INTRODUCTION TO

PSYCHOLOGY A
Session 5
Emma Lomberg
Counselling Psychologist
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WHAT IS DEVELOPMENTAL
PSYCHOLOGY
To describe the changes typically occurring from conception to
about 18 years old of age

To explain what causes these developmental changes

To predict based on past and present characteristics what

behaviour the child will manifest at a later stage in his or her life

To improve well-being – to make positive changes in people’s

lives or to prevent problems from developing
 • Ancient cultures: children were the property of their parents. They
could therefore be treated in any way they wanted. This led to

THE atrocities such as infanticide without any consequences for the

parents.

VIEWS • Middle ages (500 to 1500AD): children were viewed as miniature

adults who had to accept certain responsibilities e.g. work in a mine

AND • Seventeenth century Europe: A British Philospher John Locke

thought that a child’s environment determines what and who they

PERCEPTI
become. They are a blank slate on which experience writes.
• 20th Century: The state now has power to remove children if home

ON OF
conditions are not adequate. Society often views that children should
be seen but not heard. In SA, we had gross inequalities between
children due to apartheid.

CHILDRE • In many countries slavery, sexual abuse, prostitution, pornography,

crime, violence, abuse, HIV/AIDS, lack of social assistance and poor
N education still affect children.
• Unicef states: “to be a child in South Africa is to walk a fragile path to
adulthood”
 The prenatal stage: subdivided
into the germinal, the embryonic
and the fetal periods.

Although the development of a The neonatal stage (2-4 weeks

child is a continuous process it is old) and infancy (4 weeks – 2

DEVELOP
useful to divide it into stages. years)

MENTAL The main developmental stages

are:
Early childhood (2-6 years)

STAGES In SA the legal definition of a

child is a person under the age of
Middle childhood (6 years to
puberty – generally around 12
18 years years)

Adolescence (puberty to
adulthood – roughly 18 years)
 •Physical development: involves changes in the child’s
body such as weight and height as well as the development
of the brain and motor development

DOMAINS •Cognitive development: refers to how we acquire

information about the world by means of our senses, how
OF we process and interpret such information and how we
store, retireve and use this knowledge to direct our

DEVELOP behaviour. It includes perception, learning, memory,

thinking, decision-making, imagination, creativity,
language and intelligence.
MENT •Personality development: the totality of a person’s
psychological, social, moral and physical characteristics.
E.g. self-concept and identity
•Social development: involves the development of the
individuals interactions and relationships with other people
(morals, religion and spirituality can play a role)
DEVELOPMENTAL DEBATES
Nature vs Nature: genetics and biological factors
Nurture Nurture: environmental factors and experience

Continuity vs Does development occur gradually/continuously over time or abruptly/discontinuously in distinct

Discontinuity stages

Activity vs Are people actively involved in their own development or whether they are passive recipients of
Passivity biological or environmental effects

Universality vs To what extent is development common to all humans (universal) or different from person to
Context specific person (context specific)
PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
STAGES OF PRENATAL
DEVELOPMENT
The prenatal stages
 Prenatal period is period from conception to birth
 9 months
 Three stages: Germinal, Embryonic and Fetal
1. The germinal stage
 Also called period of zygote
 Begins with conception, lasts 1-2 weeks
 Characterized by growth of zygote and beginning of a physiologically dependent relationship between the zygote and support system of the mother
 Mitosis and cell division
 Day 6: implantation (zygote attaches to uterus wall)
2. The embryonic stage
 Developing organism is called an embryