When students have studied the material in the chapter, they will be able to answer the following:
•
Introduction
1. What are the basic characteristics of development?
2. What are your own assumptions about the nature of development and the factors that contribute to it?
3. How might an understanding of basic principles of development be useful to parents and teachers?
•
Basic developmental concepts
4. Explain and give examples of behavioral reorganization, normative development, and individual development.
•
A framework for understanding development
5. How do genetic potentials, developmental history, and environmental conditions interact to produce developmental changes?
6. Explain how Darwin's, Locke’s, and Rousseau’s views are relevant to child development.
•
Theoretical perspectives on development
7. Explain the major functions of scientific theories and how their validity can be tested.
8. Compare and contrast the major characteristics of the theories of human development discussed in this chapter (Piaget’s theory, information-processing theory, sociocultural theory, psychoanalytic theory, social learning theory, and adaptational theory).
•
Major issues in development
9. Explore the issues of gradual development vs. stages, early vs. current experience, and specificity vs. generality.
•
Research methods for studying development
10. Explain the differences between experiment and nonexperimental research techniques, and summarize the advantages and disadvantages of each.
11. Explain the research methods used to study behavior over time, and summarize the advantages and disadvantages of each.
1

Chapter 1
Note: Terms in bold print are chapter vocabulary words.
Introduction

Development is age-related change that is orderly , cumulative , and directional .

Three assumptions :
1. There are qualitative and quantitative changes.
2. Later abilities, behavior, and understanding emerge from earlier ones in systematic ways.
3. Individual development is coherent, reflecting continuity and change.
Basic Principles of Development

There is qualitative change as behavior undergoes reorganization to become increasingly more complex.

Normative development typical behavior for the average child.

Individual development individuals vary from the norm and there is continuity within each child’s individual developmental pathway over time.
Framework for Understanding Development

Three factors underlie development: genes, developmental history , and current environment .
There has been much historical debate about the relative role of these factors alone, and in combination.
 Darwin’s Theory of Evolution
1. Provided a framework for examination of gene-environment interaction.
2. Organisms exhibit adaptation to environmental circumstances to increase chances of survival in a particular environment.
3. This process occurs via natural selection where advantageous genetic traits are passed on to one’s progeny.
4. The theory created interest in child development as researchers questioned human evolution and survival via structural changes over time.

Philosophically, the naturenurture debate entailed two opposing views: Locke’s tabula rasa view where experience is the key to development and Jean Jacques Rousseau’s view that development unfolds naturally, normatively.

Present views incorporate an interaction between genes and environment. Researchers explore the relative combination of genes and environment to various traits and behaviors
(e.g., depression, intelligence, personality).
Theoretical Perspectives on Development

Theory a set of interrelated statements that serve as frameworks for interpretation of facts and findings, and for guiding scientific research.

A valid theory:
1. Is sensible and consistent.
2. Organizes, integrates, and makes sense of a body of research findings.
3. Must be testable.
2

The Nature of Development

Some theories focus on normative development while others focus on individual development

Cognition: Jean Piaget examined normative development of reasoning and thinking skills of infants and children. Skills progress through four qualitatively different stages. Children cannot understand the world and act appropriately upon it until they have the basic structures in place with each stage. His theory has been highly influential in developmental psychology and in education. The stages:
1. Sensorimotor (0 - 2 years): Infants are limited to the world of sensation and perception and motor activities until they are capable of mental representational capacities toward the end of this stage.
2. Preoperational (2½ - 7 years): Operations = logic, and preoperational = pre-logical.
Limitations in reasoning (e.g., egocentrism).
3. Concrete operations (7 - 12 years): Thinking becomes logical yet children cannot think abstractly.
4. Formal Operations (adolescence into adulthood): individual can engage in formal, logical, hypothetical-deductive reasoning.

Cognition: Information-Processing Theory
1. Computer metaphor is used.
2. Examines roles of attention, memory storage, memory retrieval, and knowledge base to explain changes in problem solving abilities with development. Quantitative change is emphasized.
3. Normative and individual development can be examined.

Cognition: Sociocultural Theory
1. Emphasizes the role played by social interaction and specific cultural practices in cognitive skill development. Qualitative change emphasized.
2. Major influence by Lev Vygotsky.
 Children regulate their own behavior via gradually internalizing directives they originally experienced in social interaction with adults.
 First they begin to produce directives via private speech .
 Ultimately they use inner speech to regulate their own behavior.
 Important concept: Zone of proximal development – gap between a particular child’s current performance and that child’s potential performance if given guidance by someone more skilled.

