Chapter 9 covers developmental psychology, so what exactly does that mean? What is developmental psychology? Development is a process of growth, change, and consistency brought about by an interaction of heredity (nature) and environment (nurture). So developmental psychology is the psychology of growth, change, and consistency through the lifespan as a result of biological and environmental influences. This type of psychology begs to ask how thinking, feeling and behavior change through infancy, childhood, adolescence and adulthood. It looks at how our brain and bodies change and how those changes effect sensation, perception, cognition, motivation, emotion and personality. Developmental psychology wants to understand what CAUSES development- is it heredity? Is it environment? How important is each one and how do they interact with one another?
Think about your own life. Do you possess characteristics that are exactly like your parents or family? Do you have certain attributes that are nothing like your family, or do you consider yourself a black sheep? Do you think you are a product of the way you were raised? We will get more in depth with these questions as the unit continues.
Think about your own life. Do you possess characteristics that are exactly like your parents or family? Do you have certain attributes that are nothing like your family, or do you consider yourself a black sheep? Do you think you are a product of the way you were raised? We will get more in depth with these questions as the unit continues.
Intro to Developmental Psychology
Click THIS LINK to find an article on nature vs. nurture from the Huffington Post. Below you will find questions to answer after reading the article.
Capabilities of the Child
So now that we understand a little more about what psychological development is, what some of the major themes are, and differing views on how we move through development, it is time to take a look at the our innate abilities as well as the early stages of life and how those abilities develop. We will also take a look at important studies and experiments that have led to our understanding of how children develop over time.
Piaget- Developmental Tasks of Infancy and Childhood
This section will focus more on looking at cognitive development from infancy through childhood while paying particular attention to Jean Piaget and his discontinuous cognitive developmental theories on schemas, assimilation, accommodation and the 4 stages of cognitive development.