Introduction to Developmental Psychology

The Life -Span Perspective - Discuss the distinctive features of a life -span perspective
on development.

• “EVERY MAN is in certain respects; a. like all other men, b. like some other men, c. like
no other man. -Henry A. Murray and Clyde Kluckhohn, from Personality in Nature,
Society, and Culture (1953).

• Each of us develops partly like all other individuals, partly like some other individuals,
and partly like no other individual.

• But as humans, we have all traveled some common paths.

• This is the general course of our development, the pattern of movement or change
that begins at conception and continues through the human life span.

How might people benefit from examining life-span development?

• about who we are • how we came to be this way • where our future will take us • We
will examine the life span from the point of conception until the time when life (or at
least life as we know it) ends.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LIFE-SPAN PERSPECTIVE

• The life-span approach emphasizes developmental change throughout adulthood as

well as childhood (Park & Festini, 2018; Schaie & Willis, 2016).

According to life-span development expert Paul Baltes (1939–2006), the life-span

perspective views development as lifelong, multidimensional, multidirectional, plastic,
multidisciplinary, and contextual, and as a process that involves growth, maintenance,
and regulation of loss.

Development Is Lifelong

• In the life-span perspective, early adulthood is not the endpoint of development;

rather, no age period dominates development.

• Researchers increasingly study the experiences and psychological orientations of

adults at different points in their lives.

Development Is Multidimensional

• No matter what your age might be, your body, mind, emotions, and relationships are
changing and affecting each other.

• Development has biological, cognitive, and socioemotional dimensions. Even within a

dimension, there are many components (Dale & others, 2018; Moss & Wilson, 2018;
Zammit & others, 2018).

Development Is Multidirectional

• Throughout life, some dimensions or components of a dimension expand and others

shrink. • For example, when one language (such as English) is acquired early in
development, the capacity for acquiring second and third languages (such as Spanish
and Chinese) decreases later in development, especially after early childhood (Levelt,
1989). • During adolescence, as individuals establish romantic relationships, their time
spent with friends may decrease. • During late adulthood, older adults might become
wiser because they have more experience than younger adults to draw upon to guide
their decision making.

Development Is Plastic

• Plasticity means the capacity for change. • For example, can you still improve your
intellectual skills when you are in your seventies or eighties? Or might these intellectual
skills be fixed by the time you are in your thirties so that further improvement is
impossible? • Understanding plasticity and its constraints is a key element on the
contemporary agenda for developmental research (Almy & Cicchetti, 2018; Park &
Festini, 2018).

Developmental Science Is Multidisciplinary

• Psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, neuroscientists, and medical researchers

all share an interest in unlocking the mysteries of development through the life span. •
How do your heredity and health limit your intelligence? • How do families and schools
influence intellectual development?

Development Is Contextual • All development occurs within a context, or setting. •

Each of these settings is influenced by historical, economic, social, and cultural factors
(Lubetkin & Jia, 2017; Nair, Roche, & White, 2018). • Contexts, like individuals, change
(Taylor, Widaman, & Robins, 2018). Thus, individuals are changing beings in a changing
world. • As a result of these changes, contexts exert three types of influences (Baltes,
2003): (1) normative age-graded influences, (2) normative history-graded influences,
and (3) nonnormative or highly individualized life events.

• Normative age-graded influences are similar for individuals in a particular age group.
These influences include biological processes such as puberty and menopause.

• They also include sociocultural factors and environmental processes such as beginning
formal education (usually at about age 6 in most cultures) and retiring from the
workforce (which takes place during the fifties and sixties in most cultures).

• Normative history-graded influences are common to people of a particular

generation because of historical circumstances.

• Nonnormative life events are unusual occurrences that have a major impact on the
lives of individual people. These events do not happen to everyone, and when they do
occur they can influence people in different ways. • Examples include the death of a
parent when a child is young, pregnancy in early adolescence, a fire that destroys a
home, winning the lottery, or getting an unexpected career opportunity.

