkages between otherwise very different conc ...
ic,
connectionist
Connectionism refers to both an approach in the field of cognitive science that hopes to explain mental phenomena using artificial neural networks (ANN) and to a wide range of techniques and algorithms using ANNs in the context of artificial int ...
(
neural net
Artificial neural networks (ANNs), usually simply called neural networks (NNs) or neural nets, are computing systems inspired by the biological neural networks that constitute animal brains.
An ANN is based on a collection of connected units ...
work), or
dynamical systems
In mathematics, a dynamical system is a system in which a function describes the time dependence of a point in an ambient space. Examples include the mathematical models that describe the swinging of a clock pendulum, the flow of water in a p ...
models.
Dynamic systems models illustrate how many different features of a complex system may interact to yield emergent behaviors and abilities. Nonlinear dynamics has been applied to human systems specifically to address issues that require attention to temporality such as life transitions, human development, and behavioral or emotional change over time. Nonlinear dynamic systems is currently being explored as a way to explain discrete phenomena of human development such as affect, second language acquisition, and locomotion.
Research areas
Cognitive development
Cognitive development is primarily concerned with the ways that infants and children acquire, develop, and use internal mental capabilities such as: problem-solving, memory, and language. Major topics in cognitive development are the study of language acquisition and the development of perceptual and motor skills. Piaget was one of the influential early psychologists to study the development of cognitive abilities. His theory suggests that development proceeds through a set of stages from infancy to adulthood and that there is an end point or goal.
Other accounts, such as that of
Lev Vygotsky
Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (russian: Лев Семёнович Выго́тский, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; be, Леў Сямёнавіч Выго́цкі, p=vɨˈɡotskʲɪj; – June 11, 1934) was a Soviet psychologist, known for his work on ps ...
, have suggested that development does not progress through stages, but rather that the developmental process that begins at birth and continues until death is too complex for such structure and finality. Rather, from this viewpoint, developmental processes proceed more continuously. Thus, development should be analyzed, instead of treated as a product to obtain.
K. Warner Schaie has expanded the study of cognitive development into adulthood. Rather than being stable from adolescence, Schaie sees adults as progressing in the application of their cognitive abilities.
Modern cognitive development has integrated the considerations of
cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of mental processes such as attention, language use, memory, perception, problem solving, creativity, and reasoning.
Cognitive psychology originated in the 1960s in a break from behaviorism, which ...
and the psychology of
individual differences
Differential psychology studies the ways in which individuals differ in their behavior and the processes that underlie it. This is a discipline that develops classifications (taxonomies) of psychological individual differences. This is distingui ...
into the interpretation and modeling of development.
Specifically,
the neo-Piagetian theories of cognitive development
''The'' () is a grammatical Article (grammar), article in English language, English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite ...
showed that the successive levels or stages of cognitive development are associated with increasing processing efficiency and
working memory
Working memory is a cognitive system with a limited capacity that can hold information temporarily. It is important for reasoning and the guidance of decision-making and behavior. Working memory is often used synonymously with short-term memory, ...
capacity. These increases explain differences between stages, progression to higher stages, and individual differences of children who are the same-age and of the same grade-level. However, other theories have moved away from Piagetian stage theories, and are influenced by accounts of
domain-specific
Domain specificity is a theoretical position in cognitive science (especially modern cognitive development) that argues that many aspects of cognition are supported by specialized, presumably evolutionarily specified, learning devices. The posit ...
information processing, which posit that development is guided by innate evolutionarily-specified and content-specific information processing mechanisms.
Social and emotional development
Developmental psychologists who are interested in social development examine how individuals develop social and emotional competencies. For example, they study how children form friendships, how they understand and deal with emotions, and how identity develops. Research in this area may involve study of the relationship between cognition or cognitive development and social behavior.
Emotional regulation
Emotional self-regulation
or emotion regulation is the ability to respond to the ongoing demands of experience with the range of emotions in a manner that is socially tolerable and sufficiently flexible to permit spontaneous reactions as well as ...
or ER refers to an individual's ability to modulate emotional responses across a variety of contexts. In young children, this modulation is in part controlled externally, by parents and other authority figures. As children develop, they take on more and more responsibility for their internal state. Studies have shown that the development of ER is affected by the emotional regulation children observe in parents and caretakers, the emotional climate in the home, and the reaction of parents and caretakers to the child's emotions.
Music also has an influence on stimulating and enhancing the senses of a child through self-expression.
A child's social and emotional development can be disrupted by motor coordination problems, evidenced by the environmental stress hypothesis. The environmental hypothesis explains how children with coordination problems and
developmental coordination disorder
Developmental coordination disorder (DCD), also known as developmental motor coordination disorder, developmental dyspraxia or simply dyspraxia from the word 'praxis' meaning to do or act, is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impaire ...
are exposed to several psychosocial consequences which act as secondary stressors, leading to an increase in
internalizing symptoms such as depression and anxiety.
Motor coordination problems affect fine and gross motor movement as well as perceptual-motor skills. Secondary stressors commonly identified include the tendency for children with poor motor skills to be less likely to participate in organized play with other children and more likely to feel socially
isolated.
Social and emotional development focuses on five keys areas: Self-Awareness, Self Management, Social Awareness, Relationship Skills and Responsible Decision Making.
Physical development
Physical development concerns the physical maturation of an individual's body until it reaches the adult stature. Although physical growth is a highly regular process, all children differ tremendously in the timing of their growth spurts.
Studies are being done to analyze how the differences in these timings affect and are related to other variables of developmental psychology such as information processing speed. Traditional measures of physical maturity using x-rays are less in practice nowadays, compared to simple measurements of body parts such as height, weight, head circumference, and arm span.
A few other studies and practices with physical developmental psychology are the phonological abilities of mature 5- to 11-year-olds, and the controversial hypotheses of left-handers being maturationally delayed compared to right-handers. A study by Eaton, Chipperfield, Ritchot, and Kostiuk in 1996 found in three different samples that there was no difference between right- and left-handers.
Memory development
Researchers interested in memory development look at the way our memory develops from childhood and onward. According to
fuzzy-trace theory Fuzzy-trace theory (FTT) is a theory of cognition originally proposed by Valerie F. Reyna and Charles Brainerd that draws upon dual-trace conceptions to predict and explain cognitive phenomena, particularly in memory and reasoning. The theory has ...
, a theory of
cognition
Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...
originally proposed by
Valerie F. Reyna and
Charles Brainerd
Charles Jon Brainerd (born 1944) is an American psychologist and professor in the College of Human Ecology at Cornell University. He is known for developing fuzzy-trace theory with his wife and colleague, Valerie F. Reyna. He serves as editor-i ...
, people have two separate memory processes: verbatim and gist. These two traces begin to develop at different times as well as at a different pace. Children as young as four years old have verbatim memory, memory for surface information, which increases up to early adulthood, at which point it begins to decline. On the other hand, our capacity for gist memory, memory for semantic information, increases up to early adulthood, at which point it is consistent through old age. Furthermore, one's reliance on gist memory traces increases as one ages.
Research methods and designs
Main research methods
Developmental psychology employs many of the
research methods
Research is "creativity, creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular att ...
used in other areas of psychology. However, infants and children cannot be tested in the same ways as adults, so different methods are often used to study their development.
Developmental psychologists have a number of methods to study changes in individuals over time. Common research methods include systematic observation, including
naturalistic observation
Naturalistic observation, sometimes referred to as fieldwork, is a research methodology in numerous fields of science including ethology, anthropology, linguistics, the social sciences, and psychology, in which data are collected as they occur i ...
or structured observation; self-reports, which could be clinical interviews or
structured interviews; clinical or
case study
A case study is an in-depth, detailed examination of a particular case (or cases) within a real-world context. For example, case studies in medicine may focus on an individual patient or ailment; case studies in business might cover a particular fi ...
method; and
ethnography
Ethnography (from Greek ''ethnos'' "folk, people, nation" and ''grapho'' "I write") is a branch of anthropology and the systematic study of individual cultures. Ethnography explores cultural phenomena from the point of view of the subject o ...
or participant observation.
These methods differ in the extent of control researchers impose on study conditions, and how they construct ideas about which variables to study.
Every developmental investigation can be characterized in terms of whether its underlying strategy involves the ''experimental'', ''correlational'', or ''case study'' approach.
The
experimental method involves "actual manipulation of various treatments, circumstances, or events to which the participant or subject is exposed;
the ''experimental design'' points to
cause-and-effect relationships.
This method allows for strong inferences to be made of causal relationships between the manipulation of one or more
independent variables
Dependent and independent variables are variables in mathematical modeling, statistical modeling and experimental sciences. Dependent variables receive this name because, in an experiment, their values are studied under the supposition or deman ...
and subsequent behavior, as measured by the
dependent variable.
The advantage of using this research method is that it permits determination of cause-and-effect relationships among variables.
On the other hand, the limitation is that data obtained in an artificial environment may lack generalizability.
The correlational method explores the relationship between two or more events by gathering information about these variables without researcher intervention.
The advantage of using a correlational design is that it estimates the strength and direction of relationships among variables in the natural environment;
however, the limitation is that it does not permit determination of cause-and-effect relationships among variables.
The
case study
A case study is an in-depth, detailed examination of a particular case (or cases) within a real-world context. For example, case studies in medicine may focus on an individual patient or ailment; case studies in business might cover a particular fi ...
approach allows investigations to obtain an in-depth understanding of an individual participant by collecting data based on
interviews
An interview is a structured conversation where one participant asks questions, and the other provides answers.Merriam Webster DictionaryInterview Dictionary definition, Retrieved February 16, 2016 In common parlance, the word "interview" r ...
, structured questionnaires, observations, and test scores.
Each of these methods have its strengths and weaknesses but the experimental method when appropriate is the preferred method of developmental scientists because it provides a controlled situation and conclusions to be drawn about cause-and-effect relationships.
Recently, scientists started relying on deep learning, a form of artificial intelligence to train deep neural networks on biological and psychological data.
Research designs
Most developmental studies, regardless of whether they employ the experimental, correlational, or case study method, can also be constructed using research designs.
Research designs are logical frameworks used to make key comparisons within research studies such as:
*
cross-sectional design
*
longitudinal design
A longitudinal study (or longitudinal survey, or panel study) is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables (e.g., people) over short or long periods of time (i.e., uses longitudinal data). It is often a type of obs ...
*
sequential design
*
microgenetic design Microgenetic design (a.k.a. microgenetic method) is a scientific method in which the same setting is studied repeatedly in order to observe change in detail. In contrast to cross-sectional and longitudinal designs, which provide broad outlines of t ...
In a
longitudinal study
A longitudinal study (or longitudinal survey, or panel study) is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables (e.g., people) over short or long periods of time (i.e., uses longitudinal data). It is often a type of obs ...
, a researcher observes many individuals born at or around the same time (a
cohort
Cohort or cohortes may refer to:
* Cohort (educational group), a group of students working together through the same academic curriculum
* Cohort (floating point), a set of different encodings of the same numerical value
* Cohort (military unit ...
) and carries out new observations as members of the cohort age. This method can be used to draw conclusions about which types of development are universal (or
normative
Normative generally means relating to an evaluative standard. Normativity is the phenomenon in human societies of designating some actions or outcomes as good, desirable, or permissible, and others as bad, undesirable, or impermissible. A norm in ...
