Time for a little time travel. You get to see what I looked like in 2011, when I taught the students of Purdue’s Introductory Psychology class a little bit about Developmental Psychology.
Author: ghollich
1. Research in Child Psychology
Summary and objectives: How do psychologists study development?
- Define key concepts such as the stages of development, including infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and the types of development: physical development, cognitive development, and social development as well as the connection between these types.
- Identify appropriate methods of doing developmental research such as correlational versus experimental studies, longitudinal versus cross-sectional studies, observational versus self-report methods.
Links
- Giant list of cognitive biases that affect your decisions (why the scientific method is best).
- List of crazy correlations (in book form from Amazon).
- How half the findings you read could be wrong.
- The “science” behind dowsing.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_development_stages
- http://www.apa.org/action/science/developmental
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_development
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longitudinal_study
- http://psychology.about.com/od/researchmethods/a/correlational.htm
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_research#Experimental_methods
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias
2. Genes & the Environment
Summary and objectives: Nature vs. nurture or nature and nurture?
Explain key concepts like heritability, polygenic variation using terms like dominant, recessive, and homozygous.
- Identify the different types of gene-environment relationships.
- Discuss the implications of critical methods and findings like twin and adoption studies and genetic marker studies.
- Apply your knowledge to discover how knowing about biology might help us change the environment we create for our children?
References
- Locke, J. (1689). An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.
- Watson, J. & Rayner, R. (1920). The Case of Little Albert.
Links
- Human Genome Project
- Mapping the Human Epigenome
- Good simple explanation of Recessive and Dominant traits and genes.
- Even better primer on genetics and genes from an agricutual standpoint.
- Nature versus Nurture revisited on Nova!
- Evolutionary Psychology
3. Prenatal development, birth, & the newborn
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts like periods of prenatal developments (using terms like germ disk, blastocyst, vernix, and placenta), stages of birth, and newborn reflexes (like the babinski, palmer, and sucking).
- Discuss the methods of testing the health of the newborn (CVS, APGAR, Ultrasound).
- Apply your knowledge and think about Why this matters? by considering the real dangers of fetal alcohol syndrome and teratogens.
References
- Murkoff, H. & Mazel, S. (2008). What to expect when you are expecting.
Links
- Story of the Fetus Song (also as mp3)
- The Visible Embryo Project
- The Multi-Dimensional Human Embryo
- Explanation of embryonic differentiation
- Fetal pictures
- Interesting discussion of When does baby’s life begin?
- The big list of Teratogens
- National Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome.
- The CDC’s Info page on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
- The Dangers of PCB’s:Polychlorinated biphenyls (used in paint and electric transformers).
- Vegan? Get your B12 for baby!
- Postpartum Depression
- Freud on Seuss’s Cat in the Hat . (Apparently babies remembered and were traumatized)
- Old fashioned ways of detecting pregnancy. Crazy thing is… Some work!
- The Moro Reflex
- More Reflexes
- Jaundice
- SIDS and more SIDS on the Web (also SIDS International).
- Biggest and best national study of children is still being planned.
- Causes of Scoliosis
- Do Parasites control us?
4. Healthy Growth & Nutrition
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts like secular growth trends, effects of various hormones, and how nutrition contributes to healthy growth.
- Apply your knowledge to think about “Why this matters?” and consider the nature of childhood obesity.
References
- Wansink, B. (2006). Mindless Eating: Why we eat more than we think.
Links
- The Baby Place: Info for parents
- Zero to Three: The place for info on early child development
- Feeding your newborn
- How breast feeding prevents illness.
- Breastmilk and HIV
- Where estrogen comes from.
- Women and testosterone.
- Why do women outlive men? (Hint: it might be testosterone).
- Overweight Kids.
- Sue McDonald’s
- McDonald’s and Nutrition
- TV and Fast Food makes kids fat!
- Dieting makes kids fat!
- The Sugar Debate
- The National Weight Control Registry
- Kids and Food
- US Government Nutrition Site
- National Osteoporosis Foundation
- More trouble in paradise: Malnutrition in Barbados.
- Getting Kids to Shape Up.
- Child Saftey network
- Baby-proof your home.
- Worst ways to get baby to sleep
- And of course, 12 scary sleep disorders
5. Neurological development
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts such as neural tube, axon, synapse, dendrite, terminal buttons, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, and occipital lobe,
- Discuss neural development from embryo to adolescence and describe the implications of neural pruning.
- Apply what you’ve learned to think about “Why this matters?” by looking at the effects of damage at different ages.
Links
- Parts of the Neuron Song (also as mp3)
- Diagram of the Nervous System
- More on Nerves
- Neural Development
- All about the brain and spinal cord
- Cranial Nerves
- Split Brain Patients
- Phineas Gage Information
- Quick Picture of Phineas (from Ripley’s Wax Mueseum)
- More information on Brain Damage
- Incredible story about a man with almost no brain.
- Great book summarizing Brain Rules for Adults and Babies.
- Potential link between synaptic pruning and schizophrenia.
6. perceptual & motor development
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts such as visual acuity, auditory threshold, sensory integration, dynamic systems theory, integration and differentiation.
- Discuss the implications of critical methods and findings like habituation studies and moving room studies.
- Talk about why this matters by connecting perception with cognition.
Links
- Perceptual Development Song (also as mp3)
- Hearing Milestones
- Vision Milestones
- All you ever wanted to know about depth perception.
- Retinal Disparity (ppt)
- Binocular Vision
- Children and Visual Problems
- NIMH ADHD
- Recent work connects critical parenting with ADHD
- ADHD
- More ADHD
- ADHD, revisited.
- ADHD Library of stuff.
- Frontline ADHD Special
- Flaws in th MTA Study of ADHD Treatment.
- List of ADHD Medications
- Motor skills summary from Baby parenting.about.com
- Motor Development Summary
- Infant’s attention and motor understanding.
- Some real research on infants’ motor skills.
7. Language Development
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts such as phonology, production, semantics, and grammar.
- Summarize the results of habituation studies and intermodal preference
- Talk about why this matters by thinking about the advantages of sign language and bilingualism.
Links
8. Theories of Cognitive Development
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts such as Piaget’s Theory (using terms like object permanence, conservation, egocentric, and mental operations), Piaget’s Stages, (sensory-motor, pre-operational, concrete, and formal operational), Vygotsky’s Theory, and Information Processing Theories.
- Describe the surprising behavior of children in the three mountain tasks and conservation tasks.
- Talk about why this matters by examining concepts of toy design.
Links
- Piaget’s theory
- More on Piaget’s Theory
- Piaget Summary Sheet
- Jean Piaget Society
- Life of Piaget
- More Piaget Biography
- Piaget: One of the 100 Great Scientists, According to TIME magazine.
- Pbs say Piaget is cool.
- Quick description of Piaget’s Stages.
- Keys to Piaget’s Ideas
9. Intelligence & skills testing,
Summary and Objectives
- Explain key concepts such as IQ, Mental Age, Spearman’s g, and crystalized vs fluid
- Compare Sternberg’s vs Howard Gardner’s types of intelligence.
- Decide when you would use WISC, Standford-Binet, or the Bayley Infant Milestones
- Talk about why this matters by examining how well tests work and the Flynn Effect.
Links
- Review of Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences
- Should we test gifted children?
- Relly funny video lecture asking if schools kill creativity?
- The Savant Syndrome
- The Jekyll and Hyde Approach to Intelligence
Child Primer 
