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Summary Experience Human Development Papalia - chapter
1-19
Ontwikkelingspsychologie (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen)
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Chapter 1: The study of Human Development
- Human development: scientific study of processes of change and stability throughout
the human life span
- Life-span development: concept of human development as a lifelong process, which can
be studied scientifically
- Physical development: growth of body and brain, including patterns of change in
sensory capacities, motor skills and health
- Cognitive development: pattern of change in mental abilities, such as learning,
attention, memory, language, thinking, reasoning and creativity
- Psychosocial development: pattern of change in emotions, personality and social
relationships
- Social construction: a concept or practice that may appear natural and obvious to those
who accept it, but that in reality is an invention of a particular culture or society.
See page 8/9 for periods of human development!!
- Maturation: unfolding of a natural sequence of physical and behavioral changes
- Nuclear family: two-generational kinship, economic and household unit consisting of
one or two parents and their biological children, adopted children or stepchildren.
- Extended family: multigenerational kinship network of parents, children and other
relatives, sometimes living together in an extended-family household.
- Socioeconomic status (SES): Combination of economic and social factors describing an
individual or family, including income, education and occupation
- Ethnic gloss: Overgeneralization about an ethnic or cultural group that obscures
differences within the group
- Normative: Characteristic of an event that occurs in a similar way for most people in a
group
- Historical generation: a group of people strongly influenced by a mayor historical event
during their formative period
- Cohort: a group of people born at about the same time
- Nonnormative: Characteristics of an unusual event that happens to a particular person
or a typical event that happens at an unusual time of life
- Imprinting: Instinctive form of learning in which, during a critical period in early
development, a young animal forms an attachment to the first moving object it sees,
usually the mother
- Critical period: Critical time when a given event or its absence has a specific impact on
development
- Plasticity: range of modifiability of performance
- Sensitive periods: times in development when a person is particularly open to certain
kinds of experiences
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Chapter 2: Theory and Research
- Mechanistic model: model that views human development as a series of predictable
responses to stimuli
- Organismic model: model that views human development as internally initiated by an
active organism and as occurring in a sequence of qualitatively different stages
- Psychoanalytic perspective: View of human development as shaped by unconscious
forces that motivate human behaviour
- Psychosexual development: In Freudian theory, an unvarying sequence of stages of
childhood personality development in which gratification shifts from the mouth to the
anus and then to the genitals
See page 28/29 for five perspectives on Human Development
- Psychosocial development: In Erikson’s eight-stage theory, the socially and culturally
influenced process of development of the ego, or self
See page 30 for stage-theories Freud/Erikson/Piaget
- Reciprocal determinism: Bandura’s term for bidirectional forces that affect
development
- Zone of proximal development (ZPD): Vygotsky’s term for the difference between what
a child can do alone and what the child can do with help
- Scaffolding: temporary support to help a child master a task
- Contextual perspective: view of human development that sees the individual as
inseparable from the social context
- Bio-ecological theory: Bronfenbrenner’s approach to understanding processes and
contexts of human development that identifies five levels of environmental influence
(page 36)
- Ethology: Study of distinctive adaptive behaviours of species of animals that have
evolved to increase survival of the species
- Sequential study: Study design that combines cross-sectional and longitudinal
techniques.
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Chapter 3: Forming a new life
- Autosomes: In humans, the 22 pairs of chromosomes not related to sexual expression
- Sex chromosomes: Pair of chromosomes that determines sex: XX in the normal human
female, XY in the normal human male
- Alleles: Two or more alternative forms of a gene that occupy the same position on
paired chromosomes and affect the same trait
- Homozygous: possessing two identical alleles for a trait
- Heterozygous: Possessing differing alleles for a trait
- Epigenesis: Mechanism that turns genes on or off and determines functions of body
cells
- Concordant: Term describing tendency of twins to share the same trait or disorder
- Reaction range: Potential variability, depending on environmental conditions, in the
expression of a hereditary trait
- Canalization: limitation on variance of expression of certain inherited characteristics
- Genotype-environmental interaction: The portion of phenotypic variation that results
from the reactions of genetically different individuals to similar environmental
conditions
- Genotype-environmental correlation: Tendency of certain genetic and environmental
influences to reinforce each other; may be passive, reactive (evocative) or active.
-Niche-picking: Tendency of a person, especially after early childhood, to seek out
environments compatible with his or her genotype
- Nonshared environmental effects: The unique environment in which each child grows
up, consisting of distinctive influences that affect one child differently than another
- Germinal Stage: first two weeks of prenatal development, characterized by rapid cell
division, blastocyst formation, and implantation in the wall of the uterus
- Embryonic Stage: Second stage of gestation (2 to 8 weeks), characterized by rapid
growth and development of major body systems and organs
- Fetal stage: Final stage of gestation (from 8weeks to birth), characterized by increased
differentiation of body parts and greatly enlarged body size
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Chapter 4: Birth and physics development during the first three years
- 20th century safer, antiseptic conditions for childbirth; reduced mortality
- ‘Labor’ is an apt term for the process of giving birth
Parturition (Entbindung): Process of uterine, cervical and other changes, usually lasting
about two weeks, preceding childbirth.
Stages of childbirth:
First stage (lasts 12 to 14hours): regular and increasingly frequent uterine contractions
cause the cervix to dilate or widen in preparation for delivery.
Second stage (lasts up to 1 or 2 hours): the contractions become stronger and closer
together. Baby’s head begins to move through the cervix into the vaginal canal. At the
end of this stage, the baby is born.
Third stage (lasts about 10 to 60minutes): The placenta and the remainder of the
umbilical cord are expelled from the mother.
Electronic fetal monitoring: Mechanical monitoring of fetal heartbeat during labor and
delivery.
Cesarean delivery (Kaiserschnitt): Delivery of a baby by surgical removal from the uterus.