) and occur in most members of a cohort. As an example a longitudinal study of early literacy development examined in detail the early literacy experiences of one child in each of 30 families.
Researchers may also observe ways that development varies between individuals, and hypothesize about the causes of variation in their data. Longitudinal studies often require large amounts of time and funding, making them unfeasible in some situations. Also, because members of a cohort all experience historical events unique to their generation, apparently normative developmental trends may, in fact, be universal only to their cohort.
In a
cross-sectional study
In medical research, social science, and biology, a cross-sectional study (also known as a cross-sectional analysis, transverse study, prevalence study) is a type of observational study that analyzes data from a population, or a representative s ...
, a researcher observes differences between individuals of different ages at the same time. This generally requires fewer resources than the longitudinal method, and because the individuals come from different cohorts, shared historical events are not so much of a
confounding factor
In statistics, a confounder (also confounding variable, confounding factor, extraneous determinant or lurking variable) is a variable that influences both the dependent variable and independent variable, causing a spurious association. Con ...
. By the same token, however, cross-sectional research may not be the most effective way to study differences between participants, as these differences may result not from their different ages but from their exposure to ''different'' historical events.
A third study design, the
sequential design, combines both methodologies. Here, a researcher observes members of different birth cohorts at the same time, and then tracks all participants over time, charting changes in the groups. While much more resource-intensive, the format aids in a clearer distinction between what changes can be attributed to an individual or historical environment from those that are truly universal.
Because every method has some weaknesses, developmental psychologists rarely rely on one study or even one method to reach conclusions by finding consistent evidence from as many converging sources as possible.
Life stages of psychological development
Prenatal development
Prenatal development is of interest to psychologists investigating the context of early psychological development. The whole prenatal development involves three main stages: germinal stage, embryonic stage and fetal stage. Germinal stage begins at conception until 2 weeks; embryonic stage means the development from 2 weeks to 8 weeks; fetal stage represents 9 weeks until birth of the baby. The senses develop in the womb itself: a fetus can both see and hear by the second trimester (13 to 24 weeks of age). The sense of touch develops in the embryonic stage (5 to 8 weeks).
Most of the brain's billions of neurons also are developed by the second trimester.
Babies are hence born with some odor, taste and sound preferences, largely related to the mother's environment.
Some
primitive reflexes
Primitive reflexes are reflex actions originating in the central nervous system that are exhibited by normal infants, but not neurologically intact adults, in response to particular stimuli. These reflexes are suppressed by the development of the ...
too arise before birth and are still present in newborns. One hypothesis is that these reflexes are vestigial and have limited use in early human life.
Piaget's theory of cognitive development
Piaget's theory of cognitive development is a comprehensive theory about the nature and development of human intelligence. It was originated by the Swiss developmental psychologist Jean Piaget (1896–1980). The theory deals with the nature of ...
suggested that some early reflexes are building blocks for infant sensorimotor development. For example, the
tonic neck reflex may help development by bringing objects into the infant's field of view.
Other reflexes, such as the
walking reflex
Primitive reflexes are reflex actions originating in the central nervous system that are exhibited by normal infants, but not neurologically intact adults, in response to particular stimuli. These reflexes are suppressed by the development of the ...
, appear to be replaced by more sophisticated voluntary control later in infancy. This may be because the infant gains too much weight after birth to be strong enough to use the reflex, or because the reflex and subsequent development are functionally different.
It has also been suggested that some reflexes (for example the
moro and
walking reflex
Primitive reflexes are reflex actions originating in the central nervous system that are exhibited by normal infants, but not neurologically intact adults, in response to particular stimuli. These reflexes are suppressed by the development of the ...
es) are predominantly adaptations to life in the womb with little connection to early infant development.
Primitive reflexes reappear in adults under certain conditions, such as neurological conditions like
dementia
Dementia is a disorder which manifests as a set of related symptoms, which usually surfaces when the brain is damaged by injury or disease. The symptoms involve progressive impairments in memory, thinking, and behavior, which negatively affe ...
or traumatic lesions.
Ultrasound
Ultrasound is sound waves with frequency, frequencies higher than the upper audible limit of human hearing range, hearing. Ultrasound is not different from "normal" (audible) sound in its physical properties, except that humans cannot hea ...
has shown that infants are capable of a range of movements in the womb, many of which appear to be more than simple reflexes.
By the time they are born, infants can recognize and have a preference for their mother's voice suggesting some prenatal development of auditory perception.
Prenatal development and birth complications may also be connected to neurodevelopmental disorders, for example in
schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social withdra ...
. With the advent of
cognitive neuroscience
Cognitive neuroscience is the scientific field that is concerned with the study of the biological processes and aspects that underlie cognition, with a specific focus on the neural connections in the brain which are involved in mental proces ...
,
embryology
Embryology (from Greek ἔμβρυον, ''embryon'', "the unborn, embryo"; and -λογία, '' -logia'') is the branch of animal biology that studies the prenatal development of gametes (sex cells), fertilization, and development of embryos and ...
and the neuroscience of prenatal development is of increasing interest to developmental psychology research.
Several environmental agents—
teratogens
Teratology is the study of abnormalities of physiological development in organisms during their life span. It is a sub-discipline in medical genetics which focuses on the classification of congenital abnormalities in dysmorphology. The related ...
—can cause damage during the prenatal period. These include prescription and nonprescription drugs, illegal drugs, tobacco, alcohol, environmental pollutants, infectious disease agents such as the
rubella
Rubella, also known as German measles or three-day measles, is an infection caused by the rubella virus. This disease is often mild, with half of people not realizing that they are infected. A rash may start around two weeks after exposure and ...
virus and the
toxoplasmosis
Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic disease caused by ''Toxoplasma gondii'', an apicomplexan. Infections with toxoplasmosis are associated with a variety of neuropsychiatric and behavioral conditions. Occasionally, people may have a few weeks or months ...
parasite, maternal malnutrition, maternal emotional stress, and Rh factor blood incompatibility between mother and child.
There are many statistics which prove the effects of the aforementioned substances. A leading example of this would be that, in America alone, approximately 100,000-375,000 'cocaine babies' are born on an annual basis. This is a result of an expectant mother abusing the drug while pregnant. 'Cocaine babies' are proven to have quite severe and lasting difficulties which persist throughout infancy and right throughout childhood. The drug also encourages behavioural problems in the affected children and defects of various vital organs.
Infancy
From birth until the first year, the child is referred to as an
infant
An infant or baby is the very young offspring of human beings. ''Infant'' (from the Latin word ''infans'', meaning 'unable to speak' or 'speechless') is a formal or specialised synonym for the common term ''baby''. The terms may also be used to ...
, in this case an infant is typically defined as a young kid especially a child on the first years. Although they are normally grouped together as infants, each of the kids have their own way of doing and responding to things as they grow up, hence considered different.
Developmental psychologists vary widely in their assessment of infant psychology, and the influence the outside world has upon it.
The majority of a newborn infant's time is spent in sleep. At first, this sleep is evenly spread throughout the day and night, but after a couple of months, infants generally become
diurnal. In a human and rodent infant there is always the observation of a diurnal cortisol rhythm which is sometimes typically entrained with a maternal substance. Nevertheless the circadian rhythm stats to take shape, and a 24 hour rhythm is observed on the kid in just some few months after birth.
Infants can be seen to have six states, grouped into pairs:
* quiet sleep and active sleep (
dream
A dream is a succession of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that usually occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. Humans spend about two hours dreaming per night, and each dream lasts around 5 to 20 minutes, althou ...
ing, when
REM sleep occurs). Generally, there are various reasons as to why infants dream. People have different arguments, some argue that it is just a psychotherapy, which usually occur normally in the brain and other say that it is a form of processing and consolidating information that has been obtained during the day. Others argue that it is a way of representing unconscious desires.
* quiet waking, and active waking
* fussing and
crying
Crying is the dropping of tears (or welling of tears in the eyes) in response to an emotional state, or pain. Emotions that can lead to crying include sadness, anger, and even happiness. The act of crying has been defined as "a complex secr ...
. In a normal set up, infants have different reasons as to why they cry. Mostly, infants cry because they are uncomfortable or wet, they are unsettled, and they might be feeling hungry or are just crying to get pampered by their parents.
Infant perception
Infant perception is what a newborn can see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. These five features are considered as the "five senses". Because of these different senses, infants respond to stimuli differently.
*
Vision
Vision, Visions, or The Vision may refer to:
Perception Optical perception
* Visual perception, the sense of sight
* Visual system, the physical mechanism of eyesight
* Computer vision, a field dealing with how computers can be made to gain un ...
is significantly worse in infants than in older children. Infant sight tends to be blurry in early stages but improves over time. Color perception similar to that seen in adults has been demonstrated in infants as young as four months, using habituation methods.
Infants attain adult-like vision at about six months.
*
Hearing
Hearing, or auditory perception, is the ability to perceive sounds
In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid.
In human physiology and psycholog ...
is well-developed prior to birth, unlike vision. Newborns prefer complex sounds to pure tones, human speech to other sounds, mother's voice to other voices, and the native language to other languages. Scientist believe these features are probably learned in the womb.
Infants are fairly good at detecting the direction a sound comes from, and by 18 months their hearing ability is approximately equal to an adult's.
*
Smell and
taste
The gustatory system or sense of taste is the sensory system that is partially responsible for the perception of taste (flavor). Taste is the perception produced or stimulated when a substance in the mouth reacts chemically with taste receptor ...
are present, with infants showing different expressions of disgust or pleasure when presented with pleasant odors (honey, milk, etc.) or unpleasant odors (rotten egg) and tastes (e.g. sour taste). Newborns are born with odor and taste preferences acquired in the womb from the smell and taste of amniotic fluid, in turn influenced by what the mother eats. Both breast- and bottle-fed babies around three days old prefer the smell of human milk to that of formula, indicating an innate preference.
Older infants also prefer the smell of their mother to that of others.
*
Touch and feel is one of the better-developed senses at birth as it is one of the first senses to develop inside the womb. This is evidenced by the
primitive reflexes
Primitive reflexes are reflex actions originating in the central nervous system that are exhibited by normal infants, but not neurologically intact adults, in response to particular stimuli. These reflexes are suppressed by the development of the ...
described above, and the relatively advanced development of the
somatosensory cortex
In physiology, the somatosensory system is the network of neural structures in the brain and body that produce the perception of touch ( haptic perception), as well as temperature (thermoception), body position (proprioception), and pain. It i ...
.
*
Pain
Pain is a distressing feeling often caused by intense or damaging stimuli. The International Association for the Study of Pain defines pain as "an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with, or resembling that associated with, ...
: Infants feel pain similarly, if not more strongly than older children, but pain relief in infants has not received so much attention as an area of research.
Glucose is known to relieve pain in newborns.
Language
Babies are born with the ability to discriminate virtually all sounds of all human languages.
Infants of around six months can differentiate between
phoneme
In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language.
For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west o ...
s in their own language, but not between similar phonemes in another language. Notably, infants are able to differentiate between various durations and sound levels and can easily differentiate all the languages they have encountered, hence easy for infants to understand a certain language compared to an adult.
