Theories of Development

Question 1

What’s the difference between critical period and sensitive period?

Answer 1

• Critical period: a time during which children undergo rapid growth and are vulnerable to injury
• Sensitive period: a time during which children can learn things by exposure

Question 2

What theories did Freud come up with?

Answer 2

• Id, ego, and superego
• Defense mechanisms
• The unconscious
• Psychosexual
• Dream interpretation

Question 3

What are Freud’s stages of development?

Answer 3

• Oral (18-24 months)
• Anal (24 months to three years)
• Phallic (three to six years)
• Latent (six years to puberty)
• Genital (puberty to adulthood)

Question 4

What are three concepts put forth by Piaget?

Answer 4

• Assimilation: the period during which children take in information
• Accommodation: the period during which children adjust their minds to received input
• Decalage: unevenness of development

Question 5

List Piaget’s four stages of development.

Answer 5

• Sensorimotor (18-24 months): dependence on direct sensations to interact with the world
• Pre-operational (24 months to 7 years): emergence of symbolism and magical thinking; causality based on spatial and temporal proximity
• Concrete operations (7 years to 12 years): able to appreciate volume, quantity, permanence, and causality
• Formal operations (12 years to adulthood): abstract reasoning and metacognition

Question 6

Who invented the attachment theory?

Answer 6

John Bowlby

This theory posits that infants can identify secure bases and strange situations.

Question 7

Bowlby thought that attachment took place from _______________.

Answer 7

age two months to seven months

Question 8

Preferred attachment is evident by ____________.

Answer 8

seven months to one year

Question 9

Separation anxiety escalates at about __________.

Answer 9

one year

Question 10

What framework did Eric Erikson create?

Answer 10

His model states that humans develop through stages in which people must resolve conflicts (such as trust vs. mistrust, autonomy vs. shame, etc.).

Question 11

Bronfenbrenner put forth a theory that _________________.

Answer 11

emphasized the ecology of human development

Question 12

What did the ACES trial show?

Answer 12

The Adverse Childhood Experiences Study showed that adults who had had four or more adverse childhood experiences – listed below – were at greatly increased risk of dying early.

Emotional abuse
Physical abuse
Sexual abuse 
Emotional neglect
Physical neglect
Mother treated violently
Household substance abuse
Household mental illness
Parental divorce
Incarceration of family member

Question 13

What is “toxic stress”?

Answer 13

Prolonged adversity or stress in the absence of buffering relationships

Question 14

According to the Center for the Developing Child at Harvard, how many children per 1,000 have toxic stress?

Answer 14

• 130 from postpartum depression
• 98 from parental substance abuse
• 75 from maltreatment

Question 15

Overall, it’s important to have an environment that is _____________.

Answer 15

good enough; that is, it’s not necessary to optimize every second of a developing child’s life but rather just to hit the basics and avoid major trauma/neglect/abuse

Question 16

What does the visual cliff experiment show?

Answer 16

Babies are placed on a table that has plexiglass over half of it that makes it look like they might fall. If the baby’s mother is standing nearby and smiling, babies will typically walk over the plexiglass. If the mother is making a scared face, however, the baby will usually not walk over the plexiglass.

Question 17

During the ages _________, vocabulary generally increases from about 1,000 words to 8,000 words.

Answer 17

3 to 6

Question 18

Children can usually understand conservation of volume during Piaget’s ___________ stage.

Answer 18

concrete operational

Question 19

Myelinization continues until the _________ decade.

Answer 19

5th

Question 20

The ability to delay gratification continues to develop until _________________.

Answer 20

people are in their 40s

Question 21

Bowlby’s main theory was _____________.

Answer 21

that the relationship between the young child and his or her caregiver determines the rest of the child’s personal development: the “secure base” idea upon which Ainsworth developed her classic experiment

Question 22

What would a “resistant” child do in Ainsworth’s separation experiment?

Answer 22

Resist the affection of the parent upon first coming back into the room

Question 23

Kohlberg’s theory posits that _____________.

Answer 23

people develop through different moral stages–starting with moral naïvity, going through selfish pragmatism, and ending with universal ethics

Question 24

Children can usually follow two-step commands by age ________.

Answer 24

two

Question 25

What is rationalization?

Answer 25

Actions based on one motive (say, for example, greed) attributed to actions based on a more acceptable motive (saying that hard work should be rewarded)

Question 26

The Heinz dilemma (should a man steal medicine he can’t afford to save his wife?) was created by ___________.

Answer 26

Kohlberg

Question 27

Healthcare workers are part of Bronfenbrenner’s ______-system.

Answer 27

micro

Question 28

Stranger anxiety starts around age _______.

Answer 28

6 months

Question 29

Vocabulary tends to increase from 1,000 to 8,000 words in the __________ age range.

Answer 29

3 to 6

Question 30

_______________ continues until the 5th decade.

Answer 30

Myelinization