• Piaget's ideas about cognitive change

• according to piaget, specific psychological structures, organized ways of making sense of experience are called schemes

• involves building schemes through direct interaction with the environment

• we use our current schemes to interpret the external world
• For example when timmy dropped objects he was assimilating them to his sensorimotor "dropping scheme"

• we create new schemes or adjust old ones after notcing that our current ways of thinking do not capture the environment completely.

• spans the first two years of life. Piaget believed that infants and toddlers "think" with their eyes, ears, hands, and other sensorimotor equipment. They cannot yet carry out many activities inside their heads.

• a process that takes place internally. Once children form new schemes, they rearrange them, linking them with other schemes to create a strongly interconnected cognitive system.

• Ages between birth and 2 yrs
• 6 stages
• Piaget based this sequence on a very small smaple: his own 3 children
• He observed his own son and 2 daughters carefully and also presented them with every day problems(such as hidden objects) that helped reveal their understanding of the world
• According to Piaget newborns know so little about the world that they cannot purposefully explore it

• provides a special means of adapting their first schemes. It involves stumbing onto a new experience caused by the baby's own motor activity. The reaction is circular because as the infant tries to repeat the event again and again, a sensorimotor response that first occured by chance becomes strenghened into a new scheme.

• (birth to 1 month)
• newborn reflexes
• a relex is an inborn, automatic response to a particular form of stimulation
• example "palmar grasp reflex" is so strong during the first week after birth that many infants can use it to support their entire weight.

• (1-4 months)
• simple motor habits centered around the infant's own body; limited anticipation events

• (4-8 months)
• Actions aimed at repeating interesting effects in the surrounding world; imitation of familiar behaviors

• (8 -12 months)
• Intentional or goal directed behavior; ability to find a hidden object in the first location in which it is hidden (object permanence); improved anticipation of events; imitation of behaviors slightly different from those the infant usually performs

• (12-18 months)
• exploration of the properties of objects by acting on them in novel ways; imitation of novel behaviors; ability to search in several locations for hidden object (accurate a-b search)

• (18- 2 years)
• internal depictions of objects and events, as indicated by sudden solutions to problems; ability to find an object that has been moved while out of sight (invisible displacement); deferred imitation; and make-believe play

• coordinating schemes deliberately to solve simple problems

• the understanding that objects continue to exist when out of sight
• example; object hidden under pillow and child doesn't know where it went to.

internal depictions of information that the mind can manipulate.

1. images or mental pictures of objects, people, and spaces

2. concepts or categories in which similar objects or events are grouped together.

• babies are born with a set of innate knowledge systems, or core domains of thought. Each of these prewired understandings permits a ready grasp of new, related information and therefore supports early rapid development
• core knowledge perspective theorists argue that infants could not make sese of the complex stimulation around them without having been genetically "set up" in the course of evolution to comprehend its crucial aspects
• violation-of-expectation findings suggest that in the first few months, infants have some awareness of all these basic object properties and quickly build on this knowledge
• also assume that an inherited foundation of linguistic knowledge enables swift language acquisition in early childhood
• understanding of metal states, such as intentions, emotions, desires, and beliefs.

• researchers have even examined infants' numerical knowledge
• suggest that babies can discriminate quantities up to three and use that knowledge to perform simple arithmetic
• babies numerical capacities are controversial

Information Processing

structure of the information-processing system

• want to know exactly what individuals of different ages do when faced with a task or problem
• most information processing researchers assume that we hold information in three parts of the mental system for processing: the sesnory register;working, or short-term,memory; and long-term memory

• as information flows through each we can use mental strategies to operate on and transform it, increasing the chances that we will retain information, use it efficiently, and think flexibility, adapting the information to changing circustance

• first information enters the sensory register, where sights and sounds are represented directly and stored briefly.

• in the second part of the mind, working, short term, memory, we actively apply mental strategies as we work on a limited amount of information.

• to manage its complex activites, a special part of working memory-called the central executive- directs the flow of information. it decides what to attend to, coordinates incoming information with information already in the system and selects, applies, and monitors strategies.

• the longer we hold information in working memory, the more likely it will transfer to the third, largest storage area- long term memory or permanent knowledge base, which is unlimited. we store so much in long-term memory that retrival-getting info. back from the system-can be problematic. information is organized like books in a library with categories to make retrieval easier. Capacity of the system gets larger and faster with age.

Deferred imitations

Make believe play

• representation enables older toddlers to splve advanced object permanence problems involving invisible displacement-finding a toy moved while out of sight, such as into a small box while under a cover. It also permits defferred imitation-the ability to remember and copy the behavior of models who are not present. And it makes possible make-believe play in which children act out every day and imaginary activities. as the sensorimotor stage draws to a close, mental symbols have become major instruments of thinking.

Vygotsky's Theory

Zone of proximal(or potential) development

• The home observation for measurement of the environment is a checklist for gathering information about the quality of children's home lives through observation and parental interview.
• factors measured by HOME during the first three years include an organized, stimulating physical setting and parental affection, involvement, and encouragement.
• regardless of SES and ethnicity, each predicts better language and IQ scores in toddlerhood and early childhood.

Behaviorists

• Learned through
• operant conditioning(reinforcement)
• Imitation

• inborn language acquisition device (LAD) biologically prepares infants to learn rules of language
• proposed by Noam Chomsky (1957)
• theory regards to the young child's amazing language skill as etched into the structure of the human brain.