At this stage infants also start to
babble, whereby they start making vowel consonant sound as they try to understand the true meaning of language and copy whatever they are hearing in their surrounding producing their own phonemes.
Infant cognition: the Piagetian era
Piaget suggested that an infant's perception and understanding of the world depended on their motor development, which was required for the infant to link visual, tactile and motor representations of objects. According to this theory, infants develop
object permanence
Object permanence is the understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be sensed. This is a fundamental concept studied in the field of developmental psychology, the subfield of psychology that addresses the development of ...
through touching and handling objects. Infants also learn the understanding that objects are solid and permanent and continue to exist when out of sight.
Piaget's sensorimotor stage comprised six sub-stages (see
sensorimotor stages for more detail). In the early stages, development arises out of movements caused by
primitive reflexes
Primitive reflexes are reflex actions originating in the central nervous system that are exhibited by normal infants, but not neurologically intact adults, in response to particular stimuli. These reflexes are suppressed by the development of the ...
.
Discovery of new behaviors results from
classical and
operant conditioning
Operant conditioning, also called instrumental conditioning, is a learning process where behaviors are modified through the association of stimuli with reinforcement or punishment. In it, operants—behaviors that affect one's environment—are c ...
, and the formation of
habits
A habit (or wont as a humorous and formal term) is a routine of behavior that is repeated regularly and tends to occur subconsciously. .
From eight months the infant is able to uncover a hidden object but will persevere when the object is moved.
Piaget came to his conclusion that infants lacked a complete understanding of object permanence before 18 months after observing infants' failure before this age to look for an object where it was last seen. Instead, infants continue to look for an object where it was first seen, committing the "
A-not-B error
The A-not-B error is an incomplete or absent schema of object permanence, normally observed during the sensorimotor stage of Jean Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development.
A typical A-not-B task goes like this: An experimenter hides an attractive ...
". Some researchers have suggested that before the age of eight to nine months, infants' inability to understand object permanence extends to people, which explains why infants at this age do not cry when their mothers are gone ("Out of sight, out of mind").
Recent findings in infant cognition
In the 1980s and 1990s, researchers developed new methods of assessing infants' understanding of the world with far more precision and subtlety than Piaget was able to do in his time. Since then, many studies based on these methods suggest that young infants understand far more about the world than first thought.
Based on recent findings, some researchers (such as
Elizabeth Spelke
Elizabeth Shilin Spelke FBA (born May 28, 1949) is an American cognitive psychologist at the Department of Psychology of Harvard University and director of the Laboratory for Developmental Studies.
Starting in the 1980s, she carried out experi ...
and
Renee Baillargeon) have proposed that an understanding of object permanence is not learned at all, but rather comprises part of the innate cognitive capacities of our species.
Other research has suggested that young infants in their first six months of life may possess an understanding of numerous aspects of the world around them, including:
* an early
numerical cognition
Numerical cognition is a subdiscipline of cognitive science that studies the cognitive, developmental and neural bases of numbers and mathematics. As with many cognitive science endeavors, this is a highly interdisciplinary topic, and includes ...
, that is, an ability to represent number and even compute the outcomes of addition and subtraction operations;
* an ability to infer the goals of people in their environment;
* an ability to engage in simple causal reasoning.
Critical periods of development
There are
critical period
In developmental psychology and developmental biology, a critical period is a maturational stage in the lifespan of an organism during which the nervous system is especially sensitive to certain environmental stimuli. If, for some reason, the org ...
s in infancy and childhood during which development of certain perceptual, sensorimotor, social and language systems depends crucially on environmental stimulation.
Feral child
A feral child (also called wild child) is a young individual who has lived isolated from human contact from a very young age, with little or no experience of human care, social behavior, or language. The term is used to refer to children who h ...
ren such as
Genie
Jinn ( ar, , ') – also romanized as djinn or anglicized as genies (with the broader meaning of spirit or demon, depending on sources)
– are invisible creatures in early pre-Islamic Arabian religious systems and later in Islamic myt ...
, deprived of adequate stimulation, fail to acquire important skills and are unable to learn in later childhood. In this case, Genie is used to represent the case of a feral child because she was socially neglected and abused while she was just a young girl. She underwent abnormal child psychology which involved problems with her linguistics. This happened because she was neglected while she was very young with no one to care about her and had less human contact. The concept of critical periods is also well-established in
neurophysiology
Neurophysiology is a branch of physiology and neuroscience that studies nervous system function rather than nervous system architecture. This area aids in the diagnosis and monitoring of neurological diseases. Historically, it has been dominated b ...
, from the work of
Hubel and
Wiesel among others. Neurophysiology in infants generally provides correlating details that exists between neurophysiological details and clinical features and also focuses on vital information on rare and common neurological disorders that affect infants''.''
Developmental delays
Studies have been done to look at the differences in children who have developmental delays versus typical development. Normally when being compared to one another, mental age (MA) is not taken into consideration. There still may be differences in developmentally delayed (DD) children vs. typical development (TD) behavioral, emotional and other mental disorders. When compared to MA children there is a bigger difference between normal developmental behaviors overall. DDs can cause lower MA, so comparing DDs with TDs may not be as accurate. Pairing DDs specifically with TD children at similar MA can be more accurate. There are levels of behavioral differences that are considered as normal at certain ages. When evaluating DDs and MA in children, consider whether those with DDs have a larger amount of behavior that is not typical for their MA group. Developmental delays tend to contribute to other disorders or difficulties than their TD counterparts.
Toddlerhood
Infants shift between ages of one and two to a developmental stage known as toddlerhood. In this stage, an infant's transition into toddlerhood is highlighted through self-awareness, developing maturity in language use, and presence of memory and imagination.