Natural childbirth: method of childbirth that seeks to prevent pain by eliminating the
mother’s fear through education about the physiology of reproduction and training in
breathing and relaxation during delivery.
Prepared childbirth: method of childbirth that uses instruction, breathing exercises and
social support to induce controlled physical responses to uterine contractions and
reduce fear and pain.
- a woman may be given local (vaginal) anesthesia, also called a pedunal block, usually
during the second stage of labor or if forceps are used. Or she can receive an analgesic
(painkiller), which reduces the perception of pain by depressing the activity of the
central nervous system.
Neonatal period: first four weeks of life, a time of transition from intrauterine
dependency to independent existence.
- The place on the head where the bones of a neonate have not yet grown together – the
fontanels, or soft spots – are covered by a tough membrane.
- Almost all new babies are covered with vernix caseosa (“cheesy varnish”), an oil
protection against infection that dries within the first few days.
Anoxia: lack of oxygen, which may cause brain damage.
- During the first few days infants secrete meconium, a stringy, greenish-black waste
matter formed in the fetal intestinal tract.
Neonatal jaundice: condition in many newborn babies, caused by immaturity of liver and
evidenced by yellowish appearance. Can cause brain damage if not treated promptly.
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- One minute after delivery and then again five minutes after birth, most babies are
assessed using the Apgar scale (a standard measurement of a new-born’s condition; it
assessed appearance, pulse, grimace, activity and respiration.)
‘Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale’ (NBAS): neurological and behavioral
test to measure neonate’s responses to the environment.
- Most new babies sleep about 75% of their time – up to 18hours a day – but wake up
every 3 to 4 hours, day and night, for feeding.
- Newborns’ sleep alternates between quite (regular) and active (irregular) sleep. Active
sleep is probably the equivalent of the REM-sleep, which in adults is associated with
dreaming. Active sleep appears rhythmically in cycles of about 1 hour and accounts for
up to 50% of a new-born’s total sleep time. The amount of REM sleep declines to less
than 30% of daily sleep time by age 3 and continues to decrease steadily throughout life.
Complications of childbirth
Low birth weight: weight of less than 2500grams at birth because of prematurity or
being small-for-date.
Preterm (premature) infants: infants born before completing the 37th week of gestation.
Small-for-date infants: infants whose birth weight is less than that of 90% of babies of
the same gestational age, as a result of slow fetal growth.
Kangaroo care: method of skin-to-skin contact in which a newborn is laid face down
between the mother’s breasts for an hour or so at a time after birth.
- Although they are fragile and must be handled carefully, low-birth-weight babies who
are cuddled and held gain weight and are released from the hospital faster.
- The physical and psychological development of children who had suffered low birth
weight or other birth complications was seriously impaired only when the children grew
up in persistently poor environmental circumstances.
Protective factors: influences that reduce the impact of potentially negative influences
and tend to predict positive outcomes.
Post mature: a foetus not yet born as of 2 weeks after the due date or 42 weeks after the
mothers last menstrual period.
Stillbirth: death of a foetus at or after the 20th week of gestation.
Infant mortality rate: proportion of babies born alive who die within the 1st year.
Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS): sudden and unexplained death of an apparently
healthy infant (“crib death”).
- Nearly 10% of SIDS victims have mutations or variations in genes associated with
irregular heart rhythms.
- Discovery of defects in the brain stem of SIDS victims, which regulates breathing,
heartbeat, body temperature and arousal.
- Research strongly supports a relationship between SIDS and sleeping on the stomach.
- Doctors recommend that infants not sleep on soft surfaces such as pillows or sheepskin
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Early physical development
Cephalocaudal principle: principle that development proceeds in a head-to-tail
direction, that is, that upper parts of the body develop before lower parts of the trunk.
Proximodistal principle: principle that development proceeds from within to without,
that is, that parts of the body near the center develop before the extremities.
Nutrition
- Proper nutrition is essential to healthy growth. Feeding needs change rapidly during
the first three years of life.
- Breast milk can be called the ‘ultimate health food’ because it offers so many benefits to
babies – physical, cognitive and emotional.
The brain and reflex behavior
Central nervous system: brain and spinal cord
- The growth of the brain is a lifelong process fundamental to physical, cognitive and
emotional development.
- The brain at birth is only about one-fourth to one-third of its eventual adult volume. By
age 6 it is almost adult size, but specific parts of the brain continue to grow and develop
functionally into adulthood
- The brains growth occurs in fits and starts called brain growth spurts. Different parts of
the brain grow more rapidly at different times.
Lateralization: tendency of each of the brains hemispheres to have specialized functions.
Left hemisphere language and logical thinking
Right hemisphere visual and spatial functions
Neurons: nerve cells
Integration: process by which neurons coordinate the activities of muscle groups
Differentiation: process by which cells acquire specialized structures and functions
Cell death: in brain development, normal elimination of excess brain cells to achieve
more efficient functioning
Myelination: process of coating neural pathways with a fatty substance called myelin,
which enables faster communication between cells.
Reflex behaviors: automatic, involuntary, innate responses to stimulation
- Human infants have an estimated 27 major reflexes, many of which are present at birth
or soon after.
- Primitive reflexes such as sucking, rooting for the nipple and the Moro reflex are related
to instinctive needs for survival and protection or may support the early connection to
the caregiver.
- Postural reflexes: reactions to changes in position or balance
- Locomotive reflexes: resemble voluntary movements that do not appear until months
after the reflexes have disappeared (such as the walking and swimming reflexes)
Plasticity: modifiability or “molding” of the brain through experience
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Early sensory capacities
- Touch and pain
- Smell and Taste
- Hearing
- Sight
Systems of action: increasingly complex combinations of motor skills, which permit a
wider or more precise range of movement and more control of the environment.
