Chapter 1 Student Study Guide

I. Defining Development (pp. 4–7)

Instructional Objective: To spark students’ interest in human development, and to describe the scientific method, so students will begin to understand the basic tool of develop- mental psychology.

1. The science of human development seeks to understand how and why people—all people, everywhere—change with increasing age, and how and why they remain the same.

2. The scientific method consists of five basic steps: (1) formulate a research question, (2) develop a hypothesis, (3) test the hypothesis, (4) draw conclusions, and (5) make the findings available.

3. Replication of research findings verifies the findings and leads researchers to more definitive and extensive conclusions. In replicating research, scientists use different participants.

4. The nature–nurture controversy is the question of how much of any characteristic is the result of genes (nature) and how much is the result of experience (nurture). Genes and environment affect every aspect of development.

5. A critical period is a time when certain things must occur for normal development to proceed. At certain points during early childhood, there may also be a sensitive peri- od, when a particular development occurs most easily. An example of this is language.

6. Deviations from development do not necessarily indicate a problem. To assume so is to commit the difference-equals deficit error.

7. An important issue in developmental science is whether individuals change or remain the same over time. Both continuity and discontinuity are evident in each person’s life and with each human characteristic.

8. One way developmentalists divide life into segments is by using chronology to identify separate stages of growth. Another is to consider three domains of development. These include the biosocial domain (brain and body as well as changes in them and the social influences that guide them), the cognitive domain (thought processes, per- ceptual abilities, and language mastery, as well as the educational institutions that encourage them), and the psychosocial domain (emotions, personality, and interperson- al relationships with family, friends, and the wider community). All three domains are important at every age, and each of the domains is affected by the other two.

II. The Life Span Perspective

Instructional Objective: To introduce the life-span perspective to the study of develop- ment, and to describe the five insights into the nature of development.

1. According to the life-span perspective, development throughout life is multidirec- tional, multicontextual, multicultural, multidisciplinary, and plastic.

2. A cohort is a group of people born within a few years of each other who tend to share certain historical events and cultural shifts.

3. Socioeconomic status (SES) is determined by several overlapping variables, includ- ing income, education, place of residence, and occupation. Although low income obvi- ously limits a person, other factors (such as education) can make poverty better or worse.

4. Culture affects development in a multitude of interrelated ways, from whether tocover your mouth when laughing to what to eat for breakfast. Cultures are dynamic, always changing, as people change and grow older. People can belong to more than one culture, with their choice depending on their immediate context.

5. Russian developmentalist Lev Vygotsky was a leader in describing the interaction between culture and education. Vygotsky believed that guided participation, the process by which mentors guide novices to master the skills and habits expected with- in a culture, is universal.

6. An ethnic group is a collection of people who share certain attributes, such as ances- try, national origin, religion, and language.

7. Although race was once defined as a biological category, it is actually a social con- struction, an idea that is built on shared perceptions, not on objective reality.

8. The value of a epigenetic approach to understanding human development can be seen in research on the origins of violence in young people. One study found that mistreat- ed boys were more likely to be overly aggressive if they had a particular variation in the MAOA gene. However, even if they inherited the gene that produces low levels of the enzyme monoamine oxidase A, boys who had not been mistreated tended to become peaceable adults.

9. (AView from Science)The value of an epigenetic approach to understanding human development can also be seen in research on mirror neurons, which are brain cells that respond to the observed actions of others. These neurons, which in the human brain reflect not only the movements but also the intentions, sensations,

and emotions of those around us, may help explain some autism, language learning, sympathy for other people, and how culture is transmitted.

10. One of the most encouraging aspects of the science of development is that development is characterized by plasticity, or the capability of change.

III. Theories of Human Development (pp. 17–25)

Instructional Objective: To describe the basic concepts of theories of development, including psychoanalytic theory, behaviorism, cognitive theory, and systems theories.

1. A developmental theory is a systematic statement of principles and generalizations that provides a framework for understanding how and why people change as they grow older.

2. Psychoanalytic theory interprets human development in terms of inner drives and motives, many of which are irrational and unconscious.

3. According to Sigmund Freud, development in the first six years progresses through three stages; at each stage, sexual interest and pleasure are focused on a particular part of the body—the mouth during infancy (the oral stage), the anus during early childhood (the anal stage), and the genitalia later in the preschool years (the phallic stage). Following a period of sexual latency, the adolescent enters the fourth stage, the genital stage, which lasts throughout adulthood.

4. Freud believed that each stage has its own potential conflicts and that how the child experiences and resolves the conflicts, especially during the first three stages, deter- mines personality patterns throughout life.

5. In his theory of human development, Erik Erikson proposed eight developmental stages, each of which is characterized by a particular challenging developmental crisis. Erikson emphasized each person’s relationship to the social environment and the importance of family and cultural influences in determining how well prepared individuals are to meet these crises. Erikson’s stages are lifelong.