During toddlerhood, babies begin learning how to walk, talk, and make decisions for themselves. An important characteristic of this age period is the
development of language, where children are learning how to communicate and express their emotions and desires through the use of vocal sounds, babbling, and eventually words.
Self-control also begins to develop. At this age, children take initiative to explore, experiment and learn from making mistakes. Caretakers who encourage toddlers to try new things and test their limits, help the child become autonomous, self-reliant, and confident.
If the caretaker is overprotective or disapproving of independent actions, the toddler may begin to doubt their abilities and feel ashamed of the desire for independence. The child's autonomic development is inhibited, leaving them less prepared to deal with the world in the future. Toddlers also begin to identify themselves in
gender role
A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...
s, acting according to their perception of what a man or woman should do.
Socially, the period of toddler-hood is commonly called the "terrible twos".
Toddlers often use their new-found language abilities to voice their desires, but are often misunderstood by parents due to their language skills just beginning to develop. A person at this stage testing their independence is another reason behind the stage's infamous label. Tantrums in a fit of frustration are also common.
Childhood
Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
divides childhood into four stages, each with its distinct social crisis:
:* Stage 1:
Infancy (0 to 1½) in which the psychosocial crisis is Trust vs. Mistrust
:* Stage 2: Early childhood (2½ to 3) in which the psychosocial crisis is Autonomy vs. Shame and doubt
:* Stage 3: Play age (3 to 5) in which the psychosocial crisis is Initiative vs. Guilt. (This stage is also called the "pre-school age", "exploratory age" and "toy age".)
:* Stage 4: School age (5 to 12) in which the psychosocial crisis is Industry vs. Inferiority
Play (or preschool) ages 3–5.
In the earliest years, children are "completely dependent on the care of others". Therefore, they develop a "social relationship" with their care givers and, later, with family members. During their preschool years (3-5), they "enlarge their social horizons" to include people outside the family.
Preoperational and then
operational
An operational definition specifies concrete, replicable procedures designed to represent a construct. In the words of American psychologist S.S. Stevens (1935), "An operation is the performance which we execute in order to make known a concept." F ...
thinking develops, which means actions are reversible, and egocentric thought diminishes.
The motor skills of preschoolers increase so they can do more things for themselves. They become more independent. No longer completely dependent on the care of others, the world of this age group expands. More people have a role in shaping their individual personalities. Preschoolers explore and question their world. For
Jean Piaget
Jean William Fritz Piaget (, , ; 9 August 1896 – 16 September 1980) was a Swiss psychologist known for his work on child development. Piaget's theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemolo ...
, the child is "''a little scientist'' exploring and reflecting on these explorations to increase competence" and this is done in "a very independent way".
Play is a major activity for ages 3–5. For Piaget, through play "a child reaches higher levels of cognitive development."
In their expanded world, children in the 3–5 age group attempt to find their own way. If this is done in a socially acceptable way, the child develops the initiative. If not, the child develops guilt. Children who develop "guilt" rather than "initiative" have failed Erikson's psychosocial crisis for the 3–5 age group.
Middle childhood ages 6–12.
For Erik Erikson, the psychosocial crisis during middle childhood is Industry vs. Inferiority which, if successfully met, instills a sense of Competency in the child.
In all cultures, middle childhood is a time for developing "skills that will be needed in their society."
School offers an arena in which children can gain a view of themselves as "industrious (and worthy)". They are "graded for their school work and often for their industry". They can also develop industry outside of school in sports, games, and doing volunteer work.
Children who achieve "success in school or games might develop a feeling of competence."
The "peril during this period is that feelings of inadequacy and inferiority will develop.
Parents and teachers can "undermine" a child's development by failing to recognize accomplishments or being overly critical of a child's efforts.
Children who are "encouraged and praised" develop a belief in their competence. Lack of encouragement or ability to excel lead to "feelings of inadequacy and inferiority".
The
Centers for Disease Control
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency, under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgi ...
(CDC) divides Middle Childhood into two stages, 6–8 years and 9–11 years, and gives "developmental milestones for each stage".
''Middle Childhood (7–10).''
Entering elementary school, children in this age group begin to thinks about the future and their "place in the world". Working with other students and wanting their friendship and acceptance become more important. This leads to "more independence from parents and family". As students, they develop the mental and verbal skills "to describe experiences and talk about thoughts and feelings". They become less self-centered and show "more concern for others".
''Middle Childhood (9–11).''
For children ages 9–11 "friendships and peer relationships" increase in strength, complexity, and importance. This results in greater "peer pressure". They grow even less dependent on their families and they are challenged academically. To meet this challenge, they increase their attention span and learn to see other points of view.
Adolescence
Adolescence is the period of life between the onset of puberty and the full commitment to an adult social role, such as worker, parent, and/or citizen. It is the period known for the formation of personal and social identity (see
Erik Erikson
Erik Homburger Erikson (born Erik Salomonsen; 15 June 1902 – 12 May 1994) was a German-American developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst known for his theory on psychological development of human beings. He coined the phrase identity cr ...
) and the discovery of moral purpose (see
William Damon
William Damon (born 1944 in Brockton, Massachusetts) is a psychologist who is a professor at Stanford University and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He is one of the world's leading scholars of human development. Dam ...
). Intelligence is demonstrated through the logical use of symbols related to abstract concepts and formal reasoning. A return to
egocentric
Egocentrism is the inability to differentiate between self and other. More specifically, it is the inability to accurately assume or understand any perspective other than one's own.