Denver developmental screening test: screening test given to children 1 month to 6
years old to determine whether they are developing normally.
Gross motor skills: physical skills that involve the large muscles.
Fine motor skills: physical skills that involve the small muscles and eye-hand
coordination
Visual guidance: use of the eyes to guide movements of the hands or other parts of the
body.
Depth perception: ability to perceive objects and surfaces three-dimensionally
Haptic perception: ability to acquire information about properties of objects, such as
size, weight and texture, by handling them.
Ecological theory of perception: theory, which describes developing motor and
perceptual abilities as interdependent parts of a functional system that guides behaviour
in varying contexts.
Dynamic systems theory (DST): E. Thelen’s theory, which holds that motor development
is a dynamic process of active coordination of multiple systems within the infant in
relation to the environment.
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Chapter 5: Cognitive Development during the first three years
Intelligent behaviour: behaviour that is goal oriented and adaptive to circumstances and
conditions of life
Bayley Scales of infant and toddler development: standardized test of infants’ and
toddlers’ mental and motor development
Home Observation for measurement of the environment (HOME): instrument to
measure the influence of the home environment on children’s cognitive growth
Early intervention: systematic process of providing services to help family’s meet young
children’s developmental needs
See page 145 for Piaget’s sensorimotor stage of cognitive development
Sensorimotor stage: Piaget’s first stage in cognitive development, in which infants learn
through senses and motor activity
Circular reactions: Piaget’s term for processes by which an infant learns to reproduce
desired occurrences originally discovered by chance
Representational ability: Piaget’s term for capacity to store mental images or symbols of
objects and events
Invisible imitation: Imitation with parts of one’s body that one cannot see
Visible imitation: Imitation with parts of one’s body that one can see
Deferred imitation: Piaget’s term for reproduction of an observed behaviour after the
passage of time by calling up a stored symbol of it
Elicited imitation: Research method in which infants or toddlers are induced to imitate a
specific series of actions they have seen but not necessarily done before
Dual representation hypothesis: proposal that children under age 3 have difficulty
grasping spatial relationships because of the need to keep more than one mental
representation in mind at the same time
Habituation: Type of learning in which familiarity with a stimulus reduces, slows or
stops a response
Dishabituation: Increase in responsiveness after presentation of a new stimulus
Visual preference: Tendency of infants to spend more time looking at one sight than
another
Visual recognition memory: Ability to distinguish a familiar visual stimulus from an
unfamiliar one when shown both at the same time
Cross-modal transfer: Ability to use information gained by one sense to guide another
Violation-of-expectations: research method in which Dishabituation to a stimulus that
conflicts with experience is taken as evidence that an infant recognizes the new stimulus
as surprising
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Implicit memory: Unconscious recall, generally of habits and skills; sometimes called
procedural memory
Explicit memory: Intentional and conscious memory, generally of facts, names and
events
Working memory: Short-term storage of information being actively processed
Guided participation: Adult’s participation in a child’s activity that helps to structure it
and bring the child’s understanding of it closer to the adult’s.
Prelinguistic speech: Forerunner of linguistic speech; utterance of sounds that are not
words. Includes crying, cooing, babbling and accidental and deliberate imitation of
sounds without understanding their meaning
Holophrase: single word that conveys a complete thought
Telegraphic speech: early form of sentence use consisting of only a few essential words
Nativism: Theory that human beings have an inborn capacity for language acquisition
Language acquisition device (LAD): In Chomsky’s terminology, an inborn mechanism
that enables children to infer linguistic rules from the language they hear
Code mixing: Use of elements of two languages, sometimes in the same utterance, by
young children in households where both languages are spoken
Code switching: Changing one’s speech to match the situation, as in people who are
bilingual
Child-directed speech (CDS): Form of speech often used in talking to babies or toddlers;
includes slow, simplified speech, a high-pitched tone, exaggerated vowel sounds, short
words and sentences and much repetition (also called parentese or motherese)
Literacy: ability to read and write
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Chapter 6: Psychosocial development during the first three years
Social smiling: Beginning in the second month, newborn infants gaze at their parents
and smile at them, signalling positive participation in the relationship
Anticipatory smiling: Infant smiles at an object and then gazes at an adult while still
smiling
Social cognition: The ability to understand that others have mental states and to gauge
their feelings and actions
Goodness of fit: Appropriateness of environmental demands and constraints to a child’s
temperament
Gender typing: Socialization process by which children, at an early age, learn
appropriate gender roles
Basic trust v. basic mistrust: Erikson’s first stage in psychosocial development, in which
infants develop a sense of the reliability of people and objects
Secure attachment: Pattern in which an infant cries or protests when the primary
caregiver leaves and actively seeks out the caregiver on his or her return.
Avoidant attachment: Pattern in which an infant rarely cries when separated from the
primary caregiver and avoids contact on his or her return.
Ambivalent (resistant) attachment: Pattern in which an infant becomes anxious before
the primary caregiver leaves, is extremely upset during his or her absence and both
seeks and resists contact on his or her return.
Disorganized-disoriented attachment: Pattern in which an infant, after separation from
the primary caregiver, shows contradictory repetitious or misdirected behaviors on his
or her return
Mutual regulation: Process by which infant and caregiver communicate emotional states
to each other and respond appropriately
Social referencing: Understanding an ambiguous situation by seeking another person’s
perception of it
Executive functioning: A set of mental processes that control and regulate other
behaviors
Conscience: Internal standards of behavior, which usually control one’s conduct and
produce emotional discomfort when violated
Committed compliance: Kochanska’s term for wholehearted obedience of a parent’s
orders without reminders or lapses
Situational compliance: Kochanska’s term for obedience of a parent’s order only in the
presence of signs of on-going parental control
Receptive cooperation: Kochanska’s term for eager willingness to cooperate
harmoniously with a parent in daily interaction, including routines, chores, hygiene and
play
Nonorganic failure to thrive: slowed or arrested physical growth with no known medical
cause, accompanied by poor developmental and emotional functioning
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Chapter 7: Physical and cognitive development in early childhood
Gross motor skills: physical skills that involve the large muscles
Fine motor skills: physical skills that involve the small muscles and eye-hand
coordination
System of action: increasingly complex combinations of skills, which permit a wider or
more precise range of movement and more control of the environment
Handedness: preference for using a particular hand
Preoperational stage: In Piaget’s theory, the second major stage of cognitive
development, in which symbolic thought expands but children cannot yet use logic.