Development Involves Growth, Maintenance, and Regulation of Loss

• Baltes and his colleagues (2006) assert that the mastery of life often involves conflicts
and competition among three goals of human development: growth, maintenance, and
regulation of loss. • As individuals age into middle and late adulthood, the maintenance
and regulation of loss in their capacities takes center stage.
Development Is a Co-construction of Biology, Culture, and the Individual

• Development is a co-construction of biological, cultural, and individual factors working

together (Baltes, Reuter-Lorenz, & Rösler, 2012). • For example, the brain shapes
culture, but it is also shaped by culture and the experiences that individuals have or
pursue. • In terms of individual factors, we can go beyond what our genetic inheritance
and our environment give us. • We can author a unique developmental path by actively
choosing from the environment the things that optimize our lives (Rathunde &
Csikszentmihalyi, 2006).

THE NATURE OF DEVELOPMENT

Biological Processes

• Biological processes produce changes in an individual’s physical nature.

• Genes inherited from parents, brain development, height and weight gains, changes in
motor skills, nutrition, exercise, the hormonal changes of puberty, and cardiovascular
decline are all examples of biological processes that affect development.

Cognitive Processes

Cognitive processes refer to changes in the individual’s thought, intelligence, and

language.

Socio-emotional Processes

• Socio-emotional processes involve changes in the individual’s relationships with other

people, changes in emotions, and changes in personality.

• Biological, cognitive, and socio-emotional processes are inextricably intertwined

(Diamond, 2013). • connection across biological, cognitive, and socio-emotional
processes are more obvious than in two rapidly emerging fields: • developmental
cognitive neuroscience, which explores links between development, cognitive processes,
and the brain (Bell & others, 2018; Nyberg, Pudas, & Lundquist, 2017). • developmental
social neuroscience, which examines connections between socio-emotional processes,
development, and the brain (Silvers & others, 2017; Sullivan & Wilson, 2018).

PERIODS OF DEVELOPMENT

• A developmental period refers to a time frame in a person’s life that is characterized

by certain features. • The most widely used classification of developmental periods
involves the eight-period sequence. • Approximate age ranges are listed for the periods
to provide a general idea of when each period begins and ends.

• The prenatal period is the time from conception to birth. It involves tremendous
growth— from a single cell to an organism complete with brain and behavioral
capabilities—and takes place in approximately a 9-month period.
 • Infancy is the developmental period from birth to 18 or 24 months. Infancy is a time
of extreme dependence upon adults. During this period, many psychological activities—
language, symbolic thought, sensorimotor coordination, and social learning, for
example— are just beginning.

• The term toddler is often used to describe a child from about 1 ½ to 3 years of age.
Toddlers are in a transitional period between infancy and the next period, early
childhood.

• Early childhood is the developmental period from 3 through 5 years of age. This
period is sometimes called the “preschool years.” During this time, young children learn
to become more self-sufficient and to care for themselves, develop school readiness
skills (following instructions, identifying letters), and spend many hours playing with
peers. First grade typically marks the end of early childhood.

• Middle and late childhood is the developmental period from about 6 to 10 or 11 years
of age, approximately corresponding to the elementary school years. During this period,
children master the fundamental skills of reading, writing, and arithmetic, and they are
formally exposed to the larger world and its culture. Achievement becomes a more
central theme of the child’s world, and self-control increases.

• Adolescence is the developmental period of transition from childhood to early

adulthood, entered at approximately 10 to 12 years of age and ending at 18 to 21 years
of age. Adolescence begins with rapid physical changes—dramatic gains in height and
weight, changes in body contour, and the development of sexual characteristics such as
enlargement of the breasts, growth of pubic and facial hair, and deepening of the voice.
At this point in development, the pursuit of independence and an identity are
preeminent. Thought is more logical, abstract, and idealistic. More time is spent outside
the family.

• The transition from adolescence to adulthood has been referred to as emerging

adulthood, the period from approximately 18 to 25 years of age (Arnett, 2015, 2016a, b).
Experimentation and exploration characterize the emerging adult. At this point in their
development, many individuals are still exploring which career path they want to follow,
what they want their identity to be, and which lifestyle they want to adopt (for example,
single, cohabiting, or married) (Jensen, 2018; Padilla-Walker & Nelson, 2017).