Social-Emotional: Psychoanalytic View of Sigmund Freud
1. Adult personality is formed from early experience where the structures of personality come to fore:
 Id – primitive drives and instincts; innate
 Ego – self; role is to find safe and appropriate expression of id drives
 Superego – the conscience; internalized parental rules and values
3

Chapter 1
2. There are five psychosexual stages of development (qualitative and sequential in nature): oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital.
3. At each stage, the child must receive appropriate gratification of the sensual pleasure for that stage’s bodily zone. Too little or too much gratification can result in fixation
(improper resolution of the major issues of the stage).
4. Highly influential theory although his developmental stages are no longer considered valid in application.

Social-Emotional: Erik Erikson
1. Psychoanalytic perspective emphasizing psychosocial development; relationships with others was important for personality development not gratification of bodily zone.
2. Are eight qualitatively distinct stages covering the lifespan where each stage has important issues (crises) to resolve. First five pertain to childhood: trust vs. mistrust, autonomy vs. shame and doubt, initiative vs. guilt, industry vs. inferiority, and identity vs. identity confusion.

Social-Emotional: Social Learning Theory
1. Associations made are often from modeling , leading to imitation of behaviors.
2. Learning is gradual and individual.

John Bowlby’s Adaptational Theory
Combines orientations involving evolution, psychoanalytic psychology, and cognition to explain the nature of early attachment relationships.

Why so many theories?
1. Different theories focus on different aspects of development.
2. We cannot have an all-encompassing theory of development with our present state of knowledge.
Major Issues in Development

Is development stage-like (qualitative) or gradual (quantitative) in nature? Both apply to development.

Are early experiences or current experiences more important?

Are developmental processes specific to knowledge or skill domains ( specificity ) or do they apply more generally to a broad range of abilities ( generality )?
Research Methods for Studying Development

Experiment – systematic manipulation of one or more factors in an effort to rule out all other influences on behavior except the ones being studied.
1. Most effect method for investigating a hypothesis – testable proposition about behavior.
2. Advantage: offer control over testing conditions to reduce variability.
3. Disadvantage: limited generalizability to everyday settings.
 Ecological Validity – degree to which findings inside of the laboratory can be applied to the outside world.


Caution should be used when examining cause and effect outcomes.
Many areas of interest to developmentalists are not ethically available for investigation.
4

The Nature of Development

Nonexperimental research – no manipulation of factors thought to control behavior
1. Natural Experiment – used when subjects cannot be assigned to groups; compare naturally occurring groups of people.
 Advantage: can study issues not appropriate for laboratory settings.
 Advantage: affords greater ecological validity.
 Disadvantage: limited control, no cause-effect outcomes can be determined.
2. Naturalistic Observation – observe behavior in everyday settings as it occurs naturally.
Long used in ethology .
 Advantage: affords greater ecological validity.
 Disadvantage: limited control, no cause-effect outcomes can be determined.
3. Survey Research – use of interviews or questionnaires to collect data; may use randomly selected individuals for inclusion in the study.
 Advantage: provides access to information that could not be gained by any other method.
 Advantage: can collect large amounts of data relatively quickly and cheaply.
 Disadvantage: provides information ab out people’s perceptions and recollections rather than direct access to events
 Disadvantage: social desirability effect could influence the responses.
•
Experimental and nonexperimental research can be combined.
•
Longitudinal study – study the same group of individuals over time.
1. Advantage: can be used to track individual developmental over time and to examine processes of development.
Prospective longitudinal studies – children are followed from early in life, before any developmental problems appear.
2. Disadvantage: expensive and time consuming.
3. Disadvantage: subject attrition can be problematic for data loss.
•
Cross-sectional study – groups of individuals of different ages are studied at the same time.
1. Advantage: conducted quickly and cheaply.
2. Disadvantage: limited in revelation of processes of development in general and individually.
3. Disadvantage: cohort effect can be problematic for interpretation of results.
•
Accelerated Longitudinal Design – combination of cross-sectional and longitudinal designs where several age groups can be followed over time simultaneously.
The Themes of This Book
•
Four themes recur throughout the textbook:
1. Development involves both change and logical connections between past and present.
2. There is an interplay between individual and normative development.
3. Both the timing of normative development and the pathway of individual development are influenced by context.
5

