DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

MIDDLE & LATE

CHILDHOOD
6-12 YEARS OLD

MODIFIED AND UPDATED BY: VINCE SANIEL, LPT, MA

 A. CHARACTERISTICS

❑ Names used by Parents:

Sloppy Age
Quarrelsome Age

❑ Names used by Educators:

Elementary School Age
Critical Period (in achievement drive)

❑ Names used by Psychologists:

Gang Age
Age of Conformity
Creative Age
Play Age
 B. DEVELOPMENTAL TASKS
The developmental tasks of
late childhood period are as
follows: By Havighurst (1972)
1. Learning physical skills necessary for ordinary
games
2. Building a wholesome attitude towards oneself
3. Learning to get along with age mates
4. Learning appropriate masculine or feminine
social roles
5. Developing fundamental skills according to their
culture for example, skills in reading, writing and
calculating
6. Developing conscience-a sense of morality and
a scale of values
7. Developing attitude towards social groups and
institutions
 C. PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT

Body build both affects the height and Improvement in a child’s motor
weight of the child in the late childhood development

Bones harden ✔ Girls are superior in skills involving fine

movements
At the end of late childhood, a child ✔ Boys are superior in skills involving gross
normally has 28 out of the 32 movements
permanent teeth
Develops skills like:
Immature sex organs ▪ Self-help skills
▪ Social-help skills
Catering to different growth rates ▪ School skills
▪ Play skills
D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT
 C. PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT cont.

Brain development in Myelination in:

middle/late childhood: Brain
growth
Frontal lobes become more
developed (especially ages
10-12)
Association areas (areas where
sensory, motor, and cognitive
function connect) – Improves
information processing speed
and reaction time
Hippocampus (transfers
information from short-term to
long-term memory)
 Physical Activity in Children

25% of children count playing video games as exercise

-e-sports: Watching other children play video games

Physical education in schools declined in recent years

-Increasing again due to health concerns
 Childhood Obesity – Physical Aspect

Body Mass Index (BMI) – Ratio of height to weight

Associated with insulin resistance, inflammation, knee

problems, cardiovascular disease
- Both in childhood and in adulthood
 Childhood Obesity – Cognitive Aspect

Processed sugars and saturated fats linked to:

- Poorer relational memory skills
- Weakened blood-brain barrier in brain

Overweight children have poorer executive functioning

- Problems controlling impulses and delaying gratification
 Childhood Obesity – Psychosocial Aspect

Increased risk of depression and low self-esteem

Increased risk of bullying and teasing

“Oblivobesity” (Katz, 2015) – Lack of recognition that children

are overweight or obese
- May prevent parents or children from seeking help
 Childhood Obesity - Intervention & Treatment

Parents can encourage:

- Practicing inhibition
- Making good food choices
- Increasing physical activity

Parents can avoid:

- Using shame and guilt
- Overemphasizing diet
D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT

Areas of Improvement

✔ Vocabulary Improvement

General Vocabulary

Special Vocabulary

✔ Pronunciations

✔ Forming Sentences

Improvement in Comprehension

✔ Content of Speech

✔ Amount of Talking
D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT
 D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT

BILINGUALISM

• Understanding/using two languages

• May not be equally used or proficient

• Bilingualism has cognitive advantages

• Better understanding of languages overall
• May help learn new words faster
 D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT

COMMUNICATION DISORDER

• Fluency disorders affect the rate of speech

• Stuttering – Sounds, syllables, or words are repeated or last
longer than normal

• Articulation disorder – Inability to correctly produce

phonemes

• Voice disorders – Problems with pitch, loudness, and

quality of the voice
 D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT
EDUCATION IN MIDDLE & LATE CHILDHOOD

• Parental involvement important but not always easy

• Work/transportation issues
• Teachers most receptive to parents similar to them
• Family capital – Power that can be used to improve a
child's education

• Cultural differences can affect classroom behavior and

performance
 D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT
Children with disabilities: What is a learning disability?

• Specific impairment of academic learning

• Interferes with a specific aspect of schoolwork

• Reduces a student's academic performance

• Not all learning problems are learning disabilities

• Sensory or motor impairments
• Language barriers
• Intellectual disability
 D. SKILLS SPEECH IMPROVEMENT
Children with disabilities: Types of learning disabilities

DYSLEXIA
DYSCALCULIA DYSGRAPHIA
 E. EMOTIONS & EMOTIONAL EXPRESSIONS

Continued Period of
Heightened Emotionality

COMMON Emotional Pattern:

1.) Fear
2.) Anger Catharsis
3.) Jealousy
4.) Curiosity
5.) Affection
6.) Joy
Catharsis can take place during the course of therapy, but it can also occur during other
moments as well. Some examples of how catharsis might take place include:

Talking with a friend. A discussion with a friend about a problem you are facing might spark a
moment of insight in which you are able to see how an event from earlier in your life might be
contributing to your current patterns of behavior. This emotional release may help you feel
better able to face your current dilemma.

Listening to a song. Music can be motivational, but it can also often spark moments of great
insight. Music can allow you to release emotions in a way that often leaves you feeling
restored.

Creating or viewing art. A powerful artwork can stir deep emotions. Creating art can also be a
form of release.

Exercise. The physical demands of exercise can be a great way to work through strong emotions
and release them in a constructive manner.
F. SOCIOEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
 F. SOCIOEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT

SELF-UNDERSTANDING

• Self-concept – Beliefs about general

personal identity

• Self-esteem – Evaluative judgment of self

• Self-efficacy – Belief that you are capable

of achieving a specific task/goal
 F. SOCIAL GROUPINGS & SOCIAL BEHAVIOR

FRIENDS & PEERS

• Increasingly important for

self-esteem

• Conceptualization of
friendship changes with
age
 F. SOCIAL GROUPINGS & SOCIAL BEHAVIOR

Conceptualizations of friendship:
Bigelow & La Gaipa (1975)

• Reward-cost – Friendship focuses on mutual activities

• Good friend = someone with similar interests

• Normative expectation – Focus on conventional morality

• Good friend = someone who’s kind and shares with you

• Empathy and understanding

• Good friend = loyal, committed, share intimate
information
 Factors that Increase
D. SKILLS SPEECH Friendship
IMPROVEMENT

1. Contact Hypothesis: bringing enemies together leads

towards friendship.

2. Law of Attraction: similar attitudes leads to friendship.

3. Mere Exposure Theory: exposure to people increases liking.

4. The Pratfall Effect: Being clumsy makes you likeable.

5. Reinforcement-Affect Theory: both forms of conditioning

leads us to like others.
F. SOCIAL GROUPINGS & SOCIAL BEHAVIOR

•They are no longer satisfied at home

so they want to be with peers.

•They become lonely if they are

unable to play with peers.
G. PLAY INTEREST

CONSTRUCTION PLAY
Making things just for the fun
of it, with little thought given
to the kids, they manage to
do a lot of things in their toys.
G. PLAY INTEREST

EXPLORING

Older children like to satisfy

their curiosity about anything
new by exploring it.
G. PLAY INTEREST

COLLECTING

As form of play increases as

childhood progresses.
G. PLAY INTEREST

GAMES & SPORTS

Older children are no longer
satisfied to play the simple
types games of early
childhood. Instead, they want
to play the games of older
childre, such as basketball,
football, voleyball, etc.
H. INCREASE IN UNDERSTANDING

STAGE OF CONCRETE OPERATION

the time when vague and nebulous

concepts of early childhood
become specific and concrete.
 H. INCREASE IN UNDERSTANDING

Elements of Concrete Operational Thought

Classification – Understand hierarchies, subclasses

Conservation – Changing one quality can be compensated for by

changes in another quality

Decentration – Consider multiple dimensions

Seriation – Arrange along quantitative dimension

 WHAT ELEMENT IS THIS???

You pour a tall cup of soda into a

shorter cup. Does your child
peacefully accept the shorter
cup? Probably.
I. MORAL ATTITUDES & BEHAVIOR
 J. CHANGES IN FAMILY RELATIONS

EFFECTS OF FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

✔ Social Adjustments outside the home

✔ Role-playing at home sets the pattern for role-playing outside the
home
✔ Type of child-training method used at home influences the
role-playing of older children
✔ Home training is responsible for sex-role typing
✔ Children’s aspirations and achievements in different areas of their
lives are greatly influenced by their parents’ attitude
 K. HAZARDS & HAPPINESS

HAZARDS
Physical & Psychological
HAPPINESS
 K. HAZARDS & HAPPINESS

PHYSICAL HAZARDS

• Illness- including measles, German measles and mumps

• Obesity- children who were overweight or obese at age of 7 or 11 years
were much greater risk of being overweight.
• Sex- inappropriate Body Build- sometimes girls with masculine body
builds and boys with girlish physiques
• Accidents- sometimes may leave a permanent scars, who experience
this accidents may become more cautious.
• Physical Disabilities- effect of the accident depends on the degree of
the disability.
• Awkwardness- compare themselves with their age mates
 K. HAZARDS & HAPPINESS

PSYCHOLOGICAL HAZARDS

• Speech - physical punishment

• Emotional - finding peer approval
• Social
• Hazards associated with interest
• Play Hazards- lack of social acceptance.
• Sex-role typing- sex role
• Conceptual Hazards- who have idealized self-
• Family relationship- weakens family ties
concepts are usually dissatisfied with
themselves as they are and with the way others
• carry this problem outside the home

treat them. • Personality Development- self rejection

• Moral- “right and wrong” and ego-centrism (false sense of
- inner control of behavior importance)
- inconsistent discipline
 K. HAZARDS & HAPPINESS

HAPPINESS

• Late childhood can and should be happy period of the life span.
• It cannot be a completely carefree time.
• Interest and patterns of life have changed because they want to
spend more time with their age-mates.
• Do many things from themselves without relying on help from others.
• Their play can be the source of their happiness.
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

BULLYING

• Unwanted, aggressive behavior involving a real or perceived

power imbalance
• May be verbal, physical, social
• Cyberbullying – Using electronic technology

• The last publicly reported Department of Education (Dep Ed)

report about bullying from public and private schools, the
Philippines recorded a dramatic 21% increase in 2015.
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

BULLYING (cont.’)

• Students perceived as “weak” or “different” at risk

• Many bullies have high self-esteem
• Lack empathy, like to dominate
• Many bullied children don’t ask for help
• Important to know warning signs
•Associated with depression, substance abuse, suicide
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

FAMILY LIFE

• Berger’s family tasks:

• Providing food, clothing and shelter
• Encouraging learning
• Developing self-esteem
• Nurturing friendships with peers
• Providing harmony and stability
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

FAMILY LIFE
(Lesbian & Gay Parents)

• Research shows little or no differences between children raised

by same-sex or opposite-sex parents.

• Beliefs about same-sex couples may influence legal policies

that affect families (e.g., adoption).
 LIVED EXPERIENCES OF
SAME-SEX COUPLES
FOSTERING A CHILD

Saniel, Charles Vince 1 & Santos, Maria Gladiola 2

1 Faculty Member, College of Science, Psychology Department, Adamson University

2 Thesis Adviser, Graduate School, Adamson University.
 RESEARCH FINDINGS

JOYS AND FAVORABLE EXPERIENCES

• (3.1) Imposing
ENCOUNTERED IN CHILD-REARING

DISCIPLINE AND BEHAVIOR MOLDING

CHALLENGES, DIFFICULTIES AND FEARS

• (1.1) • (2.1) Simple joys

Preparedness or with the authoritative
lack of it; growing child; discipline;
• (2.2) Open • (3.2) Genderless
• (1.2) Traditional
training in
Parenting Communication
discipline; and
Beliefs and and Stronger
• (3.3) Balanced
Recognition as Connection; and authority
parents; and • (2.3) Sense of
• (1.3) Health and gratitude
Well-Being
Issues
 RESEARCH FINDINGS

FUTURE PLANS
LIFE CHANGES AND GROWTH AS PARENTS

• (4.1) Lifestyle changes; • (5.1) Child’s well-being;

• (4.2) Emotional and
maturity; • (5.2) Stability and
• (4.3) Solid foundation Legitimacy of the
of relationship (attitude Family
towards family life);
and
• (4.4) Changes in sex life
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

FAMILY LIFE: DIVORCE

•Associated with increased risk of:

• Behavior problems
• Problems in adult relationships
• But most children of divorced parents do okay
• Quality of relationships important
• Amount of disruption/change important
• Child personality characteristics important
 L. CONCERNS & ISSUES

FAMILY LIFE: Cohabitating and blended

families

• Cohabitation may be short-lived and therefore disruptive to child

• Blended family – Includes kids from previous relationships
• Parents and kids may have different ideas about how stepparents
“should” behave
• Stepparents may treat stepchildren differently from their own
• Managing feelings is important
CURRENT ISSUES

❑ Lowering the age of criminal responsibility

is against child rights: UNICEF
CURRENT ISSUES

❑ Scientific studies show that brain function

reaches maturity only at around 16 years old,
affecting children’s reasoning and impulse
control. Proposals to lower the age of criminal
responsibility argue that children as young as
9 years old are criminally mature and are
already capable of discernment. If this was
the case, then why is the legal age to enter
marriage, legal contracts and employment in
the Philippines at 18 years old? A 9-year old
child has not yet even reached the age of
puberty and their brains are not developed to
understand the consequences of actions.
CURRENT ISSUES

Branding children as criminals removes accountability from

adults who are responsible for safeguarding them. If
children who have been exploited by criminal syndicates are
penalized instead of the adults who abused them, we fail to
uphold the rights and well-being of children.
If we fail to understand the underlying reasons how and
why children commit crimes, we as adults, fail our children.
CURRENT ISSUES

“TULONG, HINDI
KULONG!”
 DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

THANK YOU!