Symbolic function: Piaget’s term for ability to use mental representations (words,
numbers or images) to which a child has attached meaning
Transduction: Piaget’s term for a preoperational child to mentally link particular
phenomena, whether or not there is logically a causal relationship
Animism: tendency to attribute life to objects that are not alive
Centration: In Piaget’s theory, the tendency of preoperational children to focus on one
aspect of a situation and neglect the others.
Decenter: In Piaget’s terminology, to think simultaneously about several aspects of a
situation
Egocentrism: Piaget’s term for inability to consider another person’s point of view; a
characteristic of young children’s thought.
Conservation: Piaget’s term for awareness that two objects that are equal according to a
certain measure remain equal in the face of perceptual alteration so long as nothing has
been added to or taken away from either object.
Irreversibility: Piaget’s term for a preoperational child’s failure to understand that an
operation can go in two or more directions.
Encoding: Process by which information is prepared for long-term storage and later
retrieval
Storage: Retention of information in memory for future use
Retrieval: Process by which information is accessed or recalled from memory storage
Sensory memory: Initial, brief, temporary storage of sensory information
Working memory: Short-term storage of information being actively processed
Executive functioning: Conscious control of thoughts, emotions and actions to
accomplish goals or solve problems
Central executive: In Baddeley’s model, element of working memory that controls the
processing of information
Generic memory: memory that produces scripts of familiar routines to guide behavior
Script: General remembered outline of a familiar, repeated event, used to guide behavior
Episodic memory: Long-term memory of specific experiences or events, linked to time
and place.
Autobiographical memory: memory of specific events in one’s life
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Social interaction model: Model, based on Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory, which
proposes that children construct autobiographical memories through conversation with
adults about shared events.
Zone of proximal development (ZPD): Vygotsky’s term for the difference between what a
child can do alone and what the child can do with help.
Scaffolding: temporary support to help a child master a task
Fast mapping: process by which a child absorbs the meaning of a new word after
hearing it once or twice in conversation
Pragmatics: the practical knowledge needed to use language for communicative
purposes.
Social speech: Speech intended to be understood by a listener
Private speech: Talking aloud to oneself with no intent to communicate with others
Emergent literacy: Pre-schoolers’ development of skills, knowledge and attitudes that
underlie reading and writing
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Chapter 8: Psychosocial development in early childhood
Self-concept: Sense of self; descriptive and evaluative mental picture of one’s abilities
and traits.
Self-definition: Cluster of characteristics used to describe oneself
Single representations: In neo-Piagetian terminology, first stage in development of selfdefinition, in which children describe themselves in terms of individual, unconnected
characteristics and in all-or-nothing terms.
Real self: The self one actually is
Ideal self: The self one would like to be
Representational mapping: In neo-Piagetian terminology, second stage in development
of self-definition, in which a child makes logical connections between aspects of the self
but still sees these characteristics in all-or-nothing terms
Self-esteem: the judgement a person makes about his or her self-worth
Initiative vs. guilt: Erikson’s third stage in psychosocial development, in which children
balance the urge to pursue goals with reservations about doing so.
Gender identity: Awareness, developed in early childhood, that one is male or female.
Gender roles: Behaviors, interests, attitudes, skills and traits that a culture considers
appropriate for each sex; differ for males and females.
Gender typing: Socialization process whereby children, at an early age, learn
appropriate gender roles.
Gender stereotypes: Preconceived generalizations about male or female role behavior.
Theory of sexual selection: Darwin’s theory that gender roles developed in response to
men’s and women’s differing reproductive needs.
Identifications: In Freudian theory, the process by which a young child adopts
characteristics, beliefs, attitudes, values and behaviors of the parent of the same sex.
Gender constancy: Awareness that one will always be male or female; also called sexcategory constancy.
Gender-schema theory: Theory, proposed by Bem, that children socialize themselves in
their gender roles by developing a mentally organized network of information about
what it means to be male or female in a particular culture.
Social-cognitive theory: Albert Bandura’s expansion of social learning theory; holds that
children learn gender roles through socialization.
Functional play: Play involving repetitive large muscular movements.
Constructive play: Play involving use of objects or materials to make something.
Dramatic play: Play involving imaginary people or situations; also called pretend-,
fantasy- or imaginative play.
Formal games with rules: organized games with known procedures and penalties
Gender segregation: Tendency to select playmates of one’s own gender
Corporal punishment: Use of physical force with the intention of causing pain but not
injury so as to correct or control behavior.
Inductive techniques: disciplinary techniques designed to induce desirable behavior by
appealing to a child’s sense of reason and fairness.
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Power assertion: disciplinary strategy designed to discourage undesirable behavior
through physical or verbal enforcement of parental control.
Withdrawal of love: Disciplinary strategy that involves ignoring, isolating or showing
dislike for a child.
Authoritarian parenting: In Baumrind’s terminology, parenting style emphasizing
control and obedience.
Permissive parenting: In Baumrind’s terminology, parenting style emphasizing selfexpression and self-regulation.
Authoritative parenting: In Baumrind’s terminology, parenting style blending respect for
a child’s individuality with an effort to instill social values.
Instrumental aggression: Aggressive behavior used as a means of achieving a goal.
Overt (direct) aggression: Aggression that is openly directed at its target.
