Understanding

Life-Span Human
Development
 Defining Development

• Development
• Systematic changes and continuities in the
individual that occur between conception and
death
• Falls into three domains
o Physical development
o Cognitive development
o Psychosocial development
 Defining Development

• Growth
• Physical changes that occur from conception to maturity
• Become physically competent in early part of life span
• Biological aging
• Deterioration of organisms that leads to death
• Does involve growth in early life, stability in adulthood and
decline in later life

GAINS – stability - LOSS

 Life Span Periods

1. Prenatal – conception to birth

2. Infancy – First 2 years
3. Preschool – 2 to 5 years
4. Middle childhood – 6 to 10 years
5. Adolescence – 10 to 18 years
6. Emerging adulthood – 18 to 25 years
7. Early adulthood – 25 to 40 years
8. Middle adulthood – 40 – 65 years
9. Late adulthood – 65 and up
 Emerging adulthood

• Experienced by most people in their twenties in Westernized

cultures
• Traditional, typical markers of entering true adulthood (e.g.,
leaving home, getting married, having children, etc.) has changed
 Cultural differences

• Age grade
• Age norms
• Social clock
 Subcultural Differences

• Ethnicity
• Socioeconomic status (SES)
• Individuals from lower-income families tend to
reach milestones of adulthood earlier.
 Framing the Nature–Nurture Issue

• Nature–nurture
• How biological forces and environmental forces
act and interact to make us what we are
• Nature
• Some aspects of development are inborn or
innate, others are the product of maturation.
• Nurture
• Change in response to environment or learning
 Assumptions of the life-span
perspective

1. Lifelong process
2. Multidirectional
3. Gain and loss
4. Lifelong plasticity
5. Shaped by historical-cultural context
6. Multiply influenced
7. Must be studied by multiple disciplines
 Developmental Theories and the Issues
They Raise

• Four Major Theoretical Viewpoints

• Psychoanalytic – Freud & Erikson
• Learning perspective – Pavlov, Bandura, Watson
• Cognitive development – Piaget
• Systems theory - Bronfenbrenner
 Nature–Nurture

• Nature- Nurture
• Activity – Passivity
• Continuity – Discontinuity
• Universality–Context Specificity
 Psychoanalytic Theory

• Focused on the development and dynamics of

the personality
• People are driven by motives and emotional
conflicts
• Unaware of these motives and conflicts
• Shaped by their earliest experiences in the family
 Psychosexual Stages

• Children move through five psychosexual

stages
• Oral, anal, phallic, latent, and genital
• Defense mechanisms
• Unconscious coping devices the ego adopts to
defend itself against anxiety that can occur as
conflicts arise
• Repression, regression
 Strengths and Weaknesses

• Weaknesses of Freud’s theory

• Ambiguous, internally inconsistent, difficult to pin
down and test, not easily falsifiable
• Strengths
• Attention to unconscious processes underlying
human behavior
• Highlighted early experiences
• Emphasized importance of emotions
 Erikson’s Psychosocial Theory

• Erikson as compared to Freud

• Less emphasis on sexual urges and on the
unconscious, irrational, and selfish id
• More emphasis on social influences, rational ego,
and on development after adolescence
 Psychosocial Stages

• Humans experience eight psychosocial stages:

• Trust versus mistrust
• Autonomy vs shame and doubt
• Initiative vs guilt
• Industry vs inferiority
• Identity vs role confusion
• Intimacy vs isolation
• Generativity vs stagnation
• Integrity vs despair
 Watson: Classical Conditioning

• Watson
• Conclusions about human development and
functioning should be based on observations of
overt behavior
• Rejected psychoanalytic theory
• Pavlov – 20 years prior
• Wanted to condition a human to respond to a
stimulus
 Skinner: Operant Conditioning

• Learner behaves in some way and associates

this action with the positive or negative
consequences that follow
• People repeat behaviors with desirable
consequences and decrease behaviors with
undesirable consequences
 Bandura: Social Cognitive Theory

• Social cognitive theory

• Humans are cognitive beings whose active
processing of information plays a critical role in
their learning, behavior, and development
• Observational learning
• Learning by observing the behavior of other people
• Example: The classic Bobo doll experiment
 Strengths and Weaknesses

• Strengths
• Learning theories are precise and testable
• Learning principles can be used to understand
behavior at any age
• Learning theories have important applications
• Weaknesses
• Rarely demonstrate that learning is responsible for
observed developmental changes
• Too little emphasis on biological influences
 Constructivism

• Piaget
• Intelligence is a process that helps an organism
adapt to its environment
• Children are not born with innate ideas about
reality
• Children are not filled with information by adults
Piaget – Cognitive Development
 Other Perspectives on Cognitive
Development

• Sociocultural perspective
• Vygotsky
• Cognitive development shaped by the
sociocultural context and grows out of children’s
interactions with members of their culture
• Children are social beings
• Develop their minds through their interactions with
more knowledgeable members of their culture
 Systems Theories

• Systems theories
• Changes over the life span arise from ongoing
transactions in which a changing organism and a
changing environment affect one another
• We must look at the child and their immediate
environment and the interaction of the larger
environment
 Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model

• How the environment is organized and how it

affects development
• The developing person is embedded in a
series of four environmental systems:
• Microsystem
• Mesosystem
• Exosystem
• Macrosystem
 From Genotype to Phenotype

• Genotype
• Genetic makeup a person inherits
• Phenotype
• The characteristic or trait the person eventually
has
• Genes and environment determine how
genotype is transferred into a phenotype –
how a person looks, feels, behaves
 From Genotype to Phenotype

• Gene expression
• Single gene-pair inheritance
• Dominant gene
• Recessive gene
 Chromosome Abnormalities

• Chromosomal abnormalities
• Result when a child receives too many, too few, or
abnormal chromosomes
• Down syndrome (trisomy 21)
• Turner syndrome
• Klinefelter syndrome
 Estimating Influences

• Shared environmental experiences

• Common experiences that work to make them similar
• Twins almost as similar when growing up in different
homes as when they grow up in same home
• Non-shared environmental experiences
• Experiences unique to the individual, not shared by
others in family
 Selected Behavioral Genetics Findings

• Intelligence
• Correlations higher when people are genetically
related
• Generally intelligence has heritability of 50%
• Reared together – more similar in IQ than when
reared apart
• Fraternal twins – more alike than born @different
times
• Adopted – IQ related to adopted parents
 Gene–Environment Correlations

• Gene–environment correlations
• Ways that a person’s genes and his environment
are systematically interrelated
• Genotype – genes a person inherits
• Phonotype – characteristic they have
• Three types of gene-environment correlations
• Passive
• Evocative
• Active
 The Endocrine System

• Pituitary gland (master gland)

• Thyroid gland
Textbook page 130
 Principles of Growth

• Cephalocaudal principle
• Growth occurs in a head-to-tail direction
• Head is ahead of body during prenatal period
• Newborn
o About 25% of length
o About 13% of body weight
• Adult
o 12% of height
o 2% of weight
o First year after birth – trunk grows fastest
o Second year – legs
 Principles of Growth

• Proximodistal principle
• Growth and development of muscles from the
center outward to the extremities
• Prenatal – chest and internal organs form before
arms, hands, fingers
• 1st year – trunk rapidly grows, arms remain short
and stubby
• Will undergo a period of rapid development later
 Principles of Growth

• Orthogenetic principle
• Development starts globally and undifferentiated
• Moves toward increasing differentiation and
hierarchical integration
• Starts as single cell – becomes billions of
specialized cells (neurons, blood cells, liver cells
and so on)
• Organise and integrate into functioning systems
(e.g. brain)
 The Infant

• Infancy
• Synaptogenesis (birth to 7)
• Growth of synapses, during childhood
 The Infant

• Synaptic pruning (7 to 15)

• Removal of unnecessary synapses (p. 133)
• Developing brain has plasticity
 Rapid Growth

• Infants grow rapidly

• Gaining an ounce of weight/day and an inch in
length/month
• At birth, most bones are soft, pliable, and difficult to break
• Too small & flexible to allow them to sit up/balance
• Have all muscle cells they will have, not strog

• By age 2
• Attained about half of their eventual adult height and
weigh 27–30 pounds on average
 Brain Lateralisation

• Lateralisation
• The left and right sides of the brain are
specialised to:
• Attend to different information
• Process sensory inputs in different ways
• Control different types of motor behaviour
hemispheric specialisation/ brain lateralisation
• Already evident at birth – show more left hemispheric
response to speech sounds
Brain Lateralisation
 The Adolescent Brain: What’s Going On
in There?

• Volume of gray matter increases, peaks, then

decreases throughout the teen years
• Associated with increased synaptogenesis just
before puberty
• Followed by period of heightened synaptic
pruning
• Brain’s “white matter,” consisting of clusters of
axons, increases in linear fashion throughout
adolescence
 The Growth Spurt

• Adolescent growth spurt

• Triggered by an increase in the level of growth
hormones circulating through the body during
adolescence
• Girls’ peak rate of growth for height is 12 years,
and for weight, is 12.5 years
• Boys’ peak rate of growth for height is 13.4 years,
and for weight, is 13.9 years
 The Development of Object
Permanence

• Piaget described what he say infants doing

• He then came to conclusions on what they
were likely thinking
• Believed that groundwork for cognitive
development happened during first two years
of life
• They begin to coordinate input from their
senses and start forming patterns of action
 The Development of Object
Permanence

• Infants pass through substages where

intelligence increases as they learn about the
world and cause and effect
• They do this through observation
• Move from a reflexive to reflective state
where they can solve problems
• Most notable here is object permanence
 The Emergence of Symbols

• Symbolic capacity
• Ability to use images, words, or gestures to
represent or stand for objects and experiences
• Most important cognitive achievement of infancy
• Allows infants to manipulate ideas mentally
enabling more sophisticated thinking by
manipulating ideas in their heads
 Elementary-Aged Children: Logical
Thinking

• Concrete-operational - 7 to 11
• Master concrete operations lacking in the
previous stage
• Can add and subtract, classify things and
arrange from large to small
 Emergence of Abstract Thought

• Age 11 to 12 onwards
• Can mentally juggle and understand things that
cannot be experienced by senses (seen, heard,
tasted etc.)
 Progress toward Mastery of Formal
Operations

• Recent evidence shows that formal-

operational skills have improved over time for
teens
• Might be due to changes in curricula since
1960’s
• Including more hands-on experience = active
learning
 Developing a Theory of Mind

• Theory of mind
• Understanding that
a) people have mental states such as desires, beliefs, and intentions
and that
b) these mental states guide their behaviour

• Also called mind-reading skills – use it to predict &

explain human behaviour
 Developing a Theory of Mind

• Abilities considered important early steps in

developing a theory of mind
• Joint attention
• Understanding intentions
• Pretend play
• Imitation
• Emotional understanding
 Perspectives on Moral Development

• Three basic components of morality

• Emotional component (psychoanalytic theory)
• Feelings regarding right or wrong actions that motivate
moral thoughts
• Cognitive component (cognitive-developmental theory)
• How we think about right and wrong and make decisions
about how to behave
• Behavioural component (social learning theory)
• How we behave when we experience the temptation to
cheat or are called upon to help a needy person
 Empathy, Prosocial Behavior, and
Morality

• Newborns display a primitive form of empathy

• Distressed by other infant’s cries
• By age one to two
• Capable of truer form of empathy – try to comfort
those in distress
• By age two
• Ability to take the perspective of the friend – will
offer teddy to crying friend
 First Emotions and Emotion
Regulation

• Izard and colleagues—basic emotions are

• Biologically based
• Develop early in life
• Play critical roles in motivating and organising
behaviour
• Primary emotions
• Distinct basic emotions that emerge within the
first six months of life
• Birth: babies show contentment by smiling
 Emotional Learning in Childhood

• As children get older, they:

• Develop emotional competence
• Patterns of emotional expression, greater
understanding of emotion, and better emotion
regulation skills
• Can have mixed emotions – children understand they are
sad and angry when a toy breaks
• By 11-12 – understand that they ca be happy they will
take part in the final but scared of not winning
 Attachment Theory

• Attachment theory (Bowlby)

• Based primarily on ethology – study of behaviour
of species in their natural environment
• Attachment = strong emotional tie that binds a
person to an intimate companion
• First attachment – 6 to 7 months, normally to a
parent
• When attached – will cry, cling to parent
 Play

• Children spend much time playing

• Locomotor play (ball)
• Object play (stacking blocks)
• Social play (board games)
• Pretend play (enacting roles- tea party
 Play

• Allows children to develop many skills

• Associated with the development of motor,
cognitive, language, social, and emotional
skills
• May contribute to healthy emotional
development
 What Makes Development Abnormal?

• Three broad criteria to define line between

normal and abnormal behavior
• Statistical deviance – does the person’s behaviour
fall outside the normal range of behaviour?
• Maladaptiveness – does the behaviour interfere
with adaptation or pose a danger to them or
others?
• Personal distress – does the behaviour cause
anguish or discomfort?
 DSM Diagnostic Criteria

• Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental

Disorders – DSM-5 (2013)
• Spells out defining features and symptoms for
numerous psychological disorders
• Most psychological disorders have many variations
and many contributors
 Autism Spectrum Disorder

• ASD diagnoses – can vary from mild to severe

• In DSM-5 previously distinct disorders are
classified as ASD
• Now given as diagnosis to persons suffering from
classic autism and Asperger syndrome – mild form
of ASD
 Externalizing and Internalizing
Problems

• Children with externalizing problems

• Lack self-control
• Act out in ways that disturb other people
• Violate social expectations
• Aggressive
• Disobedient
• Difficult to control
• Disruptive
 Externalizing and Internalizing
Problems

• Children with internalizing problems

• Negative emotions are internalized, or bottled up,
rather than externalized, or expressed
• Anxiety disorders
• Phobias
• Severe shyness and withdrawal
• Depression
 Eating Disorders

• More females diagnosed

• Anorexia nervosa
• Bulimia nervosa
• Binge eating disorder
• 5% of females 13-21 have one of three eating
disorders
 Eating Disorders

• Suspected causes
• Western ideal of thinness
• Genes
• Biochemical abnormalities
• Prevention and treatment
• Family therapy approaches
• More lasting effects than individual treatment