CHAPTER 1 UNDERSTANDING LIFE-SPAN HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

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CHAPTER 1 UNDERSTANDING LIFE-SPAN HUMAN
DEVELOPMENT
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What is Development?

• Systematic changes and continuities
• In the individual
• Between conception and death
• Womb to Tomb
• Three broad domains
• Physical, Cognitive, Psychosocial

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Other Developmental Definitions

• Growth Physical changes that occur from birth to
  maturity
• Aging Positive and negative changes in the
  mature organism
• Maturation The biological unfolding of the
  individual genetic plan
• Learning Relatively permanent changes due to
  environmental experiences

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Age Grades, Age Norms, and the Social Clock

• Age Grade Socially defined age groups
• Statuses, roles, privileges, responsibilities
• Adults can vote, children cant
• Age Norms Behavioral expectations by age
• Children attend school
• Social Clock When things should be done
• Early adulthood time for 1st marriages
• Off time experiences are more difficult

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Phases of the Life Span

• Before 1600 Children viewed as miniature adults
• Modern View Children innocent, need protection
• Average life expectancy in 1900 was 47 years
• In 2000 it was 77.5 years
• Females White80, Black76
• Males White75, Black69
• Increasing population - age 65 and older

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Framing the Nature/Nurture Issue

• Nature heredity
• Maturational processes guided by genes
• Biologically based predispositions
• Biological unfolding of genes
• Nurture environment
• Learning experiences cause changes in thoughts,
  feelings, and behaviors
• Interactionist view nature nurture interact

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The Bioecological Model

• Microsystem Immediate environment
• Mesosystem Relationships among microsystems
• Exosystem Social Systems
• Macrosystem Culture
• Chronosystem Changes occur in a time frame
• This is an interactionist model

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• Urie Bronfenbrenners bioecological model of
  development pictures environment as a series of
  nested structures. The microsystem refers to
  relations between the developing person and her
  immediate environment, the mesosystem to
  connections among microsystems, the exosystem to
  settings that affect but do not contain the
  individual, the macrosystem to the broader
  cultural context of development, and the
  chronosystem to the patterning over time of
  historical and life events. Researchers face
  many challenges in studying the developing person
  in context.

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Goals of Studying Life-Span Development

• Description
• Normal development, individual differences
• Explanation
• Typical and individually different development
• Optimization
• Positive development, enhancing human capacities
• Prevention and overcoming difficulties

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Methods of Studying Life-Span Development

• Historical
• Baby Biographies Charles Darwin
• Questionnaires G. Stanley Hall
• Key Assumptions of Modern Life-Span Perspectives
• Lifelong, multidirectional process
• Gain and loss and lifelong plasticity
• Historical/cultural contexts, multiple influences
• Multi-disciplinary studies

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Unique Challenges in Developmental Research

• Infants and young children
• Attention, instruction, answering questions may
  be difficult
• Elderly Adults
• Possible sensory impairments
• Discomfort being studied, tested

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• The scientific method in action

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Conducting Developmental Research

• Self-reports interview, questionnaires, tests
• Behavioral Observations
• Naturalistic
• Advantage natural setting
• Disadvantage conditions not controlled
• Structured (Lab)
• Disadvantage cannot generalize to natural
  settings
• Advantage conditions controlled

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The Experiment

• Three Critical Features
• 1. Manipulation of independent variable
• 2. Random assignment of individuals to treatment
  conditions
• 3. Experimental control
• Quasi-Experiment No random assignment

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The Correlational Method

• Determine if 2 or more variables are related
• Correlation A measure of the relationship
• Can range from 1.0 to 1.0
• Positive variables move in same direction
• Negative variables move in opposite dir.
• Also tells you the strength of the relationship
• No relationship if correlation is 0
• Cannot establish a causal relationship

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Developmental Research Designs

• Cross-Sectional Designs
• gt1 cohorts or age-groups studied
• 1 time of testing
• Studying age differences at any one time
• Longitudinal Designs
• lt1 cohort
• 1 time of testing
• Study changes across time in one cohort

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• Cross-sectional and longitudinal studies of
  development from age 30 to age 70.

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Age, Cohort, and Time of Measurement Effects

• Age effects Changes which occur due to age
• Cohort Effects Born in one historical context
• Changes due to differences in society
• Disadvantage of cross-sectional design
• Time of measurement effects Historical
• Take place at time of data collection
• Disadvantage of longitudinal design

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Sequential Designs

• A combination of cross-sectional and longitudinal
  designs
• Advantages of both designs
• Gives information about
• Which age-related trends are age effects
• Which age-related trends are truly cohort effects
• Which age-related trends are a result of
  historical events

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• A sequential study. This study begins in 1970
  with a group of 30-year-olds studied
  longitudinally every 10 years thereafter. In
  1980, a second longitudinal study is launched, in
  1990 a third, and so on. Notice that at a point
  in time such as 2000 (orange shading) age groups
  can be compared in a cross sectional study.
  Notice too that 30-year-olds from different
  cohorts can be compared (blue shading).

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Issues in Developmental Studies

• Random sampling
• Increases likelihood that sample is
  representative of population
• Protecting rights of research participants
• Must assess the benefit to risk balance
• Researcher responsibilities
• Informed consent, debriefing, protection from
  harm, confidentiality

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Cultural and Subcultural Sensitivity in Research

• Variety of contexts considered
• Culturally sensitive methods measurements
• SES particularly important
• Ethnocentrism