An Introduction to Developmental Psychology by Bremner and Slater - 3rd Edition

An Introduction to Developmental Psychology by Bremner and Slater - 3rd Edition

The scope and methods of developmental psychology - Chapter 1

Developmental psychology can be defined as the discipline that attempts to describe and explain the changes that are present in thoughts, behavior, reasoning and functioning in a person under the influence of biological, individual and environmental factors. Developmental psychologists study the development of children and in general people throughout life from different perspectives.

Studying changes with age

The newborn infant is a helpless creature with limited means of communication and few skills. By 18 - 24 months (the end of the period of infancy) this has changed. The child has formed relationships with others, learned a lot about the world and is about to take major steps in language development. By the time of adolescence the child is mature: a thinking individual who actively tries to adapt to a rapidly changing and complex society. It is tempting to think that the child only develops because it gets older. Increasing age, by itself, contributes nothing to development. It is the maturation and changes resulting from experience that ensure the different stages in development. An example of this is puberty: despite the fact that its onset can be influenced by environmental factors, such as diet, the changes that occur are primarily genetically determined. However, it is always important to look at the various factors that influence the development as it takes place. 

Concepts of human development

The assumptions and ideas we have about human nature influence how we rear our own children and how we interpret the findings from studies of children. The 'folk' theories of development often reflect what psychologists investigate. The purpose of this is to put our understanding on a more scientific footing.

'Folk' theories of development: punishment or praise?

We all have ideas about how children should be raised. These ideas emerge from our own upbringing, our experience with peers, the ideas of our parents, the media and many other sources. These ideas often influence how we raise our own children and are often transferred from generation to generation. For example, there are various ways in which children can attach to their caregivers and these attachment styles are often continuous and stable within different generations. 

Defining development according to world views

Psychologists and others who do research on the development of children have different views on this development. They also use different approaches: there are two different ways development is looked at. The way in which the world is viewed, also known as the paradigm, is a philosophical system of ideas that serves to order a set of scientific theories and associated scientific methods. Two different visions formulated by psychologists are an organismic worldview and a mechanistic world view.

Organismic world view

According to the organismic world view, a person is a biological organism that is naturally active and continuously interacts with the environment and thereby helps to shape its own development. This world view emphasizes the interaction between maturation and experience that leads to the development of new internal, psychological structures for processing input from the environment. An example of a theoretician who supported this world view is Piaget. He suggested that cognitive development takes place in different phases and that the reasoning of the child in a particular phase is qualitatively different in earlier and later phases. The goal of developmental psychologists within this worldview is to determine when different psychological phases are present and which variables, processes and / or laws determine the differences between phases and what makes the transition between them. 

Mechanistic world view

According to the mechanistic world view, a person can be looked at as if it was a machine (like a computer), which is naturally passive until it is stimulated by the environment. According to this view, human behavior can be traced back to habits that have been learned in the environment and through previous experiences. The frequency of behavior increases when someone gets older through different learning processes and they can become less when someone gets older when they are no longer functional or lead to negative consequences. Developmental psychologists study learning principles that determine the way in which an organism responds to stimulation and if that results in an increase, decrease or changes in behavior. According to this world view, the child is more passive rather than active in forming his own development. This worldview represents the vision of the behaviorists. 

Ways of studying development 

Developmental psychologists have different strategies to investigate development. These different ways can be subdivided into two broad, inter-related categories. Designs that allow us to look at age-related changes in behavior and the associated research methods used to gather information about development. 

Cross-sectional designs

In a cross-sectional design, people of different ages are tested once, all at a different point on the x-axis. The x-axis is the horizontal axis of a graph and represents the age in years. This is the most widely used research method by development researchers because it takes the least amount of time and provides a quick approach to changes that occur as someone gets older. However, it only describes age differences. There is no way to indicate the continuity or discontinuity of different processes (such as personality stability, sudden changes in language development or production) because an average is taken of different individuals of the same age. 

Longitudinal designs

With a longitudinal design, people are tested several times as they age. This method is powerful because it looks at the individual development of a person at different moments, whereby one can look at changes within the individual and at differences between individuals. There are different types of longitudinal designs and they can be very time-consuming. Disadvantages of these designs are the costs. It can also be difficult to plan repetitive visits with the same children. Further, there can be a lot of outage. If, for example, children who find a task difficult and stop participating in the study. Related to that there can be the case of selective survivorship, which means that the children who participate in the research are not a good representation of the children in a community, which makes the results less generalizable. Another big problem is the time it takes to complete a study. This also depends on the time frame that is being looked at. If, for example, the functioning of IQ testing between a person's 20 and 80 years of age is examined, it takes 60 years to complete a study. After all that work, it is still possible that the results only apply partly to the examined age cohorts. Finally, there may also be an effect of repeated testing: children who are repeatedly examined may become better at performing a task simply because they have more experience with this. As a result, the data may not be a good reflection of normal development if it is not practiced regularly. 

Microgenetic methods

A combination of procedures that are becoming increasingly popular are referred to as microgenetic methods. Developmental psychology is fundamentally concerned with change and its causes and consequences. However, much research only provides a snapshot of changes without describing the process of change itself. Microgenetic methods examine change as it occurs and involve individual children who are examined repeatedly, within a short period of time. This method offers detailed information about an individual or individuals over a period of transition. The information gathered can include theory of mind, memory, analogical reasoning, the use of strategies, conscious and unconscious processes etc. 

In general, researchers try to collect both longitudinal and cross-sectional data for a specific subject. We expect to get similar results and this is usually the case. However, this does not always happen and the two designs can sometimes give very different results. Two cases of conflicting results are discussed below: first, the length of time between the measurements and secondly, the cohort effects are examined. 

Time between measures

If a study is developed investigating development, it must be determined at which ages children are tested or how often tests are repeated. When testing children, it is normal to examine them monthly or biweekly within a longitudinal study, depending on what the expectation is that there will be a change in behavior. The transition point for changes in behavior depending on age can be estimated on the basis of cross-sectional data. While this is applicable in most cases, children are sometimes tested in different ages which can result in different developmental functions that are being calculated. An interesting example of this is physical growth, which is usually seen as a continuous, increasing growth curve. Research has shown, however, that in small children there can be a "growth burst" in which children suddenly grow an inch and then again don't grow for a period of time. 

Cohort effects

Another serious design problem, which is particularly relevant for studies looking at a large age range, concerns cohort effects. This means that there are changes within generations in a trait that is being researched. A cohort is a group of people who all share a common experience. For example: the average height of a Western 20-year-old man increased from 1.52m around 1900 to 1.83 meters around 2007. This is due to improvements in people's eating, which made life in the womb and afterwards became healthier. In addition, differences were observed in attitudes, leisure activities and everyday life. In terms of intelligence, it can also be stated that intelligence, as measured by IQ testing, has changed over the past years. 

Sequential designs

A possible way to investigate the different findings that may arise from longitudinal and cross-sectional designs are sequential or age cohort designs. These studies contain a combination of designs and are rather rare, mainly because they cost a lot of time and money. This design is explained on the basis of an example: the intelligence is measured by means of an intelligence test. Adults in five different age groups have done this test twice. For example, the cross-sectional and longitudinal part of the test is met. The results show two effects. There is a cohort effect resulting from testing different adults at different ages around the same time: older adults did less well. In addition, there is the longitudinal effect where it appears that the same individuals do better in the second test than in the first. So, IQ scores have shown growth in recent generations, a phenomenon better known as the Flynn effect. However, if the same individuals are tested for a longer period of time, their scores remain relatively stable. In other words, intelligence does not decrease as people get older, but the environment provides better scores for new generations. The Flynn effect will be further discussed later. 

Research methods

The just discussed designs are always provided with one or more research methods to investigate development. Developmental psychologists have developed different methods to do this, the most important of which are observational studies, experimental methods, psychological tests and correlational studies.

Observational studies

The simplest form of observational studies are case studies. This means that the same person is repeatedly observed. These observations are usually in children and are done by parents or carers who are close to the child. The diaries detailing an infant's development are called baby biographies. Case studies provide a lot of information and are a source of ideas and insights. However, they have many weaknesses and disadvantages. For example, it is difficult to generalize on the basis of what has been observed in one person. In addition, there is often no system in the observations and they are often only written down afterwards. However, there are also strong points of a case study to describe: a detailed report can be made of small changes in the behavior because  the child is well known.

Time sampling

Time sampling is an observation method in which individuals are observed for a certain period of time. During frequent intervals in this period, notes are made, generally by an observer but sometimes also by the person himself, whether certain behavior occurs or not. For example, a researcher can observe a child for 20 minutes and every 30 seconds for an interval of 5 seconds indicate whether a child plays with others, plays alone, does not play, is aggressive, etcetera. There was a study in which students were given a timer that went off seven times a day. At that moment the students had to indicate what they were doing and what their affect status was: whether they were angry, happy, etcetera. The purpose of time sampling is to get an idea of ​​how frequently different behavior occurs during the observed period. However, there are two limitations of this method. Firstly, the researcher may not get a clear picture of the amount of time spent on certain behavior, so there may be a lot of behavior that is not signaled at times that are not noted. In addition, many behaviors of interest may simply not occur or might be missed during the period that recording is taking place.

Event sampling 

An alternative method is event sampling. This method does not have the problems that occur with time sampling. It's a procedure whereby researchers actively select a certain event that they want to investigate. This event is then observed, usually during the entire time in which the event takes place (not in intervals) on a continuous basis. As a result, this way of observing is also called continuous sampling and is the most used observation method in research into the development of children. Although these methods resemble a longitudinal design, their goal is to collect data in a systematic way and not to observe change. 

The clinical method

The greatest developmental psychologist of all time, Jean Piaget, studied the development of his three children during their childhood. From his research, the clinical method emerged. This is a combination of observation and a structured experiment. 

Experimental methods

The majority of studies on the behavior of children and their development are experimental. Behavior and development does not take place without a cause. The aim of the researcher is to demonstrate causal relationships between maturation, experience, learning and behavior. The essential aspect of experimental techniques is control. A situation has been constructed in which the researcher has control over the causal variables that influence the behavior that is being looked at. One of these factors, better known as the independent variable, is a constant factor. The behavior that is measured is the dependent variable. If the research goes well, changes in the behavior (the dependent variable) are caused by the controlled factor (independent variable). An example of a research using this technique is a structured observation. In this research method, the independent variable is systematically checked and adjusted, whereby the researcher observes the child's behavior (in response to the variable). 

Psychological testing

Psychological tests can be defined as instruments for the quantitative assessment of a psychological characteristic (or characteristics) of a person. The developmental psychologist has several tests at his disposal to examine psychological functioning at different ages. This includes tests of motor development, personality development, motivation, reading, etcetera. Such tests are generally standardized on the basis of large samples of children in the right age groups, which allowed standards to be set for age and gender. 

Types of test items

The type of item included in a particular test depends on the age group it is intended for and what is being measured. Tests that do research into the development of children usually consist of an observation of the child when the child is confronted with different standard situations: they can stand alone, they can make a tower of 5 blocks, et cetera. When children are older than 2 years, tests increasingly use language and give instructions to children in a verbal way. So in intelligence tests, children can be asked to solve problems, to give the meaning of words, et cetera. 

Can test scores predict later development?

Tests of ability and intelligence become increasingly accurate in predicting later behavior (for example, performing at school). However, attempts to predict the personality of an adult from personality research at a young age have not been very successful. There are a number of exceptions: children who are shy or bold are often also as adults. In addition, it has been shown that a child who fights with other children a lot is often also an adolescent who is judged by peers to be aggressive. Aggression is a personality trait which is seen as most continuous. However, personality is a term that is extremely difficult to define and personality traits are difficult to measure. A problem with measuring personality is that the most important personality traits, such as extraversion, introversion , socialableness, etcetera, are social in nature and can vary depending on the different environments in which individuals find themselves. So despite the fact that there seems to be some stability in, for example, shy or bold children, they can show different behavior in other social settings. In addition, personality development is influenced by life experiences: an adolescent will be treated differently than a child of 7 and this will affect the way the individual behaves and responds. 

Uses of tests

Developmental psychologists use many different tests. Tests are regularly used in clinical and educational assessments to gain insights into an individual child and to see how this child performs compared to children of the same age and gender. Another use is to select groups of children for participation in an experiment and then to evaluate the results of the experiment. In this research there is an experimental group, in which an experiment is performed to see what the effect is, and a control group in which no experiment is performed so that the results of both groups can be compared and to investigate if the experiment (for example a reading method) has been successful. 

Correlational studies

A correlation coefficient is a statistical value between +1 and -1 that gives an indication of the extent to which two variables are related to each other. A value close to +1 is a high positive relationship, which means that the two variables are strongly related. An example of such a relationship is between weight and height: longer people often weigh more. In addition, there are also correlations close to 0 which indicates a minimal correlation. For example, length is not correlated to academic performance. A correlation coefficient close to -1 is a high negative correlation, which means that the variables are inversely correlated. There are not many examples of this correlation, a possible example could be the relationship between watching TV and school grades: the more television is watched, the lower the grades. There are generally two types of correlational studies that are important in developmental psychology: concurrent and predictive. 

Concurrent studies

In a concurrent correlational study, there is interest in the relationship between variables measured at the same time. An example of this is to examine how much the IQ scores of twins match. In this study intelligence tests are given to twins and if the correlation is high, this means that if the IQ of one is high, the IQ of the other is also high. 

Predictive studies

A predictive correlational study is a study that is interested in finding whether individuals retain their relative standing, or rank order, relative to others, over time. For example: a smart child of 5 is also a smart person when he is 20. Correlation studies are important as they indicate which kind of properties or psychological characteristics generally go together (concurrent correlation) and which characteristics predict later behavior (predictive correlation). 

Neurodevelopmental studies

A challenging task for developmental psychologists is to understand brain development and the relationship between this development and the development of cognitive, social and motor skills. To do research on this, neuro-developmental studies are used which again use selective methods. An example of such a method is a marker task. This is a method that is designed to elicit behavior of which the neural basis is known. This neural basis is often discovered in research in animals. For example, much is known about the neural basis of vision by experimenting with monkeys. Research has shown that a specific part of the visual system called the medial temporal area (MT) in monkeys also works in the human brain and that development of this area and the relationships of this area to other brain areas is responsible for the onset of smooth pursuit. 

Imaging methods

There are different ways in which brain activity can be mapped in both animals and humans. These imaging methods can be subdivided into techniques that measure brain activity inside the head and techniques that measure activity from the scalp. Measurements from the scalp are done with electrodes that measure electrical activity produced by neurons. An example of this is an electroencephalogram (EEG). The EEG is usually performed if the brain activity is to be measured during a specific event, called an event-related potential (ERP). With this method it can be difficult to only look at specific brain areas because all activity is measured at the surface. In order to have access to deep structures, such as the areas that deal with memory or emotion, this method is not very reliable. 

Two visual techniques are better to use when measuring cortical brain areas: positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). A PET scan works by measuring the blood flow in the body. The blood flow is followed to regions where there is a lot of activity. In the case of PET, the person must be injected with radioactive material which causes this method to be used minimally in children. The fMRI also measures blood flow but does not use radioactive material. A magnetic field is used. However, there are some disadvantages of fMRI: this method is very expensive and the person has to lie very still for a longer period of time. In addition, the magnetic field is produced by a device that makes a lot of noise. Little use is made of this method in very small children, but in children aged 5 years and older there is an increase in use. 

Psychologists have different research strategies and methods for observing, classifying, testing and studying the development of children. There are no fixed rules for determining which method should be used in a specific study and this decision will depend on different considerations: the problem being investigated, the availability of the participants, the individual preference of the researcher, etcetera. 

As we have seen, observational studies are ideal for asking questions about the different phases and aspects of child development. Such studies can often lead to theories and they are important in drawing up a hypothesis about aspects of development. We must always remember that the child has a fixed repertoire of behaviors that occur in a natural setting. We can conclude that observational studies are perfect for studying the behavior and development of the child in the natural context. A frequently used argument against the use of experiments is that they often take place in a highly controlled and unnatural setting. While experimental studies tell a lot about behavior in such settings, it sometimes happens that experimental findings have little influence on events in real life. It is often stated that many experimental studies lack ecological validity. Nevertheless, much can be learned from experimental studies, even if the experimental setting is far from real life. It is also clear that observational studies are less powerful than experimental studies when it comes to understanding the causes of development or testing hypotheses. A well-controlled experiment allows us to make precise statements about cause and effect. The level of control required is often not easily obtained in a natural setting and experiments are often conducted in a laboratory. A laboratory often has no special characteristics in such a setting, it can be a quiet space in a school, for example, or it can be a room that has been designed with a purpose and where there are deliberately certain items. Experiments enable us to explore ways of research that can not easily be investigated by only using observations. 

Beyond common sense: the importance of research evidence

Sometimes when psychologists publish their findings, there are remarks such as 'what a waste of money, everyone knows that people behave like that'. Such comments assume that general observations of behavior are an adequate replacement for controlled observations and experiments. However, observations made every day of human behavior and 'folk theories' about development are unreliable and in our impressions and interpretations of behavior we are often unaware of the controlling and causative variables. In addition, there are often different contradictory 'assumptions' of people about behavior and development. Good research is needed to choose which assumption is the 'right' one or to show that all assumptions are not correct. An example of an assumption that is not true is the catharsis hypothesis. This hypothesis states that watching aggressive tendencies in others will reduce our own feelings of aggression. However, research has shown that watching aggression rather increases the aggression in children than to decrease it. 

Social policy implications of child development research

In the last part of the twentieth century and at the beginning of the twenty-first century, researchers have applied their vast amount of knowledge to the implementation of social policies, which is designed to improve the well-being of children and help them achieve their full potential. This is a global effort that several international organizations are part of. There are implications regarding social policies for specific parts of the development, other programs are designed for early intervention and aim to prevent early social and cognitive defects that come from neglect and poverty in early childhood. There are also programs to reduce bullying in schools and to reduce the impact on children who are being bullied. In addition, there are programs to detect autism, dyslexia and many other disorders. An example of a general program in the US is Head Start (a variant of which is Sure Start in England). This is a five-component program: pre-school education enrichment, screening of health, education about nutrition and hot meals, social services and education for parents. 

There are many areas in which research can contribute to the development of children. The main point is that research is not just a list of information: it has a practical purpose which is to better understand the development of children to ensure better attention to their needs and also to their familie's needs. 

Developmental functions: growing and changing

From the data that developmental psychologists collect, analyze and interpret, it is possible to describe a number of developmental functions: the ways in which humans typically grow and change with age. Developmental functions are presented in graphs. Generally, the measurement of behavior is shown on the y-axis and the x-axis is used for age or time. The practical value is that they allow us to identify unusual patterns of development and to respond to them when necessary. The theoretical value is that the data can be used to evaluate hypotheses. Human development is very complex and different aspects of development are growing and changing in different ways. There are five most common functions, which will be presented below. 

Continous function (a) - increasing ability 

A common function is the continuous function (a) (increasing ability). This is perhaps the most common function in which we become better at a skill as we age. An example is intelligence: as children grow older, they generally become more intelligent. 

Continous function (b) - decreasing ability

Another common function is the continuous function (b) (decreasing ability). This means that in some things we get worse as we grow up. An example of this is the perception of speech in early childhood (see chapter 10). 

Discontinuous (step) function 

Another function that occurs is the discontinuous (step) function. In this function, development takes place in different phases, with each new phase being qualitatively different from the previous phases. It is easy to distinguish different phases in human life such as baby time, preschool time, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, etcetera. Stages of development are found in many areas of development. 

U-shaped functions

Two other types of developmental functions are inverted and upright U-shaped functions. This function is also very common in life. Inverted U-shaped functions are extremely common in development - we improve in the early years, stabilise or level off in adulthood and get worse as we get older. Inverted U-shaped functions can also be found in shorter periods. Upright U-shaped functions involve abilities which may be present early in life and disappear to re-emerge at a later age. For example the ability of newborn infants to turn their heads and eyes towars sounds. This auditory localisation response is present at birth, diminishes at around 6 weeks of age, and reappears again around 4 months of age. 

Comparing developmental functions

It may be useful to plot more than one developmental function in the same graph to be able to map possible causal relations. 

Conclusion

Human development is extremely complex and multi-faceted. It is therefore not surprising that there are many ways to study development and many different types of developmental functions that emerge from the research as scientists try to understand how children grow and change.

Theories and issues in child development - Chapter 2

Human development is rich, varied and incredibly complex. We should not expect, therefore, that a single theory on development will do justice to this complexity and indeed no theory attempts to do this. Every theory tries to explain a part of the development and it is often the case that within each area of development there are different competing views. Before different theories are named, it is important to give a definition of a development theory. Within this chapter, a development theory is a scheme or a system of ideas based on evidence and attempts to explain, describe and predict the development and behavior of man. To make it more orderly, the theories are divided into six broad groups. 

Motor development

One of the clearest signs of development in early childhood is the baby that achieved several motor milestones. Parents are often proud of these acquisitions and many conversations between parents are about motor development. The development of motor skills has important implications for other aspects of development. The ability to act on the world affects all other aspects of development and each new accomplishment provides more independence. 

A child of 1 to 3 months age can lift his head, sit with support and has the reflex to step. In addition, it can grab objects that are placed in his or her hand, it can suck, the eyes move and it can smile. A child of 2 to 4 months can raise his head when prone and use the arms for support. It can also grab something that is placed close to the hand. A child of 5 to 8 months can sit without support and reach for objects with one hand only. A child of 5 to 10 months can stand with support and pull itself up to stand. In addition, it can point to objects of interest and grab things with thumb and one finger. A child of 5 to 11 months can crawl and grab a spoon. In addition, a child learns to move food towards the mouth during this period. A child of 10 to 14 months can stand and walk alone. It can also build a tower of cubes. In addition, the first meaningful words are produced. A child of 13 to 18 months can walk backwards and sideways. In addition, it can run, climb and climb the stairs. A child can also hold a piece of chalk and scratch it. A child of 18 to 30 months will easily learn to run, jump, walk on the toes, etcetera. The vocabulary and articulation is also expanding. Further, it can pick up small objects.

The two major theories on motor development discussed here are maturational theories and dynamic systems theory. 

Maturational theories

One of the first psychologists to study motor development was Arnold Gesell, who studied hundreds of hours of film of the motor development of children in longitudinal studies in children aged 0 to 9 years. He concluded that the motor development proceeded from the global to the specific in two different directions. One direction is called the cephalocaudal trend and proceeds from head to foot. This means that first the head is checked, then the arms and the trunk and finally the legs. The other direction of development is called proximodistal trend. This means that the motor control goes from the center of the body outwards to more peripheral segments. These two findings led Gesell to the view that maturation alone ensures motor development. Development is controlled by a maturational timetable linked to the central nervous system and the development of muscles. According to his theory, experience has little or no influence on motor development. 

One of the first researchers to question this theory was Myrtle McGraw. She tested twins with one of two motor training and discovered that the trained twins performed better in terms of motor development than the untrained twins. In addition, there are other findings that indicate that not only maturation underlies motor development. Firstly, the fact that motor development takes place in a certain order is no proof of a genetic cause. Secondly, this theory does not explain why there are major individual differences in gaining motor skills. Another theory might provide an answer to this. 

Dynamic systems theory

One of the most recent theories on motor development is the dynamic systems theory. It has become apparent that children develop skills in different ways. There are examples of children who do not like crawling and sometimes stand and walk before they crawl. Other children crawl for a very long time and then only start to stand up and walk. Various studies have shown that the way in which children learn new motor skills is similar to the way in which adults learn a new motor skill: the beginnings are usually fumbling and poor, there is trial and error learning and great concentration, all leading to the accomplished skilful activity. According to the dynamic system theory, all new motor skills are the result of a dynamic and continuous interaction of three major factors: (1) nervous system development,(2) the capabilities and biomechanics of the body and (3) environmental constraints and support. Various studies show that children have the ability to adapt their skills to the motor challenge they face. 

Despite the fact that in the past the maturation theory was adhered to, research has shown in the last 20 years that motor skills are learned, both in childhood and in life. There is increasing conviction that children actively participate in their own motor development, as the problems they face every day and the way they "solve" these problems contribute to their motor development. 

Cognitive development

Someone who has contributed a lot to our knowledge of the development of the child is Piaget. Before he influenced our understanding of the development of children, psychology was dominated by two different theoretical trends: behaviorism and psychoanalysis. Both visions will be discussed later. They are different but have the following in common: they see the child as a passive recipient of their upbringing. This all changed with Piaget:

Fundamental aspects of human development, according to Piaget

According to Piaget, children are actively engaged in shaping their own development. He states that the behavior and development of children is for a large part intrinsically motivated and not extrinsic. According to Piaget children learn to adapt to their environment and as a result of their cognitive adaptations it becomes easier for them to understand the world. Adaptation is something that all living organisms have learned to do. If they get to know the world better, they always achieve a new phase within their development. Piaget's theory is therefore a good example of the organismic world view in which children are seen as inherently active, continuously interacting with the environment in such a way that their own development is formed. Because children are active in forming their world according to the theory of Piaget, his theory is often also called constructivist theory. 

Adaptation: Assimilation and accomodation

To be able to adapt to the world, two different processes are important. Assimilation is what happens when we treat new objects, people and events as if they were familiar. That means: we assimilate what is new to our existing schemes of thought. An example is: we meet a new policeman (or doctor,..) and we treat him as we habitually treat police officers or doctors. Assimilation happens from an early age: a child gets a new toy and puts it in his mouth, as it is used to putting things in his mouth. The other process is accommodation. This is the process by which individuals have to modify or change their schemas in order to adapt to a new situation. An example of this is if a child gets a toy that is larger than what they had before, they have to adjust to take hold of it. In children, assimilation and accommodation often occur simultaneously. Throughout life, both processes are always active because we constantly strive to adapt to the world we encounter. These processes are therefore called functional invariants as they do not change during development. What does change are the cognitive structures, often called schemas. 

The four stages of cognitive development

According to Piaget, children go through four different, broad phases of development. Each stage is characterized by different ways of thinking. These stages are the sensorimotor stage, the preoperational stage, the concrete operations stage and the formal operations stage.

Sensorimotor stage (birth to 2 years)

This is one of the most impressive phases of development. The child changes from a helpless, newborn baby to a self-thinking and discovering toddler. These changes take place as a result of the infant's actions with regard to objects and people in its environment. This stage is the development of thought in action. As a result, toddlers learn to solve problems. A toddler whose language develops quickly, is at the end of this stage able to reason through thought as well as through sensorimotor activities. 

Preoperational stage (2 to 7 years)

Children that are not yet attending school can solve a number of practical, concrete problems. They can also communicate and show information through drawing, speaking and playing. These skills continue to develop during the preoperational stage but there are still some limitations in the thinking of children in this period. Children tend to be egocentric, which means that they find it difficult to view something from someone else's point of view. In addition, they show animism in their games: they tend to think that non-living objects are alive. 

Concrete operations stage (7 to 11 years)

An important characteristic of this phase is centration: focusing attention on an aspect of a situation to the exclusion of others. This is clearly demonstrated in Piaget's conservation tasks. These are tasks that examine the children's ability to understand that the physical characteristics of objects do not change when the object's shape changes. 

Formal operations stage (from about 11 years)

The child learns to solve many problems. In this phase, however, the adolescent becomes aware of his own influence on the world and learns to manipulate "variables" in his or her world to find out what causes things to happen. In addition, he or she is also introduced to the realm of possibilities and hypothetical thought. 

Overview

Within Piaget's theory, we have a detailed vision of cognitive development, from birth to adulthood. Cognitive development proceeds through a series of stages, each more complex than the previous one and each builds on the skills learned in the previous stage. It took many years before Piaget's theories affected American and British psychology. This was mainly due to three reasons. First, the American and British psychologists were dominated by followers of behaviorism. Second, Piaget only wrote in French and thirdly he often wrote very complicated about what he believed. 

Information processing approaches

Information processing approaches see the human mind as a complex system through which information flows. Information processing accounts of human cognition include current views of memory formation, with terms such as encoding, storage, retrieval, strategies and metamemory. Information processing theories are rooted in three innovations from the twentieth century. First, there was the rapid development in computer technology. Secondly, there was the view that the behavior of an organism could not be understood without knowing the structure of the perceiver's environment. The third is constructivism, a theory about how perception 'fills in' information that cannot be seen or heard directly. 

Theories about information processing focus on the information available in the environment and the means by which the child receives and interprets this information. This way of thinking can provide clarity in understanding many aspects of cognitive development. The task of the developing child is to use its perceptual systems to discover the world and to obtain information from it. This information must be encoded, stored, retrieved and acted on. In contrast to Piaget's theory, the theories about information processing are not the work of one person only but they were introduced by different scientists working with a similar assumption about the processing of information. Below are several examples. 

Cognitive development in infancy

According to the information processing approaches, cognitive development begins in a bottom-up approach, starting with the 'input' or recording of information by the child from which a complex system of knowledge is built. This is the opposite of top-down where something is assumed and work is being done to unravel the various components of it. There are two examples of the bottom-up approach. The first is a study that investigates how children see causality when one object bumps into another and causes it to move. Research has shown that children at the age of 4 months see that both objects move, but do not see causality (that one object triggers the other). It can be said that young children processed the lower-order units, but not the higher-order relations. A second example from the information processing approach concerns an investigation into object unity. If two parts of an object are visible but the center is hidden by another object, infants perceive the parts of the objects but do not see it as a single unit. Again, children need to discover higher relationships with what they see in their environment. 

Cognitive development in childhood

In childhood, the task of building knowledge often comes down to determining which of the many 'strategies' are available to solve particular problems. A typical approach to this question involves examination of arithmetic strategies (learning to add by memorisation, counting on the fingers, and so forth) repeatedly in individual children as the school year progresses, and recording speed, accuracy and strategy use. A number of strategic changes have been noted: incorporation of new strategies, identification of efficient strategies, more efficient execution of each startegy and more adaptive choices among strategies. 

Connectionism and brain development

Theory regarding the processing of information uses two new approaches in cognitive science: the use of connectionist models and methods for recording brain activity. Connectionist models are computer programs designed to imitate some parts of human cognition. The word 'connectionist' refers to the structure of the model, which consists of different processing units that are connected and influence each other. This works in the same way as the brain in which neurons are connected to each other and activate each other (through synapses). Connectionist models record information, encode the information in a way that allows the information to be processed by the computer and produce a response encoded in a way that people can understand. These models have been used to investigate different aspects of development.There is not a single model of cognitive development but instead researchers choose a specific problem, apply a model to it and build a learning mechanism around it. The theories that have been described are motivated by different notions of information: the information that is available in the stimulus, the inclusion of that information, the processing of the information by the individual and the reaction of the individual to the information. Understanding information on these different levels is a central task of the information processing theory and different methods have been used to achieve this goal: empirical studies on children (including observations), connectionist models and recordings of brain activity. 

Comparing information-processing approaches with Piaget's approach

Piaget's theory and information processing approaches have quite a lot in common. Both theories try to specify the possibilities and limitations of children as they develop and both try to explain how new levels of understanding develop from earlier, less developed, phases. They share a focus on 'active' participation of the child in his own development. In both visions children learn by doing and trying out and see the consequences of their actions. They also learn to focus their attention correctly. However, both visions also differ in a number of important ways. Information processing approaches place much emphasis on the role of limitations in processing with regard to thinking and reasoning of children. In addition, they emphasize the development of strategies and procedures as children grow older to help them overcome these limitations. Piaget's theory does not talk about limitations in processing but rather talks about the development of children with regard to making logical frameworks for thoughts. Another important difference is that information processing sees development as a continuous phenomenon while Piaget sees it more as something that goes in steps. 

Social-cognitive development

Below are some researchers who were interested in the interaction between the child and its community - the social environment. 

Vygotsky

Vygotsky was one of the first researchers to emphasize the importance of knowledgeable adults in the child's environment. According to him, the development of intellectual skills is influenced by a didactic relationship (a relationship based on instructions) with individuals who are more advanced in their development. A fascinating part of his work is the claim that higher mental skills are first encountered and used in social interactions and are later internalized and processed as individual thought processes. An important part in Vygotsky's theory is that social interaction plays a fundamental role in cognitive development. He stated that there is a gap between what the child knows and what the child can learn. At a certain point in development, a child has a certain level of understanding, a temporary maximum. A little further than this point lies the zone of close development (zone of proximal development, ZPD). This zone can be seen as a zone that represents problems and ideas that are just too complicated for the child to solve and understand independently. However, the child can discover and understand these problems with the help of an adult. So the adult can lead the child because they can think more complex. 

Behaviourism and social learning theory

At the end of the nineteenth century there was a shift in psychology going from the subjective perspective of introspectionism, the analysis of self-reported visions, to a more objective method. This scientific approach had its roots in the work of a compatriot of Vygotsky: Pavlov. Pavlov developed a great theory about learning, called classical conditioning. According to this theory, certain behaviors can be provoked by a neutral stimulus simply through the learned association with a stronger stimulus. For example, if food was shown to animals at the same time that a bell rang, eventually only the bell would provoke the same reaction as the food and the bell together. The dogs learned an association between these two stimuli. This principle of conditioning can also be applied to human behavior. 

Many psychologists embraced this idea. By its fundamental nature, Pavlov's work had the potential to explain all forms of human behavior and its development. It was combined with other theories such as Thorndike's law of effect. This law states that the chance that an action is repeated is greater if the action leads to a reward and is smaller if the action leads to punishment. With this, the shift to objectivism in research was complete. Behaviorism denied the role of the mind as an object of study and reduced all behavior to a chain of stimuli (from the environment) to the response that followed (the behavior). According to the most extreme psychologists within behaviorism, each behavior was caused by the fact that it was based on simple, repeated connections between a stimulus and its response. This is also known as the reductionists' perspective because all complicated processes are reduced to a simple core process. 

B.F. Skinner's behaviourism

An explanation of behaviorism is not complete without the work of Skinner. His influence on this area of ​​psychology may be greater than that of any other individual. He came up with the principle of operant conditioning. This method of conditioning differs from classical conditioning because children operate (emit behaviours) on their environments. According to his view, it is possible to shape the behavior of an animal or child by manipulating the reinforcement received. It is certain that our behavior is guided by the reward and / or punishment that follows and behaviorism is still used to monitor behavior. 

Social learning theory

As behaviourism stated important but rather vague things about the behavioral patterns of the child, Bandura's work looked more specifically at behaviors in a detailed manner. His behaviorism was less mechanistic than Skinner's. He not only focused on observable behavior but also looked at processing in the head. His approach eventually became known under the name social learning theory. Bandura developed this theory by performing various experiments. One experiment was that he divided children into two groups and had them watch an adult playing with a doll. The group in which the children watched a grown-up playing with the doll in an aggressive manner, later also played themselves more aggressively with this doll. Thus, without clear reinforcement, a specific type of aggressive behavior was learned. Bandura called this observational learning. The research of Bandura has shown that adults and other people in the life of a child act as models and that children learn by imitating. This type of learning occurs in all forms of social and cognitive development. In the last 40 years, social learning theory has become increasingly cognitive in its account of human learning and in the mid-1980s, Bandura had developed the social cognitive theory of human functioning. This theory is a development of social learning theory and emphasizes the ability of people to exercise control over the nature and quality of their lives and to be reflective on one's skills, the quality of one's own functioning and the intention and meaning of life. This theory emphasizes the social factors in cognitive development. 

Ethology and evolution

Evolution

The theoretical basis for every evolutionary theory of development is, of course, evolution itself. The current form of this theory is very similar to the theory developed by its inventor, Darwin. Probably the most important part of evolution is the genes. This is actually the genetic material from which the chromosomes are formed. The term gene is also used in a vague way when talking about a hereditary characteristic of an organism. If a set of genes leads to a general advantage for an organism, it leads to more of those genes in an organism. The same principle applies to behavior and physical characteristics. Evolutionary theories of the development of the child that emphasize the genetic basis of behavior and point to the adaptive and surviving value of such behaviors are known as ethological approaches.

The ethological approach

The origins of ethology can be traced back to Darwin and two European zoologists. They argued that certain behaviors in the young of many species were genetic in origin because they first ensured survival and secondly were found in many different species, including humans. One such form of behavior is imprinting. This is the tendency of the newborn young to follow the first moving objects they see. This occurs in precocial species, these are animal species of which the pups are mobile almost immediately after birth. Examples are ducks, sheep and horses. This behavior includes the formation of an attachment between the child and the mother. In addition, it is adaptive behavior because it contributes to the survival values ​​because it leads to a physical bond between parent and offspring. As a consequence, the parent is always in the neighborhood to feed the young, to give heat, to protect and to take care of. There are two implications of the conception of behavior by ethologists. First, an external stimulus is always needed. For example, a 'parent' or other is required for impregnations. If this is missing, the imprinting process will not take place or take place at a 'wrong object'. The second implication is time. Ethologists originally had one critical period. This would be the length of time that behavior needed to mature if the right conditions were met (for example, language development required a rich, linguistic environment). If this critical period is over, the behavior can not develop. Nowadays people tend more to a period in which a child is sensitive to learning certain behavior. It is easier to learn behavior during this period, but it is not the case that after this phase it is no longer possible. 

Emotional development

The British researcher John Bowlby was impressed by the research on imprinting and was one of the first to give an ethological and evolutionary interpretation of the development of people. He has made a great contribution to our understanding of attachment in early childhood and his theory still has a great influence. Below is a summary of what he and his colleague Mary AInsworth stated. 

Attachment theory - John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth

Before Bowlby drew up his theory, it was believed that the attachment of children to their caretakers was a secondary drive. This is because the mother (primary carer) is the primary drive of the baby (including hunger, thirst and the need for heat). As a result, the secondary empowerment bond between mother and child would exist: attachment. Bowlby stated that there is a drive in people to form a bond that is just as strong as any other primary need. He established the principle of monotropy, which means that the child has the need to form an attachment with a significant other (generally the mother). This claim turned out not to be entirely correct because children were often found to have different attachment bonds and in some cases their strongest bond is formed with someone other than the mother, such as the father, a grandfather or grandmother or brothers and sisters who are not always primary drives of the child but provided satisfactory interactions ( quality time ) with the child. Bowlby believed that the attachment system between the child and the caretaker was organized and strengthened when a child was between 6 and 12 months old and more clearly expressed when a child started crawling. At that time children had a tendency to use their mother as a 'safe base' from which they could discover. Ainsworth did further research and invented the strange situation. In this situation, a baby of (usually) around a year old and its mother were put in an experimental room where there were several pieces of toys. The mother sits on a chair and at some point leaves the room while a stranger enters. An observer then notes the infant's response to several events: when the stranger enters, when the mother leaves and when she returns. Using the results of this experiment, Ainsworth discovered that there are several attachment 'styles' that differ in degree of security. 

