Developmental psychology and child psychology?

blogs, contributions, summaries, study assistance and experiences abroad

Image
Table of related content to: Developmental psychology and child psychology

   

More supporting content:
What is developmental psychology?

What is developmental psychology?

Developmental psychology is a fascinating field that explores the lifespan changes in human beings. It delves into the physical, cognitive, social, emotional, and moral development that individuals experience from conception to death.

What are the main features of developmental psychology?

  • Lifespan Approach: It examines development across all stages of life, from prenatal development to old age.
  • Multidimensional Focus: Developmental psychology recognizes that growth occurs in various domains – physical, cognitive, social, emotional, and moral.
  • Nature vs. Nurture: This field explores the complex interplay between biological (genetic) predispositions and environmental influences on development.
  • Continuity vs. Discontinuity: Developmental psychologists debate whether development is a gradual, continuous process or punctuated by distinct stages.

What are important sub-areas in developmental psychology?

  • Prenatal Development: Examines the growth and development of the fetus from conception to birth.
  • Infancy and Childhood: Focuses on rapid physical, cognitive, social, and emotional development during the early years.
  • Adolescence: Studies the physical, cognitive, and social changes experienced during puberty and teenage years.
  • Emerging Adulthood: Explores the development of identity, relationships, and career paths in young adulthood.
  • Middle Adulthood: Examines changes in physical health, cognitive abilities, and family dynamics during middle age.
  • Late Adulthood: Studies the physical, cognitive, and social changes associated with aging.

What are key concepts in developmental psychology?

  • Critical Period: A specific time window when an organism is highly susceptible to environmental influences impacting development.
  • Maturation: The biological unfolding of genetic potential, leading to physical growth and development.
  • Attachment Theory: Explores the importance of early emotional bonds with caregivers for healthy emotional and social development.
  • Cognitive Development: The process of acquiring knowledge, skills, and thinking abilities throughout life.
  • Social Development: The process by which individuals learn to interact with others and form relationships.
  • Moral Development: The development of an understanding of right and wrong, and a sense of ethical principles.

Who are influential figures in developmental psychology?

  • Jean Piaget (Psychologist): Pioneered the theory of cognitive development, proposing stages of cognitive growth in children.
  • Lev Vygotsky (Psychologist): Emphasized the role of social interaction and culture in cognitive development, introducing the concept of the Zone of Proximal Development.
  • Erik Erikson (Psychologist): Developed the theory of psychosocial development, proposing eight stages of psychosocial challenges individuals face throughout life.
  • John Bowlby (Psychoanalyst): Pioneered attachment theory, highlighting the significance of early emotional bonds with caregivers for healthy development.
  • Mary Ainsworth (Psychologist): Expanded upon attachment theory, identifying different attachment styles (secure, anxious, avoidant) formed in early childhood.

Why is developmental psychology important?

  • Understanding Human Development: Provides a deeper understanding of how humans grow and change throughout life.
  • Early Childhood Intervention: Helps design programs and interventions to support healthy development in children, especially those facing challenges.
  • Education: Developmental psychology informs educational practices by tailoring teaching methods to different age groups and developmental stages.
  • Parenting and Family Support: Offers insights into child development stages, fostering positive and supportive parenting practices.
  • Aging Well: Helps us understand the aging process and develop strategies to promote healthy aging physically, cognitively, and socially.

How

.......read more
Access: 
Public
What is child psychology?

What is child psychology?

Child psychology is a specialized field within developmental psychology that focuses specifically on the mental, emotional, social, and cognitive development of children from prenatal development through adolescence.

What are the main features of child psychology?

  • Focus on Childhood: It delves into the unique aspects of development during the early years of life.
  • Multifaceted Approach: Examines a variety of domains, including emotional well-being, cognitive abilities, social skills, and moral development.
  • Developmental Stages: Child psychology acknowledges that children progress through distinct stages with specific challenges and milestones.
  • Play and Exploration: Recognizes the importance of play and exploration in learning and development.

What are important sub-areas in child psychology?

  • Prenatal Development: Examines how experiences in the womb can impact a child's physical and mental development.
  • Infant Development: Focuses on rapid physical, cognitive, and social-emotional development during the first year of life.
  • Early Childhood Development: Studies the cognitive, social, and emotional growth that occurs between the ages of 2 and 6.
  • Middle Childhood Development: Examines the physical, cognitive, and social changes experienced during the school years (ages 6-12).
  • Adolescence: Studies the physical, cognitive, and social changes experienced during puberty and the teenage years.