Chapter 1
4. Cognitive and social development are integrated processes.
Three Family Vignettes
The story of four children and three families (Williams, Gordon, Polonius) is presented before each major section and the characters of the vignettes are integrated into concept demonstrations throughout the chapters.
The following are lecture topic suggestions to complement Chapter 1 reading material.
Topic 1: Developmental Pathways
•
Theoretical Questions : What is the relation between normal development and developmental deviations that result in maladaptive behavior? Why does previous development place constraints on later developmental pathways?
•
Bowlby's model of developmental pathways and the metaphor of the branching tree (see the textbook) are useful for helping students understand the nature of development. It may be worthwhile to elaborate on the model in a lecture .
•
Background Literature:
1. Bowlby, J. (1982). Attachment and loss (2nd ed.). New York: Basic Books.
2. Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base . New York: Basic Books.
3. Waddington, C. H. (1957). The strategy of the genes . London: Allen and Unwin.
•
Theoretical Model : Background information is available at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/devel/kid-c/resources/1-top.htm
•
Discussion Questions: What does Bowlby's model of developmental pathways suggest about the malleability of individuals from infancy through adolescence? What are some examples of different developmental pathways within each of the following domains: physical, cognitive, social and emotional? Are there differences in malleability that are related to the domain of development in question? Do some domains have more potential developmental pathways than others?
Topic 2: Using Theories of Development to Explain Aggression
•
Theoretical Question: How does each theory presented in Chapter 1 explain children's aggression?
•
To help students understand the differences among the theories presented in Chapter 1, it may be helpful to apply each theory to another topic in child development, in much the same way that empathy was discussed in the textbook. Because aggression has been heavily researched from a variety of theoretical points of view, it is one logical candidate for such a lecture. A discussion of aggression provides a good opportunity to examine what type of development each theory is best equipped to explain (individual vs. normative) and what aspects of behavior each theory is most concerned with (reasoning about aggression, controlling aggressive impulses, imitating others' aggression, etc.).
•
Background Literature:
1. Baldwin, A. L. (1967). Theories of child development.
New York: John Wiley & Sons.
2. Miller, P. H. (1989). Theories of developmental psychology (2nd ed.). New York: Freeman.
6

The Nature of Development
•
Theoretical Perspectives : Background information is available at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/devel/kid-c/resources/1-top.htm
1. Piaget's theory
2. Freud’s theory
3. Information-processing theory
4. Social learning theory
5. Bowlby's adaptational theory
•
Discussion Questions: Many studies have reported finding higher levels of aggression among boys than among girls. How does each of the major developmental theories account for this gender difference?
Topic 3: Child Development in Historical Perspective
•
Historical Questions: What is the history of the scientific study of child development in the U.S?
What intellectual, political, and societal forces contributed to the development of the field of child psychology as we know it today? How has childrearing advice disseminated to parents changed?
•
Examining child psychology from a historical perspective helps both to define more clearly the unique characteristics of the scientific study of child development and to highlight the interaction between science and culture.
•
Background Literature:
1. Borstelmann, L. J. (1983). Children before psychology: Ideas about children from antiquity to the late 1800s. In P. H. Mussen (Ed.), Handbook of child psychology (4th ed.) Vol. 1, W. Kessen (Vol. ed.), History, theory, and methods . New York: Wiley.
2. Cairns, R. B. (1983). The emergence of developmental psychology. In P. H. Mussen (Ed.),
Handbook of child psychology (4th ed.) Vol. 1, W. Kessen (Vol. ed.), History, theory, and methods . New York: Wiley.
3. Cravens, H. (1993). Before Head Start: The Iowa Station and America's Children.
Chapel Hill,
NC: The University of North Carolina Press.
4. Elder, G. H., Jr., Modell, J., & Parke, R. D. (Eds.). (1993). Children in time and place:
Developmental and historical insights . New York: Cambridge University Press.
5. Kessen, W. (1979). The American child and other cultural inventions. American Psychologist , 34 ,
815-820.
6. Riegel, K. F. (1972). The influence of economic and political ideology upon the development of developmental psychology. Psychological Bulletin , 78 , 129-141.
7. Sears, R. R. (1975). Your ancients revisited: A history of child development. In E. M. Hetherington
(Ed.), Review of child development research , Vol. 5. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
8. Senn, M. J. R. (1978). Insights on the child development movement in the United States.
Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development , Serial No. 161.
9. Smuts, A. B., & Hagen, J. W. (Eds.) (1986). History and research in child development.
Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development , 50 , (Serial No. 211).
10. Stendler, C. B. (1950). Sixty years of child training practices. Journal of Pediatrics , 36 , 122-134.
11. Wallace, D. B. (1994). The observing eye: A century of baby diaries. Human Development , 37 , 1-
29.
7