Relational (social or indirect) aggression: Aggression aimed at damaging or interfering
with another person’s relationships, reputation or psychological well-being.
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Chapter 9: physical and cognitive development in middle childhood
Rough-and-tumble play: vigorous play involving wrestling, hitting and chasing, often
accompanied by laughing and screaming.
Body image: descriptive and evaluative beliefs about one’s appearance
Hypertension: chronically high blood pressure
Acute medical conditions: Illnesses that last a short time
Chronic medical conditions: Illnesses or impairments that persist for at least 3 month
Concrete operations: Third stage of Piagetian cognitive development (approximately
ages 7 to 12), during which children develop logical but not abstract thinking.
Seriation: Ability to order items along a dimension.
Transitive inference: Understanding the relationship between two objects by knowing
the relationship of each to a third object.
Class inclusion: Understanding of the relationship between a whole and its parts.
Inductive reasoning: Type of logical reasoning that moves from particular observations
about members of a class to a general conclusion about that class.
Deductive reasoning: Type of logical reasoning that moves from a general premise about
a class to a conclusion about a particular member or members of the class.
Executive functioning: Conscious control of thoughts, emotions and actions to
accomplish goals or solve problems.
Meta-memory: Understanding of processes of memory.
Mnemonic strategies: Techniques to aid memory.
External memory aids: Mnemonic strategies using something outside the person
Rehearsal: Mnemonic strategy to keep an item in working memory through conscious
repetition.
Organization: mnemonic strategy of categorizing material to be remembered.
Elaboration: Mnemonic strategy of making mental associations involving items to be
remembered.
Cultural bias: tendency of intelligence tests to include items calling for knowledge or
skills or more familiar or meaningful to some cultural groups than to others.
Culture-free tests: Intelligence tests that, if they were possible to design, would have no
culturally linked content.
Culture-fair tests: Intelligence tests that deal with experiences common to various
cultures, in an attempt to avoid cultural bias.
Culture-relevant tests: Intelligence tests that would draw on and adjust for culturally
related content.
Theory of multiple intelligences: Gardner’s theory that each person has several distinct
forms of intelligence.
Triarchic theory of intelligence: Sternberg’s theory describing three elements of
intelligence: componential, experiential and contextual.
Componential element: Sternberg’s term for the analytic aspect of intelligence.
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Experiential element: Sternberg’s term for the insightful or creative aspect of
intelligence.
Contextual element: Sternberg’s term for the practical aspect of intelligence.
Tacit knowledge: Sternberg’s term for the practical aspect of intelligence (know-how)
Sternberg Triarchic Abilities Test (STAT): Test that seeks to measure componential,
experiential and contextual intelligence.
Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC-II): Nontraditional individual
intelligence test designed to provide fair assessments of minority children and children
with disabilities.
Dynamic tests: Tests based on Vygotsky’s theory that emphasize potential rather than
past learning.
Pragmatics: Set of linguistic rules that govern the use of language for communication.
English-immersion approach: Approach to teaching English as a second language in
which instruction is presented only in English.
Bilingual education: system of teaching non-English-speaking children in their native
language while they learn English, and later switching to all-English instruction.
Bilingual: Fluent in two languages
Two-way (dual-language) learning: Approach to second-language education in which
English speakers and non-English-speakers learn together in their own and each other’s
languages.
Decoding: process of phonetic analysis by which a printed word is converted to spoken
form before retrieval from long-term memory.
Visually based retrieval: Process of retrieving the sound of a printed word when seeing
the word as a whole.
Phonetic (code-emphasis) approach: Approach to teaching reading that emphasizes
decoding of unfamiliar words.
Whole-language approach: Approach to teaching reading that emphasizes visual
retrieval and use of contextual clues.
Metacognition: Awareness of a person’s own mental processes.
Social capital: Family and community resources on which a person can draw.
Intellectual disability: significantly subnormal cognitive functioning. Also referred to as
cognitive disability or mental retardation.
Dyslexia: Developmental disorder in which reading achievement is substantially lower
than predicted by IG or age.
Learning disabilities (LDs): Disorders that interfere with specific aspects of learning and
school achievement.
Convergent thinking: Thinking aimed at finding the one right answer to a problem.
Divergent thinking: Thinking that produces a variety of fresh, diverse possibilities.
Enrichment programs: Programs for educating the gifted that broaden and deepen
knowledge and skills through extra activities, projects, field trips or mentoring.
Acceleration programs: Programs for educating the gifted that move them through the
curriculum at an unusually rapid pace.
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Chapter 10: Psychosocial development in middle childhood
Representational systems: In neo-Piagetian terminology, the third stage in development
of self-definition, characterized by breadth, balance and the integration and assessment
of various aspects of the self.
Industry vs. inferiority: Erikson’s fourth stage of psychosocial development, in which
children must learn the productive skills their culture requires or else face feelings of
inferiority.
Internalizing behaviors: Behaviors by which emotional problems are turned inward; for
example, anxiety or depression.
Externalizing behaviors: Behaviors by which a child acts out emotional difficulties; for
example, aggression or hostility.
Coregulation: Transitional stage in the control of behavior in which parents exercise
general supervision and children exercise moment-to-moment self-regulation.
Hostile attribution bias: tendency to perceive others as trying to hurt one and to strike
out in retaliation or self-defence.
Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD): Pattern of behavior, persisting into middle
childhood, marked by negativity, hostility and defiance.
Conduct disorder (CD): Repetitive, persistent pattern of aggressive, antisocial behavior
violating societal norms or the rights of others.
School phobia: unrealistic fear of going to school.
Separation anxiety disorder: Condition involving excessive, prolonged anxiety
concerning separation from home or from people to whom a person is attached.
Social phobia: extreme fear and/or avoidance of social situations.
Generalized anxiety disorder: anxiety not focused on any single target.