What are key concepts in child psychology?

  • Attachment Theory: The importance of early emotional bonds with caregivers for healthy emotional and social development.
  • Developmental Milestones: The expected skills and abilities children acquire at different ages.
  • Cognitive Development: The process of acquiring knowledge, skills, and thinking abilities throughout childhood.
  • Social Development: The process by which children learn to interact with others and form relationships.
  • Play Therapy: A therapeutic approach using play to help children express themselves, process emotions, and develop coping mechanisms.
  • Temperament: Inborn behavioral styles and characteristics influencing children's responses to their environment.

Who are influential figures in child psychology?

  • Jean Piaget (Psychologist): Pioneered the theory of cognitive development, proposing stages of cognitive growth in children.
  • Lev Vygotsky (Psychologist): Emphasized the role of social interaction and culture in cognitive development, introducing the Zone of Proximal Development.
  • Erik Erikson (Psychologist): Developed the theory of psychosocial development, proposing eight stages of psychosocial challenges individuals face throughout life, including challenges specific to childhood.
  • John Bowlby (Psychoanalyst): Pioneered attachment theory, highlighting the significance of early emotional bonds with caregivers for healthy development.
  • Mary Ainsworth (Psychologist): Expanded upon attachment theory, identifying different attachment styles (secure, anxious, avoidant) formed in early childhood.

Why is child psychology important?

  • Promoting Healthy Development: Provides insights for optimizing a child's physical, cognitive, social, and emotional well-being.
  • Early Intervention: Helps identify developmental delays or challenges early on, allowing for timely intervention and support.
  • Understanding Behavior: Provides a framework for understanding children's behavior and responding appropriately.
  • Positive Parenting: Offers guidance on effective parenting practices that foster healthy development and nurturing relationships.
  • Educational Practices: Informs the development of age-appropriate curriculum and teaching methods in schools.

How is child psychology applied in practice?

  • Early Childhood Education: Provides the foundation for designing effective preschool and kindergarten programs.
  • Parenting Education and Support: Offers guidance on child development stages and
.......read more
Access: 
Public
Developmental psychology and child psychology: The best textbooks summarized

Developmental psychology and child psychology: The best textbooks summarized

Summaries and Study Assistance with Developmental psychology and child psychology

Table of content

  • Summary with the book: A Critical Introduction to Sport Psychology by Moran and Toner - 3rd edition
  • Summary with the book: Abnormal Child and Adolescent Psychology by Wicks-Nelson and Israel - 8th edition
  • Summary with the book: Adolescence by Steinberg - 12th edition
  • Summary with the book: An Introduction to Developmental Psychology by Slater and Bremner - 3rd edition
  • Summary with the book: Child and Adolescent Therapy: Cognitive-Behavioral Procedures by Kendall - 4th edition
  • Summary with the book: Cognitive Behaviour Therapy for Children and Families by Graham and Reynolds - 3rd edition
  • Summary with the book: How Children Develop by Siegler a.o. - 6th edition
  • Summary with the book: Life-Span Human Development by Sigelman and Rider - 9th edition
  • Summary with the book: The boy who was raised as a dog by Perry

About developmental psychology and child psychology

  • Developmental psychology is the scientific study of how people change and grow throughout their lifespan. Child psychology is a subfield of developmental psychology that focuses specifically on the cognitive, social, and emotional development of children.
Access: 
Public
Developmental psychology: the best scientific articles summarized

Developmental psychology: the best scientific articles summarized

Study guide with articles for Developmental psychology

Summaries and study assistance with articles for Developmental psychology

  • for 60+ summaries with articles for Developmental psychology, see the supporting content of this study guide

Related summaries and study assistance

Summaries and supporting content: 
Access: 
Public
Developmental psychology: The best concepts summarized

Latest

Latest changes and updates tagged with: Developmental psychology and child psychology

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 21

Developmental delay refers to a delayed, but normal path of development. A developmental difference refers to a qualitatively different path of development. Whether the development is delayed or different depends on the area of development. One approach to quantifying a delay includes looking at the extent to which individual children perform relative to a level expected for their chronological age on standardised assessment tests. Spotting atypical development can also be done by checking the scores of a test of children and comparing them with the population. This makes use of standard deviations. Concluding that one aspect of development is delayed doesn’t tell us anything about what underlies the delay.