Egocentrism is found across the life span: in infancy, early chi ...
thought often occurs early in the period. Only 35% develop the capacity to reason formally during adolescence or adulthood. (Huitt, W. and Hummel, J. January 1998)
It is divided into three parts, namely:
# Early Adolescence: 9 to 13 years
# Mid Adolescence: 13 to 15 years and
# Late Adolescence: 15 to 18 years
The adolescent unconsciously explores questions such as "Who am I? Who do I want to be?" Like toddlers, adolescents must explore, test limits, become
autonomous
In developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy, autonomy, from , ''autonomos'', from αὐτο- ''auto-'' "self" and νόμος ''nomos'', "law", hence when combined understood to mean "one who gives oneself one's ow ...
, and commit to an
identity
Identity may refer to:
* Identity document
* Identity (philosophy)
* Identity (social science)
* Identity (mathematics)
Arts and entertainment Film and television
* ''Identity'' (1987 film), an Iranian film
* ''Identity'' (2003 film), ...
, or
sense of self
In the psychology of self, one's self-concept (also called self-construction, self-identity, self-perspective or self-structure) is a collection of beliefs about oneself. Generally, self-concept embodies the answer to the question ''"Who am I? ...
. Different roles, behaviors and
ideologies
An ideology is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons, especially those held for reasons that are not purely epistemic, in which "practical elements are as prominent as theoretical ones." Formerly applied pri ...
must be tried out to select an identity. Role confusion and inability to choose vocation can result from a failure to achieve a sense of identity through, for example, friends.
Early adulthood
Early adulthood generally refers to the period between ages 18 to 29, and according to theorists such as Erik Erikson, is a stage where development is mainly focused on
maintaining relationships. Examples include creating bond of intimacy, sustaining friendships, and starting a family. Some theorists state that development of intimacy skills rely on the resolution of previous developmental stages. A sense of identity gained in the previous stages is also necessary for intimacy to develop. If this skill is not learned the alternative is alienation, isolation, a fear of commitment, and the inability to depend on others.
A related framework for studying this part of the lifespan is that of
emerging adulthood
Emerging adulthood refers to a phase of the life span between late adolescence and early adulthood, as initially proposed by Jeffrey Arnett in a 2000 article from the ''American Psychologist''. It primarily describes people living in developed co ...
. Scholars of emerging adulthood, such as Jeffrey Arnett, are not necessarily interested in relationship development. Instead, this concept suggests that people transition after their teenage years into a period not characterized as relationship building and an overall sense of constancy with life, but with years of living with parents, phases of self-discovery, and experimentation.
Middle adulthood
Middle adulthood generally refers to the period between ages 29 to 59. During this period, middle-aged adults experience a conflict between generativity and stagnation. They may either feel a sense of contributing to society, the next generation, or their immediate community; or develop a sense of purposelessness.
Physically, the middle-aged experience a decline in muscular strength, reaction time, sensory keenness, and cardiac output. Also, women experience
menopause
Menopause, also known as the climacteric, is the time in women's lives when menstrual periods stop permanently, and they are no longer able to bear children. Menopause usually occurs between the age of 47 and 54. Medical professionals often ...
at an average age of 48.8 and a sharp drop in the hormone
estrogen
Estrogen or oestrogen is a category of sex hormone responsible for the development and regulation of the female reproductive system and secondary sex characteristics. There are three major endogenous estrogens that have estrogenic hormonal acti ...
. Men experience an equivalent endocrine system event to menopause.
Andropause in males is a hormone fluctuation with physical and psychological effects that can be similar to those seen in menopausal females. As men age lowered testosterone levels can contribute to mood swings and a decline in
sperm
Sperm is the male reproductive cell, or gamete, in anisogamous forms of sexual reproduction (forms in which there is a larger, female reproductive cell and a smaller, male one). Animals produce motile sperm with a tail known as a flagellum, whi ...
count. Sexual responsiveness can also be affected, including delays in
erection and longer periods of
penile stimulation required to achieve
ejaculation
Ejaculation is the discharge of semen (the ''ejaculate''; normally containing sperm) from the male reproductory tract as a result of an orgasm. It is the final stage and natural objective of male sexual stimulation, and an essential componen ...
.
The important influence of biological and social changes experienced by women and men in middle adulthood is reflected in that fact that depression is highest at age 48.5 around the world.
Old age
The
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of h ...
finds "no general agreement on the age at which a person becomes old." Most
"developed countries" set the age as 60 or 65. However, in
developing countries
A developing country is a sovereign state with a lesser developed industrial base and a lower Human Development Index (HDI) relative to other countries. However, this definition is not universally agreed upon. There is also no clear agreem ...
inability to make "active contribution" to society, not chronological age, marks the beginning of old age. According to
Erikson's stages of psychosocial development, old age is the stage in which individuals assess the quality of their lives. In reflecting on their lives, people in this age group develop a feeling of integrity if deciding that their lives were successful or a feeling of despair if evaluation of one's life indicates a failure to achieve goals.
Physically, older people experience a decline in muscular strength, reaction time, stamina, hearing, distance perception, and the sense of smell.
They also are more susceptible to diseases such as cancer and pneumonia due to a weakened immune system. Programs aimed at balance, muscle strength, and mobility have been shown to reduce disability among mildly (but not more severely) disabled elderly.
Sexual expression depends in large part upon the emotional and physical health of the individual. Many older adults continue to be sexually active and satisfied with their sexual activity.
Mental
disintegration may also occur, leading to
dementia
Dementia is a disorder which manifests as a set of related symptoms, which usually surfaces when the brain is damaged by injury or disease. The symptoms involve progressive impairments in memory, thinking, and behavior, which negatively affe ...
or ailments such as
Alzheimer's disease
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...