6. Instead of advancing a stage theory of development, proponents of behaviorism (also called learning theory) have formulated laws of behavior that operate at every age. The basis of all varieties of behaviorism is the idea that psychology should focus on the objective and scientific study of behavior.

7. According to behaviorism, conditioning is the process by which responses become linked to particular stimuli. As demonstrated by the Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov, classical conditioning (also called respondent conditioning) involves learning by association: The organism comes to associate a neutral stimulus with a meaningful one.

8. In operant conditioning (also called instrumental conditioning), proposed by B. F. Skinner, the individual learns that a particular action produces a particular consequence.

9. Any consequence that follows a behavior and makes the person (or animal) likely to repeat that behavior is called reinforcement.

10. Social learning theory emphasizes the ways in which people learn new behaviors by observing and imitating, or modeling, the behavior of other people they consider admirable, powerful, nurturing, or similar. Modeling is most likely to occur whenthe observer is uncertain or inexperienced. Social learning is related to perceptions and interpretations, and to self-understanding, social reflection, and self-efficacy.

11. Cognitive theory focuses on the structure and development of thought processes and their effect on attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.

12. Jean Piaget viewed cognitive development as a process that follows a universal sequence of age-related periods: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational.

13. According to Piaget, each person strives for cognitive equilibrium—that is, a state of mental balance achieved through the development of mental concepts that explain his or her experiences. Cognitive disequilibrium (a state of imbalance) promotes a search for knowledge as the person modifies old concepts and constructs better ones to fit new experiences.

14. Piaget said that people adapt to new experiences either by reinterpreting them to fit into, or assimilate with, old ideas. Some new experiences force people to revamp old ideas so that they can accommodate new experiences.

15. The approach that emphasizes the influence of the systems, or contexts, that support the developing person is Urie Bronfenbrenner’s ecological-systems approach. According to this model, human development is supported by systems at four nested levels: the microsystem (immediate social setting), the exosystem (local, such as school and church), the macrosystem (cultural values, political processes, economic policies, and social conditions), and the chronosystem, which emphasizes the importance of historical time on development. A fifth system, the mesosystem, connects systems, for example, the interface between home and school. As a reflection of the impact of biology on development, this systems approach was recently renamed bioecological theory.

16. The related approach to development, which stresses fluctuations and transitions, is dynamic-systems theory. A crucial tenet of this theory is that

development is dynam- ic, which means that the interaction between the physical and emotional being, and between the person and every aspect of the environment, is always in flux, always changing.

Chapter 2 Student Study Guide

The Beginning of Life (pp. 43–49)

Instructional Objective: To explain the basic mechanisms of heredity, and to describe the process of conception.

1. The work of body cells is done by proteins. Instructions for manufacturing proteins are stored in molecules of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), each of which is a chromo- some.

2. Every human body cell, except the sperm and ovum, has 23 pairs of chromosomes (one chromosome in each pair from each parent). The sperm and ovum receive only one member of each chromosome pair when cells divide to produce gametes, and thus have only 23 single chromosomes each.

3. When a sperm and an ovum combine, they create a cell called a zygote, which in humans has 46 chromosomes and which contains all the instructions for development. These instructions, which are organized into units called genes, are transmitted to cells via four chemicals abbreviated A, T, C, and G.

4. An organism’s entire genetic inheritance is called its genotype. The organism's phenotype is its observable characteristics and behaviors.

5. Some genes come in several normal variations called alleles. The sum total of the genetic instructions for a living organism is the genome. A worldwide effort to map all the human genes led to the Human Genome Project, which was completed in 2003 and which continues to reveal surprises.

6. In some pregnancies, a single zygote splits into two separate identical cells that devel- op into genetically identical, or monozygotic (MZ), twins, who have the potential for developing the same physical appearance and psychological characteristics and the same vulnerability to specific diseases. Dizygotic (DZ), or fraternal, twins begin life as two separate zygotes and share no more genes than any other siblings (about 50 percent). The incidence of dizygotic births varies by the mother’s age and ethnicity.

7. The 44 chromosomes that are independent of the sex chromosomes are called autosomes.

8. The 23rd pair of chromosomes, which determines sex, is designated XY in the male and XX in the female. The critical factor in the determination of the zygote’s sex is which sperm reaches the ovum first, a Y sperm, creating a boy, or an X sperm, creatng a girl.

9. The natural sex ratio at birth is close to 50/50. In times of serious adversity (such as famine), XY embryos are more likely than XXs to be expelled in a spontaneous abortion, or miscarriage.

10. Most traits are polygenic—that is, affected by many genes—and multifactorial— that is, influenced by many factors, including factors in the environment. To differenti- ate humans from other animals, the action of other genes, called regulator genes, is crucial. Regulator genes direct polygenic interactions, controlling the expression, duplication, and transcription of the other genes.

