Developmental Matrix paper for Psyc.
KarruechesTwinchapter_3_physical_and_cognitive_develpment_in_infancy_2.ppt
Development in Infancy
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A. Growth and Stability – Physical Growth
- By age 5 months, the average infant’s birthweight has doubled to about 15 lbs.
- By age 1, the infant’s birthweight has tripped to approximately 22 lbs.
- By the end of the second year, the average child weighs four times it birthweight.
- By age 1, the average baby stands 30 inches tall.
- By the end of the second year, the average child is 3 feet tall.
B. The Nervous System and Brain
- The nervous system comprises the brain and the nerves that extend throughout the body.
- Infants are born with between 100 to 200 billion NEURONS, the nerve cells of the nervous system.
- As the infant’s experience in the world increase, neurons that do not become interconnected become unnecessary and die of- a process called SYNAPTIC PRUNING.
C. Integrating the Bodily System: The Life Cycles of Infancy
- Behavior becomes integrated through the development of various body RHYTHMS, which are repetitive, cyclical patterns of behavior.
- An infant’s STATE is the degree of awareness it displays to both internal and external stimulation.
C. Integrating the Bodily System: The Life Cycles of Infancy (cont.)
- The major state occupying in infant is sleep.
- On average, newborn sleep 16 -17 hours daily, ranging from 10 to 20 hrs a day.
- Sleep stages are fitful and “out of sync” during early infancy.
- By the end of the first year most infants are sleeping through the night for a total of about 15 hrs.
- SUDDEN INFANT DEATH SYNDROME (SIDS)
- Is a disorder in which seemingly healthy infants die in their sleep.
Motor Development
- Reflexes
- Swimming reflex
- Eye blink reflex
- Gross motor skills
- crawling (8 - 10 months)
- walking (9 months - 1 year)
- Fine motor skills
- coordinate movement of limbs (3 months)
- grasping (11 months)
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Nutrition
- Assists in physical development
- Malnutrition produces adverse results
- Slower growth
- Susceptibility to disease
- Lower IQ scores
- Undernutrition - deficiency in the diet
- Breast-feeding
- 70% of mothers in US breastfeed
- best food source
- Infant obesity
- 20% above the average for a given weight
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Development of the Senses
- Visual perception
- Auditory perception
- ability to hear begins prenatally
- sound localization
- Smell & Taste
- Sensitivity to pain & touch
- born with the capacity to feel pain
- touch is most highly developed sense in newborns
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Cognitive Development
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Piaget’s Approach
- Knowledge is the product of motor behavior
- All children pass through universal stages
- Content & quality of knowledge increase
- Movement depends on physical maturation & experience with the environment.
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Piaget’s Approach (cont.)
- Two principles underlie the growth in children’s schemes:
- Assimilation
- Is when people understand an experience in terms of their current stage of cognitive development and way of thinking
- Accommodation
- Is change in existing ways of thinking that occur in response to encounters with new stimuli or events
Sensorimotor Stage (birth -2)
- Simple reflexes – (substage 1)
- First month of life
- Various reflexes determine the infant’s interaction with world.
- First habits & primary circular reactions (substage 2)
- One to 4 months of age
- Coordination of actions
- Primary circular reactions
- Are the infant’s repeating of interesting or enjoyable actions on his or her own body.
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Sensorimotor Stage (birth -2)
- Secondary circular reactions – (substage 3)
- Four to 8 months of age
- Begins to act on world (e.g., rattle rattler)
- Vocalization increases and imitation begins.
- Coordination of secondary circular reactions
(substage 4)
- Eight to 12 months of age
- Employ GOAL-DIRECTED BEHAVIOR
- Development of OBJECT PERMANCE
- The realization that people and object exist even when they cannot be seen.
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Sensorimotor Stage (birth -2)
- Tertiary circular reactions – (substage 5)
- Twelve to 18 months
- Are the deliberate variation of actions to bring desirable consequences.
- Beginning of thought – (substage 6)
- Eighteen to 24 months of age
Language
- Characteristics
- Phonology
Refers to the basic sounds of language, that can be combined to produce words and sentences.
- Morphemes
Are the smallest language unit that has meaning.
- Semantics
Are the rules that govern the meaning of words and sentences.
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Origins of Language
- Linked to the way infants think & how they understand the world
- Comprehension precedes production
- Infants show prelinquistic communication
- First words spoken 10 - 14 months
- 18 months - linking words in sentences
Origins of Language (cont.)
- Learning Theory
- Reinforcement & conditioning
- Shaping
- Nativist Approach
- Genetically determined
- Infant-Directed Speech
- Short, simple
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