Childhood depression: mood disorder characterized by such symptoms as a prolonged
sense of friendlessness, inability to have fun or concentrate, fatigue, extreme activity or
apathy, feelings of worthlessness, weight change, physical complaints and thoughts of
death or suicide.
Art therapy: Therapeutic approach that allows a person to express troubled feelings
without words, using a variety of art materials and media.
Play therapy: Therapeutic approach that uses play to help a child cope with emotional
distress.
Drug therapy: Administration of drugs to treat emotional disorders.
Resilient children: Children who weather adverse circumstances, function well despite
challenges or threats, or bounce back from traumatic events.
Protective factors: Influences that reduce the impact of early stress and tend to predict
positive outcomes.
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Chapter 11: Physical and cognitive development in adolescence
Primary sex characteristics: organs directly related to reproduction, which enlarge and
mature during adolescence.
Secondary sex characteristics: Physiological signs of sexual maturation (such as breast
development and growth of body hair) that do not involve the sex organs.
Adolescence growth spurt: Sharp increase in height and weight that precedes sexual
maturity.
Spermarche: Boy’s first ejaculation.
Menarche: Girl’s first menstruation.
Secular trend: Trend that can be seen only by observing several generations, such as the
trend toward earlier attainment of adult height and sexual maturity, which began a
century ago in some countries.
Formal operations: Piaget’s final stage of cognitive development, characterized by the
ability to think abstractly.
Hypothetical-deductive reasoning: Ability, believed by Piaget, to accompany the stage of
formal operations, to develop, consider and test hypotheses.
Declarative knowledge: Acquired factual knowledge stored in long-term memory.
Procedural knowledge: Acquired skills stored in long-term memory.
Conceptual knowledge: Acquired interpretive understandings stored in long-term
memory.
Preconventional morality: First level of Kohlberg’s theory of moral reasoning in which
control is external and rules are obeyed in order to gain rewards or avoid punishment or
out of self-interest.
Conventional morality (or: morality of conventional role conformity): Second level in
Kohlberg’s theory of moral reasoning in which standards of authority figures are
internalized.
Postconventional morality (or: morality of autonomous moral principles): Third level of
Kohlberg’s theory of moral reasoning, in which people follow internally held moral
principles and can decide among conflicting moral standards.
Active engagement: personal involvement in schooling, work, family or other activity.
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Chapter 12: Psychosocial development in adolescence
Identity: according to Erikson, a coherent conception of the self, made up of goals, values
and beliefs to which a person is solidly committed.
Identity vs. identity confusion: Erikson’s fifth stage of psychosocial development, in
which an adolescent seeks to develop a coherent sense of self, including the role she or
he is to play in society.
Identity statuses: Marcia’s term for states of ego development that depend on the
presence or absence of crisis and commitment.
Crisis: Marcia’s term for period of conscious decision-making related to identity
formation.
Commitment: Marcia’s term for personal investment in an occupation or system of
beliefs.
Identity achievement: Identity status, described by Marcia, that is characterized by
commitment to choices made following a crisis, a period spent in exploring alternatives.
Foreclosure: Identity status, described by Marcia, in which a person who has not spent
time considering alternatives (that is, has not been in crisis) is committed to other
people’s plans for his or her life.
Moratorium: Identity status, described by Marcia, in which a person is currently
considering alternatives (in crisis) and seems headed for commitment.
Identity diffusion: Identity status, described by Marcia that is characterized by absence
of commitment and lack of serious consideration of alternatives.
Cultural socialization: Parental practices that teach children about their racial/ethnic
heritage and promote cultural practices and cultural pride.
Individuation: Adolescents’ struggle for autonomy and personal identity.
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Chapter 13: Physical and cognitive development in emerging and young adulthood
Emerging adulthood: proposed transitional period between adolescence and adulthood
commonly found in industrialized countries.
Premenstrual syndrome (PMS): Disorder producing symptoms of physical discomfort
and emotional tension for up to 2weeks before a menstrual period.
Infertility: Inability to conceive a child after 12 month of sexual intercourse without the
use of birth control.
Reflective thinking: Type of logical thinking that becomes more prominent in adulthood,
involving continuous, active evaluation of information and beliefs in the light of evidence
and implications.
Postformal thought: Mature type of thinking that relies on subjective experience and
intuition as well as logic and allows room for ambiguity, uncertainty, inconsistency,
contradiction, imperfection and compromise.
Emotional intelligence (EI): Salovey and Mayer’s term for the ability to understand and
regulate emotions; an important component of effective, intelligent behavior.
Substantive complexity: Degree to which a person’s work requires thought and
independent judgement.
Spillover hypothesis: Hypothesis that there is a carryover of cognitive gains from work
to leisure that explains the positive relationship between activities in the quality of
intellectual functioning.
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Chapter 14: Psychosocial development in emerging and young adulthood
Recentering: Process that underlies the shift to an adult identity
Normative-stage models: Theoretical models that describe psychosocial development in
terms of a definite sequence of age-related changes.
Intimacy vs. isolation: Erikson’s sixth stage of psychosocial development, in which young
adults either form strong, long-lasting bonds with friends and romantic partners or face
a possible sense of isolation and self-absorption.
Life structure: In Levinson’s theory, the underlying pattern of a person’s life at a given
time, built on whatever aspects of life the person finds most important.
Developmental tasks: In normative-stage theories, typical challenges that need to be
mastered for successful adaptation to each stage of life.
Timing-of-events model: Theoretical model of personality development that describes
adult psychosocial development as a response to the expected or unexpected occurrence
and timing of important life events.
Normative life events: In the timing-of-events model, commonly expected life
experiences that occur at customary times.
Social clock: Set of cultural norms or expectations for the times of life when certain
important events, such as marriage, parenthood, entry into work and retirement, should
occur.