11. One type of genetic interaction involves additive genes—for example, the various genes underlying height and skin color.

12. Some genes interact in a nonadditive fashion. Genes that have a controlling influence over weaker, recessive genes are called dominant genes. Hundreds of physical characteristics follow this nonadditive dominant–recessive pattern. A person who has a gene in his or her genotype that is not expressed in the phenotype but that can be passed on to the person’s offspring is said to be a carrier of that gene.

13. The percentage of the variation in a trait within a particular population that can be attributed to genes is called its heritability.

II. Genetic Problems (pp. 50–57)

Instructional Objective: To describe the most common chromosomal and genetic abnormalities and their causes, and to help students understand the benefits and limitations of genetic counseling.

1. Scientists study genetic and chromosomal abnormalities in order to gain a fuller appreciation of the complexities of nature–nurture interactions, to increase under- standing of how to reduce or limit their harmful consequences, and to foster human understanding.

2. About 5 to 10 percent of all zygotes have too few or too many chromosomes. Most such zygotes do not even begin to develop, and less than 1 percent come to term—usually because a spontaneous abortion occurs. Once in every 200 births, however, a baby is born with a chromosomal abnormality that leads to a recognizable syndrome. The vari- able that most often correlates with chromosomal abnormalities is the mother’s age.

3. Some cells in the zygote may end up with more or fewer than 46 chromosomes.

4. The most common of the extra-chromosome syndromes is Down syndrome (trisomy- 21), in which the person exhibits distinguishing features of the eyes, face, and tongue. The extra chromosome at site 21 also makes them more susceptible to heart defects, slow intellectual development, and by middle age, Alzheimer disease. People with Down syndrome age faster than other adults.

5.About 1 in 500 infants is either missing a sex chromosome or has three or more of them. One such syndrome is Turner syndrome, in which the girl has only one X chro- mosome (XO). Another is Klinefelter syndrome, in which a boy inherits the XXY pattern.

6.Potentially harmful genes are present in every individual’s genotype. Most of the known genetic disorders are dominant and usually not seriously disabling. Tourette syndrome is thought to be a dominant disorder.

7.Lethal recessive-gene disorders are usually rare, but among the more common reces- sive genetic disorders are cystic fibrosis, thalassemia, and sickle-cell anemia.

8.Some recessive conditions are sex-linked, meaning that they are located only on the X chromosome. Because males have only one X chromosome, they are more likely than females to manifest these characteristics in their phenotype. For example, fragile X syndrome is a sex-linked condition in which part of the X chromosome is attached by such a thin string of molecules that it seems about to break off. Although there is con- siderable variation in its effects, some mental deficiency is common (more so in males than in females).

9.Genetic counseling is a means by which couples can learn more about their genes and make informed decisions about childbearing. Genetic counselors must present facts, not opinions, but facts are not always straightforward.

10.Complications of genetic testing are that the specific effects of many regulator genes are not yet known, and medical treatments for many conditions are not yet proven effective. Prospective parents need to decide when to take the risk, when to wait, when to avoid pregnancy, and when to opt for prenatal testing.

11.In the United States and many other nations, every newborn is tested for phenylke- tonuria (PKU), a recessive condition that will result in severe retardation if the com- mon food substance phenylalanine is consumed.

From Zygote to Newborn (pp. 57–63)

Instructional Objective: To outline the rapid and orderly development that occurs between conception and birth.

1. The first two weeks of prenatal development are called the germinal period. Soon

after conception, the one-cell zygote begins to duplicate, divide, and differentiate.

2. If all goes well, the placenta begins to form and implantation of the cell mass occurs. At least 60 percent of all natural conceptions and 70 percent of all in vitro con- ceptions fail to become properly implanted, thereby terminating the pregnancy.

3.The embryonic period begins in the third week as the formless mass becomes a distinct being, now referred to as the embryo.

4.A thin line down the middle of the outer layer of cells (theprimitivestreak)formsa structure that becomes the neural tube, then the brain and spinal column (the central nervous system).

5.In the fourth week, the cardiovascular system is functioning; the eyes, ears, nose, and mouth start to form. At five weeks, the arm and leg buds appear.

6.By the end of the second month, the developing organism weighs about 1 gram (1/30

ounce), is 21/2 centimeters (1 inch) long, and has all the basic organs and body parts of a human being, and a unisex structure called the indifferent gonad.

7.From the start of the ninth week after conception, the beginning of the fetal period, the sex organs begin to take shape. By the twelfth week, the genitals are fully formed.

8.If the fetus is male (XY), the SRY gene on the Y chromosome signals the development of male sex organs. If the fetus is female (XX), no signal is sent, and the fetus begins to develop female sex organs. The sex organs may now be visible on a sonogram. Most functions of the brain are gender-neutral; some sex differences in brain organiza- tion occur in mid-pregnancy.

9.At the end of the third month, the fetus has all its body parts, weighs approximately 3 ounces (87 grams), and is about 3 inches (7.5 centimeters) long.

10.In the middle three months, the systems develop more fully. The crucial factor in the fetus’s attaining the age of viability, beginning at about 22 weeks, is brain matura- tion, which is essential to the regulation of basic body functions, such as breathing and sucking.

11.Weight gain during the final three months is about 5 pounds (21/4 kilograms). The heart and lungs mature, and the digestive system begins to function. Brain growth is so extensive that the brain’s cortex must fold into layers in order to fit into the skull.

IV. Birth (pp. 63–71)

Instructional Objective: To help students understand the birth process, the method used to assess the newborn’s physical condition, problems that can occur during the birthing process and how these may affect the newborn, and the nature of the parent–newborn

bond.

1. Birth usually begins at about 38 weeks after conception, when the fetus’s brain signals the release of hormones that trigger uterine contractions in the mother. The baby is born, on average, after 12 hours of active labor for first births and 7 hours for subsequent births.

2. The Apgar scale is used to assign a score between 0 and 2 to the newborn’s heart rate, breathing, muscle tone, color, and reflexes at one minute after birth and again at five minutes. A score of 7 or better indicates the newborn is not in danger; below 7, that the infant needs help in establishing normal breathing; and below 4, that the baby is in critical condition and needs immediate medical attention.

3. Home births are usually normal and healthy, but they risk complications, and hospital births risk too much intervention.

4. Many North American mothers today use a professional birth coach, or doula, to assist them.

5. Cesarean sections now account for about one-third of U.S. births.

6. Low birthweight (LBW) is defined as birthweight that is less than 51/2 pounds (2,500 grams). Babies who weigh less than 3 pounds, 5 ounces (1,500 grams) are classified as very low birthweight (VLBW); those who weigh less than 2 pounds, 3 ounces (1,000 grams) are classified as extremely low birthweight (ELBW).

7. Low-birthweight infants who are born 3 or more weeks early are called preterm. Others, born close to the due date but weighing less than most full-term newborns, are called small for gestational age (SGA).

8. Maternal illness, drug use (especially smoking), and malnutrition are common causes of low birthweight. Other causal factors include the mother’s poor overall health, poor health habits (including drug abuse), and the mother’s youthful age (mostly because of teens’ poor eating habits).

9. Fathers, other relatives, neighbors, and cultures can help to reduce the incidence of birth complications. Kangaroo care is a technique that encourages close involvement between a mother and a low-birthweight infant.

10.Some inexperienced mothers may develop feelings of sadness and inadequacy, or post- partum depression, in the days and weeks after birth.

11. The term parent–infant bond is used to emphasize the strong, loving connectionthat forms between parent and child in the early moments after birth.

12. Extensive research has shown that the events right after birth are just one episode in

a long-term process of bonding between parent and child.

V. Nature, Nurture, and the Phenotype (pp. 71–78)

Instructional Objective: To make students aware of teratogens that may affect prenatal development, as well as factors that may help prevent complications.

1. There are four general principles of genetic influence that virtually all developmental- ists accept:

a. Genes affect every aspect of human behavior. b. Most environmental influences on children raised in the same household are not shared. c. Genes elicit responses from other people that shape each child’s development. d. People of all ages choose friends and environments, in a process called niche-picking, that are compatible with their genes.

2. The increase in the rate of nearsightedness among children in East Asia has been attributed to the increasing amount of time spent by children in the close study of books. In other parts of the world, this problem may be caused by genes or by poor nutrition, especially lack of vitamin A.

3. Certain genetic traits encourage drinking and drug taking. These traits include a quick temper, sensation seeking, and high anxiety. Other traits and environmental contexts make it hard to drink. A woman who drinks during pregnancy may give birth to a child with fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS).

4. Teratogens include such substances or conditions as viruses, drugs, chemicals, stres- sors, and pollutants that can impair prenatal development and lead to birth defects, even to death.

5. Three crucial factors that determine whether a specific teratogen will cause harm, and of what nature, are the developing organism’s genetic vulnerability to damage from the substance, the timing of exposure, and the amount of exposure.

6. Some teratogens have a cumulative effect on the developing individual. For other ter- atogens, there is a threshold effect; that is, the substance is virtually harmless until exposure reaches a certain level.

Chapter 3 Student Study Guide

I. Body Changes (pp. 86–93)Instructional Objective: To familiarize students with infants’ normal patterns of bodygrowth and brain development.

1. The norms, or averages, of height and weight for North American newborns are about 20 inches (51 centimeters) and 71⁄2 pounds (3.4 kilograms). Infants typically double their birth weight by the fourth month and triple it by age 1.

2. By age 2, body weight has increased to an average of 30 pounds (13.5 kilo grams); bodylength has increased to between 32 and 36 inches (81–91 centimeters), half their adult height.

3. In the early months, most of the newborn’s weight gain is fat. Head-sparing is the phenomenon by which the brain continues to grow even though the body stops growingin a malnourished child.

4. Each of the brain's neurons consists of a single axon but many dendrites. About 70 percent of neurons are in the brain’s cortex.

5. Neurons communicate with one another at synapses, where the axon of one neuron meets—but does not touch—the dendrites of other neurons. As a neural impulse is generated, chemicals called neurotransmitters carry information from the axon of the sending neuron across the synaptic gap to the dendrites of the receiving neuron.

6. Following neural growth, neurons in some areas of the brain wither from disuse or under use in a process called pruning.

7. The last part of the brain to mature is the prefrontal cortex, which plays an important role in anticipation, planning, and impulse control. Shaken baby syndrome, a life-threatening condition, occurs when an infant is violently shaken back and forth,rupturing blood vessels in the brain and breaking neural connections.

8. There are several important implications of brain development for caregivers, including that early brain growth is rapid and reflects experience and that each part of the brain has its own sequence for growth.

9. Newborns typically sleep about 17 hours a day, primarily in active sleep. Over the firstmonths of life, the relative amount of time spent in the stages of sleep changes. REM (rapid eye movement) sleep is characterized by dreaming and flickering eyes behind closed lids. During this stage of sleep, brain waves are fairly rapid. REM sleep decreases over the first months, as does the dozing stage called transitional sleep. Slow-wave sleep, also called quiet sleep, increases markedly at 3 or 4 months of age. II. Moving and Perceiving (pp. 93–100)Instructional Objective: To provide students with a sense of the newborn’s sensory and perceptual capacities, and the early development of those capacities, and to familiarize students

with the normal patterns of motor-skill development during infancy.

10. The most visible and dramatic body changes of infancy involve motor skills. Reflexes are involuntary responses to stimuli. The breathing reflex begins in normal newborns even before the umbilical cord is cut. Other reflexive behaviors that maintain the oxygen supply are hiccups, sneezing, and thrashing.

11. Shivering, crying, and tucking the legs close to the body are examples of reflexes that help to maintain body temperature. A third set of reflexes facilitates feeding. One of these is the tendency of the newborn to suck anything that touches the lips. Another is the tendency of newborns to turn their heads and start to suck when something brushes against their cheek; this is the rooting reflex. Other reflexes include the Babinski reflex, stepping reflex, swimming reflex, Palmar grasping reflex, and Moro reflex.

12. Developmentalists distinguish between gross motor skills, such as walking, and fine motor skills, such as grasping and holding a toy. Between 8 and 10 months, most infants are crawling on “all fours” (sometimes called creeping). Some children can walk with assistance at 9 months, stand alone momentarily at 10 months, and walk well, unassisted, at 12 months. The factors that combine to allow toddlers to walk are muscle strength, brain maturation within the motor cortex, and practice.

13. By 6 months of age, most babies can reach for, grab at, and hold onto almost any object of the right size.

14. Although the sequence at which motor skills are mastered is the same in all healthy infants, the age at which skills are acquired varies greatly.

15. Motor-skill acquisition in identical twins is more similar than in fraternal twins, and it varies by ethnic group, suggesting that genes play an important role. Cultural patterns of child rearing can also affect motor-skill development.

16. Sensation is the process by which the visual, auditory, and other sensory systems detect stimuli; perception occurs when the brain tries to make sense out of a stimulus so that the individual becomes aware of it.

17. Hearing in the newborn is quite acute. Young infants are particularly attentive to the human voice. With time, they can also distinguish patterns of sounds and syllables.

18. Newborns focus most readily on objects between 4 and 30 inches (10–75 centimeters)away.

19. With increasing maturation of the visual cortex, focusing improves and scanning is more organized, efficient, and centered on important points.

20. Binocular vision develops at about 3 months.

21. Taste, smell, and touch also function at birth.

22. The infant’s early sensory abilities seem organized for two goals: social interaction andcomfort.

III. Surviving in Good Health (pp. 100–105)Instructional Objective: To give students a sense of why the infant mortality ratedecreased during the twentieth century.

23. Between 1950 and 2007, about 3 billion children died before age 5. In the healthiest nations, 99.9 percent of children who survive the first month live to age 15.

24. A key factor in reducing the childhood death rate was the development of immunization.Although many parents have concerns about the potential side effects of vaccinations, the risks of diseases far outweigh the risks of immunization.

25. Another reason for lower infant mortality worldwide is a decrease in sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). The risk factors for SIDS include low birthweight, heavy clothing, self-bedding, teenage parenthood, and maternal smoking.

26. In most Western cultures, infants do not sleep with their parents. In contrast, parents in Asia, Africa, and Latin America practice co-sleeping with their infants. This does not seem to be harmful unless the adult is drugged or drunk.