• Early adulthood is the developmental period that begins in the early twenties and
lasts through the thirties. It is a time of establishing personal and economic
independence, advancing in a career, and for many, selecting a mate, learning to live
with that person in an intimate way, starting a family, and rearing children.

• Middle adulthood is the developmental period from approximately 40 to about 60

years of age. It is a time of expanding personal and social involvement and responsibility;
of assisting the next generation in becoming competent, mature individuals; and of
reaching and maintaining satisfaction in a career.

• Late adulthood is the developmental period that begins during the sixties or seventies
and lasts until death. It is a time of life review, retirement, and adjustment to new social
roles and diminishing strength and health.
Four Ages

• Life-span developmentalists who focus on adult development and aging increasingly

describe life-span development in terms of four “ages” (Baltes, 2006; Willis & Schaie,
2006): • First age: Childhood and adolescence • Second age: Prime adulthood, ages 20
through 59 • Third age: Approximately 60 to 79 years of age • Fourth age:
Approximately 80 years and old

Three Developmental Patterns of Aging

• K. Warner Schaie (2016a, b) recently described three different developmental patterns

that provide a portrait of how aging can encompass individual variations:

• Normal aging characterizes most individuals, for whom psychological functioning

often peaks in early middle age, remains relatively stable until the late fifties to early
sixties, and then shows a modest decline through the early eighties. However, marked
decline can occur as individuals approach death

. • Pathological aging characterizes individuals who show greater than average decline
as they age through the adult years. In early old age, they may have mild cognitive
impairment, develop Alzheimer disease later on, or have a chronic disease that impairs
their daily functioning.

• Successful aging characterizes individuals whose positive physical, cognitive, and

socioemotional development is maintained longer, declining later in old age than is the
case for most people. For too long, only the declines that occur in late adulthood were
highlighted, but recently there has been increased interest in the concept of successful
aging (Docking & Stock, 2018).

DEVELOPMENTAL ISSUES

• Nature and Nurture - The nature-nurture issue involves the extent to which
development is influenced by nature and by nurture. Nature refers to an organism’s
biological inheritance, nurture to its environmental experiences.

• Stability and Change - Is the shy child who hides behind the sofa when visitors arrive
destined to become a wallflower at college dances, or might the child become a sociable,
talkative individual? • Is the fun-loving, carefree adolescent bound to have difficulty
holding down a 9-to-5 job as an adult? • These questions reflect the stability-change
issue, which involves the degree to which early traits and characteristics persist through
life or change. • Many developmentalists who emphasize stability in development argue
that stability is the result of heredity and possibly early experiences in life. •
Developmentalists who emphasize change take the more optimistic view that later
experiences can produce change.

• Continuity and Discontinuity - When developmental change occurs, is it gradual or

abrupt? Think about your own development for a moment. Did you gradually become
the person you are today? Or did you experience sudden, distinct changes as you
matured? • Developmentalists who emphasize nurture describe development as a
gradual, continuous process. Those who emphasize nature often describe development
as a series of distinct stages. • The continuity -discontinuity issue focuses on the degree
to which development involves either gradual, cumulative change (continuity) or distinct
stages (discontinuity).

• The scientific method is essentially a four-step process: (1) conceptualize a process or

problem to be studied, (2) collect research information (data), (3) analyze the data, and
(4) draw conclusions. • In step 1, when researchers are formulating a problem to study,
they often draw on theories and develop hypotheses. • A theory is an interrelated,
coherent set of ideas that helps to explain phenomena and facilitate predictions.

• Five theoretical orientations to development: psychoanalytic, cognitive, behavioral

and social cognitive, ethological, and ecological.

BIOLOGICAL BEGINNINGS

Evolutionary Perspective

In evolutionary time, humans are relative newcomers to Earth. As our earliest ancestors
left the forest to feed on the savannahs and then to form hunting societies on the open
plains, their minds and behaviors changed, and they eventually established humans as
the dominant species on Earth. How did this evolution come about?