The study of atypically developing children provides a profile of the main behaviours associated with a condition within the context of development across the human lifespan. Atypical trajectory refers to a sequence of development that departs from the typical

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 20

Bullying is the term used to define an individual’s repeated exposure to negative actions by one or more other people. There is a lot of social pressure in the classroom. A key factor is the process of social comparison, where the child compares his performance with his classmates. This comparison is mostly upward and can raise the child’s level of academic performance, but can also result in negative self-perception. Self-worth protection is the tendency of some students to reduce their levels of effort so that any subsequent poor academic performance will be attributed to low motivation rather than a lack of ability.

There is also peer pressure to either work hard or to not work hard. The visible demonstration of a student’s attempt to excel academically has social risks. These social risks can result in reduced striving. Stress levels in relation to academic performance can often be

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 19

Resilience occurs when children experience positive outcomes despite experiencing significant risk. Risk is defined as those stressors that have proven or presumed effects on increasing the likelihood of maladjustment in children (e.g: poverty, maltreatment). Risk factors are catastrophic events. Risk factors pose a pervasive threat through deprivation of children’s basic needs. A protective factor is anything that prevents or reduces vulnerability for the development of a disorder. Vulnerability factors refer to those attributes of the individual that contribute to maladjustment under conditions of adversity. Children’s exposure to risk varies according to age. Infants are more vulnerable, yet less likely to suffer from difficulties involving their social environment, because of their lack of understanding of the situation.

There are several major risk factors:

  1. Death of a parent
    This is a traumatic event for children, but there is evidence that it has a smaller effect on
.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 18

Pedagogy refers to any aspect of theory or practice related to teaching. In the 1960s, there was a shift toward a child-centred education. Piaget emphasised the role of the teacher for providing the best physical environment for children to overcome their egocentrism and start to understand conservation. Discovery learning is encouraging children to learn by discovering information for themselves. Based on constructivism, many learning activities involve discovery learning. The most efficient way of learning is guided discovery, where children are the centre of their learning, but a teacher provides feedback as they develop their understanding.

Piaget argued that egocentrism could be overcome via interaction with peers because this shows the child different perspectives. Peers are more important than adults because they are more proximate and credible than adult helper. Peers provide the ideal source of socio-cognitive conflict, where two opposing egocentric views result in a cognitive conflict. Through

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 16

Adolescents can see both figures in ambiguous figures, while young children can only see one, or take longer to see the other. This suggests increased flexibility of perception. Adolescents have a superior ability to allocate attentional resources. Selective attention is the ability to allocate attentional resources and focus on a specific topic. Adolescents have superior selective attention. Young children divide their attention, while adolescents selectively focus their attention.

Speed of processing refers to the amount of time needed to carry out any given mental calculation. Speed of processing develops rapidly during childhood and continues to develop during the adolescent years. This development is partially driven by the maturation of white matter in the brain.

There is rapid development in face processing abilities during childhood and adolescence. The encoding switch hypothesis claims that different information about faces is represented in memory by children of different ages. Children prior to

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 15

Moral dilemmas are situations in which people must choose and justify a course of action or reasoning with respect to a moral issue. Piaget concluded that younger children’s moral judgement was governed by unilateral respect for adults and adults’ rules, with little understanding of reciprocity or the intentions of others. Kohlberg defined five stages of moral development:

  1. Heteronomous morality (punishment orientation)
    Moral reasoning in which children believe that right and wrong are determined by powerful adult figures.
  2. Instrumental morality (personal gain)
    Children in this stage reason from their personal gain.
  3. Interpersonal normative morality (social evaluation)
    Children in this stage seek to be viewed as good and feel guilt when it is likely that others condemn their behaviour. Individuals are concerned with how the self is evaluated by others.
  4. Social system morality (social order)
    Children in this stage argue
.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 12

Cultural tools refer to any tools that help us calculate, produce models, make predictions and understand the world more fully. Orthographies, writing systems, differ greatly. Alphabetic scripts are a writing system in which written symbols correspond to spoken sounds. In Chinese, each letter corresponds to a morpheme. Children find it difficult to realize that letters represent phonemes. Children get better at phonemes as they get older. Instruction is necessary for learning how to read and write. The environment plays a key role. The more children have learned about phonemes, the better they read and write.