Chapter 1
12. Wolfenstein, M. (1955). Fun morality: An analysis of recent American child-training literature. In
M. Mead & M. Wolfenstein (Eds.), Childhood in contemporary cultures (pp.168-178). Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
13. Young, K. T. (1990). American conceptions of infant development from 1955 to 1984: What the experts are telling parents. Child Development , 61 , 17-28.
•
Additional reading: In recognition of the centenary of the American Psychological Association,
American Psychologist and Developmental Psychology published a series of articles during 1992 about the history of the scientific study of children .
•
Historical Background: Background information is available at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/devel/kid-c/resources/1-top.htm
. The study of child development emerged out of two distinct sources: (1) external societal pressures, including the desire to better the health, rearing, education, and legal and occupational treatment of children and (2) intellectual and academic concerns.
•
Discussion Questions: Compared with its inception, is the field of child development more or less influenced by society and by advances in other sciences today? Looking through the current edition of this textbook, which topics appear to be most dependent on societal influences and the historical era in which we are living? Which topics are most likely to be retained unchanged in future editions and which are most likely to be greatly revised or even deleted?
Topic 4: Bias in Research
•
A lecture topic on Bias in Research could be compiled from the following: Items 9 and 10 exploring the impact of Zeitgeist on research and bias in naturalistic observation found at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/devel/kid-c/resources/4-activity/a-02.htm
. Additional bias discussion material can be obtained from item 5 at http://www.mhhe.com/socscience/devel/kidc/resources/1-lecture/l-02.htm
, which explores research on subjects’ biases in surveys as well as experiments. Further discussion could be addressed regarding the biases of culture and historic period of the various theorists presented in the chapter.
•
At the above listed Web site are additional Lecture Topic options available for this chapter:
1. The concept of stage in child psychology. (item 1)
2. Learning concepts applied. (item 2)
3. Observation in the work of Ethologists and Behaviorists. (item 3)
1. Why Study Children?: Ask your students why they believe it is important to study infants and children.
Have your students generate, in class, a list of why they think child psychology is important. Some of their responses should highlight the following: social policy concerns, educational application and reform, exploration of changes that occur relatively rapidly in infancy and childhood (development of gross and fine motor skills, for instance), exploration of behaviors that are difficult to examine in adulthood (e.g., language development), exploration of early experiences impacting later behaviors.
Have them related the study of child development to future careers as teachers or health care providers. How might research in child development inform these areas? Have students explore the following Web sites to see how research is “translated” into public policy, health care approaches, education, and parenting. Perhaps a critical thinking paper could follow from what students have gathered from these (and other) Web sitess.
 Kids Health http://www.kidshealth.org
. This site, from Nemours Foundation, offers extensive articles on childhood illness and health issues, and provides information to parents, children and
8

The Nature of Development even professionals. The articles are well written and annotated, covering issues from infancy to adolescence.
 "Investing in Our Children: What We Know and Don't Know About the Costs and Benefits of Early
Childhood Interventions" http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR898 . This site provides an independent cost-benefit analysis published by the Rand Corporation on the impact of early childhood intervention on child health and development, educational attainment, and economic well-being. Funded by the California Wellness Foundation.
 The National Parenting Center (TNPC) http://www.tnpc.com
. A large magazine format, with news on medical and behavioral issues in parenting. The site provides advice from a variety of experts in the field of child development. Chat rooms on specific topics are available, as well as a shopping area for related products.
 National Parent Information Network http://ericps.ed.uiuc.edu/npin/ . There is a great deal of annotated, categorized information, culled from the massive repository of ERIC, the federally funded Educational Resource Information Center. The NPIN offers news, book reviews, a
Parents AskERIC feature, discussions and so on. Emphasis is on professional as well as parental aspects of child development. It contains links to other parent resources.
2. Other Pioneers in Child Development: Students reg ularly ask, “What about women, what about people of color?” “Did they not contribute?” People that students are often interested in is Dr. Mamie
Phipps Clark and her husband Dr. Kenneth Clark, both of whom were African American. Mamie could not secure an academic position as an African America woman. Yet, this did not stop her from achieving an important place in history. She and Kenneth published several seminal papers on their research of racial identification and self-perception in African American preschoolers, which contributed to the Supreme Court decision to end racial segregation. The references are: Clark, K.B.,
& Clark, M.P. (1939). The development of consciousness of self in Negro pre-school children.
Archives of Psychology . Washington, D.C.: Howard University; Clark, K.B., & Clark, M.P. (1939). The development of consciousness of self and the emergence of racial identification in Negro preschool children. Journal of Social Psychology , 10 , 591-599; Clark, K.B., & Clark, M.P. (1939). Segregation as a factor in the racial identification of Negro pre-school children. Journal of Experimental Education, 8,
161-165; Clark, K.B., & Clark, M.P. (1940). Skin color as a factor in racial identification of Negro preschool children. Journal of Social Psychology, 11 , 159 –169; Clark, K.B., & Clark, M.P. (1947).
Racial identification and preference in Negro children. In T.M. Newcomb & E.L. Hartley (Eds.),
Reading in social psychology . New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Biographical information on Dr.
Phipps Clark is available at http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/mamiephippsclark.htm
. Both Mamie and Kenneth were featured in articles in American Psychologist, January 2002, Volume 57, Number
1. A biography of Kenneth B. Clark is available at http://www.frostburg.edu/dept/psyc/mbradley/ psyography/clark.html
. There is a great Web site with many links to biographies of women in psychology, http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/women.html
. Students should be directed to these Web sites. Perhaps students could work in groups to select a few of the persons listed at these sites, and present some highlights of their work and contributions to child psychology during a lecture period.
Also, students can reflect on the hurdles faced by these individuals by society and the educational systems of the day. This can lead to a discussion of Zeitgeist issues.
3. Developmental Psychology in the News: To demonstrate the depth and scope of developmental psychological research and theorizing, have students collect news stories from television, magazines, and newsprint that are relevant to issues of prenatal development, infancy, childhood, and adolescence. Most newspapers offer free on-line access to their stories. One Web site with a list of newspapers for every state is http://www.onlinenewspapers.com
. This project could take place over the course of one week, or perhaps even over the course of the semester, allowing students to compare the news stories to course content, noticing discrepancies and agreements.
4. Review Three Articles from a Developmental Journal: Students can follow the procedures below to
“research” a topic of interest in the field of developmental psychology. Results of this activity will provide an active learning experience that should support course material on how to conduct scientific research. Also, if the topic the student selects is covered in lecture material later in the course, the student might be able to contribute to class discussions on the topic.
9