NATURAL SELECTION AND ADAPTIVE BEHAVIOR

• Natural selection is the evolutionary process by which those individuals of a species

that are best adapted are the ones that survive and leave the most fit offspring. • Those
that do survive and reproduce pass on some of their characteristics to the next
generation. • Darwin proposed that natural selection fuels evolution. • In evolutionary
theory, adaptive behavior is behavior that promotes the organism’s survival in a natural
habitat.

EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY

• Evolutionary psychology emphasizes the importance of adaptation, reproduction, and

“survival of the fittest” in shaping behavior (Bjorklund, 2018; Legare, Clegg, & Wen,
2018; Lewis & others, 2017). • “Fit” in this sense refers to the ability to bear offspring
that survive long enough to bear offspring of their own. • In this view, natural selection
favors behaviors that increase reproductive success—the ability to pass your genes to
the next generation (Russell, Hertz, & McMillan, 2017).

Evolutionary Developmental Psychology

• What makes humans different from other species? • What characteristics does
humans have that enabled them to compete with other species? • Agile hands (make
and use tools) • Color vision (spot ripe fruits, game animals and predators) • Mastery of
fire ( cook food, warmth, frighten nocturnal predators) • Upright posture ( long distance
walking, see long distances across the plains) • Bipedalism (carry food with them) •
Linguistic abilities (collective knowledge of all members of the tribe) • What are the
consequences of large brains and upright posture in humans?

• An extended childhood period might have evolved because humans require time to
develop a large brain and learn the complexity of human societies. • Humans take
longer to become reproductively mature than any other mammal. • During this
extended childhood period, they develop a large brain and have the experiences needed
to become competent adults in a complex society

This period of apprenticeship enabled the developing brain to be modified by

experience.

Genetic Foundations of Development

Genetics - the science of inherited traits.

THE COLLABORATIVE GENE

• Each of us began life as a single cell weighing about one twentymillionth of an ounce!
• This tiny piece of matter housed our entire genetic code—information that helps us
grow from that single cell to a person made of trillions of cells, each containing a replica
of the original code. • That code is carried by DNA, which includes our genes.

• chromosomes - Threadlike structures that come in 23 pairs, with one member of each
pair coming from each parent. • Chromosomes contain the genetic substance DNA.

• DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is a complex molecule that has a double helix shape, like
a spiral staircase and contains genetic information.

• Genes, the units of hereditary information, are short segments of DNA. They help cells
to reproduce themselves and to assemble proteins.

• Proteins, in turn, are the building blocks of cells as well as the regulators that direct
the body’s processes (Goodenough & McGuire, 2017; Mason & others, 2018).

GENES AND CHROMOSOMES

• All of the cells in your body, except the sperm and egg, have 46 chromosomes
arranged in 23 pairs. • The cells in your body, except the sperm and egg, have 46
chromosomes arranged in 23 pairs. These cells reproduce through a process called
mitosis.

• A different type of cell division—meiosis— forms eggs and sperm (which also are
called gametes).

• During meiosis, a cell of the testes (in men) or ovaries (in women) duplicates its
chromosomes but then divides twice, thus forming four cells, each of which has only
half of the genetic material of the parent cell. • By the end of meiosis, each egg or
sperm has 23 unpaired chromosomes.

• During fertilization, an egg and a sperm fuse to create a single cell called a zygote. • In
the zygote, the 23 unpaired chromosomes from the egg and the 23 unpaired
chromosomes from the sperm combine to form one set of 23 paired chromosomes—
one chromosome of each pair coming from the mother’s egg and the other from the
father’s sperm.

Fertilization

PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT AND BIRTH

THE COURSE OF PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT

• Typical prenatal development, which begins with fertilization and ends with birth,
takes between 266 and 280 days (38 to 40 weeks). • It can be divided into three periods:
germinal, embryonic, and fetal

The Germinal Period

• The period of prenatal development that takes place in the first two weeks after
conception. • It includes the creation of the zygote, continued cell division, and the
attachment of the zygote to the uterine wall.

GERMINAL STAGE (FIRST 2 WEEKS)

1. The blastocyst is differentiated into 3 layers: the ectoderm, the endoderm and
the mesoderm
2. The blastocyst moves down the fallopian tube into the uterus for implantation.
3. The embryonic stage begins with implantation, and fully implanted blastocyst is
referred to as embryo.

