Psy 101 -- Chapter 4

Front 1

developmental psychology

Back 1

a branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social changes throughout the lifespan

Front 2

zygote

Back 2

the fertilized eggs

enters a 2-week period of rapid cell division and develops into an embryo

Front 3

embryo

Back 3

the developing human organism from about 2 weeks after fertilization through the second month

Front 4

fetus

Back 4

the developing human organism from 9 weeks after conception to birth

Front 5

teratogens

Back 5

agents, such as chemicals and viruses, that can reach the embryo or fetus during prenatal development and cause harm

Front 6

fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS)

Back 6

physical and cognitive abnormalities in children cause by a pregnant woman's heavy drinking

Front 7

rooting reflex

Back 7

a baby's tendency, when touch on the cheek, to turn toward the touch, open the mouth, and search for the nipple

Front 8

habituation

Back 8

decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimulation

Front 9

maturation

Back 9

biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience

Front 10

schema

Back 10

a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information

Front 11

assimilation

Back 11

interpreting one's new experience in terms of one's existing schemas

Front 12

accommodation

Back 12

adapting one's current understandings to incorporate new information

Front 13

cognition

Back 13

all the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating

Front 14

sensorimotor stage

Back 14

in Piaget's theory, the stage (from birth to 2 weeks) during which infants know the world mostly in terms of their sensory impressions and motor activities

Front 15

object permanence

Back 15

the awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived

Front 16

preoperational stage

Back 16

in Piaget's theory, the stage (from 2- 6/7) during which a child learns to use language but does not yet comprehend the mental operations of concrete logic

Front 17

conservation

Back 17

the principle that properties such as mass, volume, and number remains the same despite changes in form of objects

Front 18

egocentrism

Back 18

in Piaget's theory, the preoperational child's difficulty taking another's point of view

Front 19

theory of mind

Back 19

people's ideas about their own and others' mental states -- about their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts and the behavior these might predict

Front 20

autism

Back 20

a disorder that appears in childhood and is marked by deficient communication, social interaction, and understanding of others' states of mind

Front 21

concrete operational stage

Back 21

in Piaget's theory, the stage of cognitive development (from 6/7 - 11) during which children gain the mental operations that enable them to think logically about concrete events

Front 22

formal operational stage

Back 22

in Piaget's theory, the stage of cognitive development (beginning at 12) during which people begin to think logically about abstract concepts

Front 23

stranger anxiety

Back 23

the fear of strangers that infants commonly display, beginning by about 8 months of age

Front 24

attachment

Back 24

an emotional tie with another person

shown in young children by their seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress in separation

Front 25

critical period

Back 25

an optimal period shortly after birth when an organism's exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produces proper development

Front 26

imprinting

Back 26

the process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical period very early in life

Front 27

basis trust

Back 27

according to Erik Erikson, a sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy

Front 28

self-concept

Back 28

a sense of one's identity and personal worth