Chapter 1
 Psychology-relevant databases will be used to identify three citations published in the last five years centering on a topic in developmental psychology. Papers selected should report results of an empirical study on a topic. Web resources should not be used for this task.
 This activity should be conducted in conjunction with class/lecture material on the scientific method including, but not limited to, forming hypotheses from theories, identifying independent and dependent variables, and defining variables conceptually and operationally.
 Student should find and copy three articles on a topic of their choice in developmental psychology. (Note: a library tour might be organized for students or suggested to students to do in advance of this task.)You might help students narrow their focus. It might be fun, depending on the classroom size, to choose a topic for everyone to research, such as selfesteem, which is broad enough and extensively researched enough that students are likely to not duplicate chosen articles. In this way, a more global exploration of the topic area can be obtained, and perhaps a joint lecture venture (instructor and students) could be instantiated.
 Students should be able to state the hypothesis(es) of the studies they read, and to delineate relevant independent and dependent variables.
 They should briefly indicate what methodology was used in each article and what the main findings were. Students should be able to summarize, in their own words, what the conclusions are from each of the studies.
 Evaluate the three articles. Which were more interesting? Why? Which were more easily understood? Why?
 Peer reviewed journals:

Child Development

Developmental Psychology

Developmental Review

Infant Behavior and Development

Journal of Adolescence

Journal of Experimental Child Psychology

Journal of Youth and Adolescence

Merrill-Palmer Quarterly
5. Book “Report” Nature-Nurture: Have students explore “ The Nurture Assumption: Why Children Turn
Out the Way They Do ” by Judith Rich Harris (1998), Free Press. This book has met with controversy among those in the general pu blic and in developmental psychology. “Harris looks with a fresh eye at the real lives of real children and shows that the nurture assumption is nothing more than a cultural myth…The Nurture Assumption is a profound work that brings together insights from psychology, sociology, anthropology, primatology, and evolutionary biology to offer a startling new view of who we are and how we got that way” (From Book Review, Amazon.com). Reading and summarizing the tenets of this book for class discussion at the end of the semester could be a great semester project for individual students or to be divided into sections for discussion among groups of students in the course. The roles of family, peers, and overall society are addressed regarding how we become the people that we are through our childhood experiences and thus will touch upon much that is discussed in the chapters of this textbook. There is a video listed in the video resource section that may be of interest to show in conjunction with this exercise, “ Do Parents Matter? Judith Harris on the
Power of Peers” .
6. Examples of Nature-Nurture: Have students consider the Nurture position held by John Locke by listing five examples from daily life to demonstrate that individuals such as parents and teachers still hold onto this idea of the child as blank slate (e.g., “spare the rod, spoil the child”). Ask students to consider how they would parent if they believe that children learn everything from experience, that one can mold a child’s outcomes by exposing him to specific rewards, punishments, and behavior modeling. Ask whether they know of anyone whose parents believed that a child could be shaped to be what the parents wanted, regardless of the individual’s natural talents or tendencies. Ask whether they find themselves thinking that parents are 100% responsible for child behavior. If they say no, ask them what about when they hear of children or adolescents committing violent crimes. Do they find
10

