DEVELOPMENTAL

PSYCHOLOGY
Studies physical, cognitive and
social development throughout
the life span
Give your best estimate of the age (in months) at
which about 50 percent of children begin to:
1. Laugh 2 months
2. Pedal a tricycle 24 months
3. Sit without support 5-6 months
4. Feel ashamed 24 months
5. Walk unassisted 12 months
6. Stand on one foot for 10 seconds53 months (4.5 y)
7. Recognize and smile at caregivers 4-5 months
8. Kick a ball forward 20 months
9. Think about things that cannot be seen 24 months
10. Make two-word sentences 20-22 months
 THREE MAJOR ISSUES

Nature versus nurture

Continuity versus stages

Stability versus change

 THREE MAJOR ISSUES
Continuity and stages:
What parts of development are gradual and continuous and which
are changed abruptly in separate stages?
Debate – These stages reflect specific world views and adult life
progressing through fixed, predictable stages
 THREE MAJOR ISSUES

Stability and Change:

Which of our traits persist through life? How do we change as
we age?
We experience both stability and change in who we are
Temperament is stable
One study followed 1000 three year old New Zealanders
Those who were low in conscientiousness and self-control were more
vulnerable to ill health, substance abuse, arrest and single parenthood.

Social attitudes are more likely to change

 MATURATION
The development of the brain unfolds based
on genetic instructions, causing various bodily
and mental functions to occur in sequence—
e.g. standing before walking, babbling before
talking—this is called maturation.

Maturation sets the basic course of

development, while experience adjusts it.
INFANT CORTEX DEVELOPMENT
 HOW WE KNOW THE BEHAVIOR
IS DUE TO MATURATION?

Criteria:
1. universal
2. sequential
3. relatively uninfluenced by
experience
 MOTOR DEVELOPMENT
First, infants begin to roll over. Next, they
sit unsupported, crawl, and finally walk.
Experience has little effect on this sequence.
Renee Altier for Worth Publishers

Phototake Inc./ Alamy Images

Profimedia.CZ s.r.o./ Alamy

Jim Craigmyle/ Corbis
 TOILET TRAINING

• Bowel and bladder control are other examples of

behavior where experience has a limited impact
• Pleading or punishment are not going to produce
successful toileting before muscular and neuronal
maturation
 NATURE/NURTURE

• Maturation: A key nature concept

• Critical Period: A key nurture concept

A critical period is a specific time period

during development when a specific kind of
stimulation (or lack of stimulation) can have a
profound effect on later development
 STAGES OF PRENATAL
DEVELOPMENT
• conception (fertilization)
• zygote (0-2 wks)
• embryo (2-8 wks)
• rapid cell division; major organs present

• fetal period (9 wks-birth)

• further refining of organs, growth of the fetus,
fat accumulation, etc
CONCEPTION
…INTO A ZYGOTE
… AND THEN AN EMBRYO AND
INTO A FETUS

40 days 45 days 2 months 4 months

TERATOGENS: AGENTS HARMFUL
TO AN ORGANISM

• Drugs
• cigarettes; alcohol (FAS); cocaine; heroin;
marijuana

• Diseases
• Rubella and critical periods

• Zika virus
• microcephaly
 NEWBORN CAPABILITIES
• Reflexes
• Personality
• Easy, Difficult, Slow-to-Warm

• Preferences The face-like image was gazed at almost

twice as long as the other
• High contrast;
• movement;
• face-like objects;
• smell and sound of mom!
 NEWBORN CAPABILITIES

• Reflexes
• rooting; sucking; grasping; Babinski;
Moro; swimming; habituation
 REFLEXES
• Babinski (when present in a child older than
2 or an adult, it often indicates a brain or
nervous system disorder; Moro (clinging to
parent if lose balance); swimming;
 HABITUATION
• Habituation is a decrease in response to a stimulus after
repeated presentations
• A novel stimulus gets attention when it is first presented but
there is a weakening of response with repeated exposure
• Take the cat head vs dog head – after a series of cat images
infants looked longer at dog head
• Infants focus first on the face not the body
BABIES CAN LEARN AND RETAIN
INFORMATION

As young as three
months, infants
learn that kicking
moves a mobile.

That learning cane

be retained for a
month.

However, it is
context dependent.
 LOVE IN INFANT MONKEYS:
EXPERIMENTS IN ATTACHMENT
HARLOW’S STUDIES – 1950S

• Harry and Margaret Harlow

• Investigated prevalent notion that
children became attached because
parents fed them
• Accidental discovery
• Harlow’s Surrogate Mother
Experiments
• Monkeys preferred the comfortable
cloth mother, to the nourishing wire
mother
 EXPERIMENTS IN ATTACHMENT

Evidence of Attachment in Harlow’s Studies:

1. Contact comfort
2. Fear reduction
3. Secure base (for exploration)

Monkeys raised by
artificial mothers were
terror-stricken when
placed in strange
situations without their
surrogate mothers
SECURE ATTACHMENT IN
HUMANS
• Comes from
• Body Contact
• skin to skin is encourages for first
2 hours and as much as possible in
the first 24 hours
• Familiarity/Consistency
• Evidence of a critical period in
many animals (sensitive in humans)
 FAMILIARITY
• Critical Period for imprinting
• Imprinting: at 12 hours after birth, ducklings attach to objects that
move
SECURE ATTACHMENT IN
HUMANS
• Comes from
• Body Contact
• skin to skin is encourages for first
2 hours and as much as possible in
the first 24 hours
• Familiarity/Consistency
• Evidence of a critical period in
many animals (sensitive in humans)
• Responsive Parenting
 SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT:
ATTACHMENT IN INFANTS
• Secure Attachment:
• prefers contact with loved one
• can be soothed
• follows loved one
• cries when loved one leaves

Attachment is evidenced by:

Stranger Anxiety: infant is apprehensive when confronted by a
stranger (approx 6 mo. old).
Stranger anxiety is seen in all cultures (maturation?)
ATTACHMENT STYLES
• Mary Ainsworth and the strange situation
• 100 middle class Americans; 8 episodes 3 min each
• (1) Mother, baby, and experimenter (lasts less than one
minute)
• (2) Mother and baby alone
• (3) A stranger joins the mother and infant
• (4) Mother leaves baby and stranger alone
• (5) Mother returns and stranger leaves
• (6) Mother leaves; infant left completely alone
• (7) Stranger returns
• (8) Mother returns and stranger leaves.
 ATTACHMENT STYLES

• Secure Attachment –

• Insecure Avoidant –

• Insecure Ambivalent –
HTTPS://WWW.YOUTUBE.COM/
WATCH?V=PNFKAAOSPMK
 ATTACHMENT STYLES

• Secure Attachment –
• Play happily and explore the new environment in presence of attachment
figure; distressed when they leave and calmed by contact

• Insecure Avoidant –
• do not seek contact with the attachment figure when distressed…likely to
have a caregiver who is insensitive and rejecting of their needs (Ainsworth,
1979).

• Insecure Ambivalent –
• Does not develop any feelings of security from the attachment figure; have
difficulty moving away from the attachment figure to explore novel
surroundings. When distressed they are difficult to soothe and are not
comforted by interaction with the attachment figure; from an inconsistent
level of response to their needs from the primary caregiver
 CAN YOU STUMP ‘EM?

• With a partner, create a short scenario that reveals the

attachment between an individual and their primary caregiver
(or go boldly and stretch it beyond childhood)
• First step is to choose your character’s attachment style
• Then design a short scene that highlights the attachment
style
• Then write an explanation of how we see the attachment
style (your answer key)
• Then join with your previous group