Submitted by: Ragasa, Maria Ericka R.

Subject: Developmental Psychology

CONCEPTS
1. Maturation - is the ability to respond to the environment in an appropriate
manner.
2. Developmental - describes the growth of humans throughout the lifespan, from
conception to death.
3. Fixation - refers to a persistent focus of the ids pleasure-seeking energies on an
earlier stage of psychosexual development.
4. Developmental Delays - occurs when children have not reached these
milestones by the expected time period.
5. Critical Period - is the time in the early stage of a person's life when he/she
displays a lot of sensitivity to certain environment stimulants and thus develops in a
certain way due to the things experienced during that time.
6. Growth Spurt - the term that is sued to describe any period of accelerated
physical development, especially the pubescent growth spurt.
7. Prenatal Development - The process of growth and development within the
womb, in which a single-cell zygote (the cell formed by the combination of a sperm
and an egg) becomes an embryo, a fetus, and then a baby.
8. Prenatal defects - Birth defects are defined as abnormalities of structure,
function, or body metabolism that are present at birth.
a. Structural or metabolic defects are those in which a specific body part
is missing or formed incorrectly; metabolic birth defects are those in which there is
an inborn problem in body chemistry. The most common type of major structural
defects is heart defects, which affect 1 in 150 babies in the United States.
b. Defects caused by congenital infections result when a mother gets an
infection before or during the pregnancy. Infections that can cause birth defects
include rubella (German measles), cytomegalovirus (CMV), syphilis, toxoplasmosis,
Venezuelan equine encephalitis, parvovirus, and, rarely, chickenpox. None of these
affect 100% of babies whose mothers are infected during pregnancy.
9. Maternal Health - is the health of women during pregnancy, childbirth, and the
postpartum period.
10. Stages of Prenatal Development
a. The Germinal Stage - begins with conception, when the sperm and egg

cell unite in one of the two fallopian tubes. The fertilized egg, known as a zygote,
then moves toward the uterus, a journey that can take up to a week to complete.
Cell division begins approximately 24 to 36 hours after conception.
b. The Embryonic Stage - The mass of cells is now known as an embryo.
The beginning
of the third week after conception marks the start of the
embryonic period, a time when the mass of cells becomes a distinct human being.
The embryo begins to divide into three layers each of which will become an
important body system. Approximately 22 days after conception, the neural tube
forms. This tube will later develop into the central nervous system including the
spinal cord and brain.
c. The Fetal Stage - Once cell differentiation is mostly complete, the
embryo enters the next stage and becomes known as a fetus. This period of
develop begins during the ninth week and lasts until birth. The early body systems
and structures established in the embryonic stage continue to develop. The neural
tube develops into the brain and spinal cord and neurons form. Sex organs begin to
appear during
the third month of gestation. The fetus continues to grow in both
weight and length, although the majority of the physical growth occurs in the later
stages of pregnancy.