Trait models: Theoretical models of personality development that focus on mental,
emotional, temperamental and behavioral traits, or attributes.
Five-factor model: Theoretical model of personality based on the “Big 5” factors
underlying clusters of related personality traits: neuroticism, extraversion, openness to
experience, conscientiousness and agreeableness.
Typological approach: theoretical approach that identifies broad personality types or
styles.
Ego-resilience: Dynamic capacity to modify one’s level of ego-control in response to
environmental and contextual influences.
Ego-control: Self-control and the self-regulation of impulses.
Fictive kin: Friends who are considered and behave like family members.
Triangular theory of love: Sternberg’s theory that patterns of love hinge on the balance
among three elements: intimacy, passion and commitment.
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Chapter 15: Physical and cognitive development in middle adulthood
Presbyopia: Age-related, progressive loss of the eyes’ ability to focus on nearby objects
due to loss of elasticity in the lens.
Myopia: Near-sightedness.
Presbycusis: Age-related, gradual loss of hearing, which accelerates age 55, especially
with regard to sounds at higher frequencies.
Basal metabolism: Use of energy to maintain vital functions.
Vital capacity: Amount of air that can be drawn in with a deep breath and expelled.
Menopause: Cassation of menstruation and of ability to bear children.
Perimenopause: Period of several years during which a woman experiences
physiological changes of menopause; includes first year after end of menstruation (also
called climacteric).
Erectile dysfunction: Inability of a man to achieve or maintain an erect penis sufficient
for satisfactory sexual performance.
Osteoporosis: Condition in which the bones become thin and brittle as a result of rapid
calcium depletion.
Fluid intelligence: Type of intelligence, proposed by Horn and Cattell, that is applied to
novel problems and is relatively independent of educational and cultural influences.
Crystallized intelligence: Type of intelligence, proposed by Horn and Cattell, involving
the ability to remember and use learned information; it is largely dependent on
education and culture.
Encapsulation: In Hoyer’s terminology, progressive dedication of information
processing and fluid thinking to specific knowledge systems, making knowledge more
readily accessible.
Literacy: In an adult; ability to use printed and written information to function in
society, achieve goals and develop knowledge and potential.
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Chapter 16: Psychosocial development in middle adulthood
Individuation: Jung’s term for emergence of the true self through balancing or
integration of conflicting parts of the personality.
Generativity vs. stagnation: Erikson’s seventh stage of psychosocial development, in
which the middle-aged adults develops a concern with establishing, guiding and
influencing the next generation or else experiences stagnation (a sense in activity or
lifelessness),
Generativity: Erikson’s term for concern of mature adults for establishing, guiding and
influencing the next generation.
Interiority: Neugarten’s term for a concern with inner life (introversion or
introspection), which usually appears in middle age.
Midlife crisis: In some normative-crisis models, stressful life period precipitated by the
review and re-evaluation of one’s past, typically occurring in the early to middle forties.
Turning point: psychological transitions that involve significant change or
transformation in the perceived meaning, purpose or direction of a person’s life.
Midlife review: Introspective examination that often occurs in middle age, leading to
reappraisal and revision of values and priorities.
Ego-resiliency: The ability to adapt flexibly and resourcefully to potential sources of
stress.
Identity process theory (IPT): Whitbourne’s theory of identity development based on
processes of assimilation and accommodation.
Identity schemas: Accumulated perceptions of the self shaped by incoming information
from intimate relationships, work-related situations and community and other
experiences.
Identity assimilation: Whitbourne’s term for effort to form new experiences into an
existing self-concept.
Identity accommodation: Whitbourne’s term for adjusting the self-concept to fit new
experience.
Identity balance: Whitbourne’s term for a tendency to balance assimilation and
accommodation.
Gender crossover: Gutmann’s term for reversal of gender roles after the end of active
parenting.
Social convoy theory: Theory, proposed by Kahn and Antonucci, that people move
through life surrounded by concentric circles of intimate relationships on which they
rely for assistance, well-being and social support.
Socioemotional selectivity theory: Theory, proposed by Carstensen, that people select
social contacts on the basis of the changing relative importance of social interaction as a
source of information, as an aid in developing and maintaining a self-concept and as a
source of emotional well-being.
Marital capital: Financial and emotional benefits built up during a long-standing
marriage, which tend to hold a couple together.
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Empty nest: Transitional phase of parenting following the last child’s leaving the
parents’ home.
Resolving door syndrome: Tendency for young adults who have left home to return to
their parents’ household in times of financial, marital or other trouble.
Filial maturity: Stage of life, proposed by Marcoen and others, in which middle-aged
children, as the outcome of a filial crisis, learn to accept and meet their parents’ need to
depend on them.
Filial crisis: In Marcoen’s terminology, normative development of middle age, in which
adults learn to balance love and duty to their parents with autonomy within a two-way
relationship.
Sandwich generation: middle-aged adults squeezed by competing needs to raise or
launch children and to care for elderly parents.
Caregiver burnout: condition of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion affecting
adults who provide continuous care for sick or aged persons.
Kinship care: Care of children living with parents in the home of grandparents or other
relatives, with or without a change of legal custody.
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Chapter 17: Physical and cognitive development in late adulthood
Ageism: Prejudice or discrimination against a person (most commonly an older person)
based on age.
Primary ageing: Gradual, inevitable process of bodily deterioration throughout the life
span.
Secondary ageing: Aging processes that result from disease and bodily abuse and disuse
and are often preventable.
Activities of daily living (ADLs): Essential activities that support survival, such as eating,
dressing, bathing and getting around the house.
Functional age: Measure of a person’s ability to function effectively in his or her physical
and social environment in comparison with others of the same chronological age.
Gerontology: Study of the aged and the process of aging.
Geriatrics: Branch of medicine concerned with processes of aging and medical
conditions associated with old age.
