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This module describes different research techniques

that are used to study psychological phenomena in
infants and children, research designs that are used to
examine age-related changes in development, and
unique challenges and special issues associated with
conducting research with infants and children.

Developmental psychologists investigate questions using research methods that are

tailored to the particular capabilities of the infants and children being studied.
Importantly, research in developmental psychology is more than simply examining
how children behave during games (Children's games are more than just fun. They can be
opportunities for researchers to learn about how children think, feel, and behave.) , the results
obtained from developmental research have been used to inform best practices in
parenting, education, and policy.

Research Methods
Researchers, therefore, have developed many creative ways to collect information
about infant and child development. We separete this methods into three distinct
categories: involuntary or obligatory responses, voluntary responses, and
psychophysiological responses.

Involuntary or obligatory responses

One of the primary challenges in studying very young infants is that they have limited
motor control. As a result, infants cannot actively engage with the environment in the
same way as older children and adults. For this reason, developmental scientists
have designed research methods that assess involuntary or obligatory responses.
These are behaviors in which people engage without much conscious thought or
effort. Researchers study involuntary behaviors to better understand what infants
know about the world around them. One research method that capitalizes on
involuntary or obligatory responses is a procedure known as habituation. In
habituation studies, infants are presented with a stimulus such as a photograph of a
face over and over again, When infants become bored, they look away from the
picture. If infants are then shown a new picture. their interest returns and they look at
the new picture. This is a phenomenon known as dishabituation. One classic
habituation study was conducted by Baillargeon and colleagues (1985). These
researchers were interested in the concept of object permanence, To investigate
object permanence in 5-month-old infants, the researchers used a violation of
expectation paradigm. (experiencia de la palca que debe frenarse por un objeto que
está atrás). The results of this study revealed that infants looked longer at the
impossible test event than at the possible test event. The authors suggested that the
infants reacted in this way because they were surprised – the demonstration went
against their expectation that two solids cannot move through one another. The
findings indicated that 5-month-old infants understood that the box continued to exist
even when they could not see it. Subsequent studies indicated that 3½- and 4½-
month-old infants also demonstrate object permanence under similar test conditions.
These findings are notable because they suggest that infants understand object
permanence much earlier than had been reported previously in research examining
voluntary responses.

Voluntary responses

As infants and children age, researchers are increasingly able to study their
understanding of the world through their voluntary responses. Voluntary responses
are behaviors that a person completes by choice. Importantly, these behaviors are
completely up to child and adults (and are under their control). Researchers study
the voluntary responses of infants and young children in many ways. For example,
developmental scientists study recall memory in infants and young children by
looking at voluntary responses. Recall memory is memory of past events or
episodes, such as what you did yesterday afternoon or on your last birthday. To
study memory in these subjects (kids) researchers use a behavioral method known
as elicited imitation. (tenemos él ejemplo de la caja que se abre para revelar otro
juguete, él procedimiento se le muestra la infante que después lo deberia de repetir).
Use of the elicited imitation procedure has taught developmental scientists a lot
about how recall memory develops. we now know that 6-month-old infants
remember one step of a 3-step sequence for 24 hours. Nine-month-olds remember
the individual steps that make up a 2-step event sequence for 1 month, but only 50%
of infants remember to do the first step of the sequence before the second. When
children are 20 months old, they remember the individual steps and temporal order
of 4-step events for at least 12 months – the longest delay that has been tested to
date.

Psychophysiology
Researchers may also record psychophysiological data, such as measures of heart
rate, hormone levels, or brain activity. These measures may be recorded by
themselves or in combination with behavioral data to better understand the
bidirectional relations between biology and behavior. One manner of understanding
associations between brain development and behavioral advances is through the
recording of event-related potentials, or ERPs. ERPs are recorded by fitting a
research participant with a stretchy cap that contains many small sensors or
electrodes. These electrodes record tiny electrical currents on the scalp of the
participant in response to the presentation of particular stimuli, such as a picture or a
sound. The recorded responses are then amplified thousands of times using
specialized equipment so that they look like squiggly lines with peaks and valleys.
Some of these brain responses have been linked to psychological phenomena. The
use of ERPs has provided important insight as to how infants and children
understand the world around them, for example we learn that children with autism
are in some way processing faces differently than typically developing children

Parent-report questionnaires

Researchers often ask the people who know infants and children best – commonly,
their parents or guardians – to complete surveys or questionnaires about various
aspects of their lives. These parent-report data can be analyzed by themselves or in
combination with any collected behavioral or psychophysiological data. One
commonly used parent-report questionnaire is the Child Behavior Checklist. Parents
complete the preschooler version of this questionnaire by answering questions about
child strengths, behavior problems, and disabilities, among other things. The
responses provided by parents are used to identify whether the child has any
behavioral issues, such as sleep difficulties, aggressive behaviors, depression, or
attention deficit/hyperactivity problems. Results of this king of studies recently
showed that higher levels of maternal stress during pregnancy (such as a divorce or
moving to a new house) were associated with increased attention
deficit/hyperactivity problems in children over 2 years later. These findings suggest
that stressful events experienced during prenatal development may be associated
with problematic child behavioral functioning years later – although additional
research is needed.

Interview techniques

Verbal report paradigms are among the most widely used in psychological research.
For instance, a researcher might present a child with a vignette or short story
describing a moral dilemma, and the child would be asked to give their own thoughts
and beliefs.
Research Design

Research methods are the tools that are used to collect information. But it is easy to
confuse research methods and research design. Research design is the strategy or
blueprint for deciding how to collect and analyze information. Research design
dictates which methods are used and how. Researchers typically focus on two
distinct types of comparisons when conducting research with infants and children.
The first kind of comparison examines change within individuals. As the name
suggests, this type of analysis measures the ways in which a specific person
changes (or remains the same) over time. This kind of question would be best
answered using a longitudinal research design. Another sort of comparison focuses
on changes between groups. In this type of analysis, researchers study average
changes in behavior between groups of different ages. This kind of question would
be best answered using a cross-sectional research design.

Longitudinal research designs

Longitudinal research designs are used to examine behavior in the same infants and
children over time. We have the example of análisis of hide and seek. This study is
longitudinal in nature because the researcher plans to study the same children as
they age.

Longitudinal studies may be conducted over the short term or over much longer
durations. For these reasons, longitudinal research designs are optimal for studying
stability and change over time. Longitudinal research also has limitations, however.
For one, longitudinal studies are expensive: they require that researchers maintain
continued contact with participants over time, and they necessitate that scientists
have funding to conduct their work over extended durations. An additional risk is
attrition. Attrition occurs when participants fail to complete all portions of a study. The
results from longitudinal studies may also be impacted by repeated assessments.
Consider how well you would do on a math test if you were given the exact same
exam every day for a week. Your performance would likely improve over time. This
phenomenon is known as a practice effect. A final limitation of longitudinal research
is that the results may be impacted by cohort effects. Cohort effects occur when the
results of the study are affected by the particular point in historical time during which
participants are tested
Cross-sectional designs

Cross-sectional research designs are used to examine behavior in participants of

different ages who are tested at the same point in time. For example in the case of
hide and seek the researcher might observe 2-, 4-, and 6-year-old children as they
play the game.This research is cross-sectional in nature because the researcher
plans to examine the behavior of children of different ages within the same study at
the same time.
Cross-sectional designs are useful for many reasons. Because participants of
different ages are tested at the same point in time, data collection can proceed at a
rapid pace. In addition, because participants are only tested at one point in time,
practice effects are not an issue. Cross-sectional designs are also more cost-
effective than longitudinal research designs because there is no need to maintain
contact with and follow-up on participants over time. One of the primary limitations of
cross-sectional research, however, is that the results yield information on age-
related change, not development per se. As such, the researcher cannot conclude
that 2-year-olds develop into better hiders with age; she can only state that 6-year-
olds, on average, are more sophisticated hiders relative to children 4 years younger.

Sequential research designs

Sequential research designs include elements of both longitudinal and cross-
sectional research designs. Similar to longitudinal designs, sequential research
features participants who are followed over time; similar to cross-sectional designs,
sequential work includes participants of different ages. This research design is also
distinct from those that have been discussed previously in that children of different
ages are enrolled into a study at various points in time to examine age-related
changes, development within the same individuals as they age, and account for the
possibility of cohort effects. A researcher might enroll three separate groups of
children (Groups A, B, and C). Children in Group A would be enrolled when they are
2 years old and would be tested again when they are 4 and 6 years old (similar in
design to the longitudinal study described previously). Children in Group B would be
enrolled when they are 4 years old and would be tested again when they are 6 and 8
years old. Finally, children in Group C would be enrolled when they are 6 years old
and would be tested again when they are 8 and 10 years old.

Studies with sequential designs are powerful because they allow for both longitudinal
and cross-sectional comparisons. This research design also allows for the
examination of cohort effects. For example, the researcher could examine to
determine whether performance differed by group when participants were the same
age. Sequential designs are also appealing because they allow researchers to learn
a lot about development in a relatively short amount of time. Because they include
elements of longitudinal and cross-sectional designs, sequential research has many
of the same strengths and limitations as these other approaches. For example,
sequential work may require less time and effort than longitudinal research, but more
time and effort than cross-sectional research. Although practice effects may be an
issue if participants are asked to complete the same tasks or assessments over time,
attrition may be less problematic than what is commonly experienced in longitudinal
research since participants may not have to remain involved in the study for such a
long period of time.

When considering the best research design to use in their research, scientists think
about their main research question and the best way to come up with an answer.
Challenges Associated with Conducting
Developmental Research

We have to review some of the main issues that are encountered when conducting
research with the youngest of human participants. In particular, we focus our
discussion on ethical concerns, recruitment issues, and participant attrition.

Ethical concerns
Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) review and approve of all research projects that
are conducted at universities, hospitals, and other institutions. An IRB is typically a
panel of experts who read and evaluate proposals for research. IRB members want
to ensure that the proposed research will be carried out ethically and that the
potential benefits of the research outweigh the risks and harm for participants. IRB
considers some groups of participants to be more vulnerable or at-risk than others.
Whereas university students are generally not viewed as vulnerable or at-risk, infants
and young children commonly fall into this category. infants and young children are
perceived as being at increased risk is due to their limited cognitive capabilities,
which makes them unable to state their willingness to participate in research or tell
researchers when they would like to drop out of a study. For these reasons, infants
and young children require special accommodations as they participate in the
research process. When thinking about special accommodations in developmental
research, consider the informed consent process, Infants and young children cannot
verbally indicate their willingness to participate, much less understand the balance of
potential risks and benefits. As such, researchers are oftentimes required to obtain
written informed consent from the parent, who is almost always present as the study
is conducted. Researchers must be sensitive to changes in the state of the
participant as well as to parent desires. As in adult studies, researchers must always
strive to protect the rights and well-being of the minor participants and their parents
when conducting developmental science.

Recruitment
An additional challenge in developmental science is participant recruitment.
Recruiting university students to participate in adult studies is typically easy,
unfortunately, young children cannot be recruited so easily. ¿how do researchers go
about finding infants and young children to be in their studies? by obtaining infant
birth records from the state, county, or province in which they reside, researchers
can use the obtained information to call families by phone or mail them letters
describing possible research opportunities. Researchers can choose to pay a
recruitment agency to contact and recruit families for them. More economical
recruitment options include posting advertisements and fliers in locations frequented
by families. Researchers can also utilize online social media outlets like Facebook,
which allows users to post recruitment advertisements for a small fee. each of these
different recruitment techniques requires IRB approval.

Attrition
Although attrition is quite common in longitudinal research in particular, it is also
problematic in developmental science more generally, as studies with infants and
young children tend to have higher attrition rates than studies with adults. high
attrition rates in ERP studies oftentimes result from the demands of the task, In other
cases, attrition may be due to motivation (or a lack thereof). In addition, infants and
young children are more likely to tire easily, become fussy, and lose interest in the
study procedures than are adults. For these reasons, research studies should be
designed to be as short as possible – it is likely better to break up a large study into
multiple short sessions rather than cram all of the tasks into one long visit to the lab.
Researchers should also allow time for breaks in their study protocols. Happy,
comfortable participants provide the best data.

Conclusion: Care must be taken to ensure that researchers use appropriate

methods to examine infant and child behavior, use the correct experimental design
to answer their questions, and be aware of the special challenges that are part-and-
parcel of developmental research.