Psychoanalytic theories

Sigmund Freud is the founder of psychoanalysis. Not everyone agrees, however, that his contribution to knowledge has been entirely positive. Freud stated that much of our behavior is determined by unconscious forces. In introducing his psychoanalytic theory he suggested that there are three main structures of the personality: id, ego and the superego . The ID is already present in the newborn child and consists of impulses, emotions and needs. It wants immediate satisfaction of all its wishes and needs. Because this is not feasible, the ego develops to act as a practical mediator between the reality and the needs of the id. The last structure that is developed is the superego, this is a sense of duty and responsibility - in many ways the conscience. The ego and the superego develop as an individual passes through five psychosexual phases.

The five psychosexual stages 

The first phase is the oral phase, which lasts from birth to about 1 year of age. The greatest satisfaction of the child comes at this stage from stimulation of the lips, tongue and mouth. Sucking is the main source of pleasure for the young child. 

The second phase is the anal phase. This lasts from 1 to 3 years of age. In this phase, a child learns to be tidy and the child acquires psychosexual pleasure from exercising control over the anus and by retaining and eliminating faeces. 

The third phase is the phallic phase. This phase lasts from when a child is about 3 to 6 years old. It is the period in which children get the most pleasure from stimulating their genitals. In this period, boys have an Oedipus complex. This means that the boy develops sexual feelings towards his mother and realizes that his father is a competitor for her affection. He is therefore afraid of castration by his father (the castration complex). To solve this complex he takes over the ideals of his father and develops his superego. Girls develop the Electra complex during this period. This means that they develop feelings for their father and are afraid of retaliation from their mother, so that they take over her ideals and develop a superego. 

The fourth phase is the latency phase and the fifth phase is the genital phase. These phases last from when a child is about 6 years old until adolescence. From a child around 6 years old, the torments of early childhood disappear and the sexual development of the child goes into a resting period (latency). When a child becomes an adolescent, these sexual feelings become more present and the genital phase appears. In this phase, 'true' sexual feelings arise and the adolescent strives to deal with these needs. 

Problems with Freudian theory

One of the most important claims of Freud's theory is that much of what motivates us happens unconsciously. Because this is unconscious, this can not be measured, so it is often stated that it is a faith and not a theory because it can not be based on empirical research. His vision is almost impossible to test. To illustrate this, consider the notion of reaction formation. This means that a child, often unconsciously, can reverse the negative aspects of his or her personality and upbringing. This makes it impossible to predict how a child will grow up and what kind of personality a child will develop. 

Psychoanalysis, then and now: An overview

Freud's theory has been important in pointing out two possibilities. Firstly, the possibility that early childhood can be of great importance for later development and secondly that we can be driven by unconscious needs and wishes. Freud states that if we have not completed a phase of our childhood, we can get disorders later in life and that these can only be resolved by intensive sessions in which an analyst examines what went wrong in early childhood. This theory is not supported by scientific evidence. There is little evidence for the existence of the Oedipus and Electra complex. However, there are many people who argue that psychoanalytic theories are important for the understanding of human development and there are many theorists who have offered variations and alternatives to what Freud has proposed. 

Modern psychoanalysts - Anna Freud and Erik Erikson

An example of someone who has gone further is Anna Freud, the youngest daughter of Sigmund Freud. She grew up with an interest in psychoanalysis and had the idea that adolescence and puberty showed a number of challenges for young people. During this period of ego struggle, through meeting these challenges the ego matures and becomes better able to defend itself. For Erik Erikson, the formation of the personality was not complete when a child was 6 or 7, as Freud stated. He suggested that phases of psychological conflict and adaptation occur throughout life. He proposed the psychosocial stages of development. He emphasized the role of the broader social world in which acquaintances, friends, society and culture were involved. The child goes from the stage of 'basic trust' in early childhood to the final stage in adult life of maturity with a sense of self-worth and integrity. 

Humanistic theory 

Humanist theories focus on the subjective experiences, motives and needs of the individual. In general, this theory differs from the psychoanalytic view because it places less emphasis on the role of the unconscious in explaining behavior. Humanists argue that we are not driven by unconscious needs and are not driven by external environmental factors such as reinforcement and rewards. They state that people have free will and are motivated to fulfill their potential. Their inner need or desire to fulfill their potential is known as self-actualization. This motive for self-actualization is not only the case in childhood but occurs throughout life. 

Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs

An important person in the development of humanistic theory was Abraham Maslow. He suggested that there is a hierarchy of needs or motives that determine our behavior. This hierarchy starts with the basic needs for survival and goes towards the desire for self-actualization. The first need of someone is physiological, after that comes the need for safety and security, then comes the need for love and connectedness, then comes the need for appreciation and finally the need for self-actualization. His theory is not intended as a theory of child development: his hierarchy is applicable in all phases of life. 

Different theories for different needs

This chapter describes various theories that have been developed to explain human behavior. What has become clear is the complexity of the development of children and therefore we can not expect that one theory only can be an explanation for more than one or two areas of development. However, it is important to remember that in children all aspects of development are interrelated. To illustrate this, we will emphasize an area of development in which different theoretical visions make their own different contribution: the gender development. This means  that children realize that they are a boy or girl and that they realize that there is certain behavior in this sex. 

Gender development

A cognitive account

A cognitive view on the development of sex increasingly realizes that a child is a boy or a girl and that this is something that can not be changed. This realization is also known as gender constancy. Most children come to this realization after they are 3 years old and almost all children know this when they are around 7 years old. According to this Kohlberg theory, children will behave according to their sex once they understand which gender they are.  

A social learning account

A vision from social learning theory on the development of sex is based on the work of Bandura. Here the child is empowered by what parents and others see as fitting to the gender of the child (girls play with dolls, boys do not cry). In addition, children imitate important others and learn to observe models of the same sex to see how they behave. By means of observation, imitation and reinforcement, children learn to behave in accordance with their gender. 

A psychoanalytic view

According to the psychoanalytic theory, children learn to behave on the basis of the Electra and Oedipus complex. As a result, boys and girls learn to behave in the same way as the parent of their own sex does. 

However, it is important not to exclude the role of nature (biological determinants) in the development of gender and associated behaviors. 

Overview

It can be said that social influences and the cognitive development of children influence their behavior with regard to their gender. But it is also clear that biological influences are important. There are different theoretical views and there are different causes for the development of sex in childhood. 

Issues in child development

There are several issues in research on the development of children and the most important ones are summarized below. Many of these topics are specific to a particular area or areas of development, but there are others that affect almost all aspects of growth. Three of the latter are described below: the nature-nurture issue, stability versus change and continuity versus discontinuity.

The nature-nurture issue

With regard to the nature-nurture issue, it can be said that we are all the product of the interaction between nature (inheriting genetic factors) and nurture (environmental influences ). Psychologists and behavior geneticists have tried to estimate the contribution that both nature and nurture have to the individual. 

Stability versus change

With regard to the stability versus change issue, it can be stated that certain aspects of the development of children show stability while others change. For example, certain personality traits are stable while other properties are more variable. 

Continuity versus discontinuity

With regard to continuity versus discontinuity, it can be stated that according to some theorists, development progresses step by step, while according to other theorists this is done in a continuous manner. What makes this complicated is that it has often been found that aspects of the development develop both continuously and discontinuously.

The nature-nurture debate - Chapter 3

The observation of differences in cognitive skills between people has different explanations, depending on the context and purpose of the discussion. This chapter takes a look at this question from a behavioral and molecular-genetic point, looking at both the genetic and environmental factors that play a role in individual differences in cognition.

Precocial and altricial species

The terms precocial and altricial refer to species where the young differ in their degree of maturity when they hatch or are born: in precocial species the young are physically mobile and able of hatching from the moment of birth, whereas the young of altricial species are helpless and do not have this capability.

Nativism and empiricism

The roots of the idea that genes influence cognition come from the nature versus nurture thought. The main idea of ​​this proposition is that genes and the environment are influenced in a loose way. Genes and the environment are seen as independent forces within this framework. Part of this is the nativism - empiricism discussion in psychology. This is the discussion about the influence of genes and the influence of experience with nativism describing the view that many skills or abilities are 'native' or hard wired into the brain at birth (result of genetic inheritance) and empiricism describing the view that humans are not born with built-in 'core knowledge' (so that all knowledge results from learning and experience). 

Cognitive development

People differ in many biological and psychological ways. We now take a look at differences in cognitive abilities between people. There are many tests of different aspects of cognition - attention, memory, problem-solving, mathematics, vocabulary, speed of processing. These are typically measured with intelligence tests. 

The start of it all: the first intelligence test

The first intelligence test along modern lines was created by the Frenchman Alfred Binet in 1905. Binet had been set the task by the Parisian school authorities of devising a test that would select those children who were unlikely to learn much from being in ordinary schools, so that they could then be given special education. A modern version of binet's test is still much used today - the Stanford-Binet test which is now on its fifth edition (2003).

Mental age and intelligence quotient (IQ)

Binet introduced the concept of mental age (MA) which can be defined as an individual's level of mental ability relative to others. If a child with a real or chronogical age (CA) of 5 years succeeded at problems usually solved by 7-year-olds, their MA would be 7 while their CA is 5 and the child would be judged to be bright. A few years later (1912), William Stern introduced the term intelligence quotient (IQ) and in its original formulation it was simply calculated as a child's MA divided by the child's CA multipled by 100.  

Intelligence tests

There are four important things to note about IQ tests and IQ scores. 1) The simple formula given above is no longer used, but the purpose of IQ tests is always to compare people's scores with those from people of the same population and of approximately the same age. 2) The average IQ at a given time is always 100. To ensure this it means that tests are carefully standardised every few years to ensure that the population varies around this mean. 3) Children's and adult's raw scores tend to increase from one generation to the next (flynn effect). 4) The items on IQ tests invariably proceed from the simpleto the complex, so that an individual raw score (and hence their IQ) is derived from the number of items passed before they make mistakes. Three well-known tests are: 1) the Stanford-Binet for the ages of 2 to adulthood; 2) the Wechsler scales (Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of  Intelligence (WPPSI); Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC); Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS); 3) the Differential Ability Scales (DAS-II), from infancy to adolescence. 

Intelligence test items

Many tests divide intelligence into two broad abilities, verbal and performance subscales.

Verbal subscales 

Similarities: The child is asked to say in what way things might be similar. For example: 'in what ways do blue, green and yellow go together?'. Comprehension: This subscale measures the child's common sense and understanding ('Why do people need to pay taxes?'). Recall of digits: The tester reads out sequences of digits and after each sequence the child calls it back. The average digit span for adults is about seven items. 

Performance subscales

Block design: The child is given a set of blocks with coloured patterns on them and is asked to use them to make patterns that the tester shows. Copying: The child is shown a drawing and asked to copy it on a sheet of paper.

Controversies and issues in intelligence 

How much of intelligence is shaped by genetic factors and how much by our environment? In fact, it has long been recognized that genes and environment are not additive, in the sense that x per cent is caused by genes and y per cent by the environment. Rather, they interact with each other in causing the development of all human characteristics, including intelligence. Accordingly, scientists try to produce estimates of heritability, which is asking the question how much of the variation in intelligence is caused by genetic factots?

Heritability

Almost everything that can be measured or studied in humans varies around the average of the given population. The concept that is traditionally used to describe such variance is that of individual differences. The existence of individual differences in the way people think and learn has early drawn the attention of researchers. Two hypotheses dominated philosophical thinking and still dominate much thought in current research: people are born as they are ( genetic determinism ) and people learn to be who they are ( environmentalism ). There have been many attempts to test both hypotheses. Today, however, it is thought that there is not a single source for individual differences, but that the occurrence of variance between people is the product of a complex interplay between the genes and the environment. 

Jensen's arguments 

Arthur Jensen argued that his findings of lower IQ scores in low socioeconomic status (SES) children and black/white differences were largely genetically determined and not a result of cultural and environmetal differences, which many had believed and continued to believe. His views on racial differences resulted in him being accused of racism and described as one of the most provocative figures in 20th century psychology. The controversy continues to the present day. 

Genetic contributions to cognitive growth

Familial resemblance

One type of evidence concerning genetic influences to cognitive development is from the relatedness, or similarity, of IQs between individuals who have various degrees of genetic relatedness (familial resemblance), from highly related people (e.g. identical twins) to unrelated individuals (complete strangers). Clearly, relatives share genes, the shared precentage varying with the degree of relatedness. 

Monozygotic (identical) twins share all of their genes. Dizygotic (fraternal) twins share half oftheir genes. A parent and their offspring have half of their genes in common. Two siblings also share, on average, half of their genes.

Missing heritability 

No one doubts that cognitive development is heavily dependent on our genetic make-up, but the genes associated with cognitive abilities remain elusive. Missing heritability describes the failure to find any of the genes associated with cognitive abilities. Nevertheless, it is commonly agreed that intelligence has a strong genetic component and it is thought that its heritability increases with the individuals age. Recent estimates suggest that heritability of IQ averages around 0.5, meaning that 50% of the variation in IQ observed in a given population is accounted for by genetic differences. 

Gene-environment interaction (GxE)

A gene x environment interaction (GxE) is when different genotypes respond to similar environmental factors in different ways to create an individual's phenotype (e.g. only half of all long-term smokers will die prematurely due to a smoking- related disease).

Environmental influences on cognitive development

Adaptation studies

Skeels' study

Skeels found that an early deprived upbringing can have serious detrimental effects on children's development, and that these detrimental effects can be ameliorated, at least in part, by placement into good quality adoptive homes. Subsequent research has confirmed and modified some of these conclusions. 

Romanian adoptees

It was found that institutionalised Romanian adoptees who were over 6 months at the time of adoption, although they showed signs of developmental catch-up, had cognitive levels that were well below those of comparison groups. The developmental catch-up experienced by the previously institutionalised children was a result of the radical improvement in rearing conditions. This catch-up, which has been found by countless other researchers with adopted children is an example of environmental drift, which is a development shift in the direction of the changing environment. Four deprivation-specific patterns are associated with those children who were over 6 months at the time of adoption: 1) Quasi-autistic symptom; characterised by inzense circumscribed interests and abnormal preoccupations, which are associated with deficits in theory of mind; 2) Disinhibited social engagement; characterised by a marked disregard for social boundaries, together with an undue familiarity with strangers; 3) Inattention/overactivity, which shares many features with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder; 4) Cognitive impairment, as shown in the reduced IQ associated with the children aged over 6 months at the time of adoption. The heterogeneity of the effects of deprivation can be partially explained by genetic factors in the form of gene x environment interactions (GxE). The extent of the developmental recovery is also related to the age at which the children are adopted.

Other adoption studies

Duyme, Dumaret and Tomkewicz (1999) demonstrated the effects of a complete environmental change on children's IQs, the gains being strongly related to the socioeconomic status (SES) of the adoptive families, i.e. further evidence of environmental drift and also gene x environment (SES) interaction. 

The flynn effect

The flynn effect is a clear example of environmental effects on cognitive development. It describes the well-known finding that that IQ scores in Wetsern societies have been rising at an average rate of three IQ points per decade since 1932. IQ tests therefore have to be re-standardised every few years in order that the average IQ remains at 100. This increase in IQ scores has been attributed to several possible causes: a reduction in family size so that the children get more parental input, improvements in education, improvements in diet, and the increasing complexities in modern societies which include complex technological inventions. Clearly, this effect cannot be attributed to genetic causes since genetic changes take many generations to have an effect.

Compensatory education

Poverty and malnutrition

It is known for many years that poverty and malnutrition (serious condition that occurs when a person's diet does not contain the right amount of nutrients, caused by a lack of food and/or an inadequate diet) can have a devastating negative effect on children's development. The definition of poverty will vary depending on the country it refers to. In poor an/or developing countries absolute poverty often refers to limited access to food and/or clean water. In developed countries a common definition of relative poverty is households which earn 60% or less than the median income. Research with non-human animals, typically rats, where the environment can be precisely controlled, has established that environmental variations will affect brain development and cognitive functions both positively and negatively - a highly stimulating and nurturant environment facilitates brain growth while a limited non-nurturant environment inhibits it. 

Head start and sure start

Compensatory education offers supplementary programmes or services designed to help children at risk of cognitive impairment and low educational achievement to succeed. The longer children live in poverty, the greater their academic deficits. Thus, children living in poverty are likely to experience a cycle of deprivation that can persist over generations. In the following we introduce two additional resources that aim to improve early childhood environments.  

Head start

Project head start began in the USA in 1965 and aims to help break the cycle of poverty of low-income children from birth to age of 5, i.e. providing the children with a comprehensive programme to support their cognitive, social, nutritional and emotional needs and also to support parents and engender positive parent-child relationships. With respect to the children's intelligence it seemed that children enrolled in head start had an increase of around 10 IQ points, but that shortly after enrolling in school, and when head start stopped, these advantages soon disappeared. Early evaluations thus suggested that compensatory education was not worthwhile. However, Rutter (1985), among others, commented that parental involvement was essential. It was concluded that whether or not the cognitive gains last depends on whether teachers and parents respond to the initial changes in the children's behavior and performance. The positive benefits of head start have been the following: reduced numbers of US children had to repeat a grade/year; fewer children were placed in special education classes or classified as learning disabled; teachers rated the children more positively on attitudes to teaching and learning; the children had higher self-esteem and self-efficacy; in later life they were less likely to get into trouble with the police.

Sure start

Sure start is the UK equivalent of the US head start (1998). They provided play sessions for childre, family support with advice on parenting, guiding on health and nutrition, speech and language therapy and access to specialist support services. It was concluded that teaching improved parenting skills and had great benefits in reducing problem behaviors in young children. Parents were taught to: increase positive child behavior through praise and incentives; improve parent-child interaction; set clear expectations: limit setting and non-aversive management strategies for non-compliance; apply consistent gentle consequences for problem behavior. Overall, evaluations of compensatory education programmes have been positive. Hair et al. (2015) summarise the effects as follows: '...interventions aimed at improving children's environments may alter the link between childhood poverty and deficits in cognition and academic achievement.'

The effects of genes and environments are not seperable but interdependent. One cannot separate the effect of genes from that of environments, or nature from nurture. It now seems to be accepted that approximately 50% of the variance of general cognitive ability in populations in developed countries can be explained by our genetic inheritance, and this influence gradually increases with age, from infancy to adulthood.

Prenatal development - Chapter 4

Introduction

It is easy to see birth as the beginning of psychological development because we can easily observe this development in the newborn child. A child is dependent on the world and grows and changes a lot in a short time. In recent years, however, it has become clear that birth is an important milestone in development, but that this development already starts in the uterus. New technologies allow us to observe the development in the womb. Research into the development of the brain and the spinal cord has mapped fascinating processes through which nerves arise, move and connect with each other, creating paths between the brain and the organs. A major change in the brain involves the development of the cerebral cortex that is largely complete when a foetus is 27 weeks. The senses become functional between 8 weeks and 26 weeks, marking the end of the embryonic period and organogenesis (process of organ formation in very early development). From 26 weeks this marks the beginning of the last trimester of pregnancy. At first, touch develops, then the feelings of taste and smell, the vestibular senses, listening and finally seeing. 

During most of the last century, knowledge of the prenatal development was obtained by indirect method of investigation such as presenting loud noises near the mother's abdomen and watching movement on the surface of her abdomen. Another indirect measurement currently used is testing the perception and memory of neonates, an infant less than a month old. In addition to the indirect methods, we can now also use direct methods for research. For example, activity can be measured from the nervous system to get information about normal development and also about individual development pathways or phenotypes. An important direct measurement of the autonomic nervous system is the placement of ultrasound around the mother's abdomen and thus measuring the heart rate of the baby electronically. This method also provides information about movement. In addition, the brain activity of a baby can also be tracked by using an fMRI for example. The impact of prenatal experiences occurs at various levels, from biochemical factors that influence gene expression to maternal lifestyle characteristics that affect the environment of the foetus. Complex interactions between the genes and the environmental factors influence the achievement of neuronal identity, the directing of axons to their target, the connections between cells (synaptogenesis), and also the programmed death of cells (apoptosis).

The brain, the spinal cord and the emergence of the mind

Processes and sequencing of brain development

During the embryonic period, the central nervous system begins as cells of ectoderm, the outermost layer of the embryo. This embryo has three layers. These layers are the foundation for organ formation. The endoderm thickens and becomes the neural plate with 18 days after fertilization. At that moment it is already subdivided into cells that develop in the forebrain, midbrain and hindbrain. The neural plate folds to become the neural tube and at the end of the first month the embryo is basically organized in a cranial-caudal manner. This means that work starts at the brain and then moves towards the other end (i.e. the feet) in humans. Cells are born (neurogenesis ) and begin a migration to their final location. Neurogenesis and migration continue to work until the 6th month of pregnancy and they are followed up by major changes in individual cells that program them for the different tasks the brain will receive. 

In the nervous system there is a hierarchy of control systems that determines what the fetus does and when. This hierarchical structure becomes more complex as the unborn child develops further. The larger the behavioral repertoire, the greater the need for organization in the nervous system. In the beginning, behavior is a reflex. When the child is born everything is learned that is needed and the reflexes are trainable by habit and repeated stimulation. 

Development of the cerebral cortex

For memory, language, thoughts, control and integration of movement with the senses, a primary part of the brain is responsible: the cerebral cortex: the outer 'crust' of the hemispheres that is about as thick as a credit card. During the first two or three months of pregnancy there is relatively little development in this crust. It is therefore not surprising that behavior that occurs before this time is mainly reflexes and is probably controlled by simpler circuits that occur in the midbrain. The cerebral hemispheres begin to develop from the forebrain when a foetus is about 9 weeks old and are rapidly increasing in size. At 4 months pregnancy, the cells begin to migrate into the cerebral hemispheres. Cell migration is unique in the cortex: cells migrate and find their final destination in the interior of the six layers. After 6 months of pregnancy, the surface of the cortex is no longer smooth because rapid proliferation of cells has caused the folds that are needed on the cortex. Sulci (valleys) and gyri (ridges) have arisen and the frontal, parietal and occipital lobes can be distinguished. Rapid brain development does not stop at the moment a child is born but continues during the first month after the pregnancy. 

At 27 weeks pregnancy, the number of cells in the cerebral cortex is equal to the number of cells in an adult but at birth the brain of a baby has only 25% of the volume of an adult. More volume comes from an increase in the size of cells and proliferation of dendrites during synaptogenesis. Most growth, however, comes from the myelination of nerve fiber: the formation of myelin, a thick insulator, around the nerve fiber is very important in neural development. The myelin prevents leakage of the messages traveling along a nerve and also makes it possible that messages go faster and are transferred more efficiently. 

Despite the fact that the brain is not yet fully developed, foetuses have a limited ability to learn from about 24 weeks of age. They respond to the environment and have a limited form of memory. When they are born, the cerebral cortex consists of a large number of primary motor and sensory zones. The frontal lobes are important for hearing, memory and a sense of time and self. The occipital lobes are the visual center of the brain. The association cortex areas surround the primary sensory area and their development takes a lot longer because they are about higher cognitive and integrative functions that develop through experience. 

Behavioral organisation

Behavior of the foetus becomes more organized when the pregnancy proceeds. If a fetus is 34 weeks old, its behavior differs from that of a foetus of 13 weeks: patterns of rest and activity can already be recognized. Foetuses spend most of their time in peaceful sleep or active sleep. If a foetus is 38 weeks old, they spend less time in the status of active sleep. As their brains have matured this last month, more inhibitory pathways have been developed which limit the amount of exercise.

Sensations

Touch

The rise of the senses follows a set mammalian pattern of development. Emergence is further organized in a cranial-caudal direction. The first system that will function is touch. If a foetus is about 8 weeks old, it can respond by moving. Within two weeks, foetuses learn to curl their fingers in a reflexive grasping movement when their palm is touched in the womb. Initially, foetuses move their head and neck away from the source of facial touch. This is the precursor of the rooting reflex: the fact that babies turn their faces to the side where their cheeks are touched. This helps them to find the mother's nipple. When foetuses start moving, they will be touching the uterine wall, the umbilical cord the umbilical cord and also themselves. Foetuses will touch their own face more frequently than any other body part. 

The chemosensory system

The gustatory (tatse) and olfactory (smell) senses are called the chemosensory systems because the sensory receptors in the mouth and nose respond to molecules of the substances that reach them. Taste receptors respond to molecules by transmitting the experience of sweet, salt, bitter, sour and umami (meaty). It is difficult to indicate what foetuses can smell and taste. For example, through the mother, alcohol or perfume can reach the baby and influence its development. This can reach the baby through the blood or via the placenta, for example. Fragrances and tastes that foetuses receive can determine their preference when they are born. Newborn children are selectively responsive their own mother's colostrum. The fluid from the breast that precedes milk. This is confirmed by research, showing that if a mother after her pregnancy dramatically adjusts her diet, the child has more difficulty learning to suck. 

The vestibular system

As described earlier, foetuses do a lot of exercise, constantly changing positions within the fluid that protects it from the outside world. Foetuses are also dependent on the movements of the mother and they come into contact with positional changes that depend on gravity (i.e. whether the mother is standing, sitting or lying down). This information is sensed by the vestibular system. The sensory system that contributes to the balance and spatial orientation. This system is located in the inner ear of the foetus. The information is forwarded from this system to the brain where it is processed and information about movement and position is extracted. Although it is difficult to elicit a response from the vestibular system in foetuses, it does not mean that this system does not work. By 25 weeks, foetuses will show a righting reflex and it is possible that the vestibular system in some way is responsible for the fact that most babies are down with their heads just before the mother gives birth. We do not know exactly how much information about the position and movement foetuses actually process when they are still in the womb. We do know, however, that the system is actively stimulated and that this stimulation is very important for many aspects of normal foetal growth and development. Vestibular stimulation plays an important role in changing states of arousal. This becomes more apparent as time goes on. Initially, foetuses are often silent when the mother moves a lot and causes a lot of vestibular stimulation. Even when children are born, parents often lull them to calm them down: this also happens under the influence of the vestibular system. The level of vestibular stimulation received by the foetus during pregnancy is very high. Studies on preterm infants have shown that there is a lack in neuro-behavioral development that can partly be explained by a lack of vestibular stimulation. It has been found that when these children are placed on waterbeds instead of on mattresses that can compensate for the vestibular stimulation they miss by being out of the womb. This can lead to better sleep organization. Sessions between mother and child can also help the child develop a better circadian rhythm (this is a 24-hour rhythm). 

The visual system

Pregnancy is a time for the structural formation of the basic components of the visual system, from the development of the eyes to the specialized areas in the brain that receive and process visual input. As mentioned earlier, there is little visual stimulation in the prenatal world of the baby. The inside of the uterus is dark. The eyelids are fused shut shortly after their formation and do not open until 5 to 7 months of gestation. 

Development of the eyes

Approximately 5 weeks after fertilization, two balloon-shaped structures form on either side at the front of the brain. These are the future eyes. As they develop, they are separated from the brain by a small stalk; this is where the nerve fibers will travel between the eye and the brain. For a couple of days the balloons fold to form a two-layer head and the retina develops. The adult retina is a complex neural structure that consists of many different layers whose function is to capture the light that enters the eye and convert it into electrical impulses or messages that can be transmitted in the brain. The cells that accomplish this task are called rods and cones and they develop from the inner wall of the optic cup. The outer layers form a pigment-containing layer that absorbs the light. This layer also develops the network of blood vessels needed by the rods and cones. The lens of the eye begins to form after about 2 months of pregnancy. The eyelids and muscles that move the eyes also begin to form in this period. The circular ring of pigment, the iris, also begins to develop. By 3 months, the eyelids are fused together. By 6 months, all muscles that move the eyeball are in place. Movements of the eye generally start between weeks 16 and 23, although not all muscles are fully formed. The eyes sometimes make slow, rolling movements or faster movements. It is known that even premature baby 's, born after 26 weeks gestation, have the ability to distinguish light from dark and soon be able to make subsequent movements in order to follow an attractive moving object. 

Development of the visual pathway

There is a simultaneous development of the visual path that connects the light-sensitive cells in the eye with the brain. This path involves the transmission and interpretation of the electrical impulses that encode visual information when it enters the eye. There is a series of relay stations that form between the eye and the cerebral cortex and connect all cells. In humans, the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) of the thalamus has evolved to be one such relay station. By 9 weeks of pregnancy, shortly after the period of the embryo, the optic nerve has already penetrated the neural tube and there is a partial crossing over of fibers of the optic nerve. In this way, information from both eyes is integrated. This transition is complete when a foetus is 15 weeks old. At the end of the first trimester the nerve fibers are interconnected with cells in the brain area. 

Development of the visual cortex

As the nerve fibres pass on from the LGN they go to the visual cortex: an area at the back of the brain in the occipital lobes. The visual cortex is organized as a map of the two retinas. Each point of the retina represents a point in the visual cortex. The visual cortex processes the information it receives. The surrounding brain areas are involved in the perceptual processes, for example the interpretation of the sensory information. Their development is less well known, but they probably begin to form at the end of the third trimester. The development of the cerebral cortex is characterized by the formation of layers of different cells and by around 7 months this cortex reaches about the same structure seen in adults. At this moment the eyelids of the foetus are no longer completely closed. Foetuses will spend some time with their eyes open and blinking with their eyelids. If foetuses were born now at 28 weeks, they would have some vision and can easily distinguish between light and dark and have the opportunity to distinguish a shape. 

The auditory system

The development of the auditory system starts at around 6 weeks of pregnancy. At that moment, two small bubbles appear at the back of the brain. These become the inner ear and will later contain the auditory and balance organs. The tube of the middle ear also begins to develop. At 7 weeks, the external part of the ear along with the canal leading into the ear and the eardrum develop from a groove between the mouth and the heart. At 8 weeks the inner ear begins to develop the channels that will eventually contain the organs that determine balance and position. The cochlea (a structure encased in bone that contains the receptors for sound) forms a week later in the inner ear. This is the first step towards the the shell-shaped structures that the auditory organs will form. Hair cells are present in the channels around 10 weeks. The middle ear forms two soft structures that later become two of the three bones that move sound from the outer to the inner ear. The vestibular system begins to work at around 14 weeks. This system will be receiving high levels of stimulation at this time and the baby is moving almost continuously. Not only through their own activity but also through the movement of the mother. The cochlea contains hair cells from that moment on and the auditory nerve attaches itself to the cochlear canal. By 20 weeks, the third bone is present in the ear and all three of them have begun to harden. This process is likely to improve the ability of the middle ear to conduct sound. Cochlear function presumably starts at around 24 weeks. At that moment, the external ear is adult-shaped but continues to grow in size until 9 years of age. 

Responses to sounds

The auditory system becomes mature enough between 23 and 25 weeks to detect vibroacoustic stimulation. At that point, the sensors of the system are not yet sufficiently developed. In addition, messages from the external ear are not transferred properly, yet. Nevertheless, almost all frequencies can already be heard. The sounds that are available to foetuses must pass through the mother so that the sounds that reach the foetus are predominantly low-frequency ones. Nevertheless, many sounds can be heard in the womb, including the sound of the heartbeat of the mother. Yet, the sound that is heard the clearest and the most frequent is the voice of the mother. After birth, babies hear sound that travels through air while foetuses listen to sound that comes through fluid. In addition, the auditory system in the womb is still immature, which makes it difficult to determine how well these sounds are converted into electrical signals or what the foetuse's brain makes of these messages. It is important that a baby does pick up sounds in the womb: sounds are thought to shape permanent changes in the auditory system, and these are probably required for normal brain development.

Prenatal and transnatal auditory learning

Because there are few methods for measuring their behavior, it is difficult to determine when foetuses have learned and when that learning has been retained into the postnatal period (transnatal learning - learnig that occurs during the prenatal period which is remembered during the postnatal period). One way of doing it during the foetal period is to repeatedly present a stimulus and measure whether there is a reduction in responding that cannot be attributed to sensory adaptation or response system fatigue. Habituation experiments typically take place over a period of minutes during which learning is shown by a change to lower response rate. This way it can be checked whether the heartbeat of children responds to the offering of sound. If we accept that foetuses can learn about sounds they hear when they are in the womb, then it makes sense to ask when there is an indication that newborn children react to sound in a different way than they did during the prenatal period. A natural prenatal sound is the rhythm of the heart. 

Learning about mother's voice and language

Although the voice of the mother is a prominent sound and is more intense than others, it is not more intelligible. All voices are muted for the baby in the womb, mainly because the higher frequency sound waves travel relatively poorly through the maternal body to reach the foetus. Several studies support the hypothesis that newborn babies prefer to listen to a filtered recording of the maternal voice compared to the unfiltered voice. This preference for the prenatal version of the voice suggests that newborn babies can learn about sounds that are present in the womb and that early postnatal response is influenced by this experience. Selective responses to specific stimuli, such as the well-known voice of the mother, can be biologically adaptive and help the baby because they are less likely to immerse the immature nervous system with information. 

Research has shown that babies react differently to the mother's voice shortly after birth than to the voice of foreign women and that there is also other brain activity when they hear their mother speak. In addition to showing preference for listening to specific voices, newborns also show that they respond differently to languages. Within the first four days after birth, babies recognize the language their mother speaks of other languages. When they are 2 days old they already show a preference for the language the mother speaks in comparison to a foreign language. The rhythmic structure of a language seems to be of importance here. 

Studies on transnatal learning suggest that the foetus can learn and that prenatal experience influences postnatal brain activity and behavior. It is also suggested that the voice of the mother can be a perceptual bridge to postnatal life and that we still know very little about the underlying mechanisms, limitations and possibilities of both prenatal and transnatal learning. 

Risks to fetal development

Perinatal (the period just before and after birth) complications can have their origins in parental preconception conditions as well as in gene -environment interactions during embryogenesis and gestation period. Genetic factors are probably responsible for about 10 to 15% of congenital abnormalities while environmental factors account for about 10% (i.e. alcohol, radiation and vitamin A deficiency). The rest of the congenital abnormalities are the result of multifactorial causation, which is the result of genes and environment interacting with each other. 

In chromosomal abnormalities, whole chromosomes or parts of them are missing or duplicated. Chromosomal abnormalities are generally seen in 1 in 200 births and are seen in 50 to 70% of the miscarriages in the first trimester. Abnormal numbers of chromosomes are generally caused by an error in separating the chromosomes in daughter cells during the meiotic division. The risk of this increases with advancing maternal age. If the age of the father is higher, this increases the risk of abnormalities in social functioning with, for example, schizophrenia or autism being more common. Disorders can occur from a deviant gene that is inherited. The risk of having a child with a disorder that is dependent on this abnormal gene depends in part on the genetic mutations of the partner. Examples of autosomal genetic disorders are, for example, Mafran syndrome and Huntington. 

Effects of exposure to psychoactive substances 

If the mother consumes a lot of alcohol, this influences the development of the foetus and the child. Adverse foetal outcomes include an increased risk of spontaneous abortion, stillbirth, premature separation of the placenta, growth retardation and in some cases premature delivery. Those are itself a riskfactor for future health problems, poor development and newborn mortality. For children who survive birth, the effects may be an increased risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), mild to severe physical abnormalities and cognitive and behavioral limitations. Alcohol has harmful effects on the development and functioning of the placenta, which is crucial for the survival and normal development of the foetus. 

Despite the many attempts to warn pregnant women of the dangers of smoking during pregnancy, smoking is still one of the most preventable risk factors for an unsuccessful pregnancy outcome. In general, babies born to women who smoke weigh about 100 to 200 grams less than babies who had a mother who did not smoke and are twice as likely to have foetal growth retardation. In addition, smoking is associated with the risk of premature birth and perinatal complications such as premature detachment from the placenta. Cigarette smoking is also associated with a two- to threefold increase for SIDS. Finally, there are still behavioral problems and cognitive disadvantages at a later age, including problems with attention, visuoperceptual processing and the processing of speech. 

Nutrition and foetal development

Specific nutritional requirements must be met for healthy foetal development. For example, proper amounts of calcium are needed for foetal bone, muscle and transmitter production and sufficient iron is needed for the development of red blood cells. Research indicates that regardless of gross congenital anomalies, women's food intake and/or weight gain during pregnancy may subtly affect foetal development in ways that have implications for the child's future medical and mental health, with some effects appearing only in adulthood. A mature disease that is associated with specific prenatal challenges during a specific period is called developmental programming. This is the hypothesis that prenatal conditions have detrimental effects on health in adulthood. For example, a low birth weight is linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular diseases and, for example, high blood pressure. However, a higher birth weight is related to an increased risk of breast cancer and mental illness. 

Effects of maternal stress

Like the diet, psychosocial stress also affects negative birth outcomes such as low birth weight and premature birth. More support for a link between maternal stress and the development of the foetus comes from other studies that indicate that during the gestation period the mother's psychological variables, such as stress and anxiety, affect the maternal condition of the mother. Nevertheless, other research has shown that little stress can have a positive influence on the development of the baby.

Prenatal development of postnatal functions: the bridge to infancy

Many of the reflex behaviors that babies show after they are born include breathing, rooting, sucking and swallowing and are part of the foetal repertoire. Other reflexes that have less clear functional significance for humans include the toe-curling reflex, the finger-grasping reflex and the startle reflex. These reflexes all disappear during the first year of life. Another reflexive movement that received a lot of attention is the stepping reflex. If there is resistance to the feet of babies, they make incremental movements, this reflex usually occurs in the first two months after birth. There are now several studies that suggest that there is fundamental psychobiological continuity between foetal development and development in early childhood. 

Summary and conclusion

An important development issue is whether we can determine which characteristics of a person remain stable. Continuity of the behavior of an individual from the foetus to the postnatal life is often difficult to confirm by (1) a rapidly developing brain and behavioral structure, (2) intra- and extrauterine constraints and supports for activity; or (3) the amount and patterns of sensory stimulation. To give a specific example; it is difficult to measure how much one individual differs from the other in the continuity of their reaction to being moved during and after gestation because it is difficult to generate movement that is the same during these two periods. If a newborn responds differently to the stimulation of the movement than they reacted in the womb, one does not know if this is because there is no continuity in their response or because the movement is different. In addition, there are abrupt changes in physiological needs and motivations during birth, such as hunger, changing temperature and other levels of oxygen. These abrupt changes make it difficult to measure the continuity of development. The triggers for and characteristics of a circadian and ultradian rhythm (rhythms that repeat in less than 24 hours) change after birth, for example oral feeding intervals and light-dark cycles vs. maternal-generated patterns of physiological, physical, and hormonal activity. 

Perception, knowledge and action in infancy - Chapter 5

Questions about the perceptual and cognitive abilities of infants are of interest in their own right and are also particularly important because infancy is in many ways a starting point for later development. Although this statement needs some qualification in the sense that a great deal of development takes place prior to birth, the moment of birth marks the infant's emergence into the world where it will stay for about 80 years. There are a whole range of entirely new experiences in that world. A fundamental question is what the newborn child does with new stimuli. In addition, it can be asked what newborn babies understand from what they see. These questions fall under the domain of cognitive development. Traditionally, an important aspect of the distinction between perception and cognition is the concept of mental representation. If we see the world as consisting of objects, it is a basis of perception. Instead, when we look at an environment that is not immediately present (in mind) we are busy with internal processes and the concept of representation. 

Visual perception from birth to 6 months

Early limitations of vision: are they really a problem?

We know that newborn's vision is significantly poorer than that of older individuals. Visual acuity, which is basically a measure of the fineness of detail that can be resolved, is about 1/30th the level of perfect adult acuity. In addition, young children have poor control over focusing their eyes (visual accommodation) - something that is necessary to create a sharp retinal image of objects that are at different distances from the person. These limitations do not last long because both visual acuity and accommodation improve rapidly during the first 6 months. In addition, this limitation only affects the details and should not affect the perception of larger structures of objects. If presented sufficiently large stimuli at a proper distance from the child, it is perfectly possible to investigate just what young infants are capable of perceiving. 

How can we investigate infant perception?

In adults it would be possible to show them different stimuli and ask them if they see a difference between them. In babies, however, it is not possible to ask these questions, so the approach is less immediate. Around the beginning of 1960, various techniques were developed that opened up exciting possibilities.

 The visual preference method

The spontaneous visual preference method includes presenting two different stimuli to the baby and measuring whether they look longer at the one object than at the other. Such a looking time is defined as a visual preference and such a preference implies discrimination. The stimuli are offered both left and right to prevent the child from simply looking in a certain direction. 

Habituation techniques

If an infant is presented with the same stimulus over a series of presentations, the time spent looking at it declines. This phenomenon, called habituation , is often described as an early example of boredom but it can also mean that there is a form of visual memory in children and this object is included in it. In addition, this phenomenon can be used to conduct research into making visual distinctions. If another stimulus is presented to an infant after habituation, we expect that if the infant can make a distinction between the two, it would recognize the new stimulus as new and therefore look at it for longer. If, on the other hand, they can not distinguish between the two stimuli, they should look at the new stimulus as little as at the old one. 

Shape perception in newborns

As mentioned earlier, young children, despite their limited visual acuity, we can still investigate shape perception provided we present sufficiently large stimuli at an appropriate viewing distance. It appears that newborns can perceive differences between simple forms such as crosses, triangles, squares and circles. Research has shown that newborn children look longer at a form they were not used to yet, which indicates that they differentiate between the different forms and experience the stimulus as new if they had not seen it, yet.

The components of shape

The findings presented above were exciting but it causes the problem whether children distinguish between the forms or simply on the basis of the presence of something that has a new stimulus and an old one (for example, the pointed top of a triangle). Follow-up research has taken a different approach, starting with certain components of a form. This research has shown that newborn children see simple forms as a whole and do not look at a collection of separate parts. 

Newborns perceive a three-dimensional world

Knowledge that very young children perceive at least the angular elements of patterns is of great importance. However, the children's world does not only consist of flat patterns. The world consists of 3D objects. This presents a challenge for the perceptual system because if objects move and reorient, the retinal image they produce will change in shape and size. Despite these changes, an adult sees an object as the same: the shape and size do not change. This principle of size constancy leads to the perception of the same size of an object, however much its distance from the viewer changes. The development issue that emerges from this is whether these principles guide the perception of children or whether this is learned from experience. Research has shown that this property is already present in children when they are born. The retinal image size, or the size of a visually perceived object on the retina, works the same in newborns. Children look longer at an object of different size than at the same object at a new distance (and hence with a new retinal image size). 

Perceptual development in the first six months

Until now, it has been shown that the visual perception of newborns, except for details, often works the same as perception in adults. However, current research suggests that there are a number of important aspects of perception that arise during the first months of life. 

Perception of object unity

The adult visual system often fills in what it does not see: if you see a rod halfway through a brick, our visual system thinks we see a whole bar with half a brick in front instead of two half bars and a brick. This phenomenon is called an object unity. An important question is whether this is already the case in newborn children. Research showed that 4-month-old babies know about object unity. This principle does not apply to newborns, which indicates that this is something that children develop after they are born. 

Perception of object trajectories

Just as we can ask if infants fill in the hidden centre part of the rod in the object unity task, we can ask whether, when an object moves behind and occluder, they fill in the invisible part of its trajectory. This invloves a greater processing load because unlike the rod behind the box, there is a period when the object is totally invisible. Research found that 6-months-olds perceive trajectory continuity, whereas 4-months-olds only did so when the occuluder was very narrow, and 2-months-olds perceived the trajectory to be discontinous even with the narrow occluder. Further work indicates that 4-months-olds perceive trajectory continuity when either the time out of sight or the distance out of sight is short. This confirms the presence of a developmental progression that lags that of development of object unity by 2 months. 

Perception of subjective contours

Another form of perceptual organization in which the filling in of non-visible parts plays a role is the phenomenon of subjective contours. This is the principle whereby only parts of objects are shown so that the remaining contours are 'filled in' to observe a complete shape. Perception of subjective contours can be investigated in young children by habituating them to an image in which a 'filled-in' form is observed in order to expose them to this 'perceived form'. If they perceive the subjective square, the real square presented on test trials should be familiar and so they will look longer at the other test shape. This skill does not seem to exist at birth but has been found in children aged 4 and 7 months. 

The evidence mentioned above indicates that newborns and young children are able to perceive objects and deal with them in a way that is necessary for the perception of the objective, three-dimensional world. The skills of newborns seem to be limited to the 'here and now' of perception, but during the first four months children develop the ability to fill in gaps in perception in order to perceive object unity and subjective contours. 

Infant's perception of people

Children are not only surrounded by objects after birth but are also included in a social world. Therefore, it is an important questions if they are able to perceive people. For example, if a child is able to enter into an attachment relationship with a specific person, they must have a way in which they can distinguish this person from other persons. 

Face perception

Research has shown that children in the first month of their life prefer a face instead of the shape of a face without the facial features. However, there was a lot of criticism of this research and later research has revised this finding and stated that children are at least 2 months old before they can actually see faces. However, there is also research that suggests that children can perceive the face just after birth. It seems as if children are provided with a system for perceiving faces. 

Discriminating between faces

However, the question that is most relevant in relation to the social and emotional development of children concerns the age at which children are capable of distinguishing between faces, in particular between the faces of their parents and the faces of others. In general, this issue was investigated by showing children a familiar and unfamiliar face and looking at spontaneous visual preference. Several studies suggest that young children prefer the face of their mother over the face of a strange woman, even babies who had contact with their mothers for only a few hours. In all cases the babies showed a visual preference for the face of their mother. However, this finding is difficult to interpret without very strict control. It could be that children do not like their mother because of how she looks, but for example because of their smell. In addition, it could be that the mother's face reacted to seeing her child and had a more dynamic facial expression than the stranger, something that could make her more attractive in the eyes of the child. However, research has shown that this is not the case and that at birth children can probably distinguish between faces based on facial features, such as the distance between the eyes, the nose, etcetera. However, research has shown that this is not the case and that at birth children can probably distinguish between faces based on facial features, such as the distance between the eyes, the nose, etcetera.

Preference for attractive faces 

An intriguing recent finding is that children of 2 months age and newborn children look longer at a face that is considered attractive by adults than at faces that are perceived as less attractive by adults. However, this is possibly explained by the preference of 'average faces', or a prototypical face. These are faces that arise by taking the average of a set of faces. Adults also seem to have a preference for such faces. It is unlikely that children will be born with a preference for attractive faces but more likely to be born with an innate mechanism to recognize faces that draw their attention and is triggered by faces like the prototype. 

Perceptual narrowing and face processing specialisation

Although much evidence suggests that children are born with an inner mechanism for perceptual processes, there are also findings that indicate that experience affects perception. Thus, general skills become more specific and better based on experience. The conventional vision proposed by Piaget many years ago was that imitation was impossible until children were able to imagine themselves and others, something that develops later in childhood. However, it is now clear that newborns are capable of imitating facial expressions and hand movements. A fallacy in gestures is that the gestures that are done must also be able to occur spontaneously in the child so that it can be able to copy them. If the child imitates a gesture, it is difficult to determine whether the child actually imitates or spontaneously moves. This problem has been addressed in research by showing different facial expressions. Research then showed that children try to replicate the correct facial expression significantly more often. 

Voice perception

Chapter 4 has already shown that the foetus is able to pick up sound before birth. Research with young children has shown that they are able to distinguish between voice. Newborns have the ability to distinguish between different syllables. In addition, children can also produce sounds that do not occur in their own language. 

Voice and speech discrimination

It has also been shown that newborns prefer the voice of their mother over the voice of a strange woman of the same age. Because these children were only 3 days old and only had 12 contact hours with their mother, it is plausible that this is a fast learning process. However, hearing is different from vision in the sense that there is scope for learning prior to birth. The unborn child already learns about auditory information in the womb. In babies, a piece of text has been repeatedly read while they were still in the womb. After these babies were born it turned out that they had a preference for this piece of text compared to other pieces of text even though they were both read by the mother or someone else. This indicates that foetuses and newborn babiess are capable of encoding speech in detail to differences in rhythm and/or recognize intonation (the rhythmic pattern of speech) between different passages. 

Preferences for infant-directed speech

When parents speak to their children, they often speak in a way that exaggerates intonation. This means that there is more difference in their voice than when they speak to other adults. Research has shown that children prefer this form of speech to other forms of speech. This form of speech is called infant-directed speech (motherese). 

Summary

Current research indicates that the ability to perceive faces is present at birth and that discrimination between the mother's face and a stranger develops within the first days after birth. Preference for an 'attractive' face is already present at birth and is probably linked to the internal working model of the child, which ensures that the child has a preference for a prototypical face. The presence of neonatal imitation of facial expressions reinforces the conclusion that newborns are able to perceive details of the face. Voice and speech perception is already well developed in early childhood and it is plausible that the perception of voices is already being developed before birth. 

Infant's knowledge of the world

The conventional view is that cognitive processes involve a mental representation of the world. In this way cognition is distinguished from perception because cognitive processes can act from the representations of aspects of the world that are not available to the senses while perception is limited to the 'here and now'. In recent years, this clear distinction has been somewhat eroded. 

Jean Piaget and the development of object permanence

Piaget's vision was that children were not born with knowledge of the world, but instead developed more knowledge and developed the skill to represent reality in a mental way. This theoretical vision is known as constructivism. An important aspect of Piaget's theory in the development of mental representation is the ability to form a representation of objects that are not in sight, leading to the realization of their permanent state. According to him, prior to the age of 9 months, infants do not exhibit object permanence. And despite the fact that this occurs in simple form in children aged 9 months, this does not fully develop until the end of the second year of life. He found that prior to 9 months, infants did not respond when an object was hidden: even if they were very interested in an object and were therefore very motivated to find it, they did not take any action to find this object if it was not visible. 

Search onset and the A not B error

On the other hand, it turned out that when children are 9 months old their reaction to disappearing changed. If an object was hidden, children 9 months old would search for it. For Piaget, this was an indication of the beginning of the skill to form a mental representation of the absent object. However, Piaget always went further to complicate the task of testing the child's ability. He found that if children had successfully found an object at a location (A) they would not look at the place where they last saw it hidden (B). This is known as the A not B error. Piaget saw this as proof that their representation of the hidden object was not yet entirely objective: they repeated an old action to find the object. 

Later work on infant cognition 

Later research into the cognition of children has shown that children have an awareness of object permanence and a general understanding of the physical world. One of the limitations of Piaget's research techniques was that in many cases he relied on measuring the actions of children towards objects, such as reaching, but we know that motor development depends on how old children are. 

The violation of expectation technique

The technique used in the most recent studies on the skills of children is the violation of expectation technique. It bears similarities to the habituation-novelty technique previously described. Children become familiar with an event sequence and are then presented with two test trials that are variations on the original. One involving a possible event and the other involving an impossible event. Children' looking at these two test events is measured, but in this case longer looking at one event does not just indicate discrimination between the events. In these studies, if children look longer at the impossible event, this is taken as evidence that they have detected that it violates a principle of everyday reality.

Young infants reason about the number of objects in an event

Several researchers have argued that young children possess core knowledge of the world on the basis of which they reason about the events they see. This leads them to conclude that certain events are impossible. In addition, it has been claimed that young infants would reason about the number of objects involved in an event. There are researchers who claim that the insight of young children in the number of something is based on subitising, the ability to immediately see how many items there are of something without counting it consciously. This is only possible with small quantities of something. Small children seem to be able to distinguish between small numbers. In addition, research has been done to see if young children can count. A study was carried out, in which two puppets were placed behind a screen.Then the screen was lowered and there were 1 or 2 puppets behind the screen. It has been found that children aged 4 to 5 months looked longer at the unexpected situation as if they were registering that this was impossible. On this basis it was concluded that young children have an understanding of adding and removing. More research, including neuroscientific research, seems to underline this finding. 

The evidence given above provides evidence that fairly young children understand object permanence and the rules that restrict the movement of an object and also that there is basal awareness of numbers and numerical operations, especially with regard to small numbers. 

Object search revisited

If babies of around 4 months understand that an object that is hidden is still in existence, the question is why they only start looking for them when they are 8 or 9 months old. And when they start searching, the question is why they make mistakes with searching. 

Search failure is not due to motor skill

An obvious explanation for the fact that babies less than 8 months old do not search for hidden objects is their lack of motor skills. However, it seems clear that this is not the explanation. For example, research has shown that in children who failed to retrieve an object from under an opaque upturned cup succeeded when the cup was transparent. In both cases, the action needed was the same and success with the transparent cup indicates that they have the necessary motor skills to dislodge the cup. It seems logical from this example that the fact that the cup was transparent plays a role. Rather, it seems to play a role that children do not understand the relationship between objects and do not understand that one object hides the other. 

Seeking an explanation of the A and B error

In addition, a lot of research has been done into the A non B error that children make. As mentioned earlier, children from around 9 months are successfully searching for an object if it is hidden at position A, but if the object is hidden in another place (B) they have difficulty with it and continue to search in position A. Would this error simply arise because children continue with a response that they have become accustomed to during previous clogging moments? Perhaps if the object is hidden in a new place, they do not fully realize this and repeat their old reaction, a phenomenon that responds to the response perseveration: this is the repetition of a previously learned response even when it is no longer appropriate. Although some children correct this error quickly, others make this mistake for a long time and continue to search at the 'A' location. 

Memory limitations?

What is also often mentioned is that memory may play a role. It is possible that small children (still) have problems with the memory. Research has suggested that the earlier memory of hiding place A interferes with the later memory of hiding place B. This earlier memory is then more dominant. There is a big problem with the role of memory. 

Place A as a container

Another possibility is that by seeing an object hidden and then finding an object, young children quickly learn to see place A as a container and that it is this knowledge and not so much the knowledge that something is hidden, which leads to to the search on spot A. 

Attention

Predictably, a link has been found between success and continued attention to location B during the delay. Conversely, when attention is distracted during the delay, for example with a video of a bouncing ball, perseverative behavior increased. Other research has shown that those children categorized as low SES show delayed trajectories on the AB task. Additionally, high SES children consistently showed greater overall attention and greater increases in attention to complex stimuli than lower SES children across the second half of the first year of life. Clearly there is a role for individual differences in the likelihood of search errors, though, as mentioned, Piaget pointed out that infants frequently perseverate when they are fully attentive and so inattention is unlikely to be the sole cause of preservation.

Frontal cortex immaturity

There is strong evidence that a region of the brain called the frontal cortex is involved in planning and guiding actions, processes often referred to as executive functions. The immaturity of this frontal cortex in early childhood is suggested by some researchers as an explanation for the mistakes children make to use certain types of information to guide their actions. It is stated that children are not yet able to use their memory in the right way, so that they fall back on an old response and look at spot A. 

Converting knowledge to action

The evidence presented earlier strongly suggests that quite young infants have knowledge of object permanence and the rules governing object movement. However, research using object search tasks shows that they are unable to use this information to guide action. Thus, when faced with the A not B task, infants are aware of the continued presence of the object, but are simply unable to use this information to guide action. Thus, initial success at finding the object at A is based on trial and error manipulation. Development of frontal cortex involves formation of links between object knowledge and action, leading to accurate search based on knowledge of the object's position rather than trial and error. Another research thus suggests that infants appear to know where the object is wherever it is hidden, and are capable of holding that location in memory for quite some time. But they are unable to use that information to guide their manual search and may instead rely on social cues from adults.

Summary

The answer to the dilemma is that a more general role of the frontal cortex must be identified when using information for guiding actions. The evidence in this chapter strongly suggests that fairly young children already have knowledge of object permanence and the rules that relate to the movement of objects. However, research suggests that children are unable to use this information to determine their actions. Children seem to be aware of the fact that an object is still there (object permanence) but can not adequately use this information.

Emotional development and attachment relationships - Chapter 6

Emotional development underlies many other aspects of developmental psychology and has serious implications for how we conduct research with children. It is important for researchers to be aware of the emotional context in which research is conducted and the emotional maturity of each individual child. 

Emotional development

The emotional development of children can be broadly divided into three areas. Firstly, research has looked at the ability of children to recognize different facial features and to convey their own emotions. Secondly, various tasks have been designed to test the understanding of emotions in children. Thirdly, researchers have looked at how children are able to regulate their own emotions and into individual factors that can play a role in this.

Expressing and recognising emotional expressions 

Are expressions of emotion innate?

Darwin has argued that the ability to communicate emotions through a large repertoire of facial expressions is innate. More recent research has tried to investigate this claim in different ways: it has been examined whether different emotional facial expressions are universally understood and it has been observed whether newborn babies spontaneously produce recognizable facial expressions. 

Cross-cultural evidence

There is good evidence for the universality of human facial expressions in terms of emotions. For example, it has been found that there are cross cultural similarities in the adult interpretation of facial expressions. 

Expression of emotion in infancy

More convincing evidence of the innate quality of emotional expression comes from the observation that children spontaneously display a large repertoire of emotions in their facial expressions from the moment of birth. Emotions are often subdivided into the basic emotions (joy, interest, surprise, disgust, grief, stress, fear and anger) and more complex emotions (pride, shyness, jealousy, guilt and shame). 

Adults are good at reading children's facial expressions. However, adults are less good at differentiating between negative facial expressions of children such as fear, anger, grief or envy. This does not seem to be due to a lack of subtlety in facial expressions but due to the fact that the facial expressions that result from this look very similar. Fascinating research that supports the biological basis for facial expressions has recently been published. In 2003, it was investigated whether adults were able to correctly interpret the emotional expressions of children with facial abnormalities. Adults could assess this as well in children with abnormal faces as in children with no abnormalities in their face.This suggests that different signals in the face are used to radiate emotions. 

Children show basic emotions early in life, but there is a lot of debate about when more complex emotions arise. Many assume that complex emotions do not occur until the second year of life, but others maintain that the behavior of younger children contains all these emotions. However, this view is controversial, because it would also require certain cognitive skills. 

Infant discrimination of facial expressions

Even if someone states that children can show complex emotions, this skill tells us little about whether they can distinguish between emotions in other people and thus whether they have any fundamental understanding of emotions. Children seem to be able to distinguish the facial features of emotions, but this does not mean that they are able to understand the meaning of facial expressions. To be able to make a statement about this, someone has to analyze how babies respond to different facial expressions. 

Can young infants empathise with others' emotions?

Some results from research suggest that young children can empathize with the emotions they see. In order to be able to make a better judgment about this, research was conducted in which adults were asked to determine which emexpression the child was viewing based on the facial expression of the child. By 6 months, the child can respond to expressions in the right way. This way it can cry and frown in response to angry and sad faces. However, there are problems with making strong claims that this research shows that children have an understanding of emotions. The reaction of children to these emotional expressions were measured in a non-emotional context where the changes in facial expressions were not related to events and the reactions can therefore be pure imitation. The reaction of the child does not yet indicate that there is an understanding of the emotional feelings behind the facial expression. 

Social referencing

The phenomenon of social referencing, in which children look at their caregiver to get social cues (i.e. smiling or frowning) about how they should behave, provides an excellent way to measure the understanding of children about the emotional expressions of others. In a classical study, it was checked whether children could use the facial expression of their caregiver to judge a potentially dangerous situation. By using a visual cliff paradigm (piece of apparatus used to study depth perception in infants) mothers could convince their children to go to the 'deep' side by using a happy or anxious face. An anxious expression caused the children to show stress or withdrawal. However, when mothers looked happy, three-quarters of the children went to the 'deep' side. Studies such as these suggest that children are not only able to distinguish between facial expressions but also to adjust their own emotional response and behavior in accordance with the emotion that lies behind the facial expression of their mother. 

Emotion understanding

As with all areas of developmental psychology, the development of language makes it possible to determine more precisely what level of emotional understanding a child has achieved. Children begin to talk about emotions at a surprisingly young age and parents indicate that children already talk about emotions when they are in their second year of life. Some children used words that indicated emotions when they were 18 months old and there was a rapid increase in the emotional vocabulary when children were in their third year of life. Children 28 months old could already identify emotions to explain and name their own behavior and the behavior of others. 

Some researchers, based on these findings, argued that children who use emotions in language actually understand what these emotions entail. Consequrntly, they opposed the view that early social understanding consists exclusively of script knowledge (the assumption that children do not understand the emotion, but know when to use a certain word). The evidence does point to children having quite a sophisticated understanding of their own and other people's emotional lives well before their third birthday. Nevertheless, there are differences in the emotional responses of infants and young children and those of older children and adults. The question is how these differences can be characterized. One way in which researchers have approached this question is to investigate children's understanding of emotional ambiguity. This is the realization that a person's feelings may not be clear-cut or match your own emotional response. Another approach is to investigate whether children integrate their knowledge about emotions with that of other internal states such as thoughts and beliefs.

Emotion understanding tasks

Denham (1986) devised a task to assess whether children 1) can label facial expressions depicting happiness, anger, sadness and fear, 2) understand that these core emotions are triggered by certain situations (e.g. feeling afraid after a nightmare), and 3) can predict a person's emotional responses in a non-egocentric manner. He found that 2- and 3-year-olds performed at levels above chance, although there was considerable variation in children's performance. He also reported links between young children's task-based understanding of emotions and their naturalistic behavior during play. For example, superior task performance was related to more prosocial behavior towards their peers during play. Children who demonstrated predominantly happy emotional responses during play showed better emotion understanding, whereas negative emotional behaviors were associated with poorer emotion understanding. Emotional understanding may thus be related to children's ability to form harmonious, close relationships with others. 

Further, it has been investigated whether children could use their knowledge about a person's preferences and beliefs to predict their emotional reaction to a situation. After applying a false belief (incorrectly believing something to be the case when it is not) task, it was reported that 4-year-olds could not yet predict this and could not integrate their understanding of beliefs and emotions. However, if children were 6 years old, they performed well in this task. In addition, other research has shown that children between 9 and 11 years of age learn that one can feel two emotions in response to the same event, that cognitive strategies can be used to regulate emotions and that morals and moral transgressions relate to emotional responses.Further research suggests a cross-cultural stability in the development of emotion understanding.

Factors relating to emotion understanding

Studies have reported positive correlations between children's emotion understanding and concurrent performance on theory of mind tasks, which require the child to understand other's belief states. But despite these concurrent relations, there is evidence that emotion understanding is acquired earlier than theory of mind understanding and that emotion understanding may actually facilitate children's acquisition of theory of mind abilities. Apart from that, the quality of family interaction has also been found to relate to children's emotion understanding. Research suggests that the tendency to discuss people's feelings and their causes was related to children's subsequent understanding of the emotional states of story characters and emotional conflicts. Caregiver's behavior early in the child's life has also been found to predict children's later emotion understanding.

Other research has identified the earliest predictor of children's emotion understanding. It focused on the construct of mind-mindedness which indexes the caregiver's accuracy in interpreting what the infant is thinking or feeling. Recent findings have shown that mother's use of appropriate mind-related comments during infant-mother interaction at the age of 8 months positively predicts children's emotion understanding at the age of 4. Also, factors have been found to relate to poorer emotion understanding and empathy in older children. There is increasing research interest in callous-unemotional traits and how they relate to children's development. Those traits include general poverty of affect, showing a lack of remorse and a disregard for accepted values. Studies have shown that high levels of CU traits in middle childhood and adolescence are associated with problems in emotion processing and empathising with others. These findings are specific to emotion understanding: no deficits in performance on theory of mind tasks were found. 

Emotion regulation

Anyone with experience with young children knows that they are very bad at hiding their true feelings. It is therefore surprising to learn that children as young as 3 years show some ability to control their expression of mild negative emotions in a test situation. When children are 6 years old they can understand the difference between real and false emotions. One reason why children may be able to understand that true emotions can be hidden at a relatively young age is that hiding one's emotions is often explicitly dealt with in children's general socialisation. For example, it is highly likely that the reaction of adults or older children will help young children to learn that it is not always socially permissible or desirable to voice one's true negative feelings. 

Other research has found that children's tendency to feel guilty after staged mishaps was highly positively correlated with their ability to regulate their behavior. Further, a greater understanding of right and wrong early in development was associated with better engagement at school and more prosocial behavior towards peers at age 6. This research has also identified factors that predict children's conscience development. They have found associations between early parent-child mutually responsive orientation (MRO) and children's later conscience development: a better developed sense of conscience is related to higher levels of MRO. MRO involves shared cooperation and positive affect between parent and child and parental responsiveness to the child.

Attachment relationships

Bowlby's theory of attachment

The infant's expression of emotion and the caregiver's response to these emotions lies at the beginning of Bowlby's theory of attachment. His theory was influenced by many different disciplines. Before Bowlby, the predominant view of infant-mother attachment was that it was a secondary drive or by-product of the infant associating the mother with providing for physiological needs. Bowlby, however, stated that attachment was a primary drive in the infant. Although his theory has been revised several times, this argument remains important. Bowlby stated that a certain level of cognitive development is necessary to be able to attach to someone because a person must be missed if the person is not there.

The phases of attachment

He suggested that attachment develops in different phases. In the first instance, babies are in the pre-attachment phase (0-2 months) and show little distinction in their social reaction to known and unknown persons. During the second phase (2-7 months) the foundations for attachment are being laid while children begin to recognize their caregivers, although they do not yet show attachment behaviors upon separation. Clear-cut attachments are seen after about 7 months, when infants start to protest when they are separated from their caregivers and become wary of strangers (stranger anxiety). The final phase of attachment (from about 2 years) has been achieved when the attachment relationship has become a partnership between the child and the caregiver. This phase is characterized by the increasing independence of the child. From this stage on, the child relies on internal working models of attachment relationships to guide their future social interactions. Early relationships between babies and their caregivers and internal working models are the aspects of Bowlby's theory that have usually received attention. As a result, two researchers emerged to further investigate his theoretical claims: the strange situation procedure and the Adult Attachment Interview. 

Mary Ainsworth and the strange situation procedure

Bowlby's theory was mainly concerned with making and breaking attachment, probably because his experiences as a child psychiatrist brought him into contact with the negative consequences of the emotional development of maternal deprivation (the result of long-term separation from the mother or from being orphaned). Nowadays, however, researchers are less concerned with whether a child has formed an attachment, but they are more concerned with the degree of safety of the attachment. This shift in emphasis is due to the empirical research of Mary Ainsworth. She observed the interactions between mothers and their child to look at their attachment systems. What struck her were the differences in the attachment behavior of children in terms of frequency, strength and level of organization. 

Different attachment types

The Strange Situation Test test is usually performed when the child is between 1 and 2 years old and measures children's reaction to separations from and subsequent reunification with their mother and their reaction to an unknown woman (the stranger). According to Ainsworth's original scheme, there are three different types of attachment: the securely attached infants (type B), the insecurely-avoiding attached (type A) and the insecure-resistant attached (type C). 

Secure attachments

If the dynamics of the attachment relationship is seen as a balance between exploratory behavior directed toward the environment and attachment behavior to the caregiver. The caregiver's presence before it leaves gives children the safety to use their attention to play and discover. However, if the mother leaves, this ensures that they seek contact and interaction when the mother returns. Securely attached children can be both stressed and unstressed when the mother leaves, making children's reaction to separation a poor indicator of the safety of the attachment. However, they respond positively and quickly to the mother when she returns. 

Insecure attachments

In contrast, the two patterns of insecure attachment have the balance of infant attachment tipped to either extreme. Insecure-avoidant infants show high levels of environment-directed behavior to the detriment of attachment behavior, whereas insecure-resistant infants are overly preoccupied with the caregiver to the detriment of exploration and play. 

Insecure-disorganised infants (type D)

In addition to Mary Ainsworth's research, researchers later added a fourth attachment: the insecure-disorganised children. These children showed behavior that did not fit with the aforementioned categories. These infants seem disoriented during the strange situation procedure and show no clear strategy for dealing with maternal separation and subsequent reunion with their caregiver. The insecure-disorganised infant may simultaneously demonstrate contradictory behaviors during the reunion episodes, such as proximity-seeking coupled with obvious avoidance. 

Factors predicting attachment security

Several factors predict the security of attachment. Individual differences in the caregiver's sensitivity to the infant's cues were the earliest reported predictors of attachment security. The insecure-avoiding attachment was associated with mothers who had a tendency to reject or ignore the signals of their children, and inconsistent patterns of mothering were related to the insecure-resistant attachment. Sensitivity is an important predictor of the attachment relationship, but probably not the only and most important factor in the development of attachment. More and more research is investigating the origin of disorganised attachment, probably because this attachment has been identified as a risk factor for later psychopathology. These children have not been able to form an organized pattern of attachment because they are afraid of their caregivers or have experienced that their caregivers have shown fearful behavior. However, there is still much unclear about this form of attachment and about why some children are unable to enter into an organized attachment relationship with a carer. 

Internal working models and the Adult Attachment Interview

Attachment theories suggest that children use their early experiences with their caretakers to form internal working models that are used as templates for new relationships and interactions with others. If children have a sensitive attachment style they will be self-confident and see themselves as valuable and therefore expect others to deal with them in a sensitive and supportive way. However, if they are used to patterns of interaction characterized by evasion and aversion, they will expect people to be dismissive or unpredictable in interaction. 

Attachment categories in adults

Individual's representations of their early childhood experiences can be investigated by using the Adult Attachment Interview. This is a semi-structured interview where adults are asked to describe their relationships with their parents during childhood and to invoke situations where they were separated from their parents or felt angry or rejected. Specific questions also deal with experiences of loss and trauma. Based on their answers during this interview, parents are divided into one of the following four categories with regard to attachment: autonomous, dismissing, preoccupied and unresolved. Autonomous adults are able to provide coherent descriptions of their attachment experiences and value personal relationships. They may also have experienced problems in childhood but they can talk openly about the negative experiences and seem to have resolved past difficulties and conflicts. Dismissing adults deny the importance of attachment and insist that they can not evoke childhood events or emotions or tell idealized representations of their attachment. Preoccupied adults are unable to overcome their experiences in childhood and are still busy with issues related to their early attachment. Finally, the unresolved adults are adults who have not been able to cope with feelings related to the death of a loved one or the abuse they have experienced. 

Parental AAI classification and infant-parent attachment

This classification appears to be related to the security of the attachment relationship between parent and child. Autonomous parents are more likely to be attached safely and parents in the three non-autonomous groups are more likely to have children with an insecure attachment. 

Longitudinal stability in attachment security

There is little evidence to suggest that patterns of attachment remain stable over either relatively short or very long periods of time. The lack of longitudinal stability is hardly surprising given the multiple factors impacting the child over time. 

Conclusion

In summary, it can be stated that theoretical and empirical research suggests that the response of carers to the emotional signals of their child, in particular their tendency to correctly interpret the emotions and to pay attention to the negative emotions of the child, are related to the security of attachment. In particular, accurate interpretation and open communication about negative emotions by caregivers predict a safe bond between the child and the caregiver. However, much less is known about how the safety of the attachment relationship in childhood predicts the later emotional development of children.

Early social interactions with people and objects - Chapter 7

First encounters with others: biology is socially oriented

There is no doubt about the importance of interactions between the infant and the adult caregiver early in life. In those first encounters, the body and emotions play a key role. It was argued that the social environment, or the need for the other, is imprinted in what is organic. At birth, others (parents in particular) are the outside world from which infants receive everything, as satisfaction of their basic needs. Unable to do anything for themselves, their reactions must be constantly completed, compenstaed and interpreted. A human individual is a biologically social being. Biology is socially oriented, as evidenced mainly through emotions, which are expressed long before the child knows it has an addressee. Body and posture are closely linked with emotions. Emotion is an organizational factor: the child that feels is on its way to think. Emotions have a multifaceted character since the organism's tonic acticity involves both visible (body and facial expressions) and visceral sensitivities. Thanks to these sensitive attitudes a relationship is established between the inner and the outer social world. 

Infants are born knowing how to cry but not knowing how to laugh. Laughter only appears at around four months. Crying is thus a 'powerful warning call' for others when the infant does not yet have more sophisticated means of communication. Many of the actions of adults appeasing the crying of the child result in an attentive child. Emotions contribute to the construction of intentionality and meaning and are the gateway to conventions where the adult plays an important role as a guide and mediator. Scaffolding is the process whereby adults structure and simplify a child's environment in order to facilitate his or her learning. 

In the beginning it is rhythm: synchrony or coordination?

As receptive communicators, babies seem to be tuned in to human communicative acts because their perceptual systems are selectively tuned and socially preadapted to odors, to human faces, to voices, to touch, and to taste. Trevarthen names this innate primary intersubjectivity. In a very short time, children engage in turn-taking proto-conversations with caregivers: adults and children focus their attention on the other - often face to face, looking at each other, touching, articulating sounds - expressing and sharing basic emotions. Adults provide newborns with the kind of sensory stimulation that harmonizes with their early perceptual sensitivity. For example the rhythmic language that adults use to talk to children (infant-directed speech) creates the illusion of including them in a dialogue that they could understand. Further, the mouth is very important in early development. Much of the interaction with the other takes place around the mouth. For the first 6 weeks of life, the infant's waking activity seems to take place there. 

Imitation since birth or accompanying gestures?

Imitation is a very important phenomena in early development. However, there is an open debate about when its first manifestations are produced and what its function is. Metzloff and Moore claim that children from early in life already know that they are like other people. Children have at their disposal abstract representations that allow an innate mapping from the observation of the other's behavior toward certain perceptions of their own internal states. On the other hand, René Zazzo interpreted those findings as general accompanying gestures, that is, specific bodily reactions in front of certain activities directed to the infant. Imitation in infancy is often looked at as a static presentjudged solely in terms of the representational skills involved. In contrast, Uzgiris approached imitation as a process in itself and stressed the role of imitation as an interpersonal phenomenon rather than an individual capacity. 

Adult-infant interaction becomes mutual

By the sixth week of life, infants begin to respond to adults with new and sustained forms of expression. Their gaze is fixed longer on the other's eyes, they respond by smiling when the other smiles. Bruner speaks of formats of interaction, when there is reciprocity in the dyadic performances.

First intentions are borrowed

There are still many questions regarding how adults favor the transfer and construction of intentionality on infants during early development. Research suggested that infant of intentionality might be seen as embodied and therefore available to analysisin the form of motor adjustmentsin joint action. This is consonant with Wallon's view on the importance of body posture in the first forms of communication. There is a broad consensus in literature that in the first place, interactions are purely dyadic, either 1) subject-subject from birth, or 2) subject-object from 4 months, when the infant is able to act and transform upon objects that are within its reach. There is general agreement that the first triadic interactions only occur toward the end of the first year when infants begin to communicate intentionally with gestures. This triadic novelty has receiced several names. Research suggests that production of communicative gestures emerges before or in the same month as understanding communicative gestures. Whereas in language development no one disputed that infants first understand the language of others, such as their name and then produce it themselves, sometimes leaving large gaps between both phases.

The magic number three: early triadic interactions with others and objects from the beginning

It is often overlooked that the infant's first encounters with the world are completed through the adult's intentional actions. The child is placed in scenarios with objects long before it can fully act upon them as the adult does. The first triadic interactions, infant-adult-object, occur long before the end of the first year. It is the adult who first links the infant to the world. The magnet effect describes the infant's strong attraction to actions that adults make with objects, especially when these are directed toward them. Through the use of the adult, the object comes 'to life' and this exerts a powerful effct on the infant, on its attention and performance. Communicative referent are things we communicate about in interactive situations. The referent object is not the same for both, but both interact around the same. This is a fundamental principle for building up shared referents. Research involving a parent,  sound-producing and non-sound-producing plastic rings showed that, at 4 months, infants are able to grasp the rings. They easily understand that the adult's gestures invite to take the ring and make use of it. At 6 months, infants are able to explore the ring's sounds on their own. Children's first intentions are thus borrowed from the parent.

Premature babies, incubator and the kangaroo experience

Moments of intimate encounter are critical for parents to connect emotionally with their baby and get to know their needs. In the case of a premature babyat the hospital, the opportunities for this are often limited. This is one explanation why it is common to find anxious, hyper-vigilant, or disconnected parents arising from the situation, experiencing difficulties in identifying and responding to the signs of their baby. In the kangaroo method the premature baby is placed in an upright position with direct skin-to-skin contact with an adult's breast. The purpose is to create for the baby a much more organized care space than the incubator. Its parents voices, tactile and olfactory exchanges with them, and being strongly held in large areas of her body, contribute to body integration. The interaction is arranged and slowed down to suit the premature baby's needs. Parents also benefit from this encounter that promotes their emotional engagement because they progressively learn how to read the baby's signs.

Gestures to communicate with others

At around 9 months, infants begin to communicate intentionally with others by making use of gestures. This represents a major change in the infant's life, because gestures (before language) will allow him to direct the attention of others to 'what is out there'. Gestures as so relevant that their absence or alteration provide a significant warning indicator. The gesture that has attracted most attention from researchers, especially in recent decades, is pointing. It accours from around 9 months. It has a number of functions: Touching-pointing, when the pointing finger touches the referent; imperative, when the infant points at some object which is out of reach, so that, for example, the adult gets it for them; declarative, when the infant points at something to attract the attention of the other and share it; informative, when the infant tries to report to the other about something that they know the other has not seen; interrogative, when the child asks questions with the pointing gesture.

Before pointing, infants make ostensive gestures, that is, they give or show objects to the other. This type of gesture is easier than pointing because the gesture (sign) and the shown object (referent) are the same (they coincide). Therefore, the other person does not need to look away to know what the gesture is about, so that there is no difference between pointing gesture (sign) and the object in the distance (referent). As with the pointing, when the child peforms an ostensive gesture, it does this with different functions: imperative, when the child shows or gives the object so that the adult can help them; declarative; when the child makes use of the object to attract the other's attention; interrogative, when the child asks without words, showing the object to the adult; phatic, when the child gives an object to the other with no apparent goal other than giving, in order to keep the communication channel open. The absence of ostensive or pointing gestures, with the exchange of gazes involved, as well as poor responses to the adult in this type of communicative act, have become warning signs which play a key role in the early detection of autism. 

Origin of gestures. What comes first? Does the infant make gestures to itself or is it the adult who fosters them?

As indicated, children perform ostensive gestures with a communicative function when they are 8 to 9 months old, before they start pointing. The adult is also important. Very often he or she helps to arouse the ostensive gesture in the infant by making a request (i.e. reaching out its hand) to ask the infant to give, for example, the object the infant holds in its hand. So, long before infants take the initiative and present the object, adults have been asking for it with a petition gesture, trying to elicit new intentions in infants. The sequencing of ostensive gestures is: 1) adult performs ostensive gestures for infant; 2) infant performs ostensive gestures for itself; 3) adult arouses in infant interest for giving with the petition gesture; 4) infant performs communicative ostensive gestures (giving and showing) with different functions involved.

Gestures used by adults: distance between gesture (sign) and object (referent)

An important clue to the social origin of communicative gestures is the distance between gesture (sign) and object (referent). The closer the referent is, the less ambiguous and the easier gesture interpretation will turn out to be. Therefore, understanding distal pointing is likely to rely on understanding previous, simpler gestures that require less effort to enact and interpret. 1) In order to be understood by the child using ostensive gestures, the referent (about which interaction centers) must be close; 2) next in complexity is the touching-pointing gesture, the indexical-ostensive gesture affecting the referent. It is a gesture widely used to eliminate ambiguitywhen identifying the referent is not clear; 3) Another easier gesture than the pointing gesture is the placing gesture, when where the object is placed conveys meaning, for example when at the store the customer puts a product near the cashier to buy it. Infants often rely on such objects as a result of the magnet effect; 4) The most complex of the indexical gestures is the conventional pointing gesture, where the sign (pointing) and the referent (the object indicated) are different and located apart from each other.

More ideas on gestures in children with autism

In autism the gestures with 'social' functions do not develop as expected. Children with autism often point to make requests, but not to share or to ask, or point to provide some information to the other. This has been linked to difficulties in the child's theory of mind that are later evident when autism is confirmed. Furthermore, these children do usually not give objects and are not attracted by the other's action (magnet effect). In autism it is necessary to teach the child and arrange conditions so that gestures take place.

Functional permanence of objects and communicative-educational practices

If there is an issue of central importance to psychological development, it is object permanence. The object must be represented as having permanent existence, even when unobserved, otherwise thought would not be possible. Object permanence is a necessary condition for the subsequent development of symboly, language and concepts. Advocates of the competent infant paradigm state that young infants have core knowledge: basic contents or principles with which children are born. In contrast, Piaget considers that the infant possesses an early form of object permanence if it acts by removing a screen that completely covers the vanished object. For th competent infant perspective it is sufficient that the child looks at the object, fixation times being used to determine whether the child has object permanence. The similarities between both approaches are the following: 1) Objects are considered interchangeable. Every object that can be hidden (i.e. not a big table) is equivalent. For example,  a pen and a pair of keys would both be 'hideable'. Therefore, it wouldn't make a difference hiding one or the other. 2) Objects are seen as the 'physical reality', ignoring their cultural functions and pragmatic aspects of everyday life. 3) Neither communication nor educational influence plays any role in this significant cognitive achievement in the infant.

Functional permanence describes the awareness that objects have canonical (cultural) uses, i.e. that a spoon is used for eating, a phone is used for communicating, etc. This is a key dimension not only in teracting at basic levels with the environment, but also in communicating with others. Permanence of function is cultural, subject to rules (set of usage conditions culturally constructed), and agreed by the user community. From the beginning, infants are introduced by others into functional scenarios (when they are fed, bathed, etc). The relation between object permanence and functional permanence is an unexplored issue worth researching.

Adults directly involve infants in situations or make preparations, when they 'clear the way' for the infant to perform an action of some difficulty. Such interventions pave the way for infants to use objects according to their function and by themselves. This implies that they recognize (use) objects as members of classes instead of individual items. This public knowledge sets up common grounds which is the base from which to establish communication with increasingly complex means throughout development. 

Do autistic children use everyday life objects according to their function?

Since the first descriptions of autism, the disruption of the child's contact with people - the so called social world - has been highlighted. In the last decade, studies also attend to the child's interactions with objects according to their everyday function. Just as the pregmatics of language is affected in autism, which involves everything concerning its rules of social use, the pragmatics of objects also presents special particularities. The child, in many cases, seems not to recognize objects by their function. One of the atypical uses that are emphasized is 'the unusual visual exploration of objects'. Further, the reduced use of attentional searchlight is identified as a result of the restricted use of objects.

Symbolic uses of objects

Increasingly, researchers argue for the social origin of symbols. Once children begin to cope with symbols, a great cognitive and communicative leap takes place. The novelty is that interaction can be performed on absent things or in absent scenarios, that is, without the referent being present. This provides great flexibility, and communication possibilities multiply. For example, holding a spoon and pretending to eat is a sign, standing for actually eating. And that allows us to see the function even though part of the scenario is missing. If there were no spoons to eat with, it would be impossible to to understand the symbol referred to.

The development of self and gender - Chapter 8

The study of the 'self' provides an opportunity to talk about the development of the child as a complete person with feelings, thoughts and behavior instead of zooming in on motor, affective, cognitive and social developments as separate parts. In addition, it offers the possibility to combine traditional approaches in developmental psychology with a more reflective approach.

Existential self

As a person we are conscious of being and aware of our personal existence. This has been referred to in the past as the existential self. 

The development of self-agency

We know from studies on sensory deprivation that starving our bodies of sensation causes hallucinations and results in stress. From this it can be concluded that we need external stimulation to provide a feeling of 'being' and that we 'are' in a world that provides stimulation through our senses. While still in the womb, a foetus can sense the physical world around it. According to Piaget, this stimulation ensures that cognitive development can take place whereby the child learns to distinguish between his own body and the surrounding world.

Cognitive responses to the external world

With regard to the cognitive aspects of the child's stimulation by and responses to the world, it can be said that there are primary circular reactions and secondary circular reactions. Piaget stated that after a month of reflexive reactions, the reactions of babies are repeated over and over again (primary reactions), combining them into more complex actions. When a child is 4 to 8 months old, Piaget observed that babies are more responsive to the outside world and appear to be aware that their behavior affects the objects around them. If a child is about 8 months old, the secondary reactions are coordinated. The child learns to make a connection between the action that it carries out itself and the perceptible consequences. A link is made between cause and effect. This enables the child to learn that the own body is separate from the world and is a differentiated entity.

Infants are born to be sociable

From a young age, children react differently to people than to objects. Children respond actively to social stimuli and there is also the willingness of others to respond to social signals from the child, such as reacting to crying. A kind of 'dance' arises of social interactions in which both the adult and the child's movements become entangled in that of the other. From the perspective of the child, feedback is received from the adult person. In the same way that children realize that their actions affect the world around them, and they learn that they are separate from the world around them, they learn that they are also separate from others. From this it can be concluded that babies begin to realize that they are not the only person. However, it is important to note that the fact that the child develops the feeling that it is separate from others does not directly lead to the child being aware of the 'self' and others as separate 'persons'.

The development of self-awareness

When children see themselves as separate from others, there is a development of the ability to step outside oneself to look at oneself from the outside-in. This is referred to the 'me' or self as known and later became known as the categorical self (aspects of self, which define a person). This categorical self contrasts with the earlier described existential self. William James saw the innermost part of 'me' as the material me, a sense of embodiment (being related to a particular body).

The rouge on the nose test

Studies of visual recognition confirm the growing awareness of children about themselves as an object. This was investigated in a study in which various tasks, observations and measurements were used in which, among other things, a child was observed while being put in front of the mirror. A child got some color on the nose and it was checked whether the child was looking in the mirror on his own nose. This test is known as the rouge test. If a child was between 15 and 18 months of age in this test, it touched its own nose, which was interpreted as visual self-recognition. However, other studies indicate that children around 2 years of age are able to recognize themselves and respond to themselves. 

Comparing oneself with others

When children learn who they are, they also learn who they are not. In addition, they also learn that they resemble someone else in some ways and not in other ways. When children describe themselves, these descriptions often contain comparisons, such as "I am taller than ...". Characteristics such as height, haircolour, age, etc. are used by children as the basis for judgments about the categorical self. Children at a young age prefer to code relatively than absolutely.

Mead stated that self-development is a cognitive process that is housed in social experiences and activities. He believed that communication, and not necessarily interaction, plays the main role in the development of the self, particularly in the child's ability to see itself as an object.

Now I am me will I always be me?

During preschool years, children become increasingly aware of their own psychological characteristics and processes and also of the fact that other people have thoughts and feelings. On the one hand, Mead suggested that the process of trying different roles in pretend play by children allows them to select the characteristics that ultimately form a "generalized self." On the other hand, the fact that self-development occurs from social interactions implies that the development of the self continues as long as social interactions take place: the whole of life. 

Some psychodynamic theorists support the view that the 'self' ultimately crystallizes into a feeling of being a unique and whole 'self' and that there is continuity in this awareness. Erikson supported this vision and emphasized the formation of the identity. Anna Freud emphasized the importance of maintaining the integrity of the self and preventing self fragmentation, even if psychological defense mechanisms had to be used. An example of this is projection: projecting negative feelings about yourself on others. Geertz argued that the concept of 'uniqueness' of the individual (individualistic) is a Western cultural view and that other cultures have different views that emphasize the similarities between people (collectivistic). He states that Western societies are individualistic and that there are also collectivistic visions of identity (which emphasize the sameness and belongingness of individuals). However, recent research suggests that there is a series of "selves" that is constructed by other people. 

The study of self-esteem - definition, measurement and origin

Whatever vision we have of ourselves, there is no doubt that the language used by children about itself is evaluative. The descriptions of children of themselves often include aspects of self-esteem. For example, children say 'I am not good at sports' or 'I am good at drawing'. These kinds of comments are familiar to us and we have an intuitive understanding of the concept of self-esteem, although it is difficult to define this. In general, it is defined as the value that a person attaches to himself as it emerges from the thoughts and feelings that a person has about him- or herself. At the same time there may be positive and negative evaluations of different aspects of the self.

Harter distinguished between five domains of self-esteem: perceived athletic competence, behavioral conduct, physical appearance, scholastic competence and social acceptance (and also overall self-worth). Children (and adults) can feel good about a certain domain while they are less comfortable with regard to another domain. Harter made an attempt to measure self-esteem through these five domains by using a person's Self Perception Profile. Children have to choose between two pictures and indicate which picture suits them best: the competent child or the child which is less competent. Children can also indicate whether their choice for a picture or a statement is entirely true for them or only to a certain extent. 

Distinguishing between self-esteem and self-efficacy

A complicating factor is the importance attached to a domain. For example: the child can worry about a pimple in the face with regard to physical attractiveness and not worry about its performance at school. It is important to distinguish between self-efficacy (one's own belief in one's own skill in a specific domain) and self-esteem. Someone can attach a lot of value to a certain domain but not be good at other areas that the person does not care very much about. It is important to make the distinction between the quantification of self-esteem as if it were a raw material that occupied someone and as the subjective experience of self-worth. 

Alfred Adler's view

An extreme but interesting view of self-worth has been made by Adler. He believed that everyone started his life with feelings of inferiority. According to his view, the child must try to overcome this inferiority complex by striving to learn things to overcome their negative feelings. The result of an endeavor is the temporary victory of the feelings of inferiority, but this feeling loses quickly again and results in more feelings of inferiority, so that the aspiration has to start again. This is the continuous driving force. 

Erikson's eight stages of man

In his developmental theory on personality, the eight stages of man, Erikson described the social dynamics which create these value feelings as the child begins to explore the wider world. This theory states that there are eight independent phases in the development of man, each of which is characterized by a social challenge or conflict. Thus the 2- to 3-year-old child has the chance to develop 'autonomy' or 'shame' or ''self doubt' through exploration of the world' (named learning autonomy versus shame). If the expectations of the child are realistic, the child develops a feeling of autonomy through exploration, 'I can do this, I am worth it'. If the expectations of the child are limited and possibilities for exploration are limited, the child develops 'self doubt'. If the expectations are too great and possibilities are too great, the child may feel as if it is failing and it develops a sense of 'shame'. Shame and doubt are both negative feelings that create a sense of unworthiness. 

Self-esteem inventory

One way to see what influence the development of self-esteem has on children is to conduct a questionnaire (self-esteem inveentory). Another way is an observation, as in the strange situation. Here the maternal responsiveness seems to be important for the way children see themselves, see others and see relationships. The thoughts and feelings of children form the internal working model (IWM) which consists of three elements: a model of the self, a model of the 'other' and a model of the relationship with the other. The internal working model is a template for later relationships so that children have a blueprint for their expectations of themselves, others and relationships. 

The power of language

The subtlety of mutual body language is augmented by verbal language so that the vision of others, especially 'significant others', becomes the view that the child has of itself. Notes such as 'you are good' and 'what do you have fine freckles' are often repeated, so that the child adopts these thoughts and becomes the 'inner language' of the child. In a research project, Rosenberg asked children how much they cared about what others, including parents, teachers and peers, thought about them. The parents' judgments were indicated as the most important for the young child and the judgments of peers were the most important for adolescents. The power of language also helps the ability of children to make evaluative comparisons with others.This is reflected in the descriptions that children give of themselves, such as 'I get higher figures than her'. Important others also use comparisons in language, such as 'your brother eats all his food but you do not.' So by language, the judgment of others becomes the sense of value that the child feels. Motivational and cognitive mechanisms play a role here. An example is perceptual defense. This is the idea that an individual sees, hears, etc. only what he or she wants to see and hear and does not see or hear what is personally threatening. It has been found that people perceive words more quickly when they correspond with their own personal values ​​and when they are related to their needs. There is a hot cognition: the inextricable link between emotions (presumably strong emotions) and cognition. Feelings influence thoughts and thoughts affect feelings. 

Attribution theory

The study on the self uses this important cognitive-emotional link in development. The attribution theory provides a useful basis for cognitive and affective explanations for the development of self-confidence. As a cognitive theory, this theory states that a child (or adult) with little self-esteem has a tendency to attribute positive events, for example a good grade for homework, to external factors (homework was easy). Negative events (a bad grade for homework) are attributed to internal factors (I'm not smart enough). This theory can incorporate easy emotional factors, namely that the child with little self-esteem blocks positive thoughts and cognitions and that the child with great self-esteem accepts emotionally positive thoughts and cognitions. 

This is my body: The development of a sense of body image

The sense of embodiment or 'material me' begins with the developing sensation of the baby that there is a distinction between itself and objects and others. This indicates the rise of the categorical self. The child is no longer deeply self-centered and stands 'apart' from the world around it. The child begins to know itself as an object, as a body with parts and begins to evaluate his body. 

Body parts and whole

Our body has a shape, a size, many functional parts and an arrangement of the elements in a special shape so that they form a whole. So the image of the child of the body contains a mental representation of these things that contain feelings and thoughts. Small children recognize and identify physical parts, so they recognize faces from a young age. It has been stated that the identification of loose body parts and the entire body develop separately. This idea is underlined by research. 

The tadpole stage in children's drawings

The problem with such studies is that it is not clear whether the thoughts and feelings about the body of children are actually measured. They measure body recognition and identification skills but it is not possible to directly measure the child's vision of his own body. It is possible that drawings of the child's body by the child are a more reliable measurement of the thoughts and feelings of children about their bodies. The drawings of children of the human figure generally go through a tadpole stage when children are 3 to 4 years old. This is an early phase in the drawings of children of the human figure where there is no difference between the head and the body and where body parts such as the arms and legs are drawn as if they grow directly from the head. It is possible that such drawings are an illustration of the vision of children of themselves, but their drawing skills also seem to be an important factor that influences these drawings. Alternative explanations for this way of drawing are that they are only extensions of the first scribbles of children or that children have difficulty in correctly planning a drawing. 

Are children drawing themselves?

There is also the question whether children draw themselves. Is the drawing an attempt to show the child self or is it a representation of someone else's body? Piaget, in spite of the methodological difficulties, used drawings from children as proof that children were representing their own body. From his studies he concluded that the child went through a number of cognitive developmental phases. This study suggests that if the child develops cognitively and 'improves', the child forms a more detailed and accurate picture of his or her body. It is true that drawings are more detailed and realistic, but this does not necessarily indicate that the vision of children of their bodies becomes more accurate. 

Body size image

Exploration seems to be the key for children to develop a sense that their body is an object. Exploration also seems to offer opportunities to develop a sense of body size. Research has shown that early perceived size relative to others tends to stick: allegedly, children who feel small in comparison with others continue to feel smalleven after a growth spurt. A comparison was made between children's performance on body size self awareness tasks which encouraged them to consider properties of their own body size in relation to the outside world and their performance on size reasoning tasks which involved making size judgements, but did not involve representation of their own body size. Tasks which encouraged consideration of their own body size included for example the doll's clothes task in which they were offered small doll's clothes to wear and attempts to put the clothes on themselves as if they were full-sized were scored as errors. There were significantly more errors in the tasks requiring self-awareness of body size than in the size reasoning tasks. Research confirms popularly held views that from an early age overall size matters  and being overweight is undesirable. 

The perception of body attractiveness

Many studies investigated this topic. An investigation into children aged 9 years indicates that girls and white children felt less satisfied with their bodies than boys and 'black' children. Almost all children wanted to be thinner than their actual size. American children aged 10 to 11 also appear to have a thinner body ideal than children from the Czech Republic and appeared to be less satisfied with their bodies. It has been investigated that significant others are particularly important in the development of a body image, in particular with regard to the shape of the body and attractiveness. Judgments about the child's body start in the first phase of a child's life. For example, the assessment by children of their own body and their attractiveness appears to be correlated to how much they were plagued by their parents and siblings. 

Early social relationships

Several things affect the perception of physical attractiveness. First, social relationships and the nature of transactions are important. It is likely that a child who is touched in a sensitive way starts to develop a positive feeling about its body. The subtlety of mutual body language is supplemented by verbal language so that the evaluative vision of others becomes the vision of the child itself. Evaluative verbal messages play an important role in conveying these views. 

Modelling and social comparison

Secondly, modeling and social comparisons are also important processes through which children form a sense of body image. Two types of identification have been described: personal and positional modeling. Personal modelling takes place when the child feels emotionally attached to a person and wants to be just like that person. This is related to the concept of identification used by psychoanalytical theorists. It is a psychological process in which an individual identifies with another person and possibly makes an attempt to change him- or herself to be like the other (usually admired) person. Positional modelling occurs when the child perceives a similarity between himself and a role model that is not known to the child. This requires a certain form of cognitive representation and also requires that the child chooses whether or not to copy this model. 

Re-constructing the body and body image

Regardless of the vision that children have of their bodies, they can change their appearance. As children grow older, more choice and more control is gained, especially during adolescence. Choices about the young child's clothing are generally made by adults and the age at which the child is allowed to choose whatto wear depends on the nature of the relationship with the parental figures. If choice becomes possible it is likely that young people will strive to achieve their ideal body image. Choice of clothing, physical changes to the body, etc., directly affect the way a young person sees him-or herself. Peer pressure and the desire to belong is strong, so the clothing style and general appearance that is chosen can be strongly influenced by what is seen as socially desirable. A change is partly dependent on changes of the body but is mediated by reactions from others. There is a large development of the body image during childhood and later adolescence. It begins as an undifferentiated body image that is part of the external world but becomes more differentiated when feedback is received from the physical and social world and has great potential to change when choices about the physical appearance can be made. 

The development of gender identity

"It's a boy" or "it's a girl" is generally the first thing that's said about a newborn child. This categorization of the baby to one sex group is the beginning of expectations by others and certain behavior that is expected of the child. The roots of gender identity lie in both biological and social determinants. This seductive simplicity hides different complexities.

Boys and girls and shades of gender

Communities have well-defined gender roles and stereotypes of typically male and typically female behavior. It gets even more complex because it can be said that there are not just two sex categories. Gender differences are not only based on whether or not they have a penis, but also relative levels of hormones, chromosomal differences, internal reproductive structures and sex glands. There is not by definition a perfect correlation between these indicators as it appears in hermaphrodites. This is an individual with both male and female sexual organs. In addition, there are children who see themselves as transsexual. 

Gender dysphoria

This describes a condition in which someone is intensely uncomfortable with their biological gender and strongly identifies with (and wants to be) the opposite gender. It affects only a small percentage of the world's population - but estimates of its prevalence are impossible to find given that in some countries related sexual activities are illegal. However, it can be found at a surprisingly early age, as young as three years.

The boy who was raised as a girl

The way children think and feel about their gender identity does appear to have a biological basis, as is shown in the story of Bruce Reimer who lost his penis when he was 8 months old. On the advice of a psychologist, he was castrated and named Brenda. He was raised as a girl. However, he felt like a boy and allowed himself to operate at an older age so that he would be 'a boy' again. 

Rewarding gender appropriate behaviors

Socialization consists of many different processes. Strict learning theorists prefer that sex-related behavior is learned through operant conditioning. Gender-appropriate behavior are strengthened through rewards and gender-inappropriate behaviors are weakened because it is not rewarded. 

Cognitive components of gender identity

The idea that gender identity can be explained without referring to cognition does not match Freeman's findings. She found that when parents of 3- to 5-year-old children were asked to express their opinion about sex-typical play and play that was not specific to a particular sex, most certain stereotypes were rejected. However, when children were asked to identify typical 'girl's toys' and typical' boys' toys' and to predict how their parents would respond to their choice, the children predicted that their parents would approve toys that belong to their sex. A cognitive component starts to form because children here demonstrate to think about the extent to which their game is suitable. The presence of cognitive processes in learning is recognized by social learning theorists.They recognized the cognitive component in learning, but they also argued that learning generally takes place in a social context. 

Construction of gender identity

It is likely that a gender identity is constructed in a way that corresponds to the development of the 'self'. Finally, gender identity is part of the larger concept of 'self'. Society demands that gender be defined at birth so children do not have an early choice. In comparing to others, they notice things that they link to their gender (physical characteristics, clothing, game activities and the association with toys). These comparisons are made by the verbal and non-verbal messages they receive from others. When children are between 3 and 4 years old, they realize that a gender is constant and does not change (gender stability/constancy). 

The chosen categorical self

While body image and gender identity may have an existential element of experiencing the body and experiencing the gender, there is a strong categorical component in both and we can see a pattern in the way in which subjective self-categories are constructed. There are common intermingling social, affective and cognitive processes: social interaction in particular, verbal and non-verbal communications, etc. all of which contribute to forming an image of the self by the child. 

For most young children, the subjective image of their body is important, which is reflected in their amount of physical descriptions. Also for many children their gender identity is important, but not for all children. It is important to look further at the value that children attach to different aspects of themselves. Children indicate different things in which they show how important they are to them. However, it is difficult to measure the subjective importance of different characteristics, such as national identity.

Cognitive development - Chapter 9

The Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget has long been regarded as the 'giant of developmental psychology' and was an important figure internationally. This chapter deals with the cognitive development theory of Piaget, with particular emphasis on cognitive development during middle childhood. 

Piaget's cognitive-developmental theory

Around 1960, Piaget's theory on cognitive development dominated research into the development of the child. Like most researchers, his ideas were strongly influenced by his own history and background. From a young age, Piaget showed interest in Darwin's theory of evolution; in particular in how different species changed through adaptation under the influence of different environmental factors. When he was 10 he published his first article in a natural history magazine. He studied philosophy and was influenced by the study of the origin of knowledge and how we know what we know: epistemology. Piaget was interested in the relationship between psychology and biology and focused on research into intelligence. He discovered that children of the same age had the same kinds of mistakes and that these errors differed from the mistakes made by older or younger children. 

The mix of disciplines and experiences of Piaget ensured that he combined the non-empirical approach of philosophy with the empirical and scientific approach of biology and this led to a developmental theory that was fundamentally different from behaviorism. According to Piaget, everything we know and understand is filtered by our current framework of reference. In other words, we construct a new understanding of the world based on what we already know. So Piaget's approach is often called the constructivist approach. 

Underlying structures and processes

Schemes

Piaget stated that the basic unit of insight was a scheme. A scheme can be defined as a cognitive structure that forms the basis of actions and mental representations so that we can understand the environment and respond to it. Schemes create our frameworks of references that we use to filter new information. So everything we know starts with the schemes with which we are born. Three of the basic schemes we are born with are reflective actions: sucking, looking and grabbing. As children grow older they begin to use schemes based on internal mental representations instead of physical activity. Piaget called these mental schemes operations.

Processes: Organisation and adaptation 

To explain how children change their schedules, Piaget proposed two inner processes: organization and adaptation. Organization is the ability to group certain observations into coherent knowledge and this occurs within and during different phases of development. For example, at first, young babies have separate schemes for looking, grabbing and sucking. As these schemes become more organized, they become more complex multi-sensory cognitive systems that ensure that children look at an object, pick it up and suck it. This organization enables children to learn about the nature of objects (such as their shape, texture and taste). 

Piaget believed that adaptation consists of two processes called assimilation and accommodation that work together to allow the development to take place. When children experience something new, they try to assimilate this new information by including the information in their already existing schemes. Assimilation allows us to generalize and apply our knowledge to different situations. However, if someone learns something new, the child must adapt existing knowledge or generalize a new schedule (accommodation). Through the process of accommodation and assimilation, we adapt to reality. 

Piaget's stages of cognitive development

Piaget's additional processes of assimilation and accommodation include the equilibration process. According to that, we are naturally constantly motivated to assimilate and accommodate in order to achieve a status of cognitive balance. He suggests that there are several stages to be discovered in the reorganization of the structure of our thinking. These stages can be seen as qualitative changes in a child's thinking. Although Piaget suggested specific ages for the four main stages and the different sub stages, the age at which children reach certain stages differ. However, the order of development within the stages is fixed because each stage is based on the development of the previous stage. Piaget believed that his stages were universal, because he thought that all people would develop in the same order. In addition, he thought that if children were at a specific stage, this would affect all the different areas in their lives. 

The sensorimotor stage

The sensorimotor stage spans the first two years of life and is subdivided into 6 substages. During this period, everything children know is derived from information that they absorb through the senses and the motor actions they can perform. It is important to note that children can not use language for most of this stage. So they live in the present tense, depending on sensorimotor input and the limited actions they can perform. 

The first substage includes the reflexive schemes. This is the period from 0 to 1 month. During this stage, the child uses the innate reflexes such as sucking and grasping to discover its world. The second substage, called primary circular reactions between 1 and 4 months, contains a change in the voluntary control of the child's behavior. The child starts showing coordination between the senses and its motor behavior through the primary circular reactions. For example, the child happens to learn a new experience (such as thumb sucking) and repeats this behavior. In the third substage, called secondary circular reactions between 4 and 10 months, the child becomes more aware of the external world. The child now directs the behavior to reach and grasp certain objects. The behavior becomes secondary. This behavior, however, is still much repeated by the child. The child begins to act intentionally at this stage. During the fourth substage, called coordination of secondary schemes, the child learns between 10 and 12 months to combine schemes to achieve specific goals. In the fifth substage that lasts from 12 to 18 months, the tertiary circular reactions, the child starts walking and looks for new things. The child strengthens his understanding of causal reactions between events and systematically experiments with means to see the results. During the last substage (18 to 24 months), called the beginning of thought, children are able to form mental representations. This becomes visible, for example, in the ability of toddlers to imitate and repeat the actions of others at a later time. 

Criticisms of Piaget's account

There is considerable criticism of the above stages of Piaget about the development during the sensorimotor phase. The main point of criticism is that much evidence nowadays suggests that delayed imitation and, for example, object permanence occur earlier in children than suggested by Piaget. He stated that object permanence develops between 10 and 12 months. However, research has shown that children already possess this skill when they are 3.5 months old. However, at that age they are physically not yet able to search for a hidden object. In addition, there is evidence that children are capable of deferred imitation much earlier than between 18 and 24 months, as Piaget stated. 

Preoperational stage: 2 to 7 years

The pre-operational stage is a stage that is characterized by an impressive increase in mental representations and is accompanied by equally impressive limitations. This stage, which lasts from 2 to 7 years, is also subdivided into different substages. The first substage is the symbolic function substage which runs from 2 to 4 years.

Symbolic function substage: 2 to 4 years

At this stage, children acquire the ability to create a mental representation of an object that is not physically present. This ability to have symbolic thoughts increases the child's mental world because they are no longer dependent on the here and now and no longer need sensory input to think about something. Proof of symbolic functioning can be seen in fantasy play. In addition, the language and vocabulary of children is rapidly developing at this stage. 

Egocentrism

Piaget also emphasizes, however, what children can not do in the pre-operational phase. According to Piaget, the most important limitations shown by children in the symbolic function substadium is their egocentrism and animism. Egocentrism is the tendency to perceive the world only from its own point of view. So children assume that other people perceive the world in the same way and think the same way as they do. Piaget has researched the egocentrism of children through the three mountains task: The child was asked to walk around the model and to look at it from different perspectives. The child must then sit on the side and the examiner places a doll at different locations around the model. At each location, the child must indicate what the doll might see. Piaget found that children often chose what they could see and not what the doll could see. However, there has been a lot of criticism in recent years. For example, research has shown that, if familiar objects were used, such as trees and houses, children of only 3 or 4 years were able to identify the right perspective of others. Research into the understanding of young children from the perspectives of others has shown that children of 14 months already seem to participate in so-called rational imitation: the children produce an action that they think the adult intended to do, rather than what the adult actually did.

Animism

Another limitation is animism. This refers to the belief that inanimate objects have lifelike qualities such as thoughts, feelings and desires, and are capable of carrying out actions. Researchers today think that Piaget overestimated the animistic belief of children. 

Intuitive thought substage: 4 to 7 years

The second substage is the intuitive thought substage which runs from 4 to 7 years. This stage is characterized by a shift in children's reasoning. Children begin to classify, organize and quantify in a more systematic way. Piaget called this the intuitive phase because the child is largely unaware of the underlying principles at this stage. The reasoning of a child is largely based on perception and intuitive rather than rational thinking which leads to limitations in the reasoning of the child. For example, children were asked to conduct a seriation task - arrange sticks on length. Some children sort shorter lengths of longer sticks and other children can lay 1 or 2 sticks on length but can not arrange all 10 sticks properly. Recent research, however, has stated that the successful conductions of children in seriation tasks are based on underlying changes to the mental operations they develop during the next phase of development, the concrete operational stage. Research suggests that the fact that children in the pre-operational stage have difficulty with such tasks is due to a lack of memory capacity. If researchers have ensured that children can remember the information they have, children understand the transitive inference or if a> b and b> c this causes a> c. 

Hierarchical classification tasks

The limitation of relying on the pre-operational logic of young children is clearly illustrated in their performance in class inclusion tasks: These are tasks that test the ability to coordinate and reason about parts and wholes simultaneously in recognising relations between classes and subclasses. For example, when a preoperational child is presented with a bunch of seven roses and two tulips they can easily state that there are more roses than tulips. However, when asked if there are more roses than flowers they typically state that there are more roses. Piaget suggested that children often find it difficult to focus on the part of the flowers. Recent research has shown that children of 4 years old were able to answer these types of questions correctly.

There is a lot of evidence that young children have formed a variety of global categories based on common, natural form, function and behavior. Findings seem to refute Piaget's opinion. It is suggested in recent research that young children are already able to draw conclusions based on non-observable characteristics.

The ability of children to categorize objects while they are at preschool age is supported by the increase in general knowledge and a rapid expansion of the vocabulary. As children learn more about their world, they form new categories. A category is a group of items that have one or a few properties in common.

Processes involved in failure to conserve

Piaget proposed that the pre-operational child's inability to conserve is characterized by three main limitations. Centration, reversibility and focusing on the end state rather than on the means to the end.

Centeration is looked at by examining Piaget's account of what happens in the preservation of liquid if it is poured into another cup with a different shape. According to Piaget, one of the cognitive limitations of the pre-operational child is that the child is unable to participate in decentration. This means that the child is not able to simultaneously focus on two properties, i.e. the height and the width of the glass. The child is more concerned with centration: the tendency to focus on an attribute (e.g. the hight of the liquid in the glass). Another limitation is that the child is unable to understand reversibility. They can not mentally reverse the action and to understand that the volume of the liquid has not changed. In addition, the child is inclined to focus on the final form rather than on the way in which a liquid, in this case, gets its shape. It is important that the age at which a child attains conservation differs per culture and depends on the substances and the concepts they are asked to preserve. Children in Western cultures generally acquire this skill when they are around 6 years old. However, children are not able to conserve weight and volume until they are around 9 years old. Piaget stated that the age differences found in different versions of the maintenance task reflect a phenomenon called horizontal décalage. This is the term used to refer to age differences when solving problems that seem to contain the same cognitive processes. He stated that different types of the maintenance task require different degrees of abstraction. According to Piaget, however, children follow this order in the same way because knowledge of the simpler concept is essential before the child learns to understand a more abstract concept.

During the last decades many researchers have put their doubts about Piaget's statement about conservation. Findings from research suggest that children already have knowledge about preservation at a young age, much earlier than Piaget suggested. There is even a form of maintaining weight that can already be found in toddlers. The child sometimes seems to understand things without understanding the whole. According to Piaget's terminology, this is an example of a vertical décalage: the child has a level of understanding at one level that has to be reconstructed at a later age at a different stage or level of understanding.

The appearance-reality distinction

Piaget stated that young children had a tendency to focus solely on the perceptual features of objects. This tendency would make it very difficult for them to pass appearance-reality tasks in which appearance and reality diverge. The majority of 3-year-olds fail to differentiate between the object's appearance and reality. They typically make two kinds of error; a phenomenism error (i.e. saying that the object looks like a sponge and really is a sponge) or an intellectual realism error (i.e. stating that the object looks like a rock and really is a rock).

The concrete operations stage: 7 to 11 years

During the concrete operational phase, which runs from 7 to 11 years, the thought processes of children change. Children develop a new set of strategies called concrete operations. This was specifically mentioned because the reasoning of children is bound to concrete situations in that phase.

Overall evaluation of Piaget's theory

Piaget's contribution to the study on cognitive development was groundbreaking. He showed that young children think differently than adults and the questions he asked still inspire researchers. Although Piaget's theory has been of great influence, there are also a number of weaknesses that are now becoming clear. For example, many researchers state that the basic processes (assimilation, accommodation, etc.) are vague and have a tendency to describe rather than explain how change takes place. In addition, it has become clear that Piaget often linked wrong ages to skills. This may be due to the fact that he often made the mistake of not making a distinction between competence and performance. There appear to be many more factors besides understanding a concept that is necessary to accomplish a task. It is therefore possible that children fail on a task because they are unable to show their competence, not because they do not possess this competence.

In addition, it appears that culture and schooling affect cognitive development. Such findings have led several researchers to argue that Piaget did not pay enough attention to the role of culture and social interaction in shaping cognitive development. In particular, the effect of schooling suggests that Piaget's assumption that children's learning is driven primarily by constructing their own knowledge by acting on the environment is too narrow. It seems more likely that teachers and adults guide children's learning by helping them to focus on important aspects of a situation, hence they are scaffolding.

Case's neo-Piagetian theory

Like Piaget, Case interpreted cognitive change as a series of four stages or structural levels: sensorimotor stage (0-2 years), the interrelational stage (2-8 years), the dimensional stage (5-11 years) and the vectorial stage (11-19 years). However, he added an information processing perspective to cognitive development. He stated that change in all phases and between phases was caused by an increase in central processing speed and the capacity of the working memory. His theory is often seen as a neo-Piagetian theory because it expands the theory of Piaget. Case argued that an increase in the capacity of the working memory was caused by three factors: brain development, automation and the formation of central conceptual structures.

Siegler's overlapping waves theory

Siegler adopts an evolutionary perspective to take into account the development of children. He suggests that when trying to accomplish tasks, children generate different strategies. He states that children are likely to use different strategies that compete with each other (overlapping waves) when children are still learning how to solve a task. As children learn to recognize and experiment with different strategies, they begin to realize that some strategies are more effective at times than others. Over time less efficient strategies are replaced by more effective ones.

Vygotsky's sociocultural perspective

Like Piaget, Vygotsky sees the child as an active seeker of knowledge. However, Vygotsky stressed the fact that the child's thinking was influenced by the social and cultural context. He saw children as part of society and collaborators in their own learning with adults. According to this theory, we share lower mental functions such as attention and memory with animals and develop these functions during the first two years of life. The skills that distinguish people from animals are the mental or psychological skills we acquire. Those change our basic mental skills to higher cognitive processes. Vygotsky stated that psychological resources are gathered through social and cultural interactions. He saw language as the most important psychological tool in cognitive development. Vygotsky stated that children use private speech as a way to guide their thinking ad planning. He stated that children's learning takes place in a zone around their development: the zone of close development (zone of proximal development). This zone contains three levels of development. The lower level is called the actual level of development and reflects what someone can do without help. The upper level is called the potential level of development and reflects what someone can not do yet. Everything between these levels is called the proximal development (i.e. it is proximal to the learner's last fully developed level). More recently, Rogoff (1998, 2003) has suggested the term guided participation as a way of capturing children's broad opportunities to learn through interaction with others. 

Overall evaluation of Vygotsky's theory

Vygotsky has been criticised for placing too much emphasis on the role of social interaction. It is probably fair to say that some learning occurs through social interaction and some learning is individually constructed through discovery learning. Unlike Piaget, who highlighted the actions of the individual on the environment as driving forward development, Vygotsky placed more emphasis on the role of cultural and social factors, such as language.

Theory of core knowledge

This theory differs from all of the other theories because it proposes that humans are endowed with a small number of domain-specific systems of core knowledge at birth and that this core knowledge becomes elaborated with experience. Core knowledge theory is often regarded as being domain-specific because theorists posit that specific modules are responsible for a particular kind of core knowledge. The principles governing reasoning in each domain are distinct because infants only apply them to entities within a specific domain. Each set of principles forms a specific system that is characterized by a set of signature limits; and whilst there is some debate over the number of core knowledge systems, Spelke and colleagues have recently proposed that there are five systems of core knowledge: 1) knowledge of objects and their motions; 2) knowledge of agents and their goal-directed actions; 3) knowledge of number and the operations of arithmetic; 4) knowledge of places in the navigatable layout; 5) knowledge of geometric forms and their length and angular relations. These systems are at the core of mature reasoning in these domains and it is these systems that support knowledge acquisition in children.

Core knowledge theory differs from the other theories mentioned in this chapter in that these theorists argue that some aspects of knowledge are innate. This theory is very controversial and many researchers argue that it cannot provide an adequate account of child development. However, this theory does provide an account for infant's and young children's abilities to perceive and reason about object properties, number, and geometry.

The development of language- Chapter 10

The apparent ease with which young children acquire their first language masks the inherent difficulty of the task. In acquiring language, children must learn to perceive and produce different types of sounds, associate thousands of words with the right meanings, combine words to produce sentences, and discover rules that determine the way people communicate with each other.

What is human language?

A communication system

Human language is primarily a communication system, a mean for speakers of a language to communicate with each other. The ability to communicate is not unique to the human species. Communication systems have also been found in bees, lions, dolphins and many more animals. However, none of these communication systems possesses all the characteristics of human communication. Human language is the most complex, diverse and efficient way of communication. Human language is actually a symbolic, rule-governed system that is both abstract and productive and that ensures that speakers are able to produce language and understand many different expressions of language.

A symbolic system

Language is a symbolic system because words and parts of words represent a meaning. The meaningful units of a language are symbols because they refer to things other than themselves. These symbols are conventional because speakers of a language use the same words to express the same meaning. Symbols of language are also arbitrary at the same time because there is no relation between sound and meaning: different languages use different sound combinations to refer to the same meaning. 

A rule-governed system

Language is a rule-governed system. This means that every human language is forced to adhere to a set of rules that reflects regularities of the language. For example, the word 'the' must precede the noun to which it refers:  'the dolphin' and not 'dolphin the'.

Language is productive

Human language is also productive because a number of sounds, words and a number of rules can together make many expressions. Although no speaker of a human language will produce all the possible phrases that exist within his or her language, the fact that they could do this means that people are not limited to reproducing sentences that they have heard before but that they produce and express things themselves. As a result, people can communicate a lot of information. We are able to speak about facts, opinions and emotions, regardless of the time in which they occur. Language also makes it possible to talk about fantasies and hypothetical events. Language also makes it possible to learn, gain new knowledge or clarify previous information.

The development of the pragmatic system

The skills that enable us to communicate effectively and appropriately in a social situation comprise the pragmatic system, which contains a number of cognitive and social skills. For example, the abilites involved in turn-taking, initiating new topics and conversations, sustaining a dialogue, and repairing a faulty communication are all important aspects of the pragmatic system.

Turn-taking

Conversations take place when participants react in succession to each other's questions or statements. Minimizing unnecessary interruptions is an important aspect of this because interruptions cause a disruption of the flow and cohesiveness of a conversation. 

Mother-child interactions

Turn-taking behavior occurs first in early interactions between mothers and their babies. Young children do not realize that they communicate when they rest for a while after drinking from the breast and giving their mother the opportunity to chat. However, this form of interaction is the beginning of the development of other forms of turn-taking. Turn-taking is also involved in other forms of mother-child interactions. Touching and vocalizations are two modalities in which exchange between mother and child happens. Mothers and children use touch to ensure exchange and reassure each other or to convey emotions. An example of interaction patterns is called proto-conversations. These are interactions between adults and children where the adults have a tendency to speak when the child has finished babbling or when the child is not babbling or doing something. These are possibly important precursors of turn-taking in early interactions. These proto-conversations are dyadic interactions because they only contain the child and the adult. These dyadic interactions change to triadic interactions when, in addition to the child and the adult, an object is added to the conversation. Triadic interactions often contain proto-imperatives and proto-declarers. A proto-imperative occurs when a child points to an object and then looks at the adult until they obtain the desired object. A proto-declarative takes place when a child makes use of pointing or looking to direct the adult's attention to a specific object. These actions enable children to communicate their intentions in a clearer way.

Imitation

Turn-taking is also involved in ininfant's imitation of others. Some studies have indicated that very young children are capable of imitating. A study even indicates that vocal imitation when children are 12 months old, is related to face imitation when children are 3 months old. A possible explanation for early imitation is the discovery of a mirror neuron system in non-human primates. Mirror neurons are a group of cells in the brain that respond to the execution of an action and to the observation of that action. It is clear that imitation in various play activities is an important predictor of the development of language.

Children regularly use imitation in their conversations with other children or adults. Imitation allows children to take a turn by repeating a part or all of what the previous speaker said. The average 2-year-old only takes 1 to 2 turns per conversation. Children from 3 to 5 years old take an average of 12 turns per conversation. Finally, imitation is a means by which children learn to increase the number of turns they take in a conversation.

Initiating interactions

Children must learn to start interactions. Children's first attempts to interact with an adult often focus on directing an adult's attention. These first attempts are generally non-verbal. Children who are only 8 months old will point or reach toward an object in which they are interested. Although pointing seems to be a universal characteristic of human culture, children already point to objects before they understand that others may point out objects to them. When children learn to respond to others, they also learn better to lead the attention of others. Between 12 and 18 months, children learn to coordinate gestures, looks and vocalisations in order to communicate their intents and wants to others. As children master language, their attempts to initiate interactions become more verbal and less gestural.

Maintaining conversations

Appropriate turn-taking is an important aspect of maintaining a conversation. Young children are likely to interrupt others and are thus likely to interrupt the conversational flow. Older children tend to wait until the other speaker is ready before they try to get the listener's attention. Children must also learn to add relevant information to a dialogue. Young children tend to use their turn to refer to something completely different from the one that is being talked about, even if they are asked a question. Adults contribute to a large extent to the structure and maintenance of conversations with young children. The conversations of young children with peers are often problematic and consist largely of imitations and repetitions.

Repairing faulty conversations

In order to learn to communicate effectively, children must learn when and how to repair conversations if there is miscommunication. In order to correct a miscommunication, it is first important to realize that there is miscommunication and it must be understood how a problem needs to be solved. Adults play an important role in the development of this aspect of the pragmatic system. They often ask children to repeat expressions or to clarify something if they do not understand children. These forms of interaction help children to learn that expressions can be misunderstood, why they are misunderstood and how miscommunication can be corrected. 

The development of the phonological system

Phonology is the aspect of language that deals with the perception and production of sounds that are used in the language. To be able to communicate effectively, children need to learn which sounds are important in the language they hear. 

Speech perception

Speech segmentation

Deciphering sounds of the language they hear is a big problem for young children. They are exposed to an undifferentiated series of sounds known as a speech stream. Children must separate this stream of speech into separate sounds and sound combinations to learn the relevant sounds of their language. Although this is a difficult task, children learn to divide the speech flow into meaningful units. Their attempts to do this are facilitated by the nature of the language that adults use against children. Speech that is used against children is higher, exaggerated and more rhythmic (infant-directed speech). When children are 7 months old, they are able to distinguish familiar words in a stream of speech. This capacity to divide the flow of speech into small parts is already present in very young children. They can also remember the words they have noticed when they are 7 months old. 

Categorical perception of speech sounds

Human speech uses sound categories called phonemes. A phoneme is a set of sounds that are not physically identical but which speakers of a language treat as equivalent sounds. Human languages ​​differ in terms of the number and types of phonemes they possess.

Infants discriminate between phonemes

Young children can already distinguish between phonemes. This has important implications. First, the fact that young children can distinguish between sounds of different phonemes but can not distinguish between sounds of the same phoneme class suggests that young children engage in the categorical perception of speech sounds. This is the process that allows us to distinguish between sounds. Secondly, the young age at which children are able to distinguish between phonemes suggests that categorical perception can be an innate mechanism for interpreting sounds. 

Becoming a native listener

The human ability to differentiate between possible phonemes decreases with age. When a child is 6 months old, it is able to distinguish between many different phonemes, including the phonemes that adult speakers can not distinguish from. However, these distinctive skills of the child are influenced by experience, in particular by the language they hear. These effects of experience become clearer as the child grows older so that the child, when it is 12 months old, is only able to distinguish between the phonemes of the language they learn and no longer between the phonemes of other languages. 

Speech production

The ability to produce speech sounds lags behind the ability to perceive the same sounds. The sounds that children can perceive at a young age can not be properly produced at that time, often only months or even years later. This development hole reflects the difficulty of learning to control the vocal cords, mouth, tongue and lips. These are all involved in the intentional production of speech sounds. All children go through the same phases of vocal production, possibly through the maturation that is needed for this. 

Reflexive vocalisations (birth-2 months)

The first sounds produced by the child are reflexive vocalizations, including cries, coughs, burps and sneezes. During the first month of life, the child produces more than one type of crying which seems to indicate that the different forms of crying mean different things. However, even when children are able to communicate because of their crying, parents often understand them mainly by external directions such as a wet diaper, rather than just based on the type of crying. 

Cooing and laughing (2-4 months)

During this period, children start to laugh and combine sounds with one another.

Babbling and vocal play (4-6 months)

When children are 4 to 6 months old they start to play with sounds (babbling). They gain more control over their vocal cords, their lips, their tongue and mouth and begin to produce many different sounds and sound combinations.

Canonical babbling (6-10 months)

When children are 6 to 10 months old, they begin to produce sound combinations that sound like words (canonical). However, there is no evidence that babies actually attach importance to these sound combinations. During this period they continue to experiment with sound. This babbling of babies is a universal phenomenon that seems to be genetically determined. Children tend to babble during the same period and produce a comparable range of sounds. Also deaf children babble, just like hearing children of deaf parents. Deaf children babble with their hands (manual babbling). 

Modulated babbling (10 months on)

The last phase of babbling is modulated babbling when children are older than 10 months. This period is characterized by a variety of sound combinations and intonation patterns overlapping with the beginning of meaningful speech. This babbling plays an important role in obtaining the intonation patterns that are important for the mother tongue of the child. 

The development of articulation

When children learn the phonological system of their language, they have to learn to pronounce words correctly. They tend to use words that they can pronounce earlier. This suggests that they are aware of the differences between the correct and incorrect pronunciation of words. When children learn to pronounce words correctly, they may produce phonological distinctions that adults can not perceive. For example, English-speaking children can use ' gwass' when they mean ' glass' and ' grass' , but they pronounce this form of ' gwass' in different ways, indicating different meanings. The capacity to produce sounds reflects a combination of heredity and environmental factors. 

The development of the syntactic system

Syntax is about how words and parts of words are related to each other to produce grammatical sentences. Sentences are not produced in a haphazard way. The production of sentences is governed by the grammatical structures and rules. The syntactic structure of every human language is the result of an interrelated set of elements. At one level is the s-structure or surface structure that corresponds to the spoken sentence. At another level, there is the d-structure, or deep structure, which concerns the more abstract representation of a sentence. 

The one-word period

The acquisition of syntax by children follows a fairly predictable pattern during the first two years of life. Somewhere between 10 and 18 months, children begin to produce single word utterances. These first words are generally based on people such as mama or aunt. When children point to a dog and say 'dog', they mean 'there is my dog'. When children point to a toy dog ​​standing on the cupboard, they mean 'I want that dog'. Here, there is a s-structure dog that has different d-structures. 

What's in a word?

Most adults interpret children's single-word utterances as if they mean more than that one word. The basic problem here is to determine how much more a child intends to produce than the single word. It is clear that children understand more than they can produce. 

The two-word period

After the period in which children can say a word, the period in which they can say two words comes. Between the ages of 18 and 24 months, most children start producing two words at the same time. These words are not chosen randomly. It seems that children first use words that they have previously produced as gestures or in combination with a gestures. They also use words that occur frequently in their environment first. 

Word order

Children's knowledge of language and their use of this knowledge is limited during the two-word period. After this period the syntactic knowledge of children increases rapidly, which leads to rapid improvement in language skills. There are several changes in the language of a child of 24 months and the language of a child of 36 months. For example, the expressions of a child are longer and they are more complex. 

The significance of overregularisation errors and creative generalisations

All languages ​​have rules that determine how grammatical forms are used. When children learn the syntax, they produce various 'mistakes' that show that they are learning these rules. Overregularisation errors occur when children apply a rule in the wrong situation. English children can say that a correct word is 'thinked', while it is 'thought', because the child makes use of the general rule for past tense. The extent to which children generalize the rules they learn depends on the ease of the language they learn. The same applies to the addition of an 's' in the plural, here are also exceptions, so is the plural of' 'man' 'men'. These errors show that children have learned a general rule but have not yet learned all exceptions to this rule. In addition, children not only use what they have heard, but also create their own language. 

How can syntactic development be explained?

Innate knowledge

The speed with which children learn syntax and the creativity that they exhibit at a young age must be explained by a theory that attempts to explain syntactic development. One of the best-known explanations is the notion that children are born with an innate knowledge of language. Chomsky's arguments for this innate knowledge are based on the following points. First, language requires the ability to relate d-structures to s-structures. Second, the environment only provides the child with information about s-structures. Because knowledge about d-structures is not available in the environment, such knowledge must be innate. Third, the sentences that children hear are complex and often not grammatical. Fourth, children receive little feedback about the grammatical correctness of their statements.Finally, children acquire their first language relatively quickly and easily. 

The language input to the child

As we have seen, children learn their first language relatively quickly and easily. Chomsky states that parents pay little attention to the syntax of their young children. Parents do not correct all non-grammatically correct statements of their child. The role of parents in providing a language model is important. Parents do much better when it comes to giving a good example of grammatical sentences. Parents often speak in short grammatical sentences to their children, making them almost always grammatically correct. The notion that children are born with knowledge of d-structures is very controversial. It seems clear that children are born with a strong ability to learn language. However, this does not directly mean that children are born with congenital knowledge of language. 

The acquisition of word meaning

Learning the meaning of words is a comprehension-based process. To learn a word, children need to get used to it. When children learn their first words, they learn that words are meaningful sounds that can be used to represent something. This process starts early. 

Guessing a word's meaning

The child's interpretation and memory of the situation in which a word is first heard determines the first guess of the child about the meaning of a word. The way in which children interpret a recently discovered word depends on the child's existing semantic system, their knowledge of the world, the level of their cognitive skills and their ability to selectively pay attention to instructions of others. The child who extends the meaning of a word too broadly ia making an overextension error. Using a word too narrowly is called an underextension error.

The complexity of the task

Although children make mistakes when they attach meaning to a word, they make relatively few mistakes considering the complexity of the task. 

Is childrens acquisition of word meaning constrained?

The complexity of learning words has led some researchers to suggest that children learn words and meanings so quickly because their choices are limited. The notion of limitations in semantic development assumes that children do not consider all the information available to them and are not overwhelmed by all possible interpretations. Both types of information are considered by children and the possible interpretations of this information are limited by congenital factors. A number of limitations have been suggested that influence the development of learning the meaning of words. Here are two examples of this. The first is the whole object constraint. This theory assumes that children believe that words refer to whole objects rather than parts of objects. The child who hears an adult saying 'elephant' and pointing to an elephant assumes that the adult refers to the entire elephant instead of a part of the elephant. The second example is the mutual exclusivity constraint. This theory assumes that children believe that there is a one-to-one correspondence between words and meaning. So when a child knows that certain beings are called "dogs," they do not use this word to refer to other types of objects or beings. They also assume that the things called "dog" have no other name. 

The importance of semantic relations

Children rather construct a semantic system instead of a list of independent words because words are related to each other and do not exist separately. The development of the semantic system is facilitated by acquiring understanding of semantic relationships. When children discover the semantic relationships needed to structure their semantic system, they become better able to organize their growing vocabulary. In addition, learning about these relationships ensures that children become aware of holes in their vocabulary. 

The interaction of language and cognitive development

Before children learn words, they have formed concepts about the world. The first words of children are often words that are expressions of these early concepts, because children look for ways in which they can communicate what they know. However, even the early development of the semantic system results in changes in the concepts of children. As children construct their semantic system, they build a rich and complex tool to represent their world in a mental way. Kuczaj suggested that children use two strategies when there is a gap in their semantic and / or conceptual system. These strategies reflect the interrelation between language and cognitive development. Strategy 1 is acquiring a new word. When children learn a new word they have to see if it fits a previously learned concept. If no concept seems appropriate, they have to construct a new concept. Strategy 2 is acquiring a new concept. When a new concept is learned, children try to connect a familiar word to it. If no word seems appropriate, they look for one. During the process of building a semantic system, children form a world view that is partly shaped by the language they hear. The development of the semantic system influences conceptual development in the way in which language organizes and dissects the world.

Acquiring a theory of mind- Chapter 11

One of the most striking features of humans is the ability to be in contact with other humans. We exchange ideas, learn from each other and influence each other. Certain non-human beings can do some of these things, but the way we do it is probably unique. 

Early attunement to other's minds

The ability to connect with other people is already present in the early development. Parents note that their newborn child has a unique set of feelings, wishes, needs, pleasures and temperaments. As children grow older this develops and they become aware of these qualities of others. This impressive beginning lays the foundation for the growth of intuitive psychology: the awareness that other people also have feelings, motives, desires and beliefs. They seem to be able to anticipate others' reactions and behavior. 

Focusing on false beliefs: The unexpected transfer test

If we ask a participant to judge the true beliefs of another person, they would respond correctly. Imagine we tell a participant a story about Max, a little boy who safely secures a bar of chocolate in the cupboard so he could eat it when he finished playing. When we ask the participant where Max thinks the chocolate is, the participant answers 'in the closet'. But maybe the participant simply says where he would look for the chocolate himself. Questions about the true convictions of a person offer no possibility to distinguish between a child that understands the mind of another person and a child that does not understand it. Both children would give the same answer. 

A test of false belief is very different. So there is the unexpected transfer test. Suppose that after Max has stored his bar,  his mother puts the chocolate in the fridge. As this happened while Max was not there, he has a false belief without knowing it. He would think the chocolate is still in the cupboard, where he left it. A good observing participant would predict that Max would look into the closet when he returns. A participant who does not understand the mind of others, would argue that Max would look at the place where they themselves know that the chocolate is located; in the fridge. A test of false belief is therefore methodologically useful because it helps us to distinguish between children who do and who do not understand that someone has convictions.

Another reason for focusing on false beliefs is because it is important for children to be attuned to wrong beliefs as opposed to right beliefs. If we can clearly identify when a person has a false believe, we can take steps to help them get a right conviction. On the other hand, we could misinform them if we wanted them to have a false belief. So there are different motives involved in wrestling with false beliefs. 

When do children begin to understand that people hold beliefs?

Piaget characterized children under 7 as self-centered. He did not expect children who were younger to have a grasp of the mental status of other people. According to Piaget, children under 7 incorrectly judged that another person from a different point had the same perspective as them. They also did not take into account the intentions of another person when they formed an opinion about something the other person had done. However, recent research has shown that children aged 4 or 5 years put their own knowledge aside and make correct attributions about the false beliefs of others. These results suggest that there is an increase in the number of children who correctly answer Max's question from the age of 4 years. Because this change was so striking, it was concluded from previous research that there was conceptual shift in children around 4 years that gave them a representational theory of mind that taught them to recognize false beliefs. These children claimed that Max would look in the cupboard for his chocolate: the place where he had last seen the chocolate. 

Do children acquire a theory of mind?

Children develop rapidly in their understanding of the mind when they are around 4 years old. 

The deceptive box test

According to Gopnik, understanding someone else's minds through simulation is implausible. She stated that being able to find out what another person thinks by finding out what you yourself would think in that situation depends on having reflective access to your own mind. This reflective access (thinking about how you feel or how you think) is called metacognition. Gopnik, together with a colleague, found that children under the age of 4 had a hard time understanding their own beliefs, just as they recognized the beliefs and thoughts of others. In their research, they showed children a tube with sweets. When they asked children what in the tube was, the children said sweets. Then the tube was opened and they showed that there was only one pen. When they asked: when you saw this tube for the first time, what did you think was inside, then children often answer: a pen (this is called deceptive box task). Many children who are 4 years older say that they thought there were sweets in it. The children who made the wrong assessment in this test were also the children who made the wrong impression in the story of Max and the chocolate. It seems that children who could not recognize the wrong beliefs of other people were not attuned to their own first beliefs and could not name them. If children do not know their own thoughts and do not know how their own mind works, they can not use this insight to think about what another person thinks. Their difficulty in understanding thoughts seems to be on a more fundamental level.

Is there a development phase?

Some people claim that there is a developmental stage in the sense that children move to a radically different level of understanding when they are around 4 years old when they learn the principles for explaining and predicting the behavior of other people. This fits neatly with the idea that competent understanding of children of the mind has the property of a theory. 

Perhaps it is not true that children around the age of 4 'suddenly' have insight into their own minds and those of others, but there could be a gradual development in gaining an understanding of the mind. Different evidence from research has emerged which suggests that children under the age of 4 may be able to recognize wrong beliefs and also that sometimes older individuals, including adults, make systematic mistakes when trying to determine what another person thinks. 

Do children suddenly begin giving correct judgements of false belief?

When conducting a test about false beliefs you can either give a correct or a wrong answer. This test is not suitable for detecting the level of performance in between. So if the development was gradual, the test of false belief would nontheless make it appear as though development occurred in stages. Instead of focusing whether the child does or does not get the test, we should look at the likelihood that a child will or will not pass the test at any given time. It seems clear that the probability that a child gives a correct answer increases when a child is between 3 and 5 years old. If we believe that this development progresses gradually, we would expect that there are many cases where a child passes one test of false beliefs and the other does not. 

Research suggests that children perform alternately on a false belief test when they are around 4 years old. Despite the fact that children who passed one test had a tendency to get the other, there were also many situations where children passed one test and the other not. So if children passed the one test, this did not necessarily mean that they would always pass it. Longitudinal research indicates that the number of false belief tests that a child obtains increases when a child gets older. This finding points to the possibility that 3-year-old children are capable of the same degree of processing as older children in finding what other people think possible, but have a tendency to make mistakes when performing the task. We must recognize the distinction between performance and competence in interpreting mistakes made by children. For example, research has shown that children aged 3 and 4 tended to take longer to answer questions about false beliefs than about reality. 

Understanding the question asked

An important contender is the wording of the question. Research suggests that children who are 3 and 4 years old do not differ from each other in terms of understanding the functioning of the mind, they differ from each other in interpreting questions. Younger children have difficulty thinking about the point in time the researcher refers to. If a question is asked about a different moment in time, young children may think that the researcher is asking them that question about that moment. 

Despite the fact that misunderstanding of the question seems to be responsible for mistakes made by children, other research suggests that it is not the only important factor. Wimmer and Hartl designed a new test to test the state change. The child sees a tube of sweets and recommends that it contains sweets when asked what is in the tube. The researcher opens the tube and shows that there are indeed candies in the tube, but while the child is watching, the researcher empties the tube and puts in a pencil. He then closes the tube and asks the standard question: when you saw the tube for the first time, what did you think it was. About 80% of children aged 3 or 4 gave a correct answer. This is more than in previous research where children did not see that the sweets were replaced by a pencil. Looking at this change was of great influence on giving the correct answer by the child. In this case, the wording of the question had no influence on this, because it was exactly the same. 

Signs of competence during infancy: can infants understand false belief?

The evidence seems to suggest that performance factors may mask early signs of competence in young children's  understanding of other people's thoughts. Specifically, it seems that children under the age of 3 have an understanding of the fact that people have thoughts about the world, but that this does not always appear in specific test conditions. Perhaps because they have to remember too much information in the stories that are generally used. However, if very young children are indeed competent, it should be possible to identify some conditions where this emerges. 

Children of only 15 months old showed to have some of understanding of false beliefs. It was concluded that children watched an event longer if the expectation did not match what they saw. The children seemed 'surprised'. Further evidence is found in a study in children aged 18 months. These studies seem to further clarify the fact that the competence of children is often underestimated by measurements of their performance. 

Adult's difficulty with false beliefs

If the explanation of developmental changes lies within the performance factors rather than within changing levels of competence, then we could expect that older participants, even adults, systematically report their own knowledge when asked to name someone's beliefs under certain circumstances. Surprisingly, there is actual evidence that adults sometimes have trouble recognizing false beliefs. This proof is a phenomenon known as hindsight bias. This can be defined as the tendency to see events that have taken place as more predictable than they were before they actually took place. There was a study in which Kevin knew that orange juice was in one pot. Later, Rebecca told me that there was milk in it. At that time, Kevin did not know what was in the box and participants were asked what Kevin thought was in it. If people only had this information, they often argued that Kevin thought there was orange juice in the can. If, however, it was told that Rebecca had taken the juice out of the jug and had milk in it, but that this knowledge was not available to Kevin, they thought he thought there was milk in it. 

In addition to the fact that adults turn out have a surprising lack of perspective-taking, it is also possible that people do not automatically adjust to the beliefs of others. Research has shown that people take longer to answer a question about the (wrong) perspective of someone other than the perspective of themselves. It seems that thinking what someone else thinks is not something that happens automatically. 

Factors that influence development

Nature versus nurture

When we make judgments about convictions, we must resist the temptation of current reality and we must not fall victim to the hindsight bias. This skill is gradually learned, but it appears that this is a lot easier for older than for younger participants. It is therefore possible that age is an important factor and that this development only comes about through maturation. Another possibility is that the development is strongly influenced by social experience. It seems that there are subtle differences between how people understand each other in different cultures. 

Are we equipped with a dedicated module in the brain for understanding other minds?

Fodor suggested a modularity vision for that states that we are born with a module for understanding the minds of others and that such a module is active from the beginning of life. The module would be refined when a child is around 4 years old, so that children are able to pass a standard test of false beliefs. However, Fodor also suggested that this module is already active at a younger age in tasks that have a different form than the standard tests, although there is little supporting evidence for this assumption. The evidence suggests that whether or not children are successful through a test of false beliefs depends on more than the activity of a specific brain module that dedicates itself to the task. The biggest problem with the idea of ​​modules is that it implies estimating what other people think,something is what we do automatically, but this does not seem to be the case. In addition, cultural variation can not easily be explained from this vision. 

The role of the family: siblings

In a family with lots of children, the potentially beneficial adult input would have to be divided, with the consequence that each child would not receive the optimum level of tutoring about the mind. A parallel can be drawn with children's general intellectual abilities. Perner et al. found that children aged 3 years who had siblings were more likely to pass a test of false belief than those of the same age without siblings. Those with several siblings stood a better chance of gicing a correct judgement than those with just one or two siblings. Astington further clarified that the beneficial effect of having siblings was confined to those with older siblings. Nevertheless, this need not imply that the experience of interacting with with siblings promotes an understanding of the mind. Perhaps the presence of siblings coincides with another as yet unspecified variable. 

The role of the family: adults

Dunn et al. tested children aged 33 months and found that children who were successful in the test tended to have parents who, six months previously, had been observed to give explanations of behavior with reference to psychological states. We might say that these parents were 'mind-minded'. In sum, the correlation between having siblings and successfully acknowledging false belief could be coincidental to variations in adult input.

The characteristics of the child

The social environment of a child seems to influence the development of recognizing beliefs. In addition, intrinsic characteristics of the child seem to be important. The characteristics of the environment and the characteristics of the child probably interact in a complex way with regard to the influence they have on development. 

Autism

In this chapter, the goal is to investigate why individuals with autism lack the understanding of the mind. Autism is characterized as a triad of impairments (Wing's triad of impairments): social relationships, communication and imagination. 

Lack of imagination

The lack of imagination manifests itself in many ways, but in particular as a limitation in the capacity to participate in fantasy play. It has been suggested that the types of mental processing needed for imagination are the same as the processing needed to understand the different states of belief. The finding that individuals with autism have a limitation in their imagination can be a clear indication of the possibility that they may not be able to attune to the minds of others. 

Socialisation and communication

Restrictions in socialization and communication also point to an underlying flaw in the understanding of the minds of others. Without the understanding of the mind, an individual would be constantly in danger of misjudging social situations or be constantly at risk of behaving inappropriately. Social skills depend on being able to recognize the sensitivities, behaviors and knowledge of other people. Difficulty in understanding the mind could present itself in the triad of impairments and these limitations are generally seen as defining for autism. Autism could be a manifestation of a limited understanding of the mind. 

Causes of autism

There is a clear possibility that at least one of the causes of autism has a genetic basis. Other causes can come from accidental injury or virus infection. These factors can lead to an abnormality in the brain that forms the neurological basis for autism. 

Failure to understand the mind

There are reasons to think that children with autism may have a delayed development of the understanding of the mind. However, this does not appear to be the case, because research that looked at the mental age of people with autism showed that teenagers, with a mental age above 4 years, were not able to recognize a false belief. It is nevertheless important to see if the failure to recognize the false belief is the result of autism or the associated learning difficulties. Many individuals with autism also have learning disabilities. This could also be responsible for their difficulty with false beliefs. However, children with Down Syndrome (DS), who also have learning disabilities, should also fail this test, which turned out not to be the case. 

Individuals with autism have an increased chance of developmental delay. Verbal mental age is a good predictor of the chances of success of children with autism, but it appears that this mental age in children with autism should be a lot higher than in normal developing children.

Reading and mathematics in developmental psychology - Chapter 12

Reading and mathematics are skills that lie at the heart of almost everything children do at school but on the other hand these two courses have little in common. Mathematic is a strictly logical system. Reading and spelling rules are fickle and heterogeneous. Mathematic uses abstract symbols; reading and spelling is about words with a meaning. Yet these two forms of learning provide the same basic demand for psychologists: how much of what children learn depends on instruction and how much do they learn from themselves without the help of others? 

Vygotsky's argument about cultural tools has convinced most developmental psychologists that instruction plays a role in intellectual development. Calculators and computers help us to understand the world better and are seen by Vygotsky as 'cultural tools'. Many psychologists, however, including Piaget, state that children construct a lot of their knowledge themselves. The distinction between Piaget and Vygotsky is important although they do not differ very much in their vision. The difference between these two theorists is mainly due to the emphasis they place on their knowledge. They both rejected the idea that children gain new knowledge only by being told. They both argued that other people played an important role in the development of children's knowledge. Vygotsky, however, emphasized the transfer of knowledge from one person to another while Piaget emphasized the child's own constructions. 

Reading and writing

A characteristic of cultural tools is that they can differ per culture. Writing systems, or spellings differ a lot from each other. In some, as in English, individual letters for the most part represent phonemes, which are the smallest parts of sound that affect the meaning of the word. Such scripts are seen as alphabetic. There are several alphabetical scripts, such as Greek, Arabic and Roman, and there are big differences between spellings that use this same script. For example, Finnish and English use the same letters, but the relationship between sounds and letters in the two spellings is completely different. This relationship is more regular in Finnish than in English. Each letter in Finnish always has the same sound, but this is not the case in English. In Finnish there is also a clear relationship between the length of a sound and the number of letters it stands for. 

There are also many scripts that are not alphabetical. For example, there is Chinese, where each sign represents a morpheme (a unit of meaning). Most characters are complex structures. Similarly in Japan there are different scripts. Some scripts also use syllables. All these scripts have been around for a long time and there is a good reason that they have existed for so long. Many of their properties fit well with the language they represent.

The difficulty of alphabetic scripts

The alphabetical solution is neat but also has limitations. The alphabet is, however, an effective way to represent English speech. The price of the alphabetical solution is psychological. For example, phonemes are a big problem for young children. It is difficult for children at the beginning to realize that letters stand for phonemes. The problem that children have with phonemes can not be solved simply by teaching them the alphabet. They have to learn how individual words can be cut into pieces and there is a lot of scientific evidence that this is difficult for them at first. However, children get better at phonemes as they get older. Nevertheless, this improvement has nothing to do with age but comes from the instruction that children receive. The older children become, the more aware of words they are, because they learn it.

Rhymes and rimes

Although the alphabetical script is based on phonemes, research suggests that the awareness of children of other phonological units plays a role in learning to read. Between the level of the syllable and the phoneme there is a set of phonological units that, according to linguists, are called intrasyllabic. These are usually smaller than the syllable and larger than the phoneme. The clearest and perhaps the most important are the units which, according to linguists, are the onset and the rime. The onset is the consonant or the consonants at the beginning of a syllable. The rime is the sound of a vowel plus of a consonant that follows. So 'k' is the onset and 'at' is the rime in the word 'cat'.

Most children are aware of rimes from a young age and often create rhymes in an active and spontaneous way. Children who are sensitive to rhyme are often better at reading and in detecting phonemes.

Children learn to read through the instruction they receive from their teachers. These skills enable children to learn to analyze words in a way that is not natural to them. In addition, it can be said that children also use phonological units that are easier for them. Rimming is a natural part of their life before they go to school and they use this informal knowledge in learning to read. 

Conditional spelling rules

The English language consists of more than just letter-sound associations, where a letter represents a sound or a phoneme. Many phonologically based spelling patterns are based on fairly refined conditional rules. These are rules that determine that a letter, or a group of letters, represents a sound in one context and another in a different context. These rules are well known and are actively taught. Other conditional rules are not always taught and picked up by children in an implicit way. Children spend little to no attention to conditional rules at the beginning. They stick to letter-sound associations in the most literal way. Inexperienced children use their knowledge of letter-sound relationships in an original way and sometimes write things as they pronounce them. 

Long after children have acquired good knowledge of letter-sound associations, they still make mistakes with the conventional spelling of morphemes. English children of 10 years still ignore that regular verbs in the past tense end in English with 'ed' and not, for example, as 'killd'. Even many adults do not seem to fully understand the game of morphemes. 

One reason for having so much trouble with this may be that children are initially unaware of the morphemes' structure a words has when they try to write them. There is some evidence for this idea. Another possible reason is that children have to go through a certain sequence of steps to learn spelling rules of morphemes. 

There seems to be several steps and overgeneralization in learning morphemes and spelling rules. The underlying three steps are possible: first, children learn by spelling a certain sound, then they learn a different way of spelling and begin to use it without first understanding when to apply which method. On one occasion they write ' list' and the other time 'lised'. As a result of feedback they receive when they use new spelling, they learn the rules behind the use and application of certain morphemes. 

The important point in this order is that children must use the new spelling before they learn the underlying rules. They use it before they actually learn about it. From research, evidence seems to emerge for this statement. At first children seem to be a 'bank' of knowledge about specific spellings of words and later they learn the rules based on this knowledge. It is important that children are taught about spelling rules. Children learn this and also seem to enjoy this. 

Number and count

Logic and number

Logical principles are the essential ingredients of number. Unless a system meets these principles, it can not be called a number system. An example of this is cardinality: each set of items with a specific number is equal in quantity to another set with the same amount of items. This sounds logical, but it is not always. Cardinality is what makes the recognition of numbers more refined and interesting than the recognition of specific patterns. To understand the cardinal properties of the number, it is necessary to look beyond just perceptual information. Two sets of objects have the same number, even if they look completely different or have been arranged differently. A second principle is ordinality. Numbers come in an order where the one is larger or more than the other. So the notion of ordinality is not only a matter of knowing that numbers come in a certain order of magnitude but also understand that if a is greater than b, and b is greater than c this automatically means that a is greater than c. 

These are essential properties of number. When we count, we use words that have only been invented. Whatever these words are, we must adhere to certain universal principles around counting. If we do not stick to these principles, we are not really counting. Five such principles have been mentioned by Gelman and Gallistel. The first three principles are about how to count. The first is the one-to-one principle, which means that all items in an object must be counted once and have to receive only one number. The second is the stable order principle. This means that one counts by producing number words in a certain order (first 1, then 2, then 3). The third principle is the last number counted principle. This means that the last number that is counted represents the value of a set. 

The other two principles are the abstraction principle and the order irrelevance principle. The first states that the number in a set is independent of the qualities of the members in that set: the rules for counting a heterogeneous set are the same as the rules for counting a homogeneous set. The second principle states that the order in which members of a set are counted does not matter. If you count from left to right, you come to the same outcome as from right to left. 

Different counting systems

All counting systems must obey these principles. Yet these systems differ within different languages ​​and cultures. The most obvious variation is in the words for numbers. For example, in some languages ​​10 + 1 is used, while in other languages ​​words like 'eleven' and 'twelve' are used. However, counting systems also differ in other ways. We are so used to the decimal system that we tend to think that this is the only system. In the past, however, different cultures have used other systems. 

Some researchers state that children are born with an innate ability to reason mathematically. Different researchers used different types of evidence to support this hypothesis. First, research was done on babies using 'habituation'. Babies were more interested in new than well-known objects (and numbers). Several other studies have achieved similar results in a similar way. However, the question is what the significance of these results is. At this moment it is not clear to determine whether there is an innate skill or sensitivity to mathematical reasoning. 

Gelman also argued that children are born with an innate concept of number, because she thinks that the understanding of the five principles is a built-in part of our cognitive system. She acknowledges that children make mistakes when counting but states that this is a question of procedural skills that are never perfect. 

Another theory states that there is some inborn knowledge, but also that learning from number gradually happens as a result of a lot of experience. From this theory it is stated that children learn about numbers in different ways. Children are born with a 'parallel individuation' system which makes it possible to recognize and represent small numbers exactly. This system only applies to sets of 1, 2 or 3 objects and even within this small amount there is development during the first years of a child's life. 

Number as a cultural resource

Because it is very difficult to gather evidence for the hypothesis that sense of numbers is innate, it is more logical that we learn mathematical knowledge and skills for a large part of our childhood. A possible way in which children learn about mathematics is because they are taught about this. With cultural means we can be sure that some instruction is needed. 

The decimal system

The decimal system is a clear example of a cultural resource. Like other cultural means, it is not easy for young children. A task that clearly shows this is the Shop task. Children receive money for this task and have to pay for items they want to buy in a store. Sometimes they only have to pay 10 or 20 cents, other times they have to combine these two and pay with different coins. These mixed exercises are a good test of their understanding of the dozens system. 

An explanation for the fact that English-speaking children aged 5 or 6 have difficulty with the above task is a cultural statement and therefore consistent with the cultural means approach. Languages ​​like Chinese and Japanese have no words like 'eleven', 'twelve', 'thirteen' and 'twenty'. They say 'ten-one' and 'ten-two'. Children from these Asian countries are better at counting and constructing numbers than European and American children. 

Logic in the understanding of number

Everyone argues that logical reasoning is important in mathematics. The only disagreement is whether or not children initially lack the necessary logical power and have to acquire it along the way. Piaget stated that children are initially prevented by their lack of logic and that they have to acquire logical skills to learn to understand mathematics. 

His view on the concept of numbers of young children is the direct opposite of the hypothesis that children are born with a learned sense of numbers. He stated that young children know words regarding numbers quickly, but do not immediately know what they mean. They still have an idea of ​​cardinality and ordinality. 

As far as cardinality is concerned, Piaget's work is directly involved in the use and understanding of numbers and words of children. For example, research has shown that children count the same number of something that was differently arranged. Children counted the same amount but judged that one was more than the other. Piaget concluded that children do not know what the word 'eight' means (in this case). A second important result was that slightly older children had a tendency to correctly determine that spreading did not cause a change in number. 

Young children sometimes do not realise that same number = same quantity

Young children sometimes do not understand that the same number means the same quantity. Piaget and Greco explained this by distinguishing between 'quantité' and 'quotité'. Quotite is the notion of children who realize that two sets of objects are the same number and understand that counting both leads to the same number word but still think that there are more objects at one than the other depending on the arrangement. They realized that the word ( quotité ) remained the same while they did not realize that the actual number ( quantité ) did not change due to a perceptual change. 

The importance of one-to-one correspondence

One way to do a comparison with regard to number is to use one-to-one correspondence. If two sets are connected, this means that one object has its counterpart in the other set. The two sets are then equal in number. One of Piaget's main proofs of the fact that he states that children have difficulty with cardinality was that they had trouble with one-on-one correspondence. 

The evidence for effective innate structures that focus on numerical principles is not strong. The research in young children is unreliable. The mistakes that preschool children make can not be dismissed as just procedural errors. Tasks in which children have to compare quantities reveal large gaps in the understanding of young children with regard to basic principles of numbers. Young children do not realize at first that counting is a way to measure the amount of something. Even if children know that two sets are the same number, they still state that they differ in quantity. They have much to learn when they are young.

Memory development and eyewitness testimony - Chapter 13

If there is a crime, for example, eyewitness reports are crucial. Especially when there is little physical evidence, such as a sexual offense, for example. It is therefore important to evaluate the factors that may affect the reliability of the reports of those involved. The critical issues are whether the witness has a reason to distort the truth and whether the memories of an event are complete and reliable. An important concept here is suggestibility. This is the tendency of children or adults to change their memories and beliefs in response to an interrogation. 

The development of memory

Memory, the ability to store, retain and recall memories is a cognitive process. Sometimes, for example for school, we consciously store things in our memory. However, usually we retain information without thinking about that we could be questioned about this later. Still, our conversations are replete with references to such past experiences. 

Recognition and recall

Researchers have developed different methods for doing research into remembering. Two common tests of memory are recognition and recall. After a person has seen a number of items or has experienced an event, they are asked to identify which items a person has seen or which items were present. This test measures recognition in the memory. An individual can also be asked to retrieve details of an event. This is a test of recall memory. 

Recognition and recall measure the explicit memory. That is the memory of an experience or event that is easy to reach. However, at times our thoughts and actions are influenced by events that we can not consciously remember. In these moments we state that we have implicit memories of these events. Such memories need other forms of measurement. 

The memory process

Encoding

The first phase of the memory system is encoding. This stage determines how the event we see is stored in memory and how detailed this happens. There is selectivity in what is encoded and not everything that we experience is stored. This selectivity in the encoding reflects our limited attention possibilities. We can not do everything at the same time. We usually only look at certain effects of an event and ignore other aspects. 

Storage

The second phase of the memory system is the stage where encoded events go to short-term memory storage. Not all memories survive this short-term memory and the limited storage there is, but the memories that survive go on to the long-term memory. The passage of time, the number of times an event has been relived (or has been repeated mentally) and the number of experiences can have a strong influence on the strength and organization of the stored information. Reminders can increase or decrease in strength as a function of how long they have been stored and as a function of the number of times the original event has been recalled. 

Retrieval

The final step in remembering includes retrieving stored information. Pick-up is rarely perfect. Actually, there are times when the content of the memory system is simply inaccessible. Different cognitive and social factors influence the retrieval of the stored information. For example, the motivation to pick something up, but also the willingness to collaborate with a researcher who wants you to pick up something and get the understanding of being picked up. Some of the factors that influence it improve the retrieval of information, other factors worsen this retrieval. 

In summary, it can be stated that in every phase of remembering, encoding, storage and retrieval, there are ways to lose the information about an event. 

Semantic and episodic memory

The encoding-storage-retrieval process is applicable to different forms of recall: from learning skills and factual knowledge to learning a foreign language and learning the layout of a new location. Between these different types of memory, there is an important distinction between semantic memory and episodic memory. Semantic memory is defined as the long-term storage of all our knowledge of the world, including concepts, algorithms, definitions of words and the relationships between them. Episodic memory is conceptualized as memory of specific events. For example, a semantic memory of the market is a place to buy stuff while an episodic memory contains trips to the market. 

Four factors that influence the development of memory: knowledge, strategies, metamemory and culture

There are factors that affect each of the three phases of memory. Below, four of these factors are described and how they affect the development of memory. The first factor is the existing knowledge of children. The second factor is the awareness and application of mnemonic strategies that make it possible to remember. The third factor is meta-memory, which refers to the understanding of memory and which strategy is needed in a given situation. The meta-memory allows us to understand how our memory works. For example, if we have to remember a list, it tells us what actions we need to take to remember that list. A fourth factor is culture and we describe memory differences between individualistic and collectivistic cultures. 

Knowledge development

To a large extent, the ability to encode, store and retrieve is directly dependent on someone's knowledge. Knowledge is the material that influences how we experience things and what we pay attention to. At the same time, knowledge is the material that changes our experiences. Children differ from adults in terms of the number of facts they have stored in their memory, in their understanding of the structure of events and in their expectations of how the world works. In general, knowledge increases as one grows older. 

Scripts

The most productive way to explain how knowledge affects the memory is through a script. Scripts are generalized representations of an event. A script contains the structure of an event because it has traces for the participants in the event and the connections between these traces. The connections represent causal and temporary relationships between the participants. For example, a script for 'going to the restaurant' contains traces for the people who go to the restaurant, the waiter, the menu, the setting of the tables and the different dishes. The connections between these tracks indicate the components of the event. The number of scripts that a person has and its effect can represent the total amount of knowledge of an individual. 

Scripts are top-down structures: they lead to the automatic generation of expectations about the causal structures of an event. We can use our existing knowledge about what 'generally' happens to fill gaps in our memory. 

If an event is very similar to our script-based knowledge, chances are that we can retrieve an event (correctly). If there is a mismatch between what is expected and what has actually happened, it often happens that this mismatch is solved because the expectation penetrates into the experience that is stored and prevents that something can be picked up in the correct manner. 

The idea that expectations based on a script affect the memory corresponds to current theories that emphasize the fact that the memory does not work the same as a camera or a recorder. Memory is an integral part of a larger cognitive and social mechanism that underlies social interaction. There is a lot of evidence to support this constructive vision on memory. 

The relationship between age, scripted knowledge and recall

The relationship between age, scripted knowledge and retrieval of memories is quite complex. Developing scripts as one gets older, but even young children have scripts for familiar events and these scripts influence the way children reconstruct events in the past. 

In order to have scripted knowledge influence the encoding, storage and retrieval of an experience, that experience must be linked to a script. One way in which an experience is identified as part of a script is through words. If you hear the word 'restaurant', you probably activate the script 'going to a restaurant'. Learning words can be seen as a process that helps to organize experiences in meaningful lumps. Words can also be used to recall memories of an event. Limited language can affect the organization and retrieval of memories. A well-known phenomenon is infantile amnesia. This is the inability of people to remember things from their early childhood (first 3 years). One of the most important characteristics of children under the age of 3 is that they have no or limited linguistic skills. If children are around 18 to 24 months, they will experience a growth in vocabulary. This point in language development is strongly associated with our first memories. Language development could be one of the explanations for amnesia in childhood and therefore it can be concluded that language is associated with memory. 

In summary, it can be stated that the theoretical construct 'a script' stands for a knowledge structure and helps explain why what a person 'remembers' is not always the same as the actual experience. Memory, like dreams, is constructive. What people pick up is rarely a direct representation of the original event. 

Strategy development

We all have to remember things. A strategy that makes it easier to remember things is called a mnemonic. The three most popular mnemonics are rehearsal, organization and elaboration. 

Rehearsal

Rehearsal is to repeat the items that need to be remembered. In a study of young children, it emerged that children repeated things that they had to remember. However, this strategy is not only used by young children but also by older children and adults. Yet the way in which people repeat is changing. Young children only repeat the last word they had heard, older children also repeated the earlier words they had to remember. 

Organization

Organization refers to classifying the items that must be remembered for meaningful groups or categories. Related to this is the cluster effect. This states that the memory for test items is significantly better if the items can be grouped according to a certain principle. Children use this strategy correctly from about 8 years onwards. However, preschool children already make an attempt here. 

Elaboration

Elaboration refers to the action whereby visual or verbal connections are made between the items that must be remembered or between these items and salient objects in one's memory. Elaboration is a strategy that works well in the paired-associate task. In this task, participants must remember couples of unrelated items. This strategy is not used spontaneously until adolescence. 

There are also other ways in which we can improve our memory. For example, by external directions, such as a reminder or a calendar. 

Knowing when to use a strategy

Small children often choose the wrong strategy or do not know how to implement the chosen strategy correctly. In general it can be said that the use of a strategy does not necessarily result in a better memory. Children must be able to not only produce a strategy, but also the circumstances in which this strategy is applied must be learned. Discovering and learning strategies happens throughout life. Later individual patterns of strategy use are strongly influenced by two factors. First, we gather more knowledge about our memory. We are going to realize that we are good at remembering certain things and are bad at remembering other things. Second, work environments often require specific memory skills. 

Metamemory development

Cognitive capacities are limited and often remembering is an effortful process. The meta-memory refers to the consciousness, the monitoring and the regulation of the content of memory and it is the mechanism that regulates effort within the memory process. The better the regulatory mechanism is, the more efficient the memory is. Meta memory has two components. The first is awareness of how the memory works and the second is the monitoring of memory. 

Awareness of how memory works

Researchers working on procedural metamemory have focused on how much overlap there is between scientific findings on how memory works and the intuitive understanding of children of the memory process. The concept of children about how memory works develops quite late. On the other hand, researchers have shown that subtler aspects of the meta-memory sometimes develop in early childhood already. For example, 3-year-old children can predict fairly accurately when they will or will not remember something they have experienced. A full understanding of memory does not arise until mid-childhood, but there is evidence suggesting that the forerunners of the meta-memory develop early on. 

Memory monitoring

Researchers who have looked at memory monitoring have concentrated on how children respond to instruction in the use of strategies. They look at whether a child benefits from it when parents and teachers explicitly tell them how to approach a memory problem. For example, research has shown that children perform best on a memory task when they receive directions from their mothers for the use of effective strategies. However, the skills of the meta-memory appear to be trainable quite late in childhood. 

Various explanations are given for the relatively poor performance of children in tasks for the meta-memory. Firstly, it appears that when using interview techniques, these results are dependent on verbal competence and may therefore underestimate the performance of children. Secondly, the use of the meta-memory contains a general understanding of the mind and how the mind works, this only develops when children are 5 years old. Finally, from a biological perspective it is possible that the brain regions involved in meta-memory are not yet fully developed in young children. The development of the meta memory may also depend on various other factors. Firstly, exposure to memory tasks may help with knowledge about memory and awareness. Secondly, it is possible that children acquire their understanding of memory through the help of adults who teach them relevant strategies. 

Cultural differences in memory

When research is done into the development of memory and memory processes, there is often the question to what extent the memory works universally and whether all people go through the same stages of memory development. 

The individualistic-collectivistic divide

Research into the memory of preschool children from China, Korea and the US showed that all three groups of children could pick up objective aspects to the same extent. American children, however, turned out to have a more detailed memory which was also more specific and emotional. Research has shown that people belonging to an individualistic culture tend to have more specific and emotion-based memories than individuals who belong to a collectivist culture. It is difficult to determine what underlies these cultural differences and whether these differences occur during encoding, storage or retrieval. It is possible that people from different cultures process the same events differently. In addition, the culture can influence the type of memories that people evoke. Finally, culture can affect memory in the process of recalling memories. 

In addition to culture, other factors also affect memory and retrieval of memories. Factors such as gender, birth order, education and socio-economic status can all contribute to differences in performance related to memory. 

Children's eyewitness testimony

Children are often involved in investigations into crimes. They are increasingly asked to testify. Their testimonies influence judgments and thus the lives of people. Because there are important consequences of the testimonies of children, it is important to investigate how competent a child can be as a witness. The judicial systems of most countries require that every witness is able to distinguish between the truth and a lie and should be able to remember information and report. Concern about the testimonies of children is that their reports may not be correct due to lack of these two skills. 

Suggestibility

Suggestibility is the tendency of children to make false statements about their experiences. The reports of children can be wrong because they deliberately or unconsciously distort the truth about an event they refer. The intentional distortion of the truth is lying and the non-intentional distortion of the truth is compliance. Children's reports can also be wrong due to their vulnerability or their evolving memory systems. 

Suggestibility is used to refer to the degree to which the encoding, storage, retrieval and reporting of events can be influenced by a series of cognitive and social factors. Cognitive factors are the factors that are related to memory characteristics and social factors are related to the characteristics of the situation that took place. This definition of influenceability is in accordance with both the legal and the daily use of the term. 

Ecological validity

Research on suggestibility responds to the argument for ecological validity. The argument of ecological validity is that aspects of the context can systematically influence behavior. If researchers find results in a particular setting or context, there is no assurance that these results will also be found in a different context. For example, it has been shown that the environment has an influence on the learning of words: divers who learned words under water performed better when they mentioned these words when they were under water than when they were above water. 

Cognitive factors

Because research into suggestibility is an offshoot of memory development, it is to be expected that the suggestibility of children is influenced by the factors that determine the development of memory. Much research has been done into the effect of memory on suggestibility. The reasoning is that it is easier to implement a wrong suggestion if the information about an event was badly encoded than if this information is strongly encoded and has been well preserved in storage. However, there seems to be no clarity about this statement because research contradicts this: research finds both a link between the suggestibility and the power of a memory as well as no connection. 

Scripts can produce false reports

The role of scripts in inducing false reports has also been studied by researchers. Research has shown that expectations based on a script are actively used to interpret ambiguous information. The use of scripts can also lead to the wrong interpretation. 

Knowledge can cause age changes in suggestibility

Research also shows that age influences suggestibility. Younger children are more influenceable than older children. However, the effect of script information on memory leads to the paradoxical situation that older children are more influenceable on the basis of scripts. These examples clearly show how research on the suggestibility has been built on research into memory and has further extended this. 

Social factors leading to false reports

The greater susceptibility of children to suggestions can be seen as a direct consequence of their relatively weaker ability to accurately encode, store, retrieve and monitor different types of information. Recently, however, researchers have also emphasized the importance of social factors in explaining suggestibility in adults and children. Based on what we know about the social development of children, it seems clear that social factors play a role in creating wrong reports. 

Understanding the language used by the questioner

The social aspect of suggestibility is defined by the interaction between the child and another person. In order to understand the dynamics of this interaction, one first has to check whether there is understanding between the two speakers. Because children's reports are often verbally uttered and the child uses language to name his memories, it is crucial that the interrogator uses the child's vocabulary and vice versa and that the child has the correct language skills necessary to express themselves clearly. 

Even if there is understanding between the speakers, other restrictions in the child-adult interaction can cause wrong reports by children. Both children and adults approach a conversation with certain assumptions, but these assumptions are often incompatible. For example, most children assume that if an adult asks a question, a 'good' child would answer. The adult also assumes that if the child does not know an answer, they will say this to the interrogator. The main source of misunderstandings is the pragmatic language skills of the child, such as understanding the intended meaning versus the literal meaning. 

Social pressures

In addition, children are often motivated to please a researcher. Children see researchers as reliable and they rarely question their actions or comments. Children can also lie to achieve a goal that the adult can give them such as getting a prize or avoiding a punishment. It appears that social pressure affects the influenceability of children. 

Do children lie and deceive?

The pressure faced by children can lead to compliance and to deception. Research has shown that young children sometimes lie. For example, pre-school children, just like adults, are sensitive to demand characteristics of a situation and therefore succumb to a wide range of motives for lying or withholding information. However, different motivations do not produce comparable levels of lying. The conclusion is that young children have already deliberately distorted their report of something they have seen and that they are doing this in response to some motives such as fear of reprisal and avoidance of shame. Children of all ages will lie if the motives are right. Children may not be different from adults in this. 

The ability to withstand suggestive questioning may also relate to children's understanding of other's mental states. For example, children who understand that people in general are capable of holding false beliefs may in turn understand that the experimenter's beliefs do not necessarily have to reflect reality.

The interaction of cognitive and social factors

Some researchers have attempted to determine the relative importance of social versus cognitive factors in terms of suggestibility. There seems to be an interaction between cognitive and social factors. This interaction can take different forms. One possibility is that the extent to which social factors play a role in producing a false statement has a cognitive basis. If the memory is weak, children may be more indulgent and prepared to be influenced, because there is no competing reminder to refute the suggestion. It is also possible that the reports of the child are the result of social factors, but ultimately become part of the actual memory of the child. 

Is suggestibility a personality trait?

Personality traits such as extraversion and introversion are stable characteristics of individuals. Some characteristics persist with age, others are typical of a person's behavior for a certain period of time, but all are exhibited in a wide variety of circumstances. The question is whether suggestibility is a characteristic. Research data shows that younger children are more influenceable than older children and adults. Age-related differences suggest that younger children may form weaker memories and are therefore more influenceable. 

Findings from research suggest that suggestibility may be a personality trait rather than a trait of a specific situation. Suggestibility appears to be possible in all types of events, but it may be more difficult to be influenced if a situation is salient and persistent and well understood by the child.

Play and the beginnings of peer relationships - Chapter 14

This chapter looks at the origin and development of relationships with peers. These are social relationships with classmates of the same age, usually in school; and of friendship - what friendship is and whether friendship is important in development. Special attention is paid to the development of play in childhood and the role of play in social relationships. 

Early relationships with peers

In the first years, parents and other adults are very important in the life of a child. They provide care and protection and act as models for the use of language and many other forms of behavior. A number of adults, often including the parents, function as attachment figures, because they give safety to the child. However, if the child is about 2 years old, peers become more and more important sources of interest. At this age, children seem to be particularly interested in peers. In a study of 12 to 18 months old children, two mothers shared a room for play with their child. They had not met before. The children touched their mother a lot, but looked most closely at the peers who clearly interested them. Observations of children younger than 2 years show that interactions in this group of children are fast and infrequent and often only consist of looking at each other, sometimes smiling and showing a toy. Children at that age have not yet learned many social interaction skills. They can interact with adults who support interaction by responding properly and at the right time. But it takes a while before two young children learn how to do this.

The beginnings of the play

The term 'play' refers to behavior that is enjoyed by pleasure and has no clear purpose. There are different forms of play. A form of play is sensorimotor play. This refers to play with objects using their properties to ensure enjoyable effects. For example, a child can hit an object so that sound comes out or a child can drop an object repeatedly. Another form of play is pretend play, or called by Piaget: symbolic play. In this form of play, the child makes use of an object or an action. For example, a child can put a teddy bear in bed so that the bear can sleep. Children often play pretend games: first with themselves, then with a bear or a doll. Mothers appear to have a scaffolding role in the pretend play of a child, because they first encourage this, for example suggesting and demonstrating actions. Much early pretend play by the child has been largely imitated. However, if children become 3 or 4 years old, they are less dependent on older partners and take a more active role in performing pretend play. 

The growth of social participation

If a child is 2 or 3 years old, they often go to a playgroup or to a playgroup. They have begun to develop some independence from adults and are ready for interaction with peers through play and other activities. If a child is between 2 and 4 years old, there is a big increase in so-called social participation (the extent to which children play interactively and cooperatively with others). Children can be engaged in activities in different ways. Parten stated that there were 6 categories of social participation. Unoccupied social participation in which the child is not engaged in any activity, the child can also view others as a spectator (onlooker social participation), and the child can also play alone (solitary social participation). Moreover, the child can also participate in parallel activities in which it plays with others with the same material, but where there is not much interaction. Associative participation in activities means that there is interaction between children in an activity, for example in children who build a block tower together. Finally, there are cooperative activities in which there is interaction in a complementary way. Associative or cooperative participation in activities increases as children grow older. In addition, the group size of children playing increases as they get older. At the beginning of adolescence, the nature of groups of children changes, creating large groups of the same sex that later change when sexual relationships become more important.Finally, there are cooperative activities in which there is interaction in a complementary way. 

Are siblings important?

Brothers and sisters also affect the child. Researchers have argued that because the relationship with brothers and sisters is strong and emotionally powerful, this is an optimal situation to learn social understanding. Brothers and sisters learn to frustrate, tease, spawn, reassure each other. Observations suggest a powerful role for siblings in social and cognitive development. Brothers and sisters get a lot of practice in understanding each other's feelings and resolving conflicts. Several studies have found direct evidence that brothers and sisters help their younger siblings develop a theory of mind. If an older sibling is already in school, they tend to give verbal instructions in a detailed way. However, if the older sibling does not yet go to school, they make more use of examples. 

A lot of research has been done on children who have no siblings. Having brothers or sisters, according to research, does not appear to influence self-esteem or loneliness. However, it does appear to have an influence on social preference (how much does someone else like you), where children with brothers and sisters were found more likeable. In addition, children without brothers and sisters were more often seen as aggressive, bullied and withdrawn. These researchers concluded that having a brother or sister can help to deal with conflicts. 

A lot of time that pre-school children spend with each other, they play with each other. Smilansky established a play hierarchy which consists of four stages. The first stage was functional play. These are simple physical movements or actions with objects. The second phase is constructive play, in which things are made with objects. The third phase is dramatic play in which roles are played in a fantasy game and the fourth phase is playing  games with rules. In addition, he emphasized the importance of sociodramatic play. This is pretend play where social roles are played in a story (such as parents and children, sisters and patients, etcetera). 

Rubin has drawn up a game hierarchy based on Parten's scheme of social participation and Smilansky's scheme of play. This categorical scheme means that you can view pre-school children and categorize their play according to both schemes. This scheme is useful for coding the activities of children, but also has two limitations. First, it implies a developmental progress that is not universally accepted: for example, some forms of play alone can be quite mature. Secondly, it omits important forms of play such as physical activities. 

Social pretend and sociodramatic play

The role of the mother or other adults in encouraging pretend play has been demonstrated in several studies. For example, it has been found that when adults play pretend games when children are 27 to 41 months old, pretend play is more common in these children. In addition, it is stated that an older brother or sister can contribute to the pretend play experiences of a child. 

Pretend play and friendship

Children's pretence is more sustained and complex when they play with friends compared to acquaintances. The reciprocity and emotional involvement of friends seems to motivate children to keep cooperative interaction going. The work of Gottman and colleagues has looked at the processes of development and the preservation of friendship among young children. Gottman observed pairs of children between the ages of 3 and 9 who often did not know each other and then played together in their house. The children often achieved a simple common activity which they could do next to each other (form of parallel activity). If successful, the children would continue to a joint activity. Often such activity contained pretend play. Gottman describes the social skills of forming friendship as the management of levels of 'attachment' and 'conflict'. 

Sex differences in pretend play

Some studies have shown sex differences in pretend play. For example, research has found that girls more often participate in a pretend play and that their game is more sophisticated. In addition, mothers seem to perform fantasies more often with their daughters than with their sons. These mother-daughter interactions appear to be predictive of pretend play with peers. However, a review has shown that these findings are inconsistent and depend on the play environment, the toys that are available and the type of activities that were measured. However, there appear to be sex differences in the themes of pretend play. Girls often play domestic themes. Boys often play with rougher activities, for example superheroes. Also, the game of children appears to be influenced by the sex -role stereotypicality. Boys play less sophisticated with 'girl's toys' than with' boys' toys'. 

Imaginary companions

The ultimate in imagination in childhood play is perhaps the imaginary companion may follow the child around or must be fed when it is dinner time. About a quarter to half of the children have a form of imagined friend, especially if they are between 3 and 8 years old. These children often participate in a lot of sophisticated pretend play. Children are not confused about the imagined status of their friend and are aware that their imagined friend is different from their 'real' friends. 

Physical activity play

Despite the fact that there is a lot of game with objects, many games also contain physical activity, often without objects. In a review by Pellegrini and Smith, they suggested that there were three stages of development in the physical activities in play. First there were 'rhythmical stereotypes', these were physical movements, such as the baby who kicks with the legs. Then in the preschool period the 'exercise play' such as running, jumping and climbing. Finally, rougher play arises, mostly in later school years. 

Rough-and-tumble play

Rough-and-tumble play or play fighting involves wrestling, kicking, rolling on the ground and chasing. These activities are like real fighting and are often misinterpreted by teachers at school. This game is very common in preschool years and middle-childhood. Children like to pretend to fight, especially boys. It is characterized by laughter, restraint, taking turns and even handicaps (the stronger child does not win automatically). 

Functions of play

It has not yet become clear from research what the importance of play in development is. Most relevant studies have focused on game with objects. Smilansky argued that sociodramatic play was essential for normal development and that if a child was not good at this, an intervention would have to take place to make this form of play possible and stimulate. 

Is sociodramatic play important?

Smilansky had observed that children of immigrants did not show sociodramatic play and were also behind in language and cognitive skills. Other studies show similar findings for children with a disadvantaged background. This could be because their parents did not pretend to play at home and thus offered a non-stimulating environment to their children. However, it could also be that a non-stimulating environment leads to both poor playing skills and poorer language and cognitive skills. 

Play tutoring

Several studies have looked at the role of sociodramatic game for development. Smilansky and many other researchers found that it is possible to let children do better and more sociodramatic play by having preschool supervisors play such a game and stimulate this. In addition, they offered the children the necessary equipment to perform such a game. This is called play tutoring. Research showed that this had a positive influence on the development of the child. However, it is not clear whether this was due to the form of play. It seems more likely that the general stimulation by an adult was important. 

Less attention has been paid to physical play. Pellegrini and Smith have investigated evidence that physically active play is useful for developing muscle strength and endurance. It is not clear yet what the role is of, for example, roles and playing fighting of children, but it seems to contribute to their own strength and to their position in a dominance hierarchy. 

Social status and sociometry: the measurement of social relationships in the peer group

When children go to school, they mix in large groups of peers and social relationships are an important part of their life at that time. Some children are social and popular, others are lonely and others are not liked. Observation can become more clear about these relationships. For example, Clark observed school children and watched who played with whom and made sociograms. This is a visual representation of interpersonal relationships within a group. This diagram enables a person to quickly map and see the social structure in a group. This general technique is called sociometry. This is an image of the social structure in a group that originates from observation, a questionnaire or an interview. It can therefore be defined what a person's sociometric status is. That is a classification of children in popular, controversial, rejected, ignored or average. This classification depends on whether they score high or low on positive and negative nominations. Popular children scored high on 'nicest' and low on 'least fun'. Controversial children scored high on 'nicest' and 'least fun'. Ignored children scored low on 'nicest' and low on 'least fun'. Rejected children scored low on 'nicest' and high on 'least fun'. This model has been widely used in research into relationships with peers. 

A number of studies suggest potential problems for a child that is classified as rejected. In young children, poor social skills can lead to rejection by peers. Rejected children spent less time in cooperative play and social conversation than average or popular children and spent more time fighting: they also played in smaller groups and with younger or less popular children. If rejected children were between 11 and 13 years old, they often did less well at school. Ignored children were often motivated at school and were liked by teachers. Children can be found unkind and rejected for various reasons, but the most common reason seems to be that children are aggressive and disturbing. 

A social skills processing model

Children who are rejected may need help. The findings from research suggest that the rejected children do not have well-developed social skills. Dodge suggested that the social skills of interaction with peers can be seen as a model of exchange with five steps. When child A interacts with child B, these are the steps for child A: encoding the incoming information and perceiving what child B does, interpreting the information, searching for correct reactions, evaluating the possible reactions and selecting the best performing of that reaction. Child B reacts to child A in the same way. Based on this model, it is possible to find out whether rejected children miss skills on certain points of this model. There is some evidence for this. For example, aggressive children seem to misinterpret the behavior of other children and are more inclined to use an aggressive reaction. 

Different views on peer maladjustments and aggression

Not all behavior that is seen as badly adapted comes from a lack of social skills. Some rejected children respond only to the exclusion of the popular children and do not necessarily have to be rejected in other social situations. Aggressive children also appear to be quite good at manipulating others. 

Escaping from rejected status

Research has been conducted into factors that are involved in 'escaping' children from a rejected status for a period of two years. Important factors were the child's own perception of his or her social status, participation in extracurricular activities, the internal locus of control (the believe that oneself is responsible for one's own failures and successes) and parents' monitoring. 

Friendship

A related research area to sociometric status is friendship. However, it is not the same. Sociometric status refers to the general extent in which a person is liked or not liked by peers. Friendship refers to a close association between two or more children. Bonding and trust play a role in friendship - two psychological characteristics. Various phases of research have emerged regarding expectations from friendship. Children aged 6 to 8 see friendship as something that is based on the same activities, living close to each other and having the same expectations. Children aged 9 to 10 shared values, rules and sanctions. Children from 11 to 12 years looked at shared interests and based this on understanding and the extent to which they could be themselves with someone else. There seems to be a shift from physical to psychological ideas about friendship during this school period, where intimacy and devotion become more important in adolescence. 

Most children have friends. The question is whether having a friend or friends is important for certain aspects of healthy development and well-being. An American psychologist, Harry Stack Sullivan, argued that having at least one best friend was very important for pre-adolescent children and that without this friend the child would feel lonely and incompetent and had a low self-esteem. The child would also be more at risk of later misalignment and poorer mental health. 

What is special about friends?

To be able to name what is special about friendship, this should be compared with relationships and activities between non-friends. There are four major differences between these relationships. Friends play together more often, there is more reciprocity and intimacy in interactions, friends solve conflicts more often and help each other better in tasks where they have to work together. It is not easy to indicate that having friends is important for the development of the child. There appear to be three important outcomes in later life that are related to having friends. Children with few friends often drop out of school, are involved in crime, and are at risk for psychopathology in adulthood. There appears to be a connection between low acceptance by peers or having few friends and dropout at school and between aggression at school and crime at younger and later age. 

Sex differences in play and social behavior

Boys and girls differ in play and social behavior, especially during their school years. This starts at kindergarten. Observations in 2- to 4-year-old children show that boys prefer to play with blocks and vehicle toys and prefer to participate in activities that include motor activities such as throwing or kicking balls. Girls prefer to play with dolls or play household games. Many activities, however, do not show a gender preference at this age. 

From a young age, children tend to play with children of the same sex. Boys prefer to play outside and girls prefer to play indoors. Boys are more likely to playfully fight and to show aggressive behavior. Girls are often more empathetic and remain more focused on adults. 

Within the gender differences between boys and girls there are three major phenomena: segregation (the tendency of children to play with children of their own sex), differentiation (different interaction styles in boys and girls groups) and asymmetry (boys groups have more cohesive and more exclusionary). 

Explanations of sex differences

It seems almost certain that hormones affect the behavior. In the normal development of the foetus, sex hormones play a role and they ensure that boys become physically active and are interested in rougher games. However, biological factors are not entirely an explanation for the process of gender role identification and the variation in gender roles in different communities. Bandura stated that children are being cast into sex roles through adult behavior, especially that of teachers and parents. This social learning theory states that parents and others reward behavior that goes with the gender of the child. Ratification seems to have some effect, but several studies suggest that this does not explain everything. The cognitive development approach states that children are increasingly aware of their gender identity: the awareness of whether you are a boy or a girl. Children imitate people of the same sex because they seem to realize that this is what a child of their sex generally does. This is called self-socialization because it is not directly dependent on external reinforcement. 

Ethnicity

Besides differences in gender, people also differ in terms of race or ethnicity. Both are often clear physical features such as hair and skin color and facial features. In addition to the country of origin, another important difference is language and religion. When children are 4 or 5 years old they make a basic distinction, for example between black and white. And during the following years they make more complicated distinctions. For example, children of 8 or 9 years age understand that an ethnic identity does not change when someone gets older or clothes differently. Segregation based on race seems to be more common in girls than in boys, perhaps because boys play in larger groups. It also seems more apparent in older than younger children. Having preference for someone of a particular race is not the same as having prejudices. Racial prejudice describes a negative evaluation of someone due to their racial or ethnic identity. As children grow older, they often judge their own 'group' as more positive.

Prosocial tendencies, antisocial behavior and moral development in children - Chapter 15

The social life of infants mainly takes place within the family. This is because the communication skills are not yet developed enough to have good interactions and also the motor skills are not yet sufficient to go on their own. Children, on the other hand, have a complicated and diverse social world. For all social activities, thoughts, emotions and behaviors are needed that infants do not have, yet. 

What does prosocial and antisocial mean?

Social interactions have multiple goals. Many social interactions seem to be beneficial for others and not for the person who is social. Think of donations to charity or helping a stranger. Without these prosocial behaviors, a society would not be able to survive. 

It is difficult to indicate which behaviors are prosocial or anti-social. This can vary according to culture and also within a culture. Think of keeping the door open for a woman (by a man). This may be well-intended by the man, but it may also be his intention to emphasize hierarchy. 

This is why it is useful to look at the intention behind behavior. 

•        Prosocial : behavior intended to promote the well-being of others and this behavior has no instrumental advantages for the person who exhibits the behavior.

•        Antisocial : actions that are harmful to others and show scant concern about other people's feelings and needs. There is little morality associated with this behavior.

Antisocial and pro-social behaviors can also happen unconsciously. 

Continuity and transformation

Thoughts and emotions are constructs that are used to explain why social development is characterized by continuity and transformation. Continuity in behavior becomes clear when we look at a child who fights a lot with other children. This child will often be assessed as aggressive later on. There is therefore continuity in certain behaviors and this is because there are characteristic patterns of emotion, emotion regulation and cognition that are relatively stable. Transformation is clear when you look at the reasoning of a five-year-old and an adult. The cognitions change and  many social behaviors with it. 

Are prosocial and antisocial poles on the same dimension? 

Many factors that lead to prosocial behavior are also associated with antisocial behavior when they are performed in the opposite direction. Nevertheless, not every antisocial and prosocial behavior can be explained with the same processes. Prosocial behavior and antisocial behavior both have specific psychological processes. Research also shows that antisocial behavior has deeper genetic roots. 

The developmental trajectory of prosocial and antisocial behavior and thought

Toddlers

The social world of children is increasing. Young children also come into contact with sources of social information. For example, culturally relevant information about prosocial and antisocial behavior is transferred to school or via television. 

Children between two and three years clearly have character traits. These character traits are stable. Some findings from research are interesting for us: 

Children who scored high on open and relational aggression scored low on prosocial behavior. This finding corresponds to the dimensional perspective, whereby high scoring on one antisocial behavior means that you automatically score low on the other prosocial behavior. 

•        Adults and children can both see that there are individual differences in antisocial behavior.

•        Children who were judged highly on negative emotions (such as depression) scored high on aggression. This may mean that emotions and emotion regulation are important factors for understanding antisocial behavior.

•        Other research shows that antisocial behavior is connected to personality. Children who had a lack of control at age three were more likely to display antisocial behavior as adolescents.

Research also shows that children who were poorly controlled at the age of three scored high on measurements of stress reactions and low on the avoidance of adverse factors at the age 26. They also scored high on aggressiveness and on negative emotionality. This study looked at the Big Five Inventory (BFI): With the BFI it is possible to do a personality measurement based on five personality dimensions. The BFI assesses extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and openness to experience. 

The above studies state that antisocial and pro-social behaviors are opposites of the same dimension. The process that is related to this is emotion regulation. 

However, the study by Moffitt et al. (1996) shows that consistent antisocial behavior requires building blocks that are not part of the process that can lead to prosocial behavior. 

Extreme antosocial behavior and breaks in the continuum

This research distinguished two groups from each other. In the first group, boys showed antisocial behavior during childhood and during adolescence (chronic). In the second group, boys showed only antisocial behavior in adolescence. The difference between the groups was a neuropsychological deficit. The first group therefore had neuropsychological problems, which means that they have disorders in the brain. These disorders affect a person's behavior or cognitive functioning. Extremely antisocial behavior in childhood and adolescence is associated with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). ADHD does not involve brain damage, but there may be other neurochemical imbalances. Neurological deficits could therefore be the cause of antisocial behavior. 

These neurological deficits can not be fitted into a dimension with opposites. Imagine: on one side of the dimension there are neurological deficits, which results in antisocial behavior and on the other side of the dimension there is the absence of neurological deficits. That second pool could be almost anyone. Neurological deficits are therefore not useful in this dimension, a separate category is needed for people with neurological deficits. 

Research shows the following matching results: 

1. There is continuity in prosocial and antisocial behavior, especially in aggressive behavior. 

2. Antisocial behavior seems to be related to difficulties in regulating emotion, impulsivity and high levels of negative affect/influence.

3. A small percentage of boys who are consistently antisocial may have extremely difficult temperaments and neurological deficits. 

Middle childhood

When discussing the development of antisocial and prosocial behavior, the work of Piaget and Kohlberg must be mentioned. Piaget was the first to investigate the moral judgment of children in a systematic way. He had children judge moral dilemmas. The moral thinking of children turned out to be determined by unilateral respect for adults and the adult rules, without understanding reciprocity or intentions. As a result of aging and partly through interactions with peers, a morality of cooperation and social exchange is developed. In this way children learn that the intentions are important, that roles can be reversed and that moral conflicts have to be solved through discussion and making compromises. This happens around 10 years. 

The work of Piaget was the starting point for Kohlberg's research on moral judgment. He also used moral dilemmas to investigate moral reasoning. He found 5 stages (with a proposal on a sixth stage): 

1. Heteronomous morality : good and evil is determined by powerful adults (authority figures, such as the police). The intentions are not involved in the reasoning. 

2. Instrumental morality : children become aware that others have intentions and desires and that there are always two sides to an argument. 

3. Interpersonal normative morality : is characterized by emerging concerns about the perspectives of others about themselves. At this stage people want to be seen as good and they feel guilty if this is not the case. 

4. Social system morality : at this stage, individuals recognize that all members of a society have intentions and goals, but they understand that rules and laws are necessary to ensure that society can function. 

5. Human rights and social welfare morality : individuals use ethical principles to help with moral judgment. 

Stages 1 and 2 are characteristic of children, stage 3 is typical of adolescents and the morality from stage 4 is partly formed in adolescence. Stage 5 appears in adulthood, although it also rarely occurs there. 

Research shows that it does not prevent people from advancing 2 stages, so people go sequentially through the stages. Regression is very rare, so people do not go from stage 3 to 2. 

Common criticism towards the work of Piaget and Kohlberg is that the way they test does not give the right results, because people who have to answer a moral dilemma will show very different behavior in real life. The answers can therefore not be associated with actions. People often know in situations that they have acted morally incorrectly, but they have not behaved in accordance with it. How someone acts in a given situation has a lot to do with psychological and contextual factors and not with only one factor such as the moral stage. In addition, a moral stage says more about certain ways of thinking than that it says something about behavioral tendencies. Much research from the past 20 years has shown that the Kohlberg stages are not a good representation of social-cognitive development. 

Also, children seem to get a lot further in moral reasoning than stage 1, if you present them with moral dilemmas that are somewhat known to them (not the moral dilemmas about shoplifting and so on that Piaget and Kohlberg used). 

Recent research on moral reasoning in children shows 2 trends: 

1. Moral cognition is unconscious, automatically activated, so there are no consistent rules to be found 

2. These intuitions arise early and show little transformation in development. 

Many theorists now state that moral cognition is an evolutionary adaptation to the problems that life brings to a social group. 

Furthermore, recent research shows that not all social problems are morally reasoning. A distinction is made between moral and non-moral domains. 

And aggression, a form of antisocial behavior, could be best understood in terms of attribution (the belief one holds as to why people carry out a particular action or behavior). Aggressive children often have false hostile attributions. 

Kohlberg stated that his stages were universally applicable, not only in the US but also in other cultures. Research shows that this is not correct. For example, in India they rather consider higher powers during moral reasoning. 

Recent research also shows that moral reasoning is associated with personality. For example, some children can properly regulate their emotions and go through the stages more quickly and show less antisocial behavior. Emotion regulation therefore has a lot to do with moral reasoning. 

Social influences on prosocial and antisocial development

Until now, the focus of this chapter was on the psychological characteristics of children, such as personality traits, emotion regulation, moral reasoning, etc. However, these qualities are shaped by social influences. That is what we are going to talk about now. 

Development within relationships: parents and peers

Parents

Children show many psychological similarities with parents and brothers or sisters. Parents form their children through social interactions. They set an example and children will imitate this. It could also be that there is a genetic influence, but care must be taken with conclusions about this subject. There is a clear relationship between emotion regulation of parents and their children. For example, research shows that sympathetic parents also had sympathetic children. Democratic warm and supportive parents have children who are prosocial. 

Peers

Peers are important influences on the development of antisocial behavior. Friends attract children to delinquent activities. Many aggressive children are rejected by peers and rejection seems to increase aggression. Little is known about the influence of peers on prosocial behavior. Relationships with peers ensure that there is equal discussion about the solutions of moral problems. This is better than the parent-child relationship that does not produce an equal discussion. Negotiating and observing prosocial peers has a positive influence. 

Culture and development

Cultural context is very important for understanding prosocial and antisocial behavior. Adolescents in the US have a 2 times greater chance of experiencing violent murders than adolescents in Europe. However, in the US, the contribution to volunteering is much greater. This is therefore a cultural difference and has to do with cultural norms and the social context. 

The media (television in particular) is a form of cultural influence that has received a lot of attention. Children in the US watch a lot of TV, on average 3 hours a day. And there is a lot of anti-social behavior on TV. Children who watch a lot of TV are more aggressive. This has 3 reasons 

1. TV models are imitated by children. 

2. Violence on TV makes children insensitive to the danger of aggression, because a lot of danger on TV does not seem to have negative effects on innocent people. 

3. Violence on TV increases the fear of children that the world is dangerous. 

TV can also have a prosocial influence when for example cooperation is shown. TV thus has a very important influence.

Cognitive development in adolescence - Chapter 16

This chapter is about thinking in adolescence, because important and sometimes fundamental changes in thinking take place in this period. When it comes to 'adolescent thinking', it describes the process, the structure of the thought organization and the content. 

Perception and attention

Perception is one of the cognitive skills that develops earliest in life. In adolescence, perception develops further by becoming more flexible. An example of this is that two figures can be discovered in the 'ambiguous figure'. Adolescents can also assign attention sources, also called selective attention. After that, they can also focus on a specific topic when these attention sources are assigned. For example, if children and adolescents receive cards with animals and objects and they are asked to focus on the animals, then the adolescents are better able to concentrate solely on the animals. Children still focus on both. 

Memory

The memory of a young adult is undergoing rapid development in facial processing, so many years later, adolescents can recognize and name many people from the high school class. A lot of research has been done on this face processing. A proposal comes from the 'encoding switch hypothesis '; children would pay more attention to individual things and are more inclined to, for example, look at whether someone is wearing a hat, but when that hat is gone, they no longer recognize that person, this is called 'featural processing'. Adults look more to spatial layout of faces, this is 'configural processing' . 

Short-term memory

Short-term memory or working memory increases as a child gets older. A child of 5 years can remember between three and four items, while a 12-year-old can remember an average of 7 digits and 4/5 letters or words. Someone of 16 can remember more within the working memory. Such age-related improvements in immediate recall remain constant across varying retention intervals from 5 to 30 seconds of delay. 

An explanation for this could be that neurological changes provide the improved working memory. Investigating this, however, is difficult, because it may also be that children become more familiar with numbers and words, so that not the working memory is the explanation, but the improvement in math or language. 

Long-term memory

The long-term memory is more permanent than the short-term memory. It includes the following: representations of people one has met or events that have been experienced. But the long-term memory also ensures that people can learn to drive or learn to swim. Learning the multiplication tables at school is also possible because of the long-term memory. The absolute capacity of the long-term memory does not change much over the years, but there are other characteristics that change. Processing speed: an important type of development is the processing speed. Older children can retrieve information from the long-term memory faster than young children. 

Memory strategies

Differences between children and adolescents can also be seen in the types of strategies that are used to remember information. When a child and an adolescent are asked to remember a series of numbers (3-6-5-2-5-1-1), the child will use the 'rehearsal strategy' (repeat or exercise strategy) an adolescent can realize that the first three digits are the number of days in a year. That the next two figures are a quarter of 100 and that the last figures stand for a football team. Then there are only three digits to remember instead of seven (= elaboration strategy ). This last form is more efficient. Another form of elaboration/expansion is an organizational strategy. Groups are clustered, making it easier to remember (= cluster effect ). Older children and adolescents become skilled in remembering chaotic information. 

Intelligence

There is still no consensus on how intelligence should be defined. In general, the following is stated: intelligence is the underlying potential for individuals to understand the world around them and to function successfully in that world. Measurements of intelligence are often obtained through intelligence tests. A widely used test is Wechslers' Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC; Wechsler, 1991). This test is suitable for children between 6 and 16 years and gives a verbal and performance IQ. There are three main characteristics in the general intelligence of adolescents: 

1. The performance of adolescents on the subscales of the WISC is much better than that of children under ten years of age. 

2. There are differences in the speed with which adolescents develop intellectual skills. This goes faster in some areas (such as: vocabulary, coding). Other areas develop less quickly after a period of rapid development between 6 and 10 years (such as: mazes that indicate the learning speed). 

3. A certain IQ of an adolescent is relatively stable and does not change much with the years. IQ is the abbreviation for intelligence quotient. The rapid development in certain areas does not result in a higher IQ, because IQ is based on age norms. IQ only says something compared to its own age group. However, the IQ of children is not stable. 

There are researchers who claim that the stability of intelligence in adults depends on the type of intelligence being measured. Horn et al., 1981 examined fluid and crystallized intelligence. Fluid intelligence describes the ability to think and reason in an abstract way. This is measured with tests that are culture-free. Crystallized intelligence refers to storing information, skills and strategies obtained through education and prior experience. Fluid intelligence decreases while crystallized intelligence increases. In the WISC, crystallized intelligence is measured. 

The IQ increases by 3 points every decade. So children of today who would do the same test 30 years ago would score 9 points higher with the same criteria. There are thus intergenerational IQ increases. This is called the Flynn effect and is caused by environmental factors. 

Reasoning

Reasoning can be defined as mental processes with which we draw conclusions based on known information. Much reasoning is deductive or inductive. Deductive reasoning: the outcome of a specific example is based on a general principle. So specific conclusions are drawn from generalities. Inductive reasoning: is using specific examples to extract generalities. Deductive reasons can be explained on the basis of a syllogism. A syllogism consists of two statements and a conclusion drawn from these claims. For example: argument 1: all cows can fly and argument 2: Bertha is a cow, the conclusion is then: Bertha can fly. 

An example of inductive reasoning is: one hears that Bertha, Mabel and Trudy are cows that can fly. These are also the only cows that live on the Kees farm. It follows that all cows can fly on the Kees farm. Piaget argued that truly deductive and inductive reasoning can only take place when the stage of formal operations is reached. At this stage, adults can reason reliably, according to Piaget. However, there is a lot of research that claims otherwise. Example: A syllogism can consist of universal quantifiers and particular quantifiers. With a universal quantifier the word 'all' is used and with particular quantifiers the word 'some' is used. The arguments of a syllogism can also be positive and negative. It is easier to draw conclusions from the universal than the particular quantifiers . All shapes are used in the following example: 

argument 1: All C's are B's 

argument 2: All B's are A's 

conclusion 1: All A's are C's 

conclusion 2: Some A's are C's 

Conclusion 2 is valid, but many adult participants in research opt for conclusion 1. 

Analogical reasoning

Another type of reasoning is reasoning with analogy. Analogical reasoning is solving a problem by comparing it with a similar problem that has already been solved. 

Second order analogy is an analogy that requires the use of crystallized intelligence. In order to make the connections, one must be able to derive a relationship that is not inherent within the analogy. 

Formal operational thinking

Piaget stated that formal operational thinking is the highest level of cognition. This is also the last stage of development. It is very similar to the concrete stage of operations that children have, as described in chapter 9. 

The difference between children and adolescents is that: 

•        Adolescents can better think abstract. Adolescents can use one rule (the abstract, general and contentless operation) to solve many tasks. Interpropositional thinking = the individual is able to relate one or more parts of a proposition to another part to arrive at a solution to a problem (formal operational thinking). Intrapropositional thinking = includes concrete content rather than abstract symbols (concrete operational thinking).

•        Adolescents view reality as one of the many possibilities. Children are precisely earth-bound, concrete and practical.

•        Adolescents are apprentice scientist; they can generate theories and come up with hypotheses. This is also called hypothetico-deductive reasoning. This is the ability to develop theories to explain certain phenomena, to generate hypotheses based on these theories and to devise systematic tests to accept or reject these hypotheses.

Scientific problems

Two tests show that children are not yet fully developed. 

•        the balance scale problem : children think too one-sidedly.

•        The pendulum problem : children tried a number of combinations, in a random and non-systematic way. Adults proceeded systematically and isolated the important factors.

Controversies about Piaget's theory and research regarding formal operational thinking

Do all adolescents reach this stage?

Piaget's research seems to exaggerate the formal operational thinking of adolescents, because later research shows different outcomes. Piaget states that formal operational thinking is the last level of cognitive development. However, research shows that many adults do not reach this level and development continues throughout adulthood. Piaget also argued that formal operational thinking is being constructed by the adult himself and a tiny bit by cultural and educational experiences. Research shows that training does matter. It also appears that there are cross-generational gains. 

Beyond Piaget's theory?

Despite contradictory research, Piaget has contributed to research on the cognitive development of adolescents. Many people have been inspired by him to also do research on this subject. 

A post-Piaget approach is the information processing approach. The computer is used as a metaphor for describing cognitive processes. Here adolescent thinking is seen as a process of obtaining information from the environment, storing information in the short and long-term memory systems and using different rules and strategies to manipulate information. More and more complex rules are used when children grow older. Another part of research states that children and adolescents are intuitive scientists, where children are naive. In this approach children and adolescents are able to construct theories and conduct experiments to check whether the theories are correct. 

Three common mistakes in the use of intuitive theories by children and adolescents: 

1. They can not separate theory and evidence properly. They do not understand what evidence is needed to confirm/debunk a theory and they mainly search for supporting evidence. This happens especially in older children and adolescents, if they have a favorite theory and there are already possible explanations. 

2. They mainly use evidence that confirms the theories instead of debugging them. They can not let go of a theory so that they can find evidence to the contrary. If they find evidence to the contrary, they ignore it or disprove it. They are too attached to their own theory, so blind to other theories. 

3. Children and adolescents need a credible alternative theory to believe the contradiction of the existing theory. 

Five important characteristics of the development of adolescent thinking: 

1. Thought in childhood is concrete and in the here-and-now, while adolescent thinking emphasizes the world of possibilities. 

2. In adolescence, the skill arises to systematically test hypotheses. 

3. They can plan in the future. 

4. They can think about their own thinking (meta-cognition) 

5. The content of adolescent thinking includes: social, moral, political and personal issues. 

Social development - Chapter 17

Adolescence is a time of action and movement which is characterized by 'newness' and change. Social and personality development in adolescence is multifaceted and dynamic. 

Key characteristics of development

Social development in adolescence has three important characteristics. These are growth, differentiation and synthesis. With growth it is meant that adolescents develop new skills and concepts, they experience new emotions and start to function in a large number of social domains. Their social worlds are being enlarged. Differentiation refers to the number of activities, behaviors, skills, social contacts, ideas and emotions that become greater or different from those in childhood. This diversity must be brought together. Synthesis is important here. By synthesis it is meant that adolescents must synthesize this novelty into an understandable and coherent view of the world. 

There are also certain goals for adolescents who must be reached for adulthood: (1) being autonomous and emotionally regulated (2) having a sense of identity (3) being able to form close relationships with peers of the same and the opposite sex . 

These developments take place within five domains: the social environment, puberty, the family, the peer group and the self.

G. Stanley Hall: adolescence as storm and stress

The statement by G. Stanley Hall that adolescence is a time of storm and stress dominates the study of adolescence development. According to this theory, human development is divided into sequences according to the evolutionary timeline. Each individual follows the development of their species (phylogeny) in their own personal growth (ontogeny). Human development goes through the evolutionary stages through which the human species has gone (recapitulation). 

Adolescence as a second birth

Hall states that adolescence is a period in which the recapitulative instincts of childhood are replaced by newly acquired characteristics. The notion of Hall that adolescence means stress and storm is not the case for everyone. 

The adolescent social environment: Kurt Lewin

Field theory and the concept of life space

Kurt Lewin is a social scientist. His ideas came together in field theory: the assumption that behavior (B) is a function (F) of an interaction between a person (P) and his/her environment (E), or B = F (P, E). Behavior can thus be predicted by the interactions between the individual and the environment. The Lewinian environment is a psychological environment that has certain structural and dynamic characteristics. The structure of the environment is made up of areas that correspond approximately to physical areas and objects (the house), social entities (family, religious affinities), and even concepts such as abstract art and morality. The areas can be severely separated or just overlap. The areas within the environment have attractive or negative properties, these ensure movement within the environment (= locomotion).

Conflicts arise (according to Lewin) when (1) different goals compete for someone 's locomotion and (2) have positive and negative characteristics as targets, for example a positive job far away, so that you are negatively separated from your partner. 

The development of life space

Just like the environment, a person is divided into areas that are separated by more or less permeable boundaries, which correspond to the characteristics, needs and perceptions of the environment. By making a specific area active, boundaries, paths and goals are changed. The environment and the area are always changing, it is a dynamic exchange between a person and the environment (= lifespace). 

When someone gets older, there are more geographical and social areas and the boundaries become less permeable. The locomotion increases and familiar areas change (the body for example). 

Time allocation patterns

The activities of adolescents are logically required/necessary or voluntarily and in leisure time. Research shows that adolescents are first engaged in solitary activities and then engage in interaction with peers, sports activities and family activities. What adolescents do with their free time can have important consequences for development. Activities in the leisure time provide autonomy and help against boredom, which means fewer drugs may be used. 

Gender differences in time allocation

Using time allocation surveys , Bruno studied adolescent time usage by dividing a 24-hour span into four categories: 

1. Outer-directed time: time intended to achieve external goals, such as career-related goals. 

2. Other-people directed time: developing friendships and popularity 

3. Inner-directed time: to promote self-development 

4. non-directed time: meant for entertainment and relaxation 

There are differences in how males and females divide their time. American adolescent boys and girls in 1996 spent most of their time on outer-directed activities, followed by other-directed, then inner-directed and finally non-directed activities. However, girls spent more time on other-directed activities than boys and less on non-directed than boys. Girls spend more time on social activities. And boys invest more time in passive entertainment. 

Race differences in time allocation

There are also cross-cultural differences in the distribution of time. French people spend the most time on necessary activities and Norwegians least. The average free time is 4.43 hours per day, with Norwegians the most and French the least. Watching TV was the most popular activity in non-directed time. There are many factors that influence how adolescents spend their non-directed time, such as age, gender, race, geographical and individual characteristics. Girls do more social and non-competitive activities, while boys are more on the computer and do more competitive sports. There is also a difference between black and white teenagers. Black teens attach more value to basketball and shopping, while white teenagers attach more value to football and tennis. However, there have also similarities been found between white and black teenagers in, for example, TV watching and reading. Black teenagers showed less gender differences. Of course, more and more time is spent on digital activities. 

Puberty and psychological development: the work of Anna Freud

Anna Freud is the daughter of Sigmund Freud and was convinced that a good mix between education and psychoanalysis 'promised to create happier children, and thus, a happier world'. Anna and her friend Dorothy Burlingham set up a school with a broad schedule to increase the imagination of children. Anna took the role of the teacher, analyst and mentor. These observations formed the foundation for her later esteemed work: The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense. 

The ego, defence mechanisms and libidal forces

Anna Freud was particularly interested in the processes of the ego, the part of the psyche that deals with: directing action, coping with the external world and the integration of competitive drives within the self. According to Anna, the understanding of defense mechanisms (which are meant to protect the ego against harmful thoughts and feelings associated with the primary drives) provides insight into human motivation and allows the analyst to assess different levels of psychological adjustment. Therefore, by looking at the way someone protects himself against his primary instincts, ego maturity and integrity can be assessed, so that normative and pathological phenomena can be better understood. The biggest challenge is to synchronize the biological with the social environment. 

Anna describes puberty as an invasion of libido, so that instincts become important and the integrity of the ego is threatened. These are all problems surrounding the Oedipus complex that has not yet been fully resolved. Adolescents may therefore find themselves turn away from their parents and focus on new objects of love, such as celebrities. 

Timing of puberty

Research has not yet been able to confirm the hypothesis of Anna Freud. Research shows that puberty is not necessarily related to emotional and behavioral changes. The timing of puberty is, according to research, related to behavioral changes, but not puberty itself. This timing differs for boys and girls, because the effect of puberty depends on when puberty starts. 

The family and adolescence: the work of Peter Blos

Blos believed that human development is the result of transitions through sequentially ordered psychosexual stages. The successful completion of the tasks that belong to each stage is a prerequisite for healthy development. According to Blos, adolescence is of great importance for developing into an adult. He divided puberty into several stages. For example, early adolescence is characterized by a strong urge to be independent of parents, but also the desire to remain dependent. 

How do adolescents get a sense of autonomy? Research shows that gaining autonomy is not a process of separating the family, but rather of reorganizing or transforming relationships within the family. 

The ability of the adolescent to become autonomous depends on the family environment. The theoretical framework of Diana Baumrind is most useful in this context. She states that there are two important dimensions of parental behavior towards the child: 

•        Parental responsiveness: the extent to which parents respond to the needs of the child in a supportive and accepting way.

•        Parental demandingness: the extent to which parents expect mature and responsible behavior.

These two dimensions can score high or low, so that four parenting styles can be formed from the two dimensions above:

•        Autoritative parenting: parents who score high on responsiveness and demandingness. They set clear standards of behavior for their children. These parents are warm and respond to the needs of their children.

•        Authoritarian parenting: parents who score low on responsiveness and high on demandingness. They place great value on obedience and stand behind compulsive punishments. They are not of giving and taking about discipline-related problems

•        Indulgent parenting: score high on responsiveness, but low on demandability. They talk passively with their children and avoid the use of power when they have to discipline.

•        Neglectful parenting: parents who score low on responsiveness and on demandingness. They try to spend minimal time on their child / upbringing.

These parenting styles are associated with a number of important issues in psychosocial development. Many studies state that the authoritative parenting style ensures the most healthy development in adolescence. This parenting style provides structure and autonomy support. 

Peer relations: the ideas of Harry Stack Sullivan

According to Harry Stack Sullivan, social interactions are more important for human development and behavior than intrapsychic processes (which, according to Freud, are more important). The motivation to fulfill interpersonal needs ensures that psychological growth is stimulated. Every period in life, according to Sullivan, has interpersonal needs, and that need can be fulfilled by specific relationships. 

Subperiods of adolescence

Sullivan makes a difference in preadolescence, early adolescence and late adolescence. During preadolescence, individuals have a need for intimacy with peers. For the first time in their lives, adolescents in this period are looking for an equal relationship with peers with the same status and same sex. During early adolescence, extra attention is given to the opposite sex, through genital sexuality and the beginning of puberty. Late adolescence and adulthood are characterized by the further development of the relationship with the partner. 

Indeed, research shows that friendships are very important for the welfare of people. There is less anxiety and depression among people who have good friendships. 

In addition to changes in friendship, there are also changes in the structure of the group of peers. The group of peers that adolescents deal with are often much smaller and are part of a large entity (for example: gothics ). These small groups make it difficult to have contact with peers outside these groups. Being a "member" of a group can improve or limit development (think of groups, where many drugs are used). 

Peer relationships and social media

Instantaneous messaging, status updates and social networking - grouped together as social media - have vastly altered the way that adolescents interact with each other, how they show themselves off to their peers, how they learn about others, and how they establish connections with them. A recent review revealed that use of social media affects adolescents' social emotional experiences. For example, social media was found to have a positive impact on loneliness, intimacy and relationship maintenance. Cyberbullying is typically defined as aggression in an electronic environment that is intentionally and repeatedly carried out against a person who has trouble defending him- or herself. A recent study identified cybervictimisation, traditional bullying and traditional victimisation as the strongest risk factors of cyberbullying; empathy, school climate and school safety as the strongest protective factors; and drug and alcohol use, anxiety and depression as the strongest related outcomes.

Romantic relationships

Furman and Wehner state that parent-child relationships and friendships with peers are very important for having a healthy relationship. Adolescents are thus shaped by their experiences across different types of close relationships. Furman and Wehner also state that romantic relationships ensure the activation of four behavioral systems: attachment, caregiving, affiliation and sexual systems. It is only late in adolescence that these four systems are integrated into the relationship as they typically only occur in the development of long-term, stable romantic relationships. 

Brown's model of romantic development:

Specific functions for and motives of romantic relationships transform with time. Brown stated that there are four romantic functions from a development-contextual perspective (these are also stages through which the adolescent goes) (1) initiation phase (2) status phase (3) affection phase (4) bonding phase. 

During the initiation phase, young adolescents need to negotiate their sexual needs within the context of larger identity needs. Romance in adolescence is first and foremost an identity problem, because these sexual needs must be met, but also acceptance by peers. At that moment, romanticism is more of an exploration of one's own identity. In the status phase, adolescents become aware that a relationship has something public and it becomes a means for reputation management. In the affection phase the focus is much less on the context of the relationship and much more on the relationship itself. During the bonding phase, plans are being made for the future. 

Connolly and Goldberg's model of romantic development 

Connolly and Goldberg have also designed a model where there are stages of romantic growth (1) infatuation (2) affiliation (3) intimacy (4) commitment. 

During the first phase ( infatuation or falling in love) the first sparks of romantic interest become clear. During the affiliation phase, the romantic interest phase becomes manifest. During that phase, mixed-sex peer groups emerge and romantic relations are usually negotiated within the confines of the group. The intimacy phase is characterized by the emergence of dyadic romantic relationship, while the importance of the mixed peer group decreases. The final phase is characterized by commitmen . We think about the future and there is a socially recognized partnership. 

Erik Erikson and the development of identity in adolescence

Erikson was strongly influenced by classical psychoanalysis. Like Freud, he thought that all living things would grow in response to a design plan of psychological development. This belief is also called the epigenetic principle: parts of an organism develop in a sequential order, each part having its own start time. According to Erikson, the ego also develops like that. In other words, the ego has ego forces and (the separate parts) have a sequential sequence, i.e. stages, which have to be completely for a healthy ego. Each stage has a specific task that needs to be accomplished. 

There is a lot of identity confusion in adolescence, which goes together with experimenting etc. Adolescents wonder who they are and hold different beliefs and ideologies. This search period is also called the moratorium period. This is a period in the life of an individual, in which this individual identifies with different values, beliefs and thoughts need to be reconciled with the self. 

Research into identity in adolescence can be found within two different domains 

•        One domain deals with the identity formation (research has shown that the identity changes in adolescence, but the conditions in which that happens are unknown)

•        The other domain deals with the self-concept (the self changes in content and structure)

Educational implications - Chapter 18

Most developmental psychologists agree that the task of developmental psychologists is twofold: 

1. To give a good description of the changes in development that take place from childhood to adulthood. 

2. And to give logical theoretical explanations for the causes of these changes. 

In this way we can make a schedule for children that matches their developments. 

The relationship between teachers and psychologists must be viewed bidirectionally, because teachers can learn from psychologists, and vice versa. 

Child-centred psychology and education

Preschoolers go to school in a very child-friendly context: small tables and chairs in a row, with the children's drawings on the wall. This context is in line with Piaget's ideas: a child must be an active participant in the learning process, i.e. discovery learning which describes learning through play and became widespread in educational practice. 

Social interaction, learning and development

Piaget stated that social interaction is very important. Not only for encouraging learning, but also as a cause of development. According to Piaget, the primary intellectual deficit of the preoperational child is that the child can not see alternative perspectives than that of him- or herself. This egocentrism can disappear through interaction with peers. Adults can not help with that, because the difference in status and intellect is too big. 

The effects of peer interaction

Peers can cause a sociocognitive conflict. This conflict is the result of interaction, where for example two peers have a different understanding of a mathematical problem. 

Working in pairs can promote performance on Piagetian tasks

Working in pairs can improve the skills of Piagetan tasks. Research is done accompanied by the perspective taking task and conservation task. In the perspective taking task, photos of mountains are put down in a certain way for the child and the child is asked to show what the mountains would look like from a different perspective. Children often show their own perspective. According to Piaget, this can therefore be seen as egocentricity of preoperational children. A more modern version of this task allows children to work together. When a self-centered child is coupled with a child who can take better alternative perspectives, this works best (peer facilitation effects). 

In the conservation task of Piaget a liquid is poured into a vase with a different shape. Pre-operational children who are not good at the task (non-conserving) will say that the amount of fluid changes. Collaboration also ensures development in the thinking of children. These positive effects of working with peers are persistent. The effect of peers when children are older is mainly measured by means of computer tasks. Think of the Hanoi Tower. Here, too, it has a positive effect to cooperate with peers. However, gender differences have been found with respect to computer tasks. Girls are less good at computer tasks, so they have a backlog from the beginning. Girls also find the computer tasks less fun. Finally, collaborative learning describes any learning that occurs when two or more people work together on a problem.

What is effective teaching?

Vygotsky's theory

Research should focus more on the process of teaching and learning. However, research inspired by Piaget does not focus on this. Piaget concentrated on mental processes on an individual level. Vygotsky mainly deals with the social nature of learning and the co-construction of knowledge and understanding. According to Vygotsky, knowledge exists intermentally between persons before it can be intramental. 

The zone of proximal development and scaffolding

The zone of proximal development (ZPD) is the distance between the level of actual development (measured by individual problem solving) and the level of potential development (seen by controlling parents or cooperating with peers). This definition of the zone of close development of Vygotsky involves two implications. The first is that learning with help from the environment is seen as a normal but also important part of the development, because the child acquires these behaviors through practice. Secondly, it shows that teaching can be made more effective by applying this concept. This can be done by focusing on the aspects in which the child is actively developing. There is also scaffolding which refers to how parents structure and simplify the children's environment to ensure that children can learn. 

What makes effective scaffolding?

The aforementioned concepts are therefore closely connected: When parents use scaffolding, this means that they have properly understood what the child's immediate development zone is. David Wood has conducted research to see if parents can adequately teach their children things in this way. In a task that was designed so that the children in the study could not perform it without the help of their mothers (building up a pyramid) this was investigated. It turned out that there are five categories to be distinguished from the behavior of the mother when they teach their child: 1. General verbal prompts (now you make something). The mother acknowledges that the child must take action but does not specify it. 2. Specific verbal insructions (Take 4 blocks). Specific actions that the child has to take. 3. Indicates materials . 4. Arranging the material to help the child. 5. The actual fastening of the material. 

Level 1involves a very little level of maternal control and level 5 total control. Wood found that it was important that if the child fails to complete an action, the mother should carry out more control. This is the first rule of Wood. The second rule is that when a child is successful, the mother must reduce control. When this rule was applied, the children also scored better. So an effective way of learning leads to effective learning. Here the condition is established that the parent estimates the level properly. The idea of ​​Wood is approached critically by others. For example, it states that this approach minimizes the role of the child and it assumes that the parent takes control. The role of the child should not be underestimated. 

Are children effective teachers?

Children can also show aspects of scaffolding when dealing with peers who are less advanced in development than they are themselves. In a condition where one of the children is the expert and the other is the student it has been found that when 5-year-olds who had little experience of playing with lego and were linked to a child who had a lot of experience with this, they could accomplish difficult construction tasks together in comparison children who were of the same level. Other studies have confirmed these results and added that it is important that the children exchange ideas when they work together. 

These findings can be used in education by dividing the children into groups where some children are just further in development than others. It must also be ensured that these children do not take too much control when scaffolding so that the other child can benefit. Although peers are good teachers, it appears that parents provide better quality and quantity of verbal information during scaffolding . 

Implications for educational practice 

Robert Slavin has developed a method called Student Teams Achievement Division (STAD): the children must work in small groups that consist of children with different learning abilities, gender and ethnic backgrounds. They get a subject from the teacher and discuss this until everyone in the group agrees that everyone understands it completely. Research shows that children taking part in this form of learning are more successful than other children. 

Another example of how Vygotsky's ideas are used in practice is reciprocal teaching. This is often done with children who can read well, but have trouble understanding the text. The teacher must introduce strategies that increase the child's understanding of the subject (i.e. ask relevant questions or make predictions about what will happen in a story). The children must take more and more responsibility and also take on the role of teacher. It is very important that the teacher offers the right level. 

A difficulty in using the zone of proximal development and a reason that it is important to approach on the good level of the child. In a class it requires too much of the teacher to do this with all children in all situations. 

Psychology, schools and educational innovation

The above theories also bring many implications for the assessment of children. Many changes have been made worldwide in recent years, often focusing on the curriculum and not on the individual child. This is also the case in the United Kingdom where a distinction is made between certain fundamental subjects and core subjects. Furthermore, so-called attainment targets have been set up (final objectives). The children must achieve certain goals in certain important phases. 

Assessing children's learning

Two crucial aspects of assessment procedures introduced by the national curriculum in the UK. For example, children aged 7 are required to be assessed after only two or three years of education. The method of testing was different from the standard way of testing: most school tests have been standardized. This means that they give a measurement of the performance of the child compared to other children. In the introduction of the National curriculum, however, criterion tests were introduced, in which the performance of a child is measured in comparison with a certain criterion. In this case, a certain final goal. This makes it possible to see where the child stands. This form of formative testing shows teachers how to focus their attention. 

This new way of testing has received a lot of criticism, because it puts a lot of pressure on these children. These tests also assume that children go through the same chronological development at the same time. However, this does not have to be the case. 

As a result, other tests have been developed that are stirring up a lot of discussion at the moment. The first is single-level testing focused on personalized assessment. Children are not assessed at fixed times, but only when they are ready to reach a certain level. The second alternative is dynamic assessment. This method of testing is based on Vygotsky and makes a measurement of the dynamic potential of the child for learning, corresponding to his/her zone of proximal development. This method of testing gives the teacher the opportunity to focus more on  the zone of proximity development of the child.

Risk and resilience in development- Chapter 19

Risk is defined as the stressors that have a proven or assumed effect on the increasing likelihood of poor adjustment in children, such as poverty, abuse, and families that fall apart. 

Resilience occurs when children experience positive outcomes despite a high risk. For resilience there must be two conditions met: exposure to a threat or severe adversity and achieving a positive adjustment. Resilience is therefore a developmental process. 

Historical background

The beginning of the use of resilience in research can be found in research into persons with psychopathology. Here the research of Norman Garmezy and his colleagues is very important (1940-1950). When he wanted to investigate how the children of parents who had a severe mental disorder were doing, it turned out that they were doing very well. After this he started to investigate the competence of children. Also a study in Hawaii involving the population of children who had more than 4 risk factors, such as poverty showed that they were doing well in their development and they had no psychological problems. This group therefore had more resources, such as a good temperament and positive parenting to develop well. Studies such as the one just mentioned changed the view on psychopathology that was first deterministic. 

Risk factors

Risk factors include catastrophic events such as war, natural disasters, family counterfeiting such as grief and separation and economic situations, such as poverty and exposure to a negative environment, such as poor neighborhoods. Risk factors are a threat because the child is disadvantaged in the areas of basic needs such as physical livelihood and protection, emotional security and attachment, and social interactions. The risks that a child is exposed to also vary per age. Young children are still very dependent on others and are therefore more susceptible to setbacks. However, it is less likely that these children suffer from risks in their social environment, because they can not yet understand this. For adolescents, however, this is a big risk, because they do understand. 

Parental bereavement

The death of a parent is one of the most traumatic events for a child. This represents a permanent loss and separation of a primary caregiver. This can be aggravated by additional stressors such as family restructuring, new expectations of the child's behavior, grief of the parents and remembrance of the death of the parents. Yet the effects are smaller than when the parents divorce. 

Parental separation/ divorce and inter-parental conflict

Separation increases the risk of psychological, behavioral, social and academical problems. Research shows that children who grow up in single-parent families are less successful than children from two-parent families. The risks are greatest for children of divorced parents where there is a lot of conflict, the loss of contact with one parent, problems with the mental health of parents, less economic stability, and parents who enter into multiple other marriages or relationships. Although the intensity of these problems decreases, the problems remain visible until young adulthood. There is also the intergenerational circle of difficulties in relationships with others. This means that children of divorced parents are more likely to have problems with family, in intimate relationships, in their marriage and at work.These children divorce more often, they are less satisfied with their lives and their well-being is lower. However, this does not apply to all children of divorced parents. Resilience plays a major role in this. 

Abuse and maltreatment

Abused children show little resilience because their environment deviates so much from children with normal development. Mistreatment also often occurs together with other risk factors, such as many conflicts between parents, psychopathology of the parents, drug abuse of parents and poverty. The lack of protective factors makes the case more difficult. The older the children are and the shorter the abuse has been, the more resilience. 

Parental psychological disturbances

Mental health problems and drugs/alcohol abuse are also linked to different behavioral, socioemotional and cognitive problems in children. Many of these children have double risks, because there are other problems such as financial problems, stressful events and psychological problems. 

Many of the studies on psychological problems in parents have focused on mother depression, because it is more common in women. Findings show that children of these mothers are more at risk for difficulties. For example, the risk is also much greater to develop a depression in children whose parents were also depressive, than children who did not have depressive parents. Here, the non-genetic characteristics are better predictors. The behavior of the parents and what they convey to the children is therefore the most important. Little is known about heredity. Furthermore, parenting behavior appears to be very important. For example, depressive mothers show more negative and hostile behaviors, less positive behaviors and more disregard to their children. 

Socioeconomic risks

Child income poverty occurs when children grow up in a family whose income is below the level that is required to pay the minimum for basic expenses. This creates an increased risk of negative outcomes for the child. For example, poverty has serious effects such as poor physical health, lower academic performance and school performance. They are also more likely to have social emotional and behavioral problems. Here, too, the younger the child is, the worse the consequences. 

Another area that has been studied a lot is a low socio-economic status of parents and low-educated parents. There is a lower education and larger family risk factors, because there is less expertise and attention. Furthermore, it appears that the effects of low-educated parents and parents with a low income differ from the outcomes of the child. 

