Lifespan development free essay sample

Human development  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Studying change and constancy throughout the lifespan. Basic Issues in Lifespan  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Continuous or discontinuous?  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ One course of development or many?  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Nature or nurture? The Lifespan Perspective: A Balanced Point of View  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Development as lifelong.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Development as multidimensional and multidirectional.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Development as plastic.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Development as embedded in multiple context:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ age-graded influences  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ history-graded influences  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ nonnormative influences Periods of Development Prenatal Conception to birth Infancy and toddlerhood Birth to 2 years Early childhood 2 to 6 years Middle childhood 6 to 11 years Adolescence 11 to 18 years Early adulthood 18 to 40 years Middle adulthood 40 to 65 years Late adulthood 65 years to death Scientific Beginnings  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Scientific study of human development dates back to the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Charles Darwin (1809-1882)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Forefather of scientific child study.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Natural selection and survival of the fittest.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ The normative period  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ G. Stanley Hall (1844-1924) à  Ã¯Æ'   founder of the child study movement and Arnold Gesell (1880-1961).  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Both were known because of their normative approach to development. Scientific Beginnings (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ The mental testing movement  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Alfred Binet (1857-1911) à  Ã¯Æ'   created an intelligence test which sparked interest in individual differences. Mid-Twentieth Century Theories  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ In the mid-twentieth century, human development expanded into a legitimate discipline. As it attracted increasing interest, a variety of theories emerged, each of which still has followers today:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ The psychoanalytic perspective  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ People move through a series of stages in which they confront conflicts between biological drives and social expectations. The way these conflicts are resolved determines the person’s ability to learn, to get along with others, and to cope with anxiety. Mid-Twentieth Century Theories (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ The psychoanalytic perspective (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) à  Ã¯Æ'   parts of personality and psychosexual development.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Erik Erikson (1902-1994) à  Ã¯Æ'   psychosocial development.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Behaviorism  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ An approach that views directly observable events as the appropriate focus of study.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Traditional behaviorism: John B. Watson (1878-1958) à  Ã¯Æ'   classical conditioning and B. F. Skinner (1904-1990) à  Ã¯Æ'   operant conditioning Freud s Three Parts of the Personality nï  ® Id nï  ® nï  ® nï  ® Ego nï  ® nï  ® nï  ® Superego nï  ® largest portion of the mind unconscious, present at birth source of biological needs/desires conscious, rational part of mind emerges in early infancy redirects id impulses acceptably the conscience develops from ages 3 to 6 from interactions with caregivers Erikson s Psychosocial Stages Basic trust vs. mistrust Birth to 1 year Autonomy vs. shame/doubt 1–3 years Initiative vs. guilt 3–6 years Industry vs. inferiority 6–11 years Identity vs. role confusion Adolescence Intimacy vs. isolation Early adulthood Generativity vs. stagnation Middle adulthood Integrity vs. despair Late adulthood Behaviorism and Social Learning Classical conditioning Stimulus–response Operant conditioning Reinforcers and punishments Social learning Modeling Mid-Twentieth Century Theories (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Behaviorism (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Social learning theory: proposed by Albert Bandura à  Ã¯Æ'   emphasized on modeling, also known as imitation or observational learning.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Cognitive-developmental theory  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Inspired by Jean Piaget à  Ã¯Æ'   children actively construct knowledge as they manipulate and explore their world:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Sensorimotor – birth to 2 yrs.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Preoperational – 2 to 7 yrs.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Concrete operational – 7 to 11 yrs.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Formal operational – 11 yrs. onwards Recent Theoretical Perspectives  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Information processing  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ An approach that views the human mind as a symbolmanipulating system through which information flows.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Ethology and evolutionary developmental psychology  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Ethology is concerned with the adaptive or survival, value of behavior and its evolutionary history.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Evolutionary seeks to understand the adaptive value of specieswide cognitive, emotional, and social competencies as those competencies change with age. Recent Theoretical Perspectives (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ It focuses on how culture – the values, beliefs, customs, and skills of a social group – is transmitted to the next generations.  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Social interaction – cooperative dialogues with more knowledgeable members of society – is necessary for children to acquire the ways of thinking and behaving that made up a community’s culture. Recent Theoretical Perspectives (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Ecological systems theory  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917-2005) views the person as developing within a complex system of relations affected by multiple levels of the surrounding environment:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Macrosystem  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Exosystem  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Mesosystem  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Microsystem Studying Development  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Common research methods:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Systematic observation à  Ã¯Æ'   naturalistic and structured observations  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Self reports à  Ã¯Æ'   clinical and structured interviews  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Clinical, or case study method  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Methods for studying culture à  Ã¯Æ'   ethnography Studying Development (cont.)  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ General research designs:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Correlational design à  Ã¯Æ'   correlation coefficient  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Experimental design à  Ã¯Æ'   IV/DV  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Modified experimental designs à  Ã¯Æ'   field experiment/quasi  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Designs for studying development:  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Longitudinal design à  Ã¯Æ'   same group at different times  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Cross-sectional design à  Ã¯Æ'   different groups at same time  ¤Ã¯â€š ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¯ Sequential designs à  Ã¯Æ'   mixed