• Inner capacities and environment work together
• social context is important

• first speech sounds- cooing- 2 months
• babbling- 6 months
• communication stats- joint attention, preverbal gesture, give-and - take
• First words- around 1 year
• Two- word utterances- after know about 200 words
• telegraphic speech

• 0-1 year;consistency&quality of responsiveness
• virtue-hope
• Erikson recognized that many facctors affect parental responsiveness-feelings of personal happiness, current life conditions (for example, additional young children in the family),and culturally valued child-rearing practices.
• But when the balance of care is sympathetic and loving, the psychological confrlict of the first year-basic trust versus mistrust- is resolved on the positive side.
• The trusting infacnt expects the world to be good and gratifying, so he feels confident about venturing out and exploring it. the mistruful baby cannot count on the kindness and compassion of others, so she protects herself by withdrawing from people/things

• 1-2 years old; exploration and guidance balance
• firm but tolerant
• virtue-willpower
• possible outcomes
• autonomy and independent, believe can do things
• helplessness,ashamedf of trying, doubt ability
• overly impulsive or over confident

Happiness: 1. smile; from birth  2. social smile:6-10 weeks 3. laugh 3 months- 4 months

Anger: 1. general distress: from birth 2. 4-6 months

Fear: 1. first fears; 2nd half of first year 2. stranger anxiety:8-12 months- the most frequent expression of fear is to unfamiliar adults, called stranger anxiety.

secure base

point from which to explore, venturing into the environment and then returning for emotional support

Undersand Others

Social Referencing

• From 5 months on, infants perceive facial expressions as organized patterns and can match the emotion in a voice with the appropriate face of a speaking person.
• as skill at establishing joint attention improves, infants ealize that an emotional expression not only has meaning but is also meaningful reaction to a specific object or event.
• once these understanding are in place, beginning at 8 to 10 months, infants engage in social referencing- actively seeking emotional information from a trusted person in an uncertain situation

• besides expressing a wider range of emotions,infants and toddlers begin to manage their emotional experiences.
• Emotional self-regulation refers to the strategies we use to adjust our emotional state to a comfortable level of intensity so we can accomplish our goals.
• when you remind yourself that an axiety-provoking event will be over soon, suppress your anger at a friends behavior, or decide not to see a scary horror film you are engaging in emotional self-regulation
• requires voluntary effortful, management of emotions,capacity that improves gradually
• result of development of cerebral cortex and assistance of caregivers

Thomas and Chess's Temperament

9 dimensions; yielding 3 types of children.

Rhythmicity; Regularity of body functions, such as sleep, wakefulness, hunger and excretion.

Distractibility; degree to which stimulations from the environment alters behavior.

Approach/withdrawl;Response to new object,food or person

Adaptibility;Ease with which child adapts to cahnges in the environment,such as sleeping or eating in a new place.

Attention span/persistence;amount of time devoted to an activity, such as watching a mobile or playing with a toy.

Intensity of reaction;Energy level of response,such as laughing,crying,talking or gross motor activity.

Threshold of responsiveness; Intensity of stimulation required to evoke a response.

Quality of mood;amount of friendly,joyful behavior as opposed to unpleasant, unfriendly behavior

easy child- 40% quickly estblishes regular routines in infancy, is generally cheerful and adapts easily to new experiences.

Difficult child-10% is regular in dal routines, is slow to accept new experiences, and tends to react neg. and intense

slow to warm up child- 15% is inactive,shows mild, low key reactions to environmantal stimuli, neg in mood, and adjust slowly to new experiences.

• most physiological research has focused on children who fall at opposite extremes of the positive-affect and fearful distress dimensions of temperament:
• inhibited, or SHY,children, who react negatively to the withdraw from novel stimuli, and uninhibited, or sociable, children, who display poostive emotion to and approach novel stimuli.  
• shy- react neg. withdraw from new stimuli- high heart rates, stress hormones and stress symptoms- higher right hemisphere frontal cortex activity.
• Sociable- react postively- low heart rates, stress hormones and stress symptoms- higher left hemisphere frontal cortex activity

Temperament and child rearing'

the goodness of fit model

• if a child;s disposition interferes with learning or getting along with others, adults must gently but consistenly counteract the child's maladaptive style.
• to describe how temperament and enviornment together can produce favorable outcomes. Goodness of fit involves creating child-rearing environments that recognize each child's temperament while encouraging more adaptive functioning.
• combines genetics and environment
• most childrend warm and affectionate with reasonable demands
• toddler inactive- use stimulatiing parenting encourage exploration- active toddlers-give opportunites to explore, over encouraging may dampen

• Preattachment (birth to 6 weeks); newborn singles attract caregivers
• Attachment-in-the-making-(6 weeks to 7 months); babies prefer and trust caregiver
• Clear-cut- attachment(7 to 18 months); separation anxiety, secure base
• Formation of a reciprocal relationship (18-24 months) Predict caregivers return
• Types of attachment; secure 65%, Avoidant,20% Resistant- 10% disorganized/disoriented- 5%

• opportunity for attachment
• quality of caregiving;sensitive caregiving;interactional synchrony
• infant characteristics
• family circumstances; parents internal working model

Multiple attachemnts

fathers importance; sensityvity warmth family attitudes;father as playmate,mom caregiver in many countries

siblings-80% have siblings;promote positive relationships;adjustments for preschoolers. end of first year; rich emotional relationship. Over 2; become clingy,demamding and "bad"

grandparents

professional caregiver

• secure attachment related to positive outcomes in: *preschool * middle school
• Attachment style can shift

continuity of caregiving may link infant attachment and later development

• insecure attachment style
• diffuse attachment
• due to
• poor emotional/physical care
• lots of change in caregivers early in life
• Sesitive caregiving- responding promptly, consistently,and appropriately to infants and holding them tenderly and carefully.
• highly inadequate caregiving is a powerful predictor of disruptions in attachment

• emerges in 2 year
• helped by acting on environment and noticing effects
• identification of the self as a physically unique being-well established.