THIS
REVIEW IS TO BE USED AS A GUIDE TO HELP YOU STUDY. IT DOES NOT REPLACE THE INFORMATION YOU GOT IN LECTURE AND
READINGS.
1) Why do primates take so long to mature (as opposed to non-primates)?
2) Why do humans take it to such an extreme?
3) What does this say about who we are as a species?
Are there reproductive disadvantages of extended immaturity?
--we have offspring later
What might compensate this disadvantage?
--our offspring have better chances of survival
“Obstetric Dilemma”
o bipedalism associated with change in pelvic structure and smaller birth canal
o evolution of humans associated with increasing brains size (homo erectus)
o energy cost for mother to continue supporting fetus brain metabolism
A solution: à human infants are born altricial (premature, with underdeveloped brains)
Unanticipated benefits:
Important terms:
o ectoderm, endoderm, mesoderm
o neural plate
o neural tube
o proliferative zone
o glial cells, neurons, radial glial cells
o cell birthday
o Radial Unit Hypothesis
o Protomap vs. Protocortex hypotheses
o organization/specialization of cortex
o productive events; synaptogenesis
o subtractive events; synapse retraction; cell death
o stages in neural development (when most neurons are produced, at what rate; the basic timeline outlined in the Joan Stiles handout, from neural plate to brain)
o what determines which synapses are retained and which die?
Effects of experience:
o rewiring a ferret’s brain experiment
o study of congenitally deaf
o children with focal brain lesions
Adult patterns of deficit
Child patterns of deficit
Are they the same? Different? What are they?
Language: pattern is different
Spatial cognition: pattern is the same
1) What are the perceptual consequences of neural changes?
2) How is infant vision different from adult vision?
3) What are the clinical implications?
o sensitivity
o threshold/contrast threshold
o contrast
o spatial frequency
o psychophysics
o Snellen exam (eye doctor chart)
o acuity
o focus
o luminance
o chromatic
o depth perception
o magnocellular, parvocellular, koniocellular pathway
o dyslexia
o stereopsis
o binocular vision; cues
o monocular vision; cues
o photoreceptors (differences between infant and adult, shape (or morphology) and spacing)
o visual cliff (see reading)
How do we test adult vision?
How do we test infant vision? (Preferential looking)
What is the difference between threshold and sensitivity?
What level of performance is considered the threshold?
What most affects acuity?—photoreceptor spacing
What most affects sensitivity?—photoreceptor morphology (size, shape)
How do infants see color in comparison to adults?—proportionally the same
What patterns and colors do infants prefer?—low frequency, high contrast, saturated colors.
At 1 month: outer edges
At 2 months: inner features of face
How do children learn language?
o they are not taught explicitly; adults are not aware of all that they know (i.e. prefixes)
o Subsystems of language (know basic definitions):
· phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics
· mismatches between the subsystems (i.e. phonology and morphology of “organization”)
o Language learning involves learning how the subsystems interact.
Main debates: Nature vs. Nurture
Nativism –
domain specificity,
modularity (i.e. specific language impairment),
species specific, language specific;
parameters
Interactionism/Empiricism—domain general, language as an emergent property, developed as a new thing from old parts (i.e. ears did not evolve to perceive language, language took advantage of the fact that ears could perceive sounds)
Other terms and concepts:
Milestones in lg. development in children (look at table 1 in reading)
Aphasia—Broca’s and Wernicke’s
they are a bit more complicated than what we discussed in Stiles
Re-emphasize the fact that language is not located in these two areas but rather these areas happen to be optimal for language and are more important than other areas. BUT keep in mind that children with focal lesions can recover from this, although not perfectly
Patterns of language learning:
the passage from sounds to words to grammar appears to be a universal, but WHEN exactly each child goes through these stages is a different story. There is lots of variation across children and within each child, but the basic steps will be roughly the same: first comprehension, then one word-stage, vocabulary burst, then 2 word stage, etc.