27. Breast milk is the ideal food for most babies, beginning with thick, high-calorie colostrum. It is sterile and at body temperature; it contains more iron, vitamins, and other nutrients than cow’s milk; it is more digestible; it provides the infant with immunity to any disease the mother has already had or been inoculated against; and it decreases the risk of diseases that appear in childhood and adulthood, including asthma, obesity, and heart disease.

IV. Infant Cognition (pp. 105–111)Instructional Objective: To describe cognitive development during the first two years,focusing on Piaget’s theory of sensorimotor intelligence.28. Central to Piaget’s theory is the idea that infants are active participants in their cognitivedevelopment. From birth, they are able to adapt to new experiences, either through ssimilation (simply incorporating the new experience into existing concepts 6 Chapter 3

The First Two Years: Body and Brain and perceptions) or through accommodation (changing one’s perceptions and assumptions to adjust to the new experiences).

29. Piaget outlined six stages in the development of sensorimotor intelligence. a. Stage One: Reflexes (birth to 1 month). The newborn’s reflexes, such as

sucking, grasping, staring, and listening, represent its only ways of gainingknowledge about the world.

b. Stage Two: The First Acquired Adaptations (1–4 months). This stage begins when the infant starts to adapt its reflexes to the environment and to coordinate two actions (for example, grabbing a bottle to suck it). Stages one and two are examples of primary circular reactions.

c. Stage Three: Making Interesting Sights Last (4–8 months). Infants become more responsive to people and objects in the environment as they learn to repeat specific actions that have elicited pleasing responses.

d. Stage Four: New Adaptation and Anticipation (8–12 months). Infants become more purposeful in responding to people and objects, anticipating events, and engaging in goal-directed behavior. Stages three and four are examples of secondary circular reactions.

e. Stage Five: New Means Through Active Experimentation (12–18 months). The “little scientists” become more active and creative in their exploration of, and trial-and-error experimentation with, the environment.

f. Stage Six: New Means Through Mental Combinations (18–24 months). By using mental combinations, toddlers begin to anticipate and solve simple problems. This skill enables the toddler to remember better, to anticipate future events, to pretend, and to use deferred imitation. Stages five and six are examples of tertiary circular reactions.

30. A major cognitive accomplishment of infancy is the ability to understand that objects exist independently of one’s perception of them (object permanence), which, according to Piaget, does not develop until about 8 months (during stage four). Experiments have shown that infants as young as 41⁄2 months old have some inkling of object permanence.

31. Information-processing theory models cognition on the way computers analyze data.

32. Researchers once believed that perception of a visual cliff was solely the result of visual maturity. However, later studies show that even 3-month-old infants notice the difference between a solid surface and an apparent drop off: Their heart rate drops and their eyes open wide.

33. Freud believed that infants do not store memories in the first year, a phenomenon he called infantile amnesia. Piaget believed that the ability to remember things that occurred a day or two earlier did not develop until about 11⁄2 years of age. Piaget called this ability deferred imitation.

34. Research has shown that under the right conditions infant memory is much more developed than was once believed. These conditions include (a) using situations that are similar to real life, (b) ensuring that the infant’s motivation is high, and (c) providing memory-priming retrieval cues. Carolyn Rovee-Collier has shown that infant’s memory is further improved by reminder sessions that help them remember what they learned, even after intervals of as long as two weeks.

V. Language Learning (pp. 111–119)Instructional Objective: To describe language development during the first two years,and to discuss several leading theories of language development.

35. Infants are well-equipped to learn language from birth, partly due to brain readiness and partly because of their auditory experiences during the final prenatal months. Newborns show a preference for hearing speech over other sounds; they prefer child directed speech (baby talk or motherese), which is the high-pitched, simplified, and repetitive speech used by adults in talking to infants.

36. Between 6 and 9 months of age, babies begin to repeat certain syllables, a phenomenonreferred to as babbling.

37. Although deaf babies begin to babble at about the same time as hearing babies, they stop because they cannot hear responses.

38. The average baby speaks a few words at about 1 year of age. When vocabulary reaches approximately 50 expressed words, as distinct from understood words, it suddenly begins to build rapidly, at a rate of 50 to 100 or more words a month. This language spurt is called the naming explosion, because toddlers learn a disproportionate number of nouns, although the actual ratio of nouns to verbs and adjectives shows cultural influences.

39. The first words, used as holophrases (one-word sentences), occur by about 1 year; the first two-word sentence occurs at about 21 months. Variations of tone and pitch (intonation) are extensive in babbling and holophrases.

40. Grammar becomes obvious at about 21 months when infants begin using two-wordcombinations.

41. Following B. F. Skinner’s theory, many behaviorists maintain that language is acquired through associations and differential reinforcement of appropriate usage. One study that followed mother–infant pairs over time found that the frequency of early maternal responsiveness predicted the child’s rate of language acquisition many months later.

42. Noam Chomsky maintains that children have an innate predisposition to learn languageand the basics of what he calls a universal grammar, which occurs through a brain structure that Chomsky labels the language acquisition device (LAD).