Life expectancy: Age to which a person in a particular cohort is statistically likely to live
(given his or her current age and health status), on the basis of average longevity of a
population.
Longevity: Length of an individual’s life.
Life span: The longest period that members of a species can live.
Senescence: Period of the life span marked by declines in physical functioning usually
associated with aging; begins at different ages for different people.
Genetic-programming theories: Theories that explain biological aging as resulting from a
genetically determined developmental timetable.
Variable-rate theories: Theories that explain biological aging as a result of processes that
vary from person to person and are influenced by both the internal and the external
environment; sometimes called error theories.
Free radicals: Unstable, highly reactive atoms or molecules, formed during metabolism,
which can cause internal bodily damage.
Metabolism: Conversion of food and oxygen into energy.
Autoimmunity: Tendency of an aging body to mistake its own tissues for foreign
invaders and to attack and destroy them.
Survival curves: Curves, plotted on a graph, showing percentages of a population that
survive at each age level.
Hayflick limit: Genetically controlled limit, proposed by Hayflick, on the number of times
cells can divide in members of a species.
Reserve capacity: Ability of body organs and systems to put forth 4 to 10 times as much
effort as usual under acute stress; also called organ reserve.
Cataracts: Cloudy or opaque areas in lens of the eye, which cause blurred vision.
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Age-related macular degeneration: Condition in which the center of the retina gradually
loses its ability to discern fine details; leading cause of irreversible visual impairment in
older adults.
Glaucoma: Irreversible damage to the optic nerve caused by increased pressure in the
eye.
Dementia: Deterioration in cognitive and behavioral functioning due to physiological
causes.
Alzheimer’s disease: Progressive, irreversible, degenerative brain disorder
characterized by cognitive deterioration and loss of control of bodily functions, leading
to death.
Parkinson’s disease: Progressive, irreversible degenerative neurological disorder,
characterized by tremor, stiffness, slowed movement and unstable posture.
Neurofibrillary tangles: Twisted masses of protein fibers found in brains of persons with
Alzheimer’s disease.
Amyloid plaque: Waxy chunks of insoluble tissue found in brains of persons with
Alzheimer’s disease.
Cognitive reserve: Hypothesized fund of energy that may enable a deterioration brain to
continue to function normally.
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS): Intelligence test for adults that yields verbal
and performance scores as well as a combined score.
Sensory memory: Initial, brief, temporary storage of sensory information.
Working memory: Short-term storage of information being actively processed.
Episodic memory: Long-term memory of specific experiences or events, linked to time
and place.
Semantic memory: Long-term memory of general factual knowledge, social customs and
language.
Procedural memory: Long-term memory of motor skills, habits and ways of doing things,
which can be recalled without conscious effort; sometimes called implicit memory.
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Chapter 18: Psychosocial development in late adulthood
Ego integrity vs. despair: According to Erikson, the eighth and final stage of psychosocial
development, in which people in late adulthood either achieve a sense of integrity or the
self by accepting the lives they have lived and thus accept death, or yield to despair that
their lives cannot be relived.
Coping: Adaptive thinking or behavior aimed at reducing or relieving stress that arises
from harmful, threatening or challenging conditions.
Cognitive-appraisal model: Model of coping, proposed by Lazarus and Folkman, that
holds that, on the basis of continuous appraisal of their relationships with the
environment, people choose appropriate coping strategies to deal with situations that
tax their normal resources.
Problem-focused coping: In the Cognitive-appraisal model, coping strategy directed
toward eliminating, managing or improving a stressful situation.
Emotion-focused coping: In the cognitive-appraisal model, coping strategy directed
toward managing the emotional response to a stressful situation so as to lesson its
physical or psychological impact.
Ambiguous loss: A loss that is not clearly defined or does not bring closure.
Disengagement theory: Theory of aging, proposed by Cumming and Henry, that holds
that successful aging in characterized by mutual withdrawal of the older person and
society.
Activity theory: Theory of aging, proposed by Neugarten and others, that holds that in
order to age successfully a person must remain as active as possible.
Continuity theory: Theory of aging, described by Atchley, that holds that in order to age
successfully people must maintain a balance of continuity and change in both the
internal and external structures of their lives.
Selective optimization with compensation (SOC): Enhancing overall cognitive
functioning by using stronger abilities to compensate for those that have weakened.
Family-focused lifestyle: Pattern of retirement activity that revolves around family,
home and companions.
Balanced investment: Pattern of retirement activity allocated among family, work and
leisure.
Aging in place: Remaining in one’s own home, with or without assistance, in later life.
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Chapter 19: Dealing with death and bereavement
Thanatology: Study of death and dying.
Hospice care: Warm, personal, patient- and family-centered care for a person with a
terminal illness.
Palliative care: Care aimed at relieving pain and suffering and allowing the terminally ill
to die in peace, comfort and dignity. Also called comfort care.
Terminal drop: A frequently observed decline in cognitive abilities near the end of life.
Also called terminal decline.
Bereavement: Loss, due to death, of someone to whom one feels close and the process of
adjustment to the loss.
Grief: Emotional response experienced in the early phases of bereavement.
Grief work: Working out of psychological issues connected with grief.
Passive euthanasia: Deliberate withholding or discontinuation of life-prolonging
treatment of a terminally ill person in order to end suffering or allow death with dignity.
Active euthanasia: Deliberate action taken to shorten the life of a terminally ill person in
order to end suffering or to allow death with dignity; also called mercy killing.
Advanced directive (living will): Document specifying the type of care wanted by the
maker in the event of an incapacitating or terminal illness.
Durable power of attorney: Legal instrument that appoints an individual to make
decisions in the event of another person’s incapacitation.
Assisted suicide: Suicide in which a physician or someone else helps a person take his or
her own life.
Life review: Reminiscence about one’s life in order to see its significance.
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