The Nature of Development themselves immediately wondering what types of parents the child/adolescent has? Ask whether they believe that all children come into the world with the same basic future ahead if the environment were the same for them all. Have them consider the Nature position held by Rousseau by listing five examples from daily life to demonstrate that individuals such as parents and teachers still hold onto this idea that development unfolds naturally (e.g., “don’t want to ruin natural curiosity by punishing”).
Ask how they would parent if they believe that children come into the world with natural abilities that should be allowed to be expressed without staging and structuring the child’s life experiences. Ask students to consider how a “Nature classroom” would look in comparison to a “Nurture classroom.”
7. Beliefs and Biases: Have your students examine their beliefs and biases. For this task, they will need to read the three family vignettes at the end of Chapter 1.
•
Have students consider the case of Karen Polonius. Karen is young, age 16, and will be a single parent. What challenges can they list for Karen? Ask them, “If she were your friend or your child, what advice would you dispense? What support would you suggest for her within her home, at school, and/or within the community?” Have students make some projections for the future of
Karen, her child, and her relationship with her own mother (have them remember these projections to see if they correctly guessed some outcome issues when they continue to read of the Polonius family throughout this text).
•
Have students consider the case of Christine and Frank Gordon. Ask them to list challenges they see for this family. Gender of the child-to-be is a huge issue for Frank. Ask them to consider what issues may arise if the second child is another girl or if the second child is the boy that Frank wants. Have them note that this child would be expected to be an avid sports fan and player (“the blank slate” issue). Have them consider issues of the marriage. Will the second baby further stress the bonds of the marriage? Have them make some projections.
•
Have students consider the case of John and Delores Williams and list challenges they can see for this family. Delores (DeeDee) wonders aloud whether having the baby is a good idea considering her age (36 years), their tight finances, and the fact that she works outside of the home full-time. What suggestions might your students have for DeeDee and her husband John?
Have them make some projections for the future of this family. In anticipation of upcoming chapter information, have students consider what risks they believe there are for a woman to be pregnant after age 35.
8. A “Budding Developmental Psychologist.
” Have your students begin the process of noticing children of all ages in their environments (grocery store, restaurant, airport, public transportation, etc.). Have them casually watch children interact with others such as parents and siblings. Perhaps they can keep a notebook (or a mental list) of what they are noticing about the children and those around them that they encounter in everyday life . Of course, as your students’ excursion into child development expands, they will become more effective observers and will be able to address questions such as how old a child is, what he/she should be capable of regarding physical abilities, what kinds of reasoning skills the child should possess, how his/her vocabulary and grammar may be structured, how the child may think about the self and feel about the self, how well the child may regulate behavior or emotions, how important peers are to the child, h ow close the child’s attachment is to the caregiver, what parenting styles the parents appear to be using when dealing with the child, how the social context of the child may impact him or her, what difficulties might the child face in the immediate or more far reaching future, etc.
9. Sociocultural Approach : Have students provide examples of how Vygotsky’s sociocultural approach to child development is valid from present day society’s interest in multicultural perspectives in all types of domains from business to classrooms. Have them consider what impact they believe culture has on child development. Do students believe that children think differently in different cultures?
Further, have students consider Vygotsky’s concept of the Zone of Proximal Development. Another way to explore this concept is to discuss the difference between competence and performance. We have a strong bias in our educational system to focus on performance. Have students consider how their educational experiences may have been different if there had been a greater recognition of their
11