Phonemic awareness is the idea that words consist of a sequence of phonemes. This idea does not come easily to young children. Phonological skills refer to the ability to detect and manipulate sounds at the phonetic, syllabic and intra-syllabic levels. Intrasyllabic units are units of speech that are smaller than syllables

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 11

Intuitive psychology refers to the awareness some people have regarding others’ motives and beliefs. The unexpected transfer test is the classic false-belief test. The false belief test helps us differentiate between those who do and those who do not understand that minds hold beliefs.

Children below the age of 7 are egocentric, according to Piaget. A conceptual shift is a large qualitative change in an individual’s cognitive processes. Representational ability is the ability to form a mental representation of an event or an object. Metacognition refers to knowledge of one’s state of mind, reflective access to one’s cognitive abilities, thinking about how one is feeling or thinking. The deceptive box task shows false beliefs in young children, as well as difficulties with accessing one’s own beliefs. Children who were unable to acknowledge another person’s false belief were not even attuned to their own prior beliefs. If

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 10

The human language is characterised by the following things:

  1. Communication system
    It is a communication system, a means for speakers of a language to communicate with one another. This part is not unique to human language.
  2. A symbolic system
    It is a symbolic system because words and parts of words represent meaning. They refer to something other than themselves. Language systems are arbitrary.
  3. Rule-governed system
    It is a rule-governed system. Each human language is constrained by a set of rules that reflect the regularities of the language.
  4. Productivity
    It is productive because a finite number of linguistic units and a finite number of rules are capable of yielding an infinite number of grammatical utterances. Speakers are not restricted to reproducing sentences they have already heard.

Language consists of several systems, the pragmatic system, the phonological

.........Read more
Access: 
Public

An Introduction to Developmental psychology by A. Slater and G. Bremner (third edition) - Chapter 9

Piaget proposed that the basic unit of understanding was a scheme, which is a mental representation of actions and knowledge. Infants start out with three basic schemes, sucking, looking and grasping. Operations are internal mental representations. Mental representations not based on physical activity.

Children modify their schemes using two processes: organisation and adaptation. Organisation is organising several schemes into a bigger scheme. Adaptation consists of assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation is incorporating new information into a pre-existing scheme. Accommodation is modifying the pre-existing schemes (or generating a new one) in order to fit new information.

Equilibration is the state in which children’s schemes are in balance and are undisturbed by conflict. When there are too many conflicts that cannot be solved by either assimilation or accommodation, a change of thinking is required and this is a stage shift. A stage shift is a qualitative shift in a

.........Read more
Access: 
Public
Check or search within topic: Developmental psychology and child psychology
Displaying 145 - 148 of 435
Image

Emotions may facilitate adaptation by readying behavioural responses (1), enhancing memory for important events (2) and guide interpersonal interactions (3). However, emotions are maladaptive when they are of the wrong type (1), at the wrong time (2) or at the wrong intensity level (3). Emotions con...

Pages

Check or search within: all content
Check or search within: topics, countries and studies only

Search countries, goals, studies, topics or working fields

Spotlight: selection

Selected spotlight content related to Developmental psychology and child psychology
Developmental psychology: the best scientific articles summarized

Study guide with articles for Developmental psychology Summaries and study assistance with articles for Developmental psychology

  • for 60+ summaries with articles for Developmental psychology, see the supporting content of this study guide

Related summaries and study assistance

Spotlight: favorites

Spotlight stories and suggestions related to Developmental psychology and child psychology
Spotlight summaries related to Developmental psychology and child psychology
Image

What can I find on this page? On this page, you can find a summary for all the study materials you need for the developmental specialization of the Psychology bachelor's programme at the University of Amsterdam. There is a link for all the separate courses. The courses have been organized into ...

Image

What?

  • On this page we discuss questions students have with the 2022/2023 course "Developmental Psychology" at the University of Amsterdam
  • You have the opportunity to ask any questions you might have and I will try and answer them
  • On 30/1/2023 you can ask questions!

Selected Worldsupporter pages in relation with the topic