Why we learn so well: (Bates reading)
social creatures
curious, eager to share, joint attention
statistical learners
able to segment stimuli,
great imitators
an inference from many previous experiences to some future experience… this may be a generalization, or perhaps a prediction.
Big question: How do children make inductions? (since they have no previous experience)
Important terms and concepts:
o continuum of abilities across vertebrates and interactions (humans are at the “top”)
o specialized systems in humans
o embodiment (how physical and social world shapes knowledge, intelligence not just in the head)
o SCAS (socially cued attention sharing)
o gaze following (12 months)
o attention sharing and language
o word learning –mapping verbs onto intentional actions, not accidental ones; monitor adults’ attention to learn meanings of words (look where the adult looks when he says something)
o imitation
o habituation and prediction of performance in school, IQ scores
o From Siegler Reading: (among other things):
o automatization
o encoding
o generalization
o strategy construction
o Piaget
· “little scientist” learner (child discovers things on his own)
· stages in development: sensorimotor, pre-operational; concrete-operational; formal-operational
· main “happenings” at each stage (i.e. egocentric speech, conservation)
· implications for education and role of instruction
· assimilation
· accomodation
· equilibration
o Vygotsky
· environment is transformed by prior generations
· children act on the world “indirectly”
· social interaction is key to development: social scaffolding
· zone of proximal development
Basic
Questions:
What are the social influences on
cognition? on learning?
What are the implications of social dev. research on parenting
practices, teaching, etc?
Basic
concepts & terms:
·
dependent (cause) vs. independent (effect) variables
(see table below)
·
problems that arise in soc. dev. research
·
developmental milestones
·
social referencing
·
parenting styles: authoritarian, permissive,
authoritative, neglectful
·
false belief
·
gender constancy; same-sex preference; gender
stereotyping
·
complex emotions; hiding emotion, etc.
Independent vs. dependent
variables (IV vs DV) =
Cause and effect
|
|
“Is divorce harmful?”
|
“Is it bad to watch too much TV?”
|
|
IV |
-
age at divorce -
custody arrangements -
gender -
financial situation -
friends w/divorced parents? |
-
amount of TV per day -
what programs? -
age? -
other activities? |
|
DV |
-
academic performance -
social behavior -
self-report |
-
academic performance -
social behavior |
Problems that arise:
-
different people react differently to same situation
-
some causes are not obvious, small, difficult to
measure
-
some effects are hard to measure
-
may miss true causal factor (or, what’s cause, what’s
effect?)
-
cultural biases
Parenting styles
2
dimensions, 4 styles
|
|
|
ACCEPTANCE |
|
|
|
|
HI |
LO |
|
CONTROL |
HI |
authoritative |
authoritarian |
|
LO |
permissive |
neglectful |
|
outcomes?
authoritative: good grades, self-confidence, altruistic
authoritarian: academic problems; peer problems
permissive: problems with aggression; lack of
maturity w/peers; lack of independence
neglectful: most consistent negative outcomes;
antisocial behavior; academic problems
Developmental
Milestones
|
newborn |
Newborn imitation; prefers mother’s
voice; recognizes mother’s smell |
|
9 months |
1st acknowledges
intentionality of social partner; 1st social referencing |
|
12 months |
Clear attachment pattern to a
caregiver; 1st attempts at hurting & comforting |
|
18 months |
1st understanding of
desire; 1st evidence of gender-stereotypes (boys prefer trucks) |
|
2 years |
Interest in expressing
independence; private speech |
|
3 years |
Same-sex preferences in
playmates; hiding emotion |
|
4 years |
Understanding of false belief;
understands gender stability; aggression becomes verbal |
|
5 years |
Gender constancy; understands
real vs. apparent emotions |
|
6 years |
Understands complex emotions |
________________________________________________________________________
LeslIE
Carver—Genetics, Brain Development, and Behavior
Questions:
1) Does it make sense to talk about genes “for” a behavior?
2) How do genes turn “into” brains?
3) Can environment affect dev. before birth?
4) What happens to turn one cell into a baby?
Important terms: