As
noted
earlier,
experience isimportant to brain
development and
to other
as-
pects of physical
development.However,
the evidence suggests that physical changes,including those in the brain, relyon
an
inborn maturational plan
as well.
Thus,
as
is
true
of every domain of
development,
physical changes
appear
to arise from the inter-action of this maturational planwith environmental factors.
The
Brain
and
Nervous
System
F
igure4.1 shows the main structures of the brain.At birth, the midbrain and the
medulla are the most fully developed.These two parts, both in the lower part of theskull and connected to the spinal cord, regulate vital functions such as heartbeat and res-
piration as well as attention, sleeping, waking, elimination,and movement of the headand neck-all tasks a newborncanperform at least moderately well.The least developed
part of the brain at birth is the cortex,the convoluted gray matter that wraps around the
midbrain and is involved in perception, body movement, thinking, and language.Changes in the brain and nervoussystem continue throughout childhood and adoles-
cence.There are several critical processes that contribute to these changes.One of the most important principles of neurological development is that the brain
grows in spurts rather than inasmooth, continuous fashion (Fischer
&
Rose, 1994).Each of these spurts involves all of the major developmental processes you'll read aboutin the sections that follow, and each is followed by a period of stability.In infancy, the
intervals of growth and stabilityare very short.There are short growth spurts at ap-
proximately I-monthintervals until the baby is about 5 months old.As the infant gets
older,the periods of both growth and stability become longer, with spurts occurring at
about 8, 12, and 20 months of age. Between ages 2 and 4, growth proceeds very slowly,and then thereis another major spurt at age 4.
Interestingly, manygrowth spurts are
localized;
that is, they are restricted to one orafew parts of the brain rather than applying to the whole brain (Thompson et al.,
2000). Neuropsychologists havecorrelated some of these localized brain growth spurtswith milestones of cognitive development (Fischer & Rose, 1994). For example, thespurt at 20 months of age happens at the same time as most infants show evidence of goal-directed planning in their behavior. A toddler may move a chair from one locationto another so that he can climb high enough to reach a forbidden object. Similarly, the
spurt around age 4 is accompanied by attainment of an impressive level of fluency inbothspeaking and understanding language.Two major growth spurts happen in the brain during middle childhood (Spreen,Risser, & Edgell, 1995). The first islinked to the striking improvements in fine motor
skills and eye-hand coordinationthat usually emerge between 6 and 8 years of age.
During the spurt experienced by10- to 12-year-olds, the frontal lobes of the cerebralcortex become the focus of developmental processes (van der Molen & Molenaar,1994).Predictably, logic and planning, two cognitive functions that improve dramati-
cally during this period, are carried out primarily by the frontal lobes. In addition, this
/
spurt is associated with improvements in memory function (Hepworth, Rovet, & Tay-
lor, 2001).There arealso two major brain growth spurts in the teenage years.The first oc-
curs between ages 13 and 15 (Spreen, Risser, & Edgell, 1995). For the most part, thisgrowth spurt takes place in partsof the brain that control spatial perception and
The medulla and the midbrainare largelydeveloped at birth.In
the first 2 years after birth, itis
primarily the cortex that devel-
ops,although increasesin the
dendritic arbor and in synapses
also occur throughout the nerv-ous system.
midbrainAsection of the brain
lying abovethe medullaand
below the cortexthat regulates at-
tention,sleeping, waking, and
other automatic functions;it is
largely developedat birth.
medulla A portionof thebrain
that liesimmediatelyabove the
spinal cord; it islargelydeveloped
at birth.cortexTheconvoluted gray por-
tion of thebrain,which governs
most complex thought,language,
and memory.
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