Chapter 1 zone of proximal development. Have them contrast Vygotsky’s approach with Piaget’s normative development perspective of “all children, everywhere.” Is Piaget’s approach limited?
 Information about Vygotsky ’s theoretical accounts applied to education can be found at http://tip.psychology.org/vygotsky.html
.
 James Wertsch presents a discussion titled “Beyond the Individual-Social Antimony in
Discussions of Piaget and Vygotsky” at http://www.massey.ac.nz/~alock//virtual/colevyg.htm
.
 The Jean Piaget Society has a number of links and information at http://www.piaget.org
.
10. Family Traits: Ask students to think about traits that they share with other members of their immediate families. Ask them how much they think each of those traits is the result of genes and how much is due to the environment they share with the rest of their family. (Answers will probably vary from trait to trait, with most students ascribing physical traits mainly to heredity and psychological traits mainly to environment.) Then ask them why they answered the way they did and how a researcher could sort out the relative influences of heredity and environment on the traits they listed. This exercise is a good way to demonstrate the difficulty of that research task and to clarify the point that most human characteristics are a result of the interplay between environment and heredity, although some are more strongly influenced by one or the other.
 Explore issues in behavior genetics at http://www.ornl.gov/TechResources/Human_Genome/elsi/behavior.html
.
11. Theoretical Viewpoints: To highlight the different perspectives psychologists possess (and the data they consider relevant) as a function of their theoretical orientation, ask students (this works well with small groups) to adopt the viewpoint of one of the six major theories discussed in Chapter 1. Provide them with one or two scenarios like the cases given below and ask them to:
•
Discuss the questions psychologists holding that theory would ask, who they would interview
(e.g., child, parents, teachers, peers, siblings, etc.), and why they would gather that information.
•
Use the basic assumptions and principles of that theory to explain the current behavior of each child.
•
Predict what the future holds for each child; for instance, indicate what that theory would imply about the possibility and means of achieving behavior change.
•
Evaluate their theoretical analysis, saying whether they agree with its conclusions and why or why not.
Case 1: Clever Hans
Hans is an 11-year-old boy from a small Midwestern town. He is described by his teachers at school as a "difficult" child. One morning in early February, instead of going to school, Hans took his aunt's car and drove it out of town along a busy two-lane highway, heading toward a major interstate freeway. About two miles outside of town, Hans lost control of the car and swerved across the two-lane highway, barely missed hitting an oncoming car, and ended up in the middle of a frozen cornfield. Hans immediately jumped out of the car and began running away across the cornfield, carrying a bag of provisions with him. In the bag he had a Game Boy, an extra pair of tennis shoes, a small amount of money, several candy bars, and a six-pack of root beer.
Case 2: Thumbelina
Thumbelina is a 6-year-old girl. Her mother is concerned about her daughter's attachment to a pacifier and her thumb, as well as her apparent inability to give up her habit of sucking on them.
Thumbelina has just entered kindergarten; she and her mother have agreed that she will not take her pacifier to school with her, although she may have it back when her mother picks her up at the end of the day.
12. Activity Sheet 1: At the end of this chapter, is an activity sheet that could be copied for students to work on in groups or individually. The goal of this activity sheet is to have students begin thinking about research design as it applies to child development. When they are finished have groups or individuals discuss why they believe one design may be more effective at arriving at the research conclusion than another design. Have them consider the advantages and disadvantages of what is discussed. This activity is designed to be completed after students have read the chapter material.
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The Nature of Development
13. Activity Sheet 2: This sheet can be copied for students. It is a way to help students become aware of their own assumptions about child development. When they are finished, discuss their responses in class and relate them to positions associated with various developmental theories. This exercise may be most effective if completed before students read Chapter 1.
:
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Childhood (1996, 49 min., Insight Media). Explores the changing experience of childhood over the past hundred years, examining the major improvements in the lives of children due to progress in medical science and education. Also explores how war in this century has often put children in the line of fire. Among those featured in the program are best-selling author and child psychologist
Penelope Leach, and Dr. David Southall, a pediatrician who works with children from war zones.
•
Child Development (1992, 30 min., Insight Media). Presents a historical overview of the contributions of Locke, Rousseau, Freud, Erikson, Bowlby, Watson, Gesell, Piaget, and modern theorists.
•
Do Parents Matter? Judith Harris on the Power of Peers (1999, 12 minutes, Films for the Humanities and Sciences). From the high chair to high school, parents have little impact on their children’s development —or so says Judith Harris, author of The Nurture Assumption.
In this program, Ms.
Harris talks with ABC News correspondent Sylvia Chase about her controversial theory of child development through adaptation to peer groups. Steven Pinker, director of the Center for Cognitive
Neuroscience at MIT, supports her hypothesis, while Harvard child psychologist Jerome Kagan strongly disagrees, citing her total lack of scientific credentials.
•
Erik H. Erikson: A Life's Work (1992, 38 min., Insight Media). Combines biographical information about Erikson with his theoretical proposals. Includes archival materials and new live-action footage.
Highlights the relationship between the life experience of a theorist and the work that is produced.
•
Freud under Analysis (1987, 58 min.). Presents Freud's theory in historical context and assesses its influence on present-day psychology and culture. Includes historical film footage of Freud, his students, and his study in London. Produced for Nova.
•
How We Study Children: Observation and Experimentation (1994, 25 minutes, Films for the
Humanities and Sciences). Testing of a causal hypothesis involving cognitive development is best done through a combination of observational and experimental methods. Kathy Sylva and Peter
Bryant, of the University of Oxford, and other researchers share their insights into categorizing and codifying patterns of play through observation, avoiding common experiment-related pitfalls such as covariation and unintentional bias, and mitigating artificiality, a challenge to practitioners of both.
•
Research Methods for the Social Sciences (1995, Insight Media). Covers types of experimental designs and their uses; deals with basic features of experiments as well as clinical, correlation, and field methods. Lays out 7 steps of the scientific method, interpretation of data, and ethical issues.
•
