Cognitive Development In Infancy Unit 1

Front 1

Cognition

Back 1

the process or faculties by which knowledge is acquired and manipulated

Front 2

Development

Back 2

Changes in structure and/or function over time

Front 3

Structure

Back 3

some substrate of the organism, such as the mental knowledge that underlies intelligence

Front 4

Function

Back 4

denotes actions related to a structure and can include actions external to the structure being studied

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Bidirectional

Back 5

reciprocal relationship between structure and function

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Developmental function

Back 6

the species-typical form that cognition takes over time

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Individual differences

Back 7

differences in patterns of intellectual aptitudes among people of a given age

Front 8

Five Truths of Cognitive Development

Back 8

1. cognitive development proceeds as a result of the dynamic and reciprocal transaction of internal and external factors

2. cognitive development is constructed within a social context

3. cognitive development involves stability and plasticity over time

4. cognitive development involves changes in the way information is represented

5. children develop increasing intentional control over their behavior and cognition

Front 9

Nativism

Back 9

the human intellectual abilities are innate

(NATURE & BIOLOGY)

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Empiricism

Back 10

nature provides only species-general learning mechanisms, with cognition arising as a result of experience

(NURTURE & EXPERIENCE)

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Representational contraints

Back 11

representations that are hardwired into the brain so that some types of "knowledge" are innate

Front 12

Architectural constraints

Back 12

ways in which the architecture of the brain is organized at birth; limit the type and manner in which information can be processed by the brain

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Chronotopic contraints

Back 13

limitations on the developmental timing of events

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Stability

Back 14

the degree to which children maintain their same relative rank order over time in comparison with their peers in some aspect of cognition

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Plasticitiy

Back 15

the extent to which children can be shaped by experience

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Harlow (1959)

Back 16

Participants- infant monkeys

Method- given training on a discrimination learning task at different ages

Results- earlier trained monkeys performed worse

Implications- training can be helpful or harmful, it depends on the stage of development/age at which it is received

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Wynn (1992)

Back 17

Participants- 5 month olds

Method- place mickey mouse behind screen and show hand "add" another doll. Watch to see if baby is surprised when screen goes down and there's still only one doll

Results- babies did seem surprised- stared longer at impossible event

Implications- there is some basic understanding of addition and subtraction

Front 18

Domain-general abilities

Back 18

assume that at any point in time, a child's thinking is influenced by a single set of factors, with these factors affecting different aspects of cognition equally

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Domain-specific abilities

Back 19

knowing a child's ability for one aspect of cognition might tell us nothing about his or her level of cognitive ability for other aspects of thinking

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Developmental systems approach

Back 20

views development as occurring within a system of interacting levels; is centered around the concept of epigenisis

Front 21

Epigenisis

Back 21

any gene-regulating activity that doesn't involve changes to the DNA code and that can persist through one or more generations; the activity of the organism itself influencing its own development

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Behavioral genetics

Back 22

studies genetic effects on behavior and complex psychological characteristics such as intelligence and personality

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Genotype-environment theory

Back 23

propose that one's genotype influences which environments one encounters and the type of experiences one has; genes drive experience

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Passive

Back 24

biological parents provide both genes and environment for the child; effects decrease with age

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Evocative

Back 25

temperamental characteristics of child evokes responses from others; effects remain constant with age

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Active

Back 26

children seek out environments consistent with their genotypes; effects increase with age

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Neuron

Back 27

specialized nerve cells that transmit electrical and chemical signals to eachother

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Dendrite

Back 28

receive messages from other cells and transfer them to the cell body

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Synapses

Back 29

small spaces between dendrites in which messages are passed

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Neurotransmitters

Back 30

chemicals that transmit messages between cells

Front 31

Myelin

Back 31

fatty substance produced by supportive brain cells which protects and insulates axons, speeding messages can be sent

Front 32

Migration

Back 32

after cells are produced they move to the their permanent position in the brain

Front 33

Experience-expectant processes

Back 33

functions will develop for all members of a species given a species-typical environment

Front 34

Experience-dependent processes

Back 34

connections among neurons are made that reflect the unique experiences of an individual

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DeCaspar & Spence (1986)

Back 35

Participants- newborns

Method- mothers read ppassage from Cat in the Hat for last 6 wks of pregnancy. Newborns tested to see if they recognized the passage they heard before birth

Results- the familiar passage was more reinforcing than the novel passage. Babies sucked faster to continue hearing familiar passage

Implications- prenatal conditioning to auditory patterns

Front 36

Visual preference paradigm

Back 36

method used to test infants' visual discrimination abilities

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Habituation

Back 37

the decrease in response as a result of repeated presentation of a stimulus

Front 38

Dishabituation

Back 38

occurs when following habituation, a new stimulus is presented that increases the level of responsiveness

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Schemas

Back 39

sensory representations

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Discrepancy principle

Back 40

infants are most attentive to novel stimuli

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Phonemes

Back 41

the basic units of speech; evidence indicates that infants come into the world with the ability to perceive most of the phonemes found in all human languages

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Krumhansl & Juesczyk (1990)

Back 42

Participants- 4.5 to 6 month olds

Method- babies listened to snippets of Mozart, some with unnatural pauses in the clip. They learned to control which version of the music was played by turning their heads to the speaker of the music they preferred.

Results- most babies preferred the natural version with no pauses

Implications- infants seem to prefer what most adults consider pleasant sounding music

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Lynch et al. (1990)

Back 43

Participants- adults and 6.5 month olds

Method- all participants had to determine out of tune music in both western (native) and Javanese (foreign) scales

Results- adults were able to tell for native music but babies could tell for both native and foreign music

Implications- babies born able to distinguish between scales from a variety of cultures

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Intermodal integration

Back 44

the coordination of information from two or more sensory modalities

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Spelke (1976)

Back 45

Participants- 4 month olds

Method- two videos played with only one sound corresponding to one of the videos. Looking time measured to see what the baby was attending to

Results- babies attended to the video that matched the sound they were hearing

Implications- babies could use sensory input from two sources to integrate the stimuli

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Intermodal matching

Back 46

ability to recognize an object initially inspected by one sense through another sense

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Meltzoff & Borton (1979)

Back 47

Participants- 1 month olds

Method- baby given bumpy or smooth pacifier to suck then shown pictures of bumpy and smooth pacifier. Looking times measured

Results- babies looked longer at pacifier they were sucking

Implications- babies can match stimuli experienced thru different senses

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Violation of expectation

Back 48

an infant's reaction to an unexpected event is used to infer what he/she knows

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Baillargeon (1999)

Back 49

Participants- 2.5 month olds

Methods- mouse shown on one side of screen with gap in the middle and appears on the other side of screen without being seen in the gap

Results- babies seem surprised that they couldn't see the mouse in the middle of the screen because looking times increased

Implications- babies may have a sense of object permenance

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Core knowledge

Back 50

human infants are endowed with at least three systems early on *inanimate objects and their mechanical interactions *persons and their actions *number representation