Stressful life events 

There are many events that are experienced as stressful. This can be a moving to another place, but also daily irritating and unpleasant events. This has the most effect on the parents, but these events can also affect the well-being of children. It turns out that these events can lead to emotional problems. For example, it appeared that girls who experienced more stressful events had more psychological problems such as depression. Furthermore, it appeared that these high levels of stress also had physical consequences. It turned out that the bodies of children who had a lot of stress during their early childhood had more difficulty with responding adequately to stress. 

Children's social context

Children living in poor neighborhoods are more at risk of experiencing difficult circumstances. They often live in homes that are insufficient, have less access to good schools and other social resources and are more often exposed to delinquent peers and multiple violent events. It turned out in America that these children ran the risk of internalizing behaviore problems (delinquent avtivities, aggression and hyperactivity). A British study, on the other hand, showed that both the neighborhood and the family were predictors of externalizing problems. 

Societal mechanisms 

The larger social context is also very important. This can include discrimination, racism and prejudices that can negatively affect the lives of children. Racism and ethnic discrimination are linked to less perceived control, fear and frustration. It also appears that teachers often have lower expectations on these children. This could explain the under-performance of children from an ethnic minority. 

Catastrophic events

This could include war, extreme deprivation and natural disasters. Children are often unable to see the consequences of such catastrophes. This could include losing loved ones and witnessing atrocities. However, these children can lead normal lives when placed in other environments. 

Measurement of risk

The investigation of risk factors has been moved from separate factors to the investigation of several factors at the same time, because these risk factors are often clustered. The study of risk factors differs from the investigation into possible causes, because it is more probabilistic rather than deterministic. Furthermore, it turned out that one risk factor does not in itself cause major problems: it is more a history of risk factors that cause difficulties. 

Risk accumulation

Cumulative risk models have been developed to investigate multiple risk factors. In the model of Michael Rutter, individual characteristics and the quality of the environment are combined. Each risk factor is classified in one of these groups and it is checked whether a risk factor is present or absent. This leads to the cumulative risk theory which states that the sum of risk factors instead of a single risk factor leads to dysfunction, because it overwhelms the adaptive qualities of an individual. It is therefore also stated that one risk factor is not more important than the other. Here too, the amount of risk factors is more important than how heavily one risk factor weighs. 

Research shows that the more risk factors there are, the worse the development outcomes. From a study by Rutter in which he looked at the risk factors of marital distress, low socio-economic status, large family, criminality of the parents, psychiatric disorder of the mother and placement of the child in foster care, it appears that not one individual risk factor deteermines the outcomes for the children but the sum of risk factors does. The amount of risk factors also predicted a diagnosis of a disorder. 

Also in a study by Sameroff, which looked at ten risk factors, they found that the more risk factors there are, the worse the cognitive and mental health outcomes. The children with more risk factors were more often absent from school, they scored lower at school and they often had a lower IQ. The difference between the children with and without the risk factors also appeared to increase over time. 

Risk specificity

A disadvantage of the cumulative approach is that it assumes that each risk factor weighs just as much and that they can be compared. Although the sum of risk factors outweighs one risk factor, the impact of different risk factors is different. The question whether the quality or quantity of risk factors is most important for children was also investigated by Sameroff et al. They concluded that quantity was the most important when predicting outcomes for children and that the combination of risk factors did not matter. Another study used the Strengths and difficulties questionaire (SDQ) to see what weighed heavier. Here too it was found that the amount of risk factors was more important than the individual type of risk factors. During this study also the adverse life events scale was used that measures stress. The same result came from this measurement. Other studies have found the same results: the number of risk factors outweighs individual risk factors. 

Equifinality and mulitifinality

Further research has proven that one particular risk factor can lead to multiple outcomes for the child. This is called multifinality. The outcome for a child can be influenced by several risk factors. This is called equifinality . 

Levels of risks

Research has shown that the amount of emotional and behavioral problems differed per neighborhood in which the children lived. Many of these differences could be explained by the socio-economic status of the neighborhoods: the lower the socio-economic status, the more problems. However, when it was checked for socioeconomic status, it turned out that also the family was very important. 

Protective and vulnerability factors

In children who succeed in life despite risk factors, there are protective factors that compensate for the difficulties in their lives. Protective factors are characteristics of people, environments, situations and events that lead to positive adaptation to setbacks. In addition, there are also vulnerability factors. These can be placed together with protective factors on a construct in which protective factors are on the one hand and vulnerability factors on the other. Here the protective factors are the positive side (i.e. a warm upbringing) and the vulnerability factors are the negative side (i.e. parents who are very cold against their children). 

Garmezy has found three variables that act as protective factors: 1) personal characteristics of the child such as sex, intelligence and personality traits; 2) characteristics of the family such as warmth, family cohesion and structure; and 3) external support systems such as peers and school. However, it must be concluded that not all protective factors for different children are the same. Some circumstances require different things. For example, an authoritative upbringing is good for children in the middle classes, but for children in poorer neighborhoods, more control of the parents is probably necessary. 

Personal characteristics

Personal characteristics that act as protective factors are both genetic factors and factors such as gender, intelligence, temperament and personality traits. For example, personality traits determine how the child responds to a certain situation: some children will have more difficulty with it than others. Other studies have indicated that gender affects the way children react to setbacks. For example, it is suggested that girls are less sensitive to emotional and behavioral problems than boys when they are exposed to stress in the family. It was added that it was thought that boys were at greater risk of these problems in this situation. Possible explanations are that boys are more likely to be exposed to stress in the family because parents are more likely to quarrel in their presence. Boys also go to care more often than girls when a family breaks up. It may therefore be that girls are less exposed to the risks than boys. These effects turn out to be less these days. 

Intelligence as a protective factor has brought many different results. Sometimes it turned out to be a protective factor for children with a few risks, but no longer with multiple risk factors. Others argued that it is a protective factor, especially for younger children. Others argue that it is mainly the language capacities of the child. When academic capabilities are not looked at, it appears that the general capacities of the child are a protective factor at social, emotional and behavioral level. 

Temperament can also serve as a protective factor. When children have an easier temperament: being socially responsive and having humor appears to protect the child from setbacks. In this way, these children would also generate more positive reactions because of their temperament. Here, a more negative temperament is also a risk factor. 

Other protective factors are the observed locus of control, self-confidence and coping style. This involves an internal locus of control (i.e. knowing that success and failure come from one's own characteristics and actions), a more positive self-image and a healthy way of dealing with problems are protective factors for problems in the areas of behavior, mental health and emotional health. Furthermore, it appeared that children who had a strong ethnic identity showed fewer problems than children who had a weaker ethnic identity. 

Family characteristics

In family characteristics, these can be divided into proximal factors such as the interactions between the parent and the child and distal factors such as the financial status and education of the parents. Secure attachment plays an important role here. Secure attachment contains a responsive, supportive, structured and affective stimulating relationship between parent and child. Secure attachment leads to positive outcomes and is especially important in setbacks. It helps with positive self-esteem and helps with the capacities of the child with regard to adaptability, coping strategies, problem-solving possibilities and social competence. 

In addition, the way of upbringing is important. An authoritative upbringing gives the best outcome by the warmth and support it gives to the child. Here, the family's attachment is also very important. Distal protective factors are a better income for the family and higher education. 

External support systems

Important external support systems are friends. Reciprocal positive friendships can be positive for self-confidence and emotional support. In the academic field, friends who support are also important. Good care is also a positive factor. For example, children who went to a daycare at an earlier age had more positive outcomes in terms of language if they came from a family with little income. A support teacher can also have many positive effects because they can give the child the support it needs. In addition, the community of the child can also bring a lot of positive results. Social support from neighbors and a lot of involvement with each other is a protective factor. Children who participated in activities of organizations after school are also more protected. 

Theoretical models of risk and resilience

Moderator (interactive) effects models

Many protective factors only have an effect if there are setbacks in the child's life, but they are not extremely important if these setbacks are not there. Protective and vulnerability factors must therefore have an interactive relationship with a risk factor. It can therefore vary per situation. This interactive relationship is also described on the basis of a moderator. An example of such an interaction is that when a child runs a high risk, but starts in an environment with a high quality of care, this provides better cognitive development than in children who are at high risk in a poor quality environment. care. 

Main effects models

These models investigate resilience and the factors that determine the outcomes of children exposed to risk factors. Here, a homogeneous group or a heterogeneous group can be used. In a homogeneous group, the risk factors are determined by looking at which children adapt positively and which do not and how these two groups correspond. With a heterogeneous group, we look at which factors offer positive outcomes for everyone. Here it can be examined which factors could help children with difficulties that other people in society also have. 

Mediator effects models

These models show the paths in which some risk factors lead to certain outcomes. These models therefore look at intermediate factors. There are two possibilities for these models: the mediator worsens the results or improves them. 

Both mediator and main effects models are interesting for research. However, only the moderator effects model can explain the interactive nature of risk and protective factors. 

Developmental outcomes: Competence and maladjustment

The focus of research on resilience has changed in recent years from research into maladaptation to positive psychology. For example, social competence was examined (meeting social expectations) in combination with resilience. This showed that children who did well in one domain often did worse in another domain (i.e. academic and internalizing/externalizing problems). As a result, it has been concluded that resilience can no longer be determined by one domain of social competence, but that it must be determined by several. Furthermore, it turned out that children who showed competent behavior at a certain moment in the development were protected at a later time. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. Non-competent behavior can lead to more problems. 

Interventions

Many interventions now use resilience. These also derive from a more developmental perspective, because it is aimed at making the development of the child as positive as possible. There are three different programs here. The risk-centered programs focus on the attempt to reduce risks. The asset-focused programs focus on ensuring that the positive aspects in a child's life receive better quality and quantity. The process orientated programs try to improve the most important adjustment systems of children such as important relationships, functioning in the intellectual field and self-regulation systems.

Social problems in schools - Chapter 20

The beginning of school also means the beginning of an intensive relationship with peers. In this chapter, the main emphasis is on victimization and bullying and how these problems can be tackled in social relations. Although many people say that their school time was the happiest of their lives, it is more realistic that many children reluctantly attend school. There is much more anxiety today about expectations of parents, teachers and peers.

The school context 

Social pressure in the classroom

One of the biggest forms of social pressure in the classroom is the process of social comparison where the child compares his or her performance with that of others. They often compare themselves with children who do better than themself. This can result in negative self-images. Many students try to hide it when they think they are performing less. They do this, for example, by protecting their self-esteem. This means that children have less difficulty in learning, so that their lower performance is explained by their motivation instead of their skills. Although children may feel guilty because of this, they often find this more satisfying than when they fail if they do a lot of effort. This strategy often leads to anger, a feeling of being incompetent, hopeless and an emotional burn-out. 

Peer pressure to work, or not!

Peer pressure is also an important factor in children's work. It turns out that in many Eastern cultures striving is typically seen aspraiseworthy. In many Western cultures, however, it appears that children do not appreciate open display of academic engagement by classmates. Effortless success is generally admired by students. 

Victimisation and bullying in school

Bullying

Bullying is a subset of aggressive behaviors that are characterized by repetition and an imbalance in power. The behavior is repeated and the victim can not defend him- or herself. This may be because several people are bullying him/her, he/she is smaller or less strong or psychologically less strong. The victim often does not dare to say that he/she is being bullied and this can lead to, for example, low self-esteem and/or depression. Bullying can occur in many environments and also among adults. 

How do we find out about bullying?

Here are several ways: reports from parents and teachers, self-reports (anonymous questionnaires), peer nominations (ask who is the perpetrator and who is the victim of the whole class), direct observations of behavior in the school situation and interviews with individuals (eg. focus groups). 

Types of bullying

In many Western countries it appears that 5% of children often and seriously bully others and that 10% are often and seriously bullied. There is physical bullying in which children beat each other, kick and take things away from others or destroy them. Verbal bullying includes teasing, taunting and threatening. Indirect/relational bullying can be the spreading of gossip and the systematic exclusion of someone. Sometimes bullying is based on the fact that someone belongs to a certain group. This is defined as Bias bullying (bias). This may include bullying based on gender, ethnicity, sexual preferences, belief and limitations. 

Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying is a relatively new form of bullying. This includes bullying using electronic devices such as cell phone and internet. A study has identified seven different types of cyber bullying: texting bullying, cell phone calls, photo/video bullying, bullying email, chat room bullying, bullying using instant messaging, and bullying via websites.Cyber ​​bullying happens more often outside the school, but often happens among classmates. The percentage of cyberbullying cases appears to be increasing. A characteristic of cyberbullying is that unlike school, these children can never avoid this kind of bullying, because it can happen wherever they are at any time of the day. Cyberbullying can also reach many more peers because it can be done openly on the internet. Furthermore, the perpetrators can easily remain anonymous. 

Roles in bullying

There are several roles to distinguish between in bullying. We have the perpetrator/bully, the victim, those who are non-involved and bully-victims (these children are both bully and victim). Furthermore, victims can still be distinguished in passive victims and proactive victims. There can also be aggressive victims and there can also be various bullies. There are ringleader bullies (take the initiative), follower bullies (follow someone else when bullying), reinforcers (encouraging the bully or laughing the victim), defenders (who help the victim) and bystanders (who stay outside, but see everything). 

Characteristics of bullying

Many victims do not dare to tell the teacher or parents that they are being bullied. The amount of children who do not dare to tell becomes larger with age. It is more often boys who do not tell it than girls. It also appears that although many children say that they do not like bullying, a large percentage says that they could participate in bullying. 

Effects and causes of bullying

Many mentioned effects of bullying for the victims are anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, physical and psychosomatic complaints. In very severe cases the victim can commit suicide. It is often thought that bullying leads to the effects mentioned above. However, it may also be the case that children are more susceptible to bullying because they are depressed and/or have a low self-esteem. 

There are many causes of bullying. One can think of social factors, such as tolerance for violence and bullying and abuse of power in society and the way in which the media represent it. At the level of the community one can think of the level of violence in the neighborhood and the safety in the neighborhood, but also socio-economic factors. At school, the school climate and the quality of the relationship with teacher and fellow pupils play a role. Bullying can be a temptation because there is often a difference in power. It has been found that bullies often show more antisocial behavior later on. Involvement in bullying is often linked to family situations such as insecure attachment, physical discipline and being a victim of overprotective parenting. Mistreatment is also part of this. 

Risk factors for being a victim

This includes the attitudes of the group and the quality of friendships of the child. Also having a disability creates a risk. Children with disabilities are two to three times more likely to become victims of bullying. This could be because they show certain characteristics that make them a target, these children are often less well integrated in the social field and those with aggression problems will respond more often. 

Interventions to reduce bullying

There are different types of interventions. There are interventions that are aimed for entire schools. This is often seen as the first step against bullying. For example, in England and Wales it is a legal requirement that schools implement this. These plans differ per school, but it contains a framework for how schools respond in the case of bullying for the entire community. So teachers, support staff, parents and students. Another way to combat bullying is to include it as a subject in the curriculum. This way certain topics can be discussed. This can be done with the help of literature, videos, role plays, music, debates, workshops and dolls. This can increase awareness about bullying. There is some evidence that this works, but then it has to be applied consistently. Otherwise, the effects will disappear. 

There are also methods and programs that can be effective. There are, for example, quality circles, which are small groups of students. These students try to solve bullying using standard procedures, such as collecting data and presenting it. Children who participated were very positive and felt that they were more consciously busy with bullying. Another method is cooperative group work. This involves working in groups on everyday activities, which increases the group feeling and is better for academic outcomes. However, it can still be disturbed by bullying. In England there is a program called Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning. It contains seven themes, such as: saying no to bullying (focuses on what bullying means, how it feels, why people bully and how they might react to it). This program and another similar program showed positive effects. An assertiveness training can also be given to the victims to improve their low self-esteem and their way of dealing with bullying. However, this should not be offered as the only strategy, but in combination with others. 

Peer support systems use the knowledge, skills and experiences of children in a planned and structured way to reduce and deal with bullying. This could include classifying a moment in which the class can discuss specific issues, such as relationships with each other, dealing with anger, fighting and bullying (circle time). One can also think of engaging a third party who comes to a solution with the victims and bullies (mediation). Encouraging friends of victims is also a possibility. Active listening and counseling by peers is also an option. The use of peers appears to be especially good for the peers who help the victims and the overall school climate. The effects for the victims are uncertain. When there is no supervision, not enough peers are available or when the problem is too severe, peer support systems will not be effective. Bullying often takes place outside the classroom: for example in the schoolyard or in the corridors. A good policy for this can reduce bullying. This can be done by, for example, more structure and more opportunities for creativity, so that boredom and bullying is reduced. Supervision is important here, so that action can be taken in case of bullying. 

Reactive strategies against bullying

Reactive strategies are applied when bullying has already taken place. They run from punishment to more recovering strategies. One of these methods is direct sanctions. One can think of serious conversations about the behavior with parents, to be removed from the classroom, to withdraw privileges, to stay behind, to clean up waste after school and to temporarily remove it from the group. These direct sanctions are intended to make the perpetrator aware of his/her behavior and to make clear what acceptable behavior is. Furthermore, they also show the other students that the behavior is not accepted and that the rules must be taken seriously. 

There are also school tribunals or so-called bully courts. Here pupils are selected for hearing evidence of bullying and deciding which sanctions or penalties should be imposed on that behavior. Use of these bully courts would lead to a significant reduction in bullying. Teachers, however, do not find this way positive, because too much power is given to the students. 

There is also still restorative justice. Here the bully is made aware of the feelings of the victim and how much damage they have done to the victim. It is an attempt to ensure that the perpetrator tries to make up for his actions. Restorative justice is based on three principles: responsibility, restoration of the life of victim and resolution. The effectiveness of this technique depends on the extent to which pupils can talk openly about their feelings and relationships. However, this technique gives positive results. 

Counselling-based approaches

Therapy-based approaches also focus on awareness of what the victim is experiencing. One can think of a Method of shared concern. The aim here is to make perpetrators of bullying susceptible to what they do to the victim and to encourage positive behavior towards the victim. This method is often used when a group plague one victim. There are five phases: individual interviews with potential perpetrators, individual interviews with the victim, preparatory group meetings, summits, follow-up and results. 

In the United Kingdom use is made of the Support Group Method which is similar to the Method of shared concern mentioned above. This is a method that does not punish, but focuses on changing problem behavior through a combination of peer pressure by peers to generate a pro-social response and the realization of the damage and suffering that the victim has been subjected to. This involves using individual interviews with the victim, group meeting of 6-8 students, explaining the problem to the group without discussing any incidents, it states that no punishment will be given, but that everyone must ensure that the victim feels happy and safe, every person in the group gives ideas for this, hereafter the group is given the responsibility to realize the ideas and individual meetings are set up after one week to see if it has helped. Many schools (53%) were very satisfied with this method. 

Large-scale school-based interventions

Interventions at several schools at the same time are often effective, but differ greatly in their effectiveness. Often, a reduction of 50% is achieved in the successful programs. The first school-wide intervention that was implemented at several schools was set up in Norway and was very successful. Other programs also proved successful in other countries. They differed in how successful they were. This can be explained by external support, the core of the intervention, the duration of the intervention, the age of the pupils, how the school deals with it and the environment in society. 

School refusal

Absence of pupils in schools has received a lot of attention in recent years, partly due to the fact that the performance of schools is based on it. Absence is often caused by illness, but the fact that pupils do not like school at all can also play a role. Furthermore, boredom at school, the promise of nicer things outside school or a disapproval of authority play a role in absence at schools. Fears can also play a role, for example, certain events: problems with teachers, homework not made, problems with peers, problems with friends or potentially shameful circumstances (i.e. do not dare to do sports, because they are not good at it). 

Truancy or school refusal?

There is a difference between school refusal and truancy. School phobia often plays a role in school refusal. School phobics are children who have such a strong aversion to attending  school. They often want to go to school, but often can not go because of fear and are often absent for longer periods. Whereas the truant, on the other hand, often has no serious psychological problems and choose sporadically not to go. This is often accompanied by behavioral problems (delinquent behavior, disruptive behavior in the classroom, inappropriate sexual activities). 

Emotional and psychosomatic problems

School refusers often show very emotional and psychosomatic reactions and are very upset about this. The problem often starts with vague complaints about school and not wanting to go to school. Often they continue to go because of pressure from parents, teachers and doctors. They can show panic and anxious behavior. Often they can not even leave the house to go to school or they turn around halfway, when they are on their way. There may also be signs of depression such as: crying, sleep problems, irritability and indicators of low self-esteem. They also often have abdominal pain, headaches, dizziness and vomiting without a clear physical cause. These complaints often disappear when the child stays at home. However, these complaints are real and it is therefore difficult for parents to force the child to go to school.The prevalence of school refusers is difficult to determine, but is estimated at 0.4 to 2 percent in the United Kingdom. 

Types of school refusers

The first type of school refusers refuses to go to school because of fear. Around the 1940s it was thought that they refused to go to school because of divorce from loved ones at home. It was stated that these children had a very strong bond with the parent and that they wanted to return to the safe and caring relationship of the baby time. The mothers of these children would give their children excessive attention and protection. The fear would be caused by the struggle between dependence and independence in the child. Nowadays it is clear that divorce anxiety is not enough reason for refusing to go to school.The theory does not explain why most children refuse to go to school when they are 11-13 years old (this can be explained by going to secondary school for the first time) and why they can do recreational activities without their parents. According to research, the school refusers can be divided into three categories: those with separation anxiety, those with a specific phobia and those who suffer from a generalized anxiety or depression. 

Acute and chronic school refusal

In addition, a distinction can also be made between acute school refusers and chronic school refusers. In acute school refusers, there must have been three years of good attendance before they suddenly refuse to go to school. These children can often be very depressed. The chronic school refusers are more often linked to neurosis, dependence, mental illnesses of parents and lower self-esteem. The prognosis for chronic cases is often worse than for acute cases. School refusal is not a specific diagnosis in the DSM, but the children often come up with comments for a specific phobia, or separation anxiety. 

A functional approach for understanding school refusal

Kearney states that it is best to look at the functions of refusing school. Understanding what the child wins by not going to school is good to use for setting up interventions. He argues that school refusal can be caused by 4 functions that are based on negative and positive reinforcement: 1) negative reinforcement. This is to avoid a negative something or something that the child dislikes. This avoiding works empowering or rewarding because it avoids the situation. These include: a) generalized anxiety b) escaping aversive social situations. 2) Positive reinforcement: an action or outcome after behavior that ensures that the behavior will occur more often. As children see that behavior has a positive outcome, they will do this more often.This includes a) getting attention and b) doing nicer things at home. 

For clinical assessment, interviews and self-report questionnaires can be used. An example is the School refusal Assessment scale. The four functions of refusing school are presented as prepared by Kearney. These are: generalized anxiety, escaping aversive social situations, getting attention or separation anxiety and positive reinforcement by doing things at home. 

Interventions

Systematic desensitization is aimed at reducing anxiety. Here the child is first taught to relax and then it is encouraged to apply these techniques when it thinks of the cause of his/her fear. There is also emotive imagery (emotional images): the child is taught to link scary situations to scenes in which they are proud, assertive or situations that they find entertaining. Both of the above interventions are derived from the classic conditioning. 

In addition, there is also cognitive behavioral therapy. This is a popular form of intervention that focuses mainly on the negative and irritating cognitions that are often perceived by the anxious or depressed individual. In this therapy, the clinician and the child tackle this idea by exploring them and challenging these thoughts, after which they replace them for others' thoughts. For example: the idea "everyone will explain to me if I can not answer the question from the master" is replaced by "everyone makes a mistake sometimes and the others will not notice." 

Which intervention will be used depends on which of the four functions of Kearney are to be seen. In case of anxiety, desensitization is best (sometimes there is also medication, this also applies to depression). Avoiding aversive social situations can help social skills training, modeling and role playing alongside cognitive behavioral therapy. It is important to pay attention to how much attention is given and how much is rewarded. When the refusal comes about because staying at home is very rewarding, it is best to use family therapy and a penalty and reward system. To improve the situation, the age at which the problems started, the seriousness of the problems and the duration of the problems play a role. The faster the problems can be tackled, the better.

Atypical development - Chapter 21

This chapter, unlike the previous chapters, deals with the atypical development and will discuss the differences between children. When there is a backlog of a child in a certain development area, there is talk of atypical development. The qualitative differences of others in the field of behavior are also described as atypical. Research on the atypical development is still very separate from research into the typical development. This limit has become less in recent years. For example, there is more research into the influence of prenatal events on later development (i.e. research into smoking during pregnancy shows that these children show more aggression). In addition, there is more and more research into genotypes to see how this differs in atypical and typical development. An example of this is Williams syndrome which is genetically determined. The research on atypical development is also becoming more globalized, which increases the population that can be studied. 

What is atypical development?

In determining atypical development, developmental psychologists look at whether the development is delayed or different. So whether the child goes through the normal development, but deviates from it or whether the child goes through the development in a completely different way. An example of a delayed development is that of children born prematurely. For example, they know fewer words when they are 24 months old than typically developing children. However, they also show a form of other development in the field of motor skills: another pattern of controlling movements. It is therefore important to look at different developments instead of whole groups. Many milestones are known about the development of children. Important is that these milestones are not linked to one specific age, but to a timeframe in which those should take place. When the child deviates from this, parents are advised to seek medical advice. 

Another way of assessing a disadvantage can be done by comparing the child's performance on a standardized test in comparison to peers. When one compares the child with the norm one can see if and how many months the child lags behind on a particular skill. For research it is important to see which children should be examined and which should not. Researchers often use children in research that are more than 1.5 standard deviations below the average. One way to investigate how to study atypical development is to see how the behaviors of children with a different development can be compared with children who develop normally. This way one can determine characteristics of these children. For example, there has been a study comparing children with HIV with children who did not have HIV. This showed that cognitive processes in children with HIV progressed more slowly, even though they had the same cognitive potential as children without HIV. 

Why study atypical development?

Studying atypical development and to what extent it deviates from typical development can lead to effective interventions aimed at problems in children who develop atypically. These interventions could improve the prospects in the lives of these children by offering an intervention at a crucial moment in development.
An example is that the way in which children with Williams syndrome (characterized by low non-verbal IQ and limitations in visual-spatial and visual-motor skills) observe the world by viewing drawings and seeing how this differs from children without Williams syndrome. This shows that children with Williams syndrome perceive the world in separate parts (they only draw the loose parts). Later it was added that this way of drawing was also part of the development for normally developing children. This part of the development was thus only established in normal development by first studying the atypical development.This way of research has led to the study of developmental psychopathology. 

Methodological approaches used in the study of atypical development

One way to determine whether the development deviates is to compare the performance of a group of normally developing children with a group of children who develop atypically. This is how false belief tasks were first used to see how much knowledge normally developing children have about the mental state of others. Later this was much more used in children who atypically developed to see how they differed (i.e. autism spectrum disorders and blind children). It is therefore best to compare a clinical group with two control groups: one that is equal in chronological ages and one that is equal in mental ages. If the children differ with both groups, the development can be seen as delayed or different. Unfortunately, in practice it is often not possible to use multiple control groups. 

Impact of scientific discovery and technological innovation on the study of pathways in atypical development

Three developments have taken place that have had an impact on our understanding of the paths of atypical development. These are the Human Genome Project, neuro-imaging techniques to examine the brain and eye-tracking. 

The Human Genome Project is seen as one of the largest research projects in the world. This project tries to establish a map of the human genes by mapping all genes. The project showed that people have fewer genes than was thought. There are 21,000 genes and it has been found that one gene does not lead to one specific outcome, but can lead to different outcomes. This shows that the interaction between genes is important for certain outcomes in the behavior of people. Because of these interactions, many different outcomes are possible, as genes can react with each other in different ways. 

These findings have led researchers to focus on structural chromosomal abnormalities in order to identify breakpoints on chromosomes. However, risks are associated with this. The emphasis on genetic differences is often not appreciated. It can lead to forced sterilization in these people (America in the 20s and 30s). In addition, many pregnancies are broken down by prenatal testing, because people prefer not to have a child with atypical development. A good example of this is screening for the syndrome of down, which is caused by having an extra chromosome (characteristic of this is cognitive impairment, delayed language production and differences in motor skills). These techniques come simultaneously with interventions for down syndrome that significantly improve the lives of these people. People need to be made more aware of the possibilities instead of just the difficulties. 

Neuroimaging allows the localization of certain activity in the brain to be determined and to learn more about developmental pathways. So there is Positron Emmission Tomography (PET). Three-dimensional colored images of the body are made. A technique that is used more often in children is the event-related potential (ERP). This involves looking at activity in the brain while listening to certain things or looking at certain things. ERP has been useful for research on children with ADHD. These children have problems with attention, are hyperactive and impulsive. ERP studies have shown that these children exhibit abnormal activity in the frontal cortex. This area is important for executive functions. 

One last technique of neuroimaging is the Manetone cphalography (MEG). This technique uses measurements of magnetic fields generated around the head of the participant. This technique has found that children with autism process noise more slowly. 

Eye-tracking makes use of eye movements and this technique is often used in babies. Here, pictures are shown to these children and the focus is on what the child focuses on. This technique is useful because the child does not have to be able to talk or gesticulate. It can then be checked whether the eye movements change with small changes. This is used to determine saccades: fast eye movements before someone fixes at a certain point that is of interest, so that the image is on that part of the eye which provides the sharpest image (Fovea).

Understanding atypical pathways

Williams Syndrome

It is difficult to determine the development of Williams syndrome because there are few participants, because it is an extremely rare disorder. As a result, some studies have only about 5 participants. Therefore, the valuable findings often made in these studies can not be generalized to the entire population. The participants also often differ in age, so that there is no focus on a certain developmental milestone. Furthermore, there is hardly any longitudinal research, so there is still a lot of information missing. 

Williams syndrome is often characterized in two areas: language and cognitive domains. This is because cognitive domains in this population are often less, but the language capacities are often of an average level. In the field of cognitive domains, these children often have difficulties with planning, problem solving and spatial cognition. The language capacities are therefore opposite. These children are very social and communicatively very strong. It was previously thought that this difference came from the fact that language was innate. However, it appears that people with Williams syndrome show problems with respect to the pragmatics of language (social aspects of language, for example, making the conversation logical and thinking about what the listener knows). This was also apparent from a study in which these children were compared to children with SLI (Specific language impairment: atypical development only focused on language production and language comprehension). It can therefore be concluded that the lesser cognitive capacities of children with Williams syndrome lead to problems with pragmatic and social aspects of communication. 

Autism spectrum

The label of autism is difficult, because there is a very wide spectrum and there are many differences between the children with autism. The prevalence of autism is about 1 in 100 and is mainly diagnosed on the basis of behavior, because not really clear biological indicators are known yet. With the help of the DSM or the ICD-10 it can be determined whether the person shows the problems in the field of communication, social interaction and repeated behavior with a limited interest. Eye-tracking research has been very helpful, because there is atypical eye contact with these children. Six different groups can be distinguished: Asperger, high-functioning, medium-functioning, low-functioning, atypical, and pervasive developmental disorder. There are many differences between groups. It appears that children who have both autism and SLI have more normal forms of eye contact than children with autism alone. 

Explaining autism

There are three major hypotheses about the deficits that can be seen in autism. The first is theory of mind. This hypothesis states that people with autism have difficulties in understanding that others have thoughts and feelings. An important test that can help determine whether people have autism is the false belief task. This test has been described previously. People with autism generally can not accomplish this task well. There are also children with autism who can successfully complete this task. It is stated that these children could have a weaker form of autism. Other research, however, has stated that this is not true. Other studies also leave gaps in the theory of mind view hypothesis. It is likely that a deficit in the social field is not the complete explanation for autism. 

Another theory is the central coherence hypothesis of autism. This hypothesis is based on the idea that information is processed in parts instead of integrating it. This hypothesis has been investigated in different areas of development. For example, in a visual-spatial area, children with autism were more likely to find a hidden figure from a larger, more complex figure. People who found this figure used a different way of searching than those who did not. They see the parts and the others see the whole. This confirms the central coherence hypothesis, because people with autism perceived the parts. 

Investigation what the above hypothesis wanted to deepen further came with the executive function hypothesis. This states that the deficit is mainly in executive functions. Executive functions include many different skills such as inhibiting inappropriate reactions, being mentally flexible and coming up with general ideas. Research shows that children with autism have difficulty with this and that this only becomes visible if the children are older than infants. Research shows that children with autism use other parts of the brain for these tasks. 

Research on autism is growing fast and shows a lot of positive progress. For example, it appeared that an early short intervention for joint attention improved the outcomes of these children. 

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)

Children with ADHD (about 3-7%) are very hyperactive or impulsive and inattentive. For example, they have troubles waiting for their turn, making inaccurate errors in school work. These children also have difficulty keeping the visual attention. Often they are also busy with others than with what they actually have to do. It is usually diagnosed from the age of 7, but symptoms are visible throughout life. 

Researchers do not yet know about the causes of ADHD. A hypothesis is that children with ADHD have difficulty with self-monitoring (an aspect of executive functions). Children then have difficulty checking a predominant motor response. Another hypothesis is that children with ADHD have difficulty remembering instructions for a task. 

Because many hypotheses are being refuted, there is now more focus on a model that indicates multiple development paths for the development of a disorder. For example, there is now a twofold development path hypothesis by Sonuga-Barke that states that both cognitive and affective components are different in children with ADHD. This can also be extended to the brain where aspects of executive functions were localized in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the affective components in the orbital and medial prefrontal cortex. 

The impact of the absence of sensory input on developmental pathways

Blindness is a form of limitation where there is a loss of a certain developmental path. Often this development is not seen as atypical, but the boundaries are not always very clear. For example, some forms of blindness are due to a genetic abnormality. It is not yet clear whether this is included in the atypical development or not. Secondly, many blind children show behaviors that suit autism. It is not clear whether this is because they do not see or because of other causes. Finally, an important way of learning is lost in blind children: seeing. But this does not ensure that they can not develop language. They follow a different developmental path. One might see this as an atypical development. It is therefore still complicated to state that these children do not experience an atypical development. 

When blind children are older they can understand much of what happens in their environment through language. It is interesting to look at early development when these children can not yet. In early development, much of the contact between parent and child is visual. Although blind children miss this, it appears that they can make a certain contact with their caretaker: imitation, smiling and they can be socially attentive to their mother. It thus appears that information that is not visual is also enough for the emergence of interactions. These interactions can for example be through touch or rhymes. This shows that there is a very different form of communication between parents and children who are blind. These children use their hands a lot more. Furthermore, focusing on rhymes or routine together ensures that parent and child can focus on something by means of sound or touch for a certain period of time. 

Children who develop normally start grabbing objects from about 5 months and from 6 months they are interested in objects as well as people who see them. Between 7 and 15 months they find out that other people also have thoughts and they try to focus on something with that person. Blind children do not show this shared attention around 9 months. This only happens with the 21 months. 

In the literature on normal development, joint attention is divided into 4 behaviors. First, the person who wants contact requires the attention of the other person. Second, the partner responds in an appropriate way. The person who asks for attention with a reaction then shows that he/she is aware of the other person's attention. Finally, attention is focused on the object or an event by exchanging smiles, vocalizations or different looks. 

In an investigation into the difference of shared attention between parents with children who may or may not see, it has been shown that parents of children who can see mainly point out and ensure that children focus on certain things. In blind children, the parents often sat behind the child and let the child focus the child's attention on certain parts of the object by means of touch. 

Children with a dual sensory impairment

More than 50% of children who have a visual impairment often have another limitation such as an auditory impairment. In children who have these two limitations it is important to learn that they have to go through the development independently. For this, early interventions are very important and lead to a better quality of life. Intervention is aimed at increasing the understanding of the environment and their movement in that environment. In Scotland, a school has been set up that is the first to focus exclusively on these children (Hazelwood school). This school has certain characteristics that help these children develop, such as many navigation aids through the school, such as handrails and a gutter where they fit exactly with their feet, curvilinear corridors instead of corridors with corners, smells in certain places, certain ambient temperatures in certain places and 4 different ways in which the children can communicate. Although this improves the quality of life, it appears that this often does not happen outside school and there is little mention of leisure activities. 

Environmental risk factors: the case of emotional disturbances

Input from the environment is also very important in both normal and atypical development. An important model that involves the environment in development is the ecological model of Bronfenbrenner. There are five different levels of the environment in the model. The micro system forms the core of the model. This is the individual child, his/her characteristics (gender, age, health) and the setting where different relationships with others that are relevant at different points in the development. For example, in the infancy the family is most important, but at a later age also the neighborhood is important. 

When children avoid these different relationships with other people due to early deprivation, this leads to completely different outcomes. Children living in i.e. institutions, refugee camps or conflict zones do not have access to stable relationships or family. An example of this are the orphanages in Romania. Because of the regime that was in the 80's in the country, as many children as possible had to be taken care of (even contraceptives were banned). As a result, many children remained without caretakers and they had to go to institutions. These institutions were very bad and did not give the children the care they needed. For example, there was 1 employee for 20 children with children in small spots or even being sedated. The houses were dirty, children had to share a bed and there were no toys. 

After the fall of the regime, these children were adopted, because many children were young, they were followed to see what the outcomes were. One finding was that children who were in an institution for at least the first 6 months often had an attachment disorder that was unrestrained. These children had few close relationships, problems in social relations and were too friendly to strangers. A hypothesis for this is that these children, because they were less exposed to psychosocial stressors, have formed other connections in the brain. The Hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis is especially seen to be important here. 

The Bronfenbrenner model also has an impact at other levels. For example, the meso system mainly contains the relationships between the different microsystems of the child (i.e. relationship between family and school). These environments can interact with each other. For example, both a poor and a rich neighborhood can not pose any problems, as long as they feel that they trust the environment. 

In addition, the exosystem includes external influences such as the media, neighbors, and friends of the family. Then comes the masosystem, which focuses on the cultural influence. An example is the familiarization of the deaf culture, which can have a positive effect on deaf children. Finally, there is the chronosystem that contains socio-cultural events about life as compared to people who lived 10-20 years ago. So especially the zeitgeist of the moment. 

Bronfenbrenner's model gives an opportunity to place both the atypical and typical development in reality. However, the model is difficult to test.