The Embryonic Period

• The period of prenatal development that occurs two to eight weeks after conception.
• The rate of cell differentiation intensifies, support systems for the cells form, and
organs appear. • This period begins as the blastocyst attaches to the uterine wall. •
The mass of cells is now called an embryo, and three layers of cells form.

• The life-support systems include the amnion, the umbilical cord (both of which
develop from the fertilized egg, not the mother’s body), and the placenta.

• The amnion is a sac (bag or envelope) that contains a clear fluid in which the
developing embryo floats.

• The amniotic fluid provides an environment that is temperature and humidity

controlled, as well as shockproof.

• The umbilical cord contains two arteries and one vein, and connects the baby to the
placenta.

• The placenta consists of a disk-shaped group of tissues in which small blood vessels
from the mother and the offspring intertwine but do not join.

The Fetal Period

• The fetal period, lasting about seven months, is the prenatal period between two
months after conception and birth in typical pregnancies. • Growth and development
continue their dramatic course during this time. • At this time, a growth spurt occurs in
the body’s lower parts.

• Fetus - name for the developing organism from eight weeks after fertilization to the
birth of the baby. • For the first time, the mother can feel the fetus move.

FETAL STAGE (9TH TO BIRTH)

1. The fetal stage is marked by the development of the first bone cells. The embryo
is now called a fetus.
2. By the third month the fetus is able to move its head , legs and feet. By the 4th
month , the mother may feel quickening or fetal movements .
3. The beginning of the 7th month, consider the age of viability.
4. At the end of the 9th month, the fetus weighs on average 7.5 pounds and is
almost 20 inches long.

Brain Development • Four important phases of the brain’s development during the
prenatal period involve:

(1) the neural tube – • The nervous system begins forming as a long, hollow tube
located on the embryo’s back. • This pear-shaped neural tube, which forms at about 18
to 24 days after conception, develops out of the ectoderm. • The tube closes at the top
and bottom ends at about 27 days after conception,

(2) neurogenesis - • Once the neural tube has closed, a massive proliferation of new
immature neurons begins to takes place at about the fifth prenatal week and continues
throughout the remainder of the prenatal period. • The generation of new neurons is
called neurogenesis, a process that continues through the remainder of the prenatal
period but is largely complete by the end of the fifth month after conception (Keunen,
Counsell, & Benders, 2017). • At the peak of neurogenesis, it is estimated that as many
as 200,000 neurons are generated every minute,

(3) neuronal migration - • At approximately 6 to 24 weeks after conception, neuronal

migration occurs. • This involves cells moving outward from their point of origin to their
appropriate locations and creating the different levels, structures, and regions of the
brain (Keunen, Counsell, & Benders, 2017). • Once a cell has migrated to its target
destination, it must mature and develop a more complex structure, and

(4) neural connectivity - • At about the 23rd prenatal week, connections between
neurons begin to occur, a process that continues postnatally (Miller, Huppi, & Mallard,
2016).

TERATOLOGY AND HAZARDS TO PRENATAL DEVELOPMENT

• A teratogen is any agent that can potentially cause a birth defect or negatively alter
cognitive and behavioral outcomes. • The word comes from the Greek word tera,
meaning “monster.”

• The dose, genetic susceptibility, and the time of exposure to a particular teratogen
influence both the severity of the damage to an embryo or fetus and the type of defect:
• Dose. The dose effect is rather obvious—the greater the dose of an agent, such as a
drug, the greater the effect.
• Genetic susceptibility. The type or severity of abnormalities caused by a teratogen is
linked to the genotype of the pregnant woman and the genotype of the embryo or fetus
(Lin & others, 2017). For example, how a mother metabolizes a particular drug can
influence the degree to which the drug’s effects are transmitted to the embryo or fetus

. • Time of exposure. Exposure to teratogens does more damage when it occurs at

some points in development than at others (Feldkamp & others, 2017). Damage during
the germinal period may even prevent implantation. In general, the embryonic period is
more vulnerable than the fetal period.