. The average age of onset for dementia in males is 78.8 and 81.9 for women. It is generally believed that
crystallized intelligence
The concepts of fluid intelligence (''g''f) and crystallized intelligence (''g''c) were introduced in 1963 by the psychologist Raymond Cattell. According to Cattell's psychometrically-based theory, general intelligence (''g'') is subdivided into ' ...
increases up to old age, while
fluid intelligence
The concepts of fluid intelligence (''g''f) and crystallized intelligence (''g''c) were introduced in 1963 by the psychologist Raymond Cattell. According to Cattell's psychometrically-based theory, general intelligence (''g'') is subdivided into ' ...
decreases with age. Whether or not normal intelligence increases or decreases with age depends on the measure and study.
Longitudinal studies
A longitudinal study (or longitudinal survey, or panel study) is a research design that involves repeated observations of the same variables (e.g., people) over short or long periods of time (i.e., uses longitudinal data). It is often a type of obs ...
show that perceptual speed, inductive reasoning, and spatial orientation decline.
An article on adult cognitive development reports that
cross-sectional studies
In medical research, social science, and biology, a cross-sectional study (also known as a cross-sectional analysis, transverse study, prevalence study) is a type of observational study that analyzes data from a population, or a representative su ...
show that "some abilities remained stable into early old age".
Parenting
Parenting variables alone have typically accounted for 20 to 50 percent of the variance in child outcomes.
All parents have their own parenting styles. Parenting styles, according to Kimberly Kopko, are "based upon two aspects of parenting behavior; control and warmth. Parental control refers to the degree to which parents manage their children's behavior. Parental warmth refers to the degree to which parents are accepting and responsive to their children's behavior."
Parenting styles
The following
parenting styles
A parenting style is a psychological construct representing standard strategies that parents use in their child rearing. The quality of parenting can be more essential than the quantity of time spent with the child. For instance, the parent may be ...
have been described in the child development literature:
* Authoritative parenting is characterized as parents who have high parental warmth, responsiveness, and demandingness, but rate low in negativity and conflict.
These parents are assertive but not intrusive or overly restrictive.
This method of parenting is associated with more positive social and academic outcomes. The beneficial outcomes of authoritative parenting are not necessarily universal. Among African American adolescents, authoritative parenting is not associated with academic achievement without peer support for achievement.
Children who are raised by authoritative parents are "more likely to become independent, self-reliant, socially accepted, academically successful, and well-behaved. They are less likely to report depression and anxiety, and less likely to engage in antisocial behavior like delinquency and drug use."
* Authoritarian parenting is characterized by low levels of warmth and responsiveness with high levels of demandingness and firm control.
These parents focus on obedience and they monitor their children regularly.
In general, this style of parenting is associated with maladaptive outcomes. The outcomes are more harmful for middle-class boys than girls, preschool white girls than preschool black girls, and for white boys than Hispanic boys.
* Permissive parenting is characterized by high levels of responsiveness combined with low levels of demandingness.
These parents are lenient and do not necessarily require mature behavior.
They allow for a high degree of self-regulation and typically avoid confrontation.
Compared to children raised using the authoritative style, preschool girls raised in permissive families are less assertive.
Additionally, preschool children of both sexes are less cognitively competent than those children raised under authoritative parenting styles.
* Rejecting or neglectful parenting is the final category. This is characterized by low levels of demandingness and responsiveness. These parents are typically disengaged in their child's lives, lacking structure in their parenting styles and are unsupportive.
Children in this category are typically the least competent of all the categories.
Mother and father factors
Parenting roles in child development have typically focused on the role of the mother. Recent literature, however, has looked toward the father as having an important role in child development. Affirming a role for fathers, studies have shown that children as young as 15 months benefit significantly from substantial engagement with their father.
In particular, a study in the U.S. and New Zealand found the presence of the natural father was the most significant factor in reducing rates of early sexual activity and rates of teenage pregnancy in girls.
Furthermore, another argument is that neither a mother nor a father is actually essential in successful parenting, and that single parents as well as homosexual couples can support positive child outcomes.
According to this set of research, children need at least one consistently responsible adult with whom the child can have a positive emotional connection. Having more than one of these figures contributes to a higher likelihood of positive child outcomes.
Divorce
Another parental factor often debated in terms of its effects on child development is divorce. Divorce in itself is not a determining factor of negative child outcomes. In fact, the majority of children from divorcing families fall into the normal range on measures of psychological and cognitive functioning.
A number of mediating factors play a role in determining the effects divorce has on a child, for example, divorcing families with young children often face harsher consequences in terms of demographic, social, and economic changes than do families with older children.
Positive coparenting after divorce is part of a pattern associated with positive child coping, while hostile parenting behaviors lead to a destructive pattern leaving children at risk.
Additionally, direct parental relationship with the child also affects the development of a child after a divorce. Overall, protective factors facilitating positive child development after a divorce are maternal warmth, positive father-child relationship, and cooperation between parents.
See also
Journals
* Autism Research
* Child Development (journal), Child Development
* Development and Psychopathology
* Developmental Neuropsychology (journal), Developmental Neuropsychology
* Developmental Psychology (journal), Developmental Psychology
* Developmental Review
* Developmental Science
* Human Development (journal)
* Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology
* Journal of Adolescent Health
* Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
* Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry
* Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology
* Journal of Pediatric Psychology
* Journal of Research on Adolescence
* Journal of Youth and Adolescence
* Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
* Psychology and Aging (journal), Psychology and Aging
* Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
External links
*
The Society for Research in Child DevelopmentThe British Psychological Society, Developmental Psychology SectionDevelopmental Psychology lessons for teaching and learning developmental psychology
a web directory of developmental psychology organizations
Home Economics Archive: Research, Tradition, History (HEARTH)br />An e-book collection of over 1,000 books spanning 1850 to 1950, created by Cornell University'
Mann Library Includes several hundred works on human development, child raising, and family studies itemized in
specific bibliographyDevelopmental psychologySubject Area page at PLOS
{{Authority control
Developmental psychology,
Behavioural sciences