43. Researchers agree with Chomsky that a “language trigger” is not needed because words are “expected” by the developing brain.

44. A third, social-pragmatic theory of language proposes that social impulses foster infant language.

45. A hybrid theory combines aspects of several theories. Fundamental to this theory isthat some aspects of language are best learned in one way at one age, others in anotherway at another age.

Chapter 4 Student Study Guide

I. Introduction and Emotional Development (pp. 123–129)Instructional Objective: To provide students with a sense of the development of basic emotions during the first two years.

1. Infants come into the world equipped with basic social predispositions and skills thatcontribute to their growth and development. Before infants walk and talk, they have asmaller range of emotions than later, when greater mobility coincides with more emotion. The first emotions that can be reliably discerned in infants are pleasure and pain. Other early infant emotions include curiosity and happiness. Smiles of pleasure appear during the first days of life; social smiles begin to appear at about 6 weeks and laughter at about 3 or 4 months.

2. Anger becomes evident at about 6 months. During infancy, anger is a healthy reactionand usually occurs in response to frustration. In contrast, sadness indicates withdrawaland is accompanied by an increase in the stress hormone cortisol.

3. Fully formed fear emerges at about 9 months. One expression of this new emotion isstranger wariness; another is separation anxiety, or fear of abandonment, which is normal at age 1, intensifies by age 2, and subsides after that. During the second year,anger and fear typically decrease and become more targeted toward specific things.

4. Toward the end of the second year, the new emotions of pride, shame, embarrassment, and guilt become apparent. Because these emotions require an awareness of other people, they emerge from the family setting, which is itself influenced by the culture.

5. The infant’s emerging self-awareness leads to a new consciousness of others. Thatconsciousness fosters the ability to experience emotions about and express them toward other people.

6. In the classic self-awareness experiment, 9- to 24-month-old babies look in a mirrorafter a dot of rouge is put on their nose. If the babies react to the mirror image by touching their nose, it is clear they know they are seeing their own face. Most babiesdemonstrate this self-awareness between 15 and 24 months of age.

7. Pride and shame are strongly linked to self-concept. Telling toddlers they are smart orbeautiful may actually undercut their self-awareness.

8. Emotional development depends partly on maturation of the developing brain, alongwith having varied experiences and good nutrition. Infants’ understanding of themselvesis related to maturation of the brain's left temporoparietal junction and anterior cingulate gyrus. Emotional development is directly tied to brain development in socialawareness and reactions to stress.

9. Synesthesia (the stimulation of one sensory stimulus to the brain by another) is partlygenetic and more common in infants than it is among older children. Cross-modal perception is the ability to link experiences in one sense with those in another.

10. As emotional development proceeds, an infant's specific emotions come to be aroused by particular people. This indicates that infant emotional reactions depend partly on memory.

11. Chronic early stress can impair the hypothalamus, which regulates various bodilyfunctions and hormone production. Children of teenage mothers often experience morestress. Helpful behaviors such as kangaroo care demonstrate the crucial role fatherscan play in helping new mothers.

II. Theories of Infant Psychosocial Development (pp. 129–138)Instructional Objective: To explain the major theories of emotional development duringthe first two years.

1. Psychoanalytic theory connects biosocial and psychosocial development, emphasizingthe need for responsive maternal care.

2. According to Freud, during the first year infants are in the oral stage of psychosexualdevelopment, when the mouth is the infant’s prime source of gratification and the mother’s attitudes regarding feeding and weaning are critical factors in the infant’spsychological development. An oral fixation later in life may occur if a child becomesdistressed at this stage. During the second year, infants are in the anal stage, whentoilet training becomes the focal point. A fixation at this stage may result in an anal

personality.

3. Erikson maintains that emotional development occurs through a series of basic crises.The basic crisis of infancy is trust versus mistrust, and the basic crisis of toddlerhoodis autonomy versus shame and doubt. In Erikson’s view, parental guidance and protection are the keys to the child’s gaining a healthy sense of autonomy. Infants who fail to develop trust or to achieve autonomy may become adults who are suspicious and pessimistic or who are burdened by shame. Cultural norms and expectations affect views on autonomy and shame.

4. According to early behaviorism, personality is molded through the processes of reinforcement and punishment of the child’s various behaviors. A strong proponent of this position was John Watson. Later theorists, such as Albert Bandura, incorporated therole of social learning, that is, infants’ tendency to imitate the personality traits oftheir parents.

5. According to cognitive theory, a person’s thoughts and values determine his or herperspective on the world. Thus, it is the child’s interpretation of the experience, notthe experience itself, that is crucial. More specifically, infants use their early elationshipsto build a working model that becomes a frame of reference for organizing perceptionsand experiences.