Theories of Development (1997, 29 min., Insight Media). This video introduces the cognitive, psychosexual, psychosocial, behaviorist, social-learning, and sociocultural theories of child development. It profiles the work of Piaget, Freud, Erikson, Gesell, Skinner, and Vygotsky. Explains the concept of the “whole child” and shows how most theories focus on only one aspect of development.
•
Theories of Human Development (2002, 30 min. each, Insight Media). Looking at development as a process of change and reorganization, this lecture series highlights the six major theories of human development, considering the philosophical and historical contexts in which the theorists flourished. It addresses Sigmund Freud’s Psychodynamic Theory, Erik Erikson’s Psycho-Social Theory, Integrated
Attachment Theory of John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, Albert Bandura’s Social Learning Theory,
Jean Piaget’s Cognitive-Developmental Theory, and Lev Vygotsky’s Cognitive-Mediation Theory.
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Chapter 1
•
Vygotsky’s Developmental Theory: An Introduction (1994, 28 min., Davidson Films). With Deborah
Leong, Ph.D., and Elena Bodrova, Ph.D. The video illustrates four basic concepts integral to his work: children construct knowledge, learning can lead to development, development cannot be separated from its social context, and language plays a central role in cognitive development.
:
•
List of providers for most of the videos listed above:
1. Ambrose Video at www.ambrosevideo.com
or 800-526-4663
2. Davidson Films at www.davidsonfilms.com
or 888-437-4200.
3. Kent State University Audio Visual Services at 800-338-5718
4. Films for the Humanities and Sciences at www.films.com
or 800-257-5126.
5. Insight Media at www.insight-media.com
or 212-721-6316.
6. Penn State Audio Visual Services at 800-826-0132.
7. Public Broadcasting Service at 1-800-949-8670 or www.shop.pbs.org
: http://www.mhhe.com/dehart5
A variety of teaching tools for this textbook are available from the Web site for McGraw-Hill: http://users.rcn.com/brill/freudarc.html
This site is a link to Internet resources related to Sigmund Freud and his works. http://www.psychoanalysis.org
Web site of the New York Psychoanalytic Institute that offers a variety of psychoanalytic resources and online tools for Freudian studies. http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/constructivism.html
This is an excellent resource for information on socio-cultural and constructivist theories when discussing
Lev Vygotsky. http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/
For more information on evolutionary psychology this is a very good site, but gives just summaries. http://www.evoyage.com
This site contains evolutionary psychology information for the nonscientific person. http://psych.hanover.edu/Krantz/journal.html
This site contains electronic journals and periodicals on psychology in general. http://www.annonline.com/interviews/961009/
Interview with Stephen Jay Gould, along with an autobiography and additional links.
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The Nature of Development
Name: _________________________________
Activity Sheet 1 – Which Research Design Works Best and Why?
Below are statements related to research outcomes from the field of Child Development. Beneath each statement, write the type(s) of research design that may reasonably be used to obtain the outcome stated. (Remember to address whether cross-sectional, longitudinal, or accelerated longitudinal designs would be most effective.) Further, note advantages and disadvantages with using the research design(s) you suggest.
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Fathers and mothers interact differently with their children, with fathers generally displaying more physical interaction in their play styles than mothers do.
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Preschool-aged children generally have a memory span of 3 to 4 items while middle-childhood-aged children generally have a memory span of 7 items.
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Parents who use parenting styles that emphasize a nurturing and warm style where there is structure and control (democratic, authoritative parenting) are more likely to have children with higher selfesteem than parents who use a parenting style reflecting low warmth and more punitive control over children’s behavior (dictatorial, authoritarian).
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Young children from lower socioeconomic statuses have benefited in their intelligence scores from exposure to early educational programs such as Head Start.
•
Children who are regularly spanked or hit by their caregivers are more likely to demonstrate aggressive behaviors toward others .
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Chapter 1
Name: _________________________________
•
Activity Sheet 2: What's Your Theory of Child Development?
Listed below are pairs of statements concerning various aspects of development. Read each statement
8.
9.
6.
7.
2. carefully. Then circle the statement in each pair that more closely reflects your view. Discuss responses in class and relate them to positions associated with various developmental theories.
1. A. Children's abilities often seem to appear from nowhere. One day they can't do something and the next day they can.
B. Children's behaviors tend to evolve gradually through a series of small steps.
A. A child's environment during infancy plays a particularly strong role in later development.
B. By the time a child reaches adulthood, the effects of his or her environment during infancy have been pretty much overcome.
3. A. Children's intelligence is mainly inherited from their parents.
B. Children's intelligence is mainly produced by their environment.
4. A. Most preschool children are more strongly attached to their opposite-sexed parent than to their same-sexed parent.
B. Most preschool children are more strongly attached to the parent who provides the most nurturance.
5. A. Parents must provide infants with an especially stimulating environment to promote cognitive development.
B. Infants actively seek stimulation and receive enough for good cognitive development from most normal environments.
A. Children think about the world in a completely different way than adults do.
B. Children's minds are basically like adults' minds, except that they don't know as much yet.
A. Children learn most behavior by imitating adults and receiving approval for some things they do and disapproval for others.
B. Children's behavior seems to be based on some inner drive; it doesn't really matter whether others approve of what they do.
A. Most psychological problems in adulthood are caused by heredity.
B. Most psychological problems in adulthood are caused by the environments people grow up in.
A. Children's relationships with their parents determine what their later relationships with other people will be like.
B. Each type of relationship is different; adult relationships aren't influenced much by people's relationships with their parents.
10. A. Parents should be especially careful about how they wean and toilet train their children because these events have a big influence on people's personalities.
B. Weaning and toilet training are no more important in children's development than anything else that happens in infancy.
[Adapted from a quiz developed by Michael Livingston, St. John's University, Collegeville, MN.]
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