Human Development Chapter 1
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human development
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the multidisciplinary study of how people change and how they remain the same over time
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nature-nurture issue
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the degree to which genetic or hereditary influences (nature) and experiential or environmental influences (nurture) determine the kind of person you are
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continuity-discontinuity issue
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whether a particular developmental phenomenon represents a smooth progression throughtout the lifespan (continuity) or a series of abrupt shifts (discontinuity)
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universal versus context-specific development issue
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whether there is just one path of development or several paths
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biopsychosocial framework
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a useful way to organize the biological, psychological, and sociocultural forces on human development
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theory
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an organized set of ideas that is designed to explain development
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psychodynamic theories
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theories proposing that development is largely determined by how well people resolve conflicts they face at different ages
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psychosocial theory
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Erikson's proposal that personality development is determined by the interaction of an internal maturational plan and external societal demands
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epigenetic principle
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in Erickson's theory, the idea that each psychosocial strength has its own special period of particular importance
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operant conditioning
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learning paradigm in which the consequences of a behavior determine whether a behavior is repeated in the future
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reinforcement
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a consequence that increases the future likelihood of the behavior that it follows
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punishment
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a consequence that decreases the future likelihood of the behavior that it follows
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imitation or observational learning
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learning that occurs by simply watching how others behave
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self-efficacy
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people's beliefs about their own abilities and talents
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information-processing theory
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theory proposing that human cognition consists of mental hardware and mental software
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ecological theory
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theory based on idea that human development is inseparable from the environmental contexts in which a person develops
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microsystem
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the people and objects in an individual's immediate environment
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mesosystem
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provides connections across microsystems
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exosystem
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social settings that a person may not experience firsthand but that still influence development
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macrosystem
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the cultures and subcultures in which the microsystem, mesosystem, and exosystem are embedded
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life-span perspective
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view that human development is multiply determined and cannot be understood within the scope of a single framework
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selective optimization with compensation (SOC) model
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model in which three processes (selection, optimization, and compensation) form a system of behavioral action that generates and regulates development and aging
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life-course perspective
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description of how various generations experience the biological, psychological, and sociocultural forces of development in their respective historical contexts
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systematic observation
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watching people and carefully recording what they do or say
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naturalistic observation
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technique in which people are observed as they behave spontaneously in some real-life situation
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structured observations
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technique in which a researcher creates a setting that is likely to elicit the behavior of interest
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self-reports
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people's answers to questions about the topic of interest
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reliability
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extent to which a measure provides a consistent index of a characteristic
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validity
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extent to which a measure actually assesses what researchers think it does
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populations
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broad groups of people that are of interest to researchers
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sample
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a subset of the population
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correlational study
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investigation looking at relations between variables as they exist naturally in the world
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correlation coefficient
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an expression of the strength and direction of a relation between two variables
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experiment
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a systematic way of manipulating the key factor(s) that the investigator thinks causes a particular behavior
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independent variable
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the factor being manipulated
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dependent variable
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the behavior being observed
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qualitative research
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method that involves gaining in-depth understanding of human behavior and what governs it
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longitudinal study
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longitudinal study research design in which the same individuals are observed or tested repeatedly at different points in their lives
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microgenetic study
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a special type of longitudinal design in which participants are tested repeatedly over a span of days or weeks, typically with the aim of observing change directly as it occurs
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cross-sectional study
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study in which developmental differences are identified by testing people of different ages
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cohort effects
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problem with cross-sectional designs in which differences between age groups (cohorts) may result as easily from environmental events as from developmental processes
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sequential design
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developmental research design based on cross-sectional and longitudinal designs
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meta-analysis
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a tool that enables researchers to synthesize the results of many studies to estimate relations between variables
