TYPES OF RESEARCH

DESIGNS AND EARLY

LIFE DEVELOPMENT
Types of Research designs
◦ Developmental psychology is the scientific study of how and why human beings change
over the course of their life.
◦ Jean Piaget is Known as the father of developmental psychology.
Longitudinal study, researchers repeatedly examine the same individuals to detect any
changes that might occur over a period of time.
Longitudinal studies are a type of correlational research in which researchers observe and collect
data on a number of variables without trying to influence those variables.
Cross sectional research is a study in which subjects of different ages are compared at the
same time.
What is meant by cohort effect?
Cohort effects are variations over time, in one or more characteristics, among groups of
individuals defined by some shared experience such as year or decade of birth, or years of a
specific exposure

Nature VS Nurture Controversy

nature the influence of our inherited characteristics on our personality,
physical growth, intellectual growth, and social interactions.
nurture the influence of the environment on personality, physical growth,
intellectual growth, and social interactions.
Chromosomes, Genes, and DNA
◦ Genetics is the science of heredity. Understanding how genes transmit human characteristics
and traits
◦ DNA- deoxyribonucleic acid, is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms.
◦ Each section of DNA containing a certain sequence (ordering) of gene. These genes are located
on rod-shaped structures called chromosomes, which are found in the nucleus of a cell. Humans
have a total of 46 chromosomes in each cell of their bodies
◦ Twenty-three of these chromosomes come from the mother’s egg and the other 23 from the
father’s sperm.
◦ monozygotic twins identical twins formed when one zygote splits into two separate
masses of cells, each of which develops into a separate embryo.
◦ dizygotic twins often called fraternal twins, occurring when two individual eggs get
fertilized by separate sperm, resulting in two zygotes in the uterus at the same time.
 Prenatal Development
From conception to the actual birth of the baby is a period of approximately 9 months, during
which a single cell becomes a complete infant. It is also during this time that many things can
have a positive or negative influence on the developing infant.
Three stages of prenatal development
The Germinal Period Once fertilization has taken place, the zygote begins dividing and moving
down to the uterus, This 2-week period is called the germinal period of pregnancy.
The placenta also begins to form during this period. The placenta is a specialized organ that
provides nourishment and filters away the developing baby’s waste products. The umbilical
cord also begins to develop at this time, connecting the organism to the placenta
The Embryonic Period Once firmly attached to the uterus, the developing organism is called an
embryo. The embryonic period will last from 2 weeks after conception to 8 weeks, and
during this time the cells will continue to specialize and become the various organs and
structures of a human infant. By the end of this period, the embryo is about 1 inch long and
has primitive eyes, nose, lips, teeth, and little arms and legs, as well as a beating heart.
The Fetal Period: “Grow, Baby, Grow” The fetal period is a period of tremendous growth lasting
from about 8 weeks after conception until birth
◦ critical periods times during which certain environmental influences can
have an impact on the development of the infant.
◦ teratogen any factor that can cause a birth defect

Reflexes- Infants have a set of innate (existing from birth),

involuntary behavior patterns called reflexes. Until a baby is
capable of learning more complex means of interaction, reflexes
help the infant survive
Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive
Development
◦Piaget made significant contributions to the understanding of
how children think about the world around them;
◦His theory shifted the commonly held view that children’s
thinking was that of “little adults” toward recognition that it
was actually quite different from adult thinking
◦Piaget believed that children form mental concepts or schemes
as they experience new situations and events.
◦ Stages of cognitive development
◦ Sensorimotor (Birth to 2 years old)- Children explore the world using their senses and ability to
move. They develop object permanence and the understanding that concepts and mental images
represent objects, people, and events.
◦ Preoperational ( 2 to 7 years old)- They believe that everything is alive and has feelings just like their
own, a quality called animism. Another limitation is egocentrism, the inability to see the world through
anyone else’s eyes but one’s own. It is also the time of language development.
◦ Concrete Operations( 7 to 12 years old) Children at this stage are able to conserve, reverse their
thinking, and classify objects in terms of their many characteristics. They can also think logically and
understand analogies but only about concrete events.
◦ Formal Operations 12 years old to adulthood People at this stage can use abstract reasoning about
hypothetical events or situations, think about logical possibilities, use abstract analogies, and
systematically examine and test hypotheses. Not everyone can eventually reason in all these ways
◦ Intellectual growth involves three fundamental processes: assimilation, accommodation,
and equilibration.
◦ Assimilation involves the incorporation of new events into preexisting cognitive
structures.
◦ Accommodation means existing structures change to accommodate to the new
information. This dual process, assimilation-accommodation, enables the child to form
schema.
◦ Equilibration involves the person striking a balance between himself and the
environment, between assimilation and accomodation. When a child experiences a new
event, disequilibrium sets in until he is able to assimilate and accommodate the new
information and thus attain equilibrium
 Vygotsky’s Theory
◦ Vygotsky’s pioneering work in developmental psychology has had a profound influence on
school education.
◦ Whereas Piaget stressed the importance of the child’s interaction with objects as a
primary factor in cognitive development, Vygotsky stressed the importance of social and
cultural interactions with other people, typically more highly skilled children and adults.
◦ Vygotsky believed that children develop cognitively when someone else helps them by
asking leading questions and providing examples of concepts in a process called
scaffolding.
◦ In scaffolding, the more highly skilled person gives the learner more help at the
beginning of the learning process and then begins to withdraw help as the learner’s skills
improve.
◦ Vygotsky also proposed that each developing child has a zone of proximal development
(ZPD), which is the difference between what a child can do alone versus what a child can
do with the help of a teacher
Temperament
One of the first ways in which infants demonstrate that they have different
personalities (i.e., the long-lasting characteristics that make each person
different from others) is in their temperament. Researchers
Thomas & Chess ,have identified three basic temperament styles of
infants:
1. Easy:
“Easy” babies are regular in their schedules of waking, sleeping, and
eating and are adaptable to change. Easy babies are happy babies and
when distressed are easily soothed.
2. Difficult:
“Difficult” babies are almost the opposite of easy ones. Difficult babies
tend to be irregular in their schedules and are very unhappy about change
of any kind. They are loud, active, and tend to be crabby rather than happy
3. Slow to warm up: This kind of temperament is associated with infants
who are less grumpy, quieter, and more regular than difficult children but
who are slow to adapt to change. If change is introduced gradually, these
babies will “warm up” to new people and new situations.
Ainsworth Attachment Styles
◦The Strange situation test is a standardized procedure
devised by Mary Ainsworth in the 1970s to observe
attachment security in children within the context of
caregiver relationships.
◦Ainsworth concluded that there were three major styles of
attachment: secure attachment, ambivalent-insecure
attachment, and avoidant-insecure attachment.
◦Later on they added a fourth attachment style known as
disorganized-insecure attachment.
Parenting styles by Baumrind
◦ The parenting styles commonly used in psychology today are based on the work
of psychologist Diana Baumrind, a developmental psychologist at the University of
California
◦ Baumrind noticed that preschoolers exhibited distinctly different types of behavior.
Each type of behavior was highly correlated to a specific kind of parenting.
◦ Based on extensive observation, interviews, and analyses, Baumrind initially
identified three parenting styles: authoritative parenting, authoritarian parenting,
and permissive parenting
◦ Maccoby and Martin (1983) were the ones who expanded this 3-parenting-styles
and added one more style.