Term
|
Definition
| Look at something novel intently at first and then, over time, look at it less and less. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| A baby looks at an adult's eyes and then directs its own eyes towards whatever the adult is looking at. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Infants look at their caregivers' emotional expressions for clues about the possible danger of their own actions. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Experiment where a baby is first habituated to an event, then shown an impossible event that appears to violate one or more core physical principles, or another new event, but doesn't violate core principles. Infants show that they have a sense of core principles because they look longer at the impossible event. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
The principle that objects continue to exist when out of view.
Pioneered by Jean Piaget - tested infants' understanding of hidden objects. |
|
|
Term
| Piaget's development theory |
|
Definition
| Mental development derives from the child's own actions on the physical environment. Children play and explore to figure out what they can do with various objects. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| The process by which new experiences are incorporated into existing schemes. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| The expanding or changing of existing schemes to accommodate a new object or event. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Reversible actions - actions whose effects can be undone by other actions.
The type of action that contributes the most to mental development.
Develop into operational schemes. |
|
|
Term
| Four stages of development |
|
Definition
Piaget's four types of schemes that correlates to a child's age.
1. Sensorimotor (age 0-2) - thought and physical action are one and the same.
2. Preoperational (age 2-7)- ability to think beyond the here and now. Symbolize objects and events.
3. Concrete-operational (age 7-12)- can think about reversible consequences of actions. Understands conservation.
4. Formal-operational (age 12+)- principles that apply to a wide variety of situations.
Limitations: overestimates age difference in ways of thinking, is vague about the process of change, underestimates role of the social environment. |
|
|
Term
| Vygotsky's development theory |
|
Definition
Emphasized the child's interaction with the social environment. Cognitive development is a matter of learning the symbols, ideas, and modes of reasoning that have evolved over the course of history and constitutes the child's cultural environment.
Development occurs first at social level and then at the individual level. |
|
|
Term
| Language in mental development |
|
Definition
Vygotsky argues that language is the foundation for the development of higher human thought.
Children's out-loud speech to oneself is the precursor to internal verbal thought. Declines around age 7. |
|
|
Term
| Zone of proximal development |
|
Definition
| The difference between what a child can do alone and what the same child can do in collaboration with a more competent other. |
|
|
Term
| Difference between Piaget's and Vygotsky's theories |
|
Definition
Piaget: the child is a little scientist, experimenting with the world.
Vygotsky: the child is a little apprentice. They must routinely engage in activities that are important to the culture. |
|
|
Term
| Information-processing perspective |
|
Definition
| Treats the mind as a set of interacting components, which can change with age. Assumes that the mind is like a computer, analyzing information from the environment. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Episodic memory develops last because the child must first develop the capacity to encode their experiences into words.
Working memory capacity increases throughout childhood until age 15. |
|
|
Term
| Domain-specific development |
|
Definition
| Development limited to just one class of problems. Contrast to Piaget's concept that the mind develops as a whole. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
1990
Babies automatically divide teh world into two classes of entities - those that move on their own and those that don't.
Experiment: balls moved by physical impact or not. |
|
|
Term
| Children's understanding of minds |
|
Definition
1. Very young children can explain behavior in mental terms, especially in terms of perception, emotions, and desires.
2. Delay in understanding false beliefs. Exp: mother moves Maxi's candy bar into a different cupboard, where would Maxi look first?
3. Understands pretense - can play make-belief. Is a precursor to the belief-reality distinction. May also promote hypothetical reasoning. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
The smallest meaningful units of a language - smallest units that stand for objects, events, ideas, characteristics, or relationships.
Content - nouns, verbs, adj., adverbs.
Grammatical - articles, conjunctions, prepositions, prefixes, suffixes. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Elementary vowel and consonant sounds. |
|
|
Term
| Universality of human languages |
|
Definition
1. All languages use symbols (morphemes)
2. Hierarchically structured - phonemes, grammar, syntax, etc.
3. Grammatical rules are learned implicitly, not explicitly. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
1. Infants can distinguish between speech phonemes.
2. Cooing and babbling exercise and refine complex muscle movements needed for speech.
3. Word comprehension precedes word production.
4. Naming and rapid vocab development.
5. Extension of words to fit appropriate categories.
6. Use grammatical rules. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
When children use common nouns more broadly than adults would.
e.g. "dog" for all 4-legged animals
Underextension - applying words to more narrowly defined categories than adults do. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Apply new grammatical rules to numerous occasions, including ones that are not correct. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Characterized grammatical rules as fundamental properties of the human mind.
Grammatical rules link spoken sentences to the mind's system for representing meaning.
Language-acquisition device. |
|
|
Term
| Language-acquisition device (LAD) |
|
Definition
The inborn foundations for universal grammar plus entire set of inborn mechanisms that guide children's learning of the unique rules of their culture's language.
Evidence: young children invent grammar.
e.g. deaf children's invention of a grammatical sign language in Nicaragua. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Communication system that first-generation colonists from different language cultures communicatie through.
Pidgin develops into a true language, with a full range of grammatical rules with time, a creole language. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
A girl deprived of a language environment from birth until age 13. As a result, even after 7 years of language practice, her grammar still lagged far behind.
Demonstrates the critical learning period for learning first language, and the need for a language-acquisition support system. |
|
|
Term
| Language-acquisition support system (LASS) |
|
Definition
The language development environment provided by the social world into which the baby is born.
Mothers' speech to infants increases rate of language acquisition, motherese.
LASS differs across cultures. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Most linguistically accomplished ape to date. Nurtured by Sue Savage-Rumbaugh and associates. Kanzi was immersed in a language culture rather than systematic training.
Used an invented language in which teh words are geometric figures, called lexigrams. |
|
|