6. Cognitive theories also take into consideration the social constructions, or culturalbeliefs, of the entire community. Such ideas make up an ethnotheory, a culture—andethnic-group—specific theory that is not usually apparent to the people themselves.7. Systems theory recognizes a reciprocal relationship between every inherited trait andits social context. Systems theory is an epigenetic approach to development. It is particularly good at explaining temperament, the “constitutionally based” individual differences in emotions, activity, and self-regulation. Infants are born with distinct temperaments that are genetic in origin and affect personality. Some researchers believe that the line between temperament and personality is unclear. However, personality traits are generally considered to be primarily learned; temperamental traits are considered to be primarily genetic.

8. According to the New York Longitudinal Study (NYLS), infants can be described aspossessing one of four temperaments: easy (40 percent), slow to warm up (15 percent),difficult (10 percent), and hard to classify (35 percent).

9. The Big Five personality traits include openness, conscientiousness, extroversion,agreeableness, and neuroticism. These traits are found in many cultures, furtheringevidence that temperamental differences are innate. Some studies show both changeand continuity in temperament. One longitudinal study of infant temperament identified three distinct types: positive, negative, and inhibited.

10. As described by systems theory, parenting patterns affect infant emotions, and viceversa. Researchers have found considerable cultural variation in the use of proximal(close, physical) parenting and distal (distant, more intellectually focused) parenting.Proximal parenting predicts toddlers who later will be more compliant and less self-aware as compared to toddlers who experienced more distal parenting and becamemore self-aware but less obedient.

III. The Development of Social Bonds (pp. 138–150)Instructional Objective: To provide students with a sense of the importance of the socialcontext in which infants’ emotions develop, including the significance of infant–caregiverinteraction, in psychosocial development and the impact of day care.

1. An important factor in healthy psychosocial development is goodness of fit betweenthe developing child and the caregiving context.

2. Children who are high in neuroticism are more affected by their parents’ responsiveness than are easygoing children. The combination of ineffective or harsh parenting and a child's negative temperament is likely to create an antisocial child.

3. Researchers have found an impressive synchrony between infant and caregiver.Synchrony helps an infant learn to read other people’s emotions and to develop someof the basic skills of social interaction, such as taking turns and paying attention.

4. Researchers use the still-face technique to study synchrony between infant andcaregiver in order to determine whether synchrony is needed for normal development.

5. Approaching and following caregivers are proximity-seeking behaviors in infants, while holding and cuddling are contact-maintaining behaviors. Both types of behavior are clear signs of attachment.

6. A secure attachment (type B) is one in which the infant derives comfort and confidence from the caregiver, as evidenced by attempts to be close to the caregiver and by readiness to explore the environment. In this type of attachment, the caregiver acts as a base for exploration.

7. Infants who display insecure attachment may engage in little interaction with theirmothers and show no apparent distress when they leave (insecure-avoidant attachment or type A) or they may show an inconsistent mixture of behavior toward their mothers, such as both resisting and seeking contact (insecure-esistant/ambivalentattachment or type C). Type D is disorganized attachment and may be found inthe most troubled infants.

8. Mary Ainsworth has developed a laboratory procedure for measuring the security ofattachment. In this procedure, called the Strange Situation, infants’ reactions to the

comings and goings of their mothers and to friendly strangers are monitored.

9. Although secure attachment predicts both personality and social development, attachment status can change, either for the better or for the worse.

10. The emotional expressions of others begin to assume new meaning because infantsbegin to engage in social referencing; that is, they look to others for emotional cues in uncertain situations. This becomes important as crawling and walking increase infants’ mobility.

11. Researchers have found that although fathers provide less basic care than mothers,they play more, and their child-rearing style tends to be more proximal. Consequently,infants tend to look to fathers for fun and to mothers for comfort.

12. Infant day care outside the home by strangers is common in countries such as France, Israel, and Sweden, where it is subsidized by the government, but it is scarce in countries such as Ethiopia, India, and most Latin American countries where it is notsubsidized.

13. Infant day-care programs include family day care, in which children of various ages are cared for in a paid caregiver’s home, and center day care, in which children are cared for by several paid caregivers in a place designed for that purpose. Nonmaternalcare tends to vary in quality and availability.

14. Researchers have identified five factors that seem essential to high-quality day care:(a) adequate attention to each infant; (b) encouragement of sensorimotor and languagedevelopment; (c) attention to health and safety; (d) well-trained and professional caregivers; (e) warm and responsive caregivers.

15. According to the NICHD Early Child Care Network, day care is detrimental only when (a) mothers are insensitive; (b) the infant is in poor-quality day care for more than 20 hours per week, and (c) caregivers are poorly trained.

IV. Conclusions in Theory and Practice (pp. 150–152)1. Regarding the major theories of development, no single theory stands out as the bestinterpretation of psychosocial development during infancy. Although the first twoyears are important, early emotional and social development is influenced by the parents’ behavior, the quality of day-care patterns within the child’s culture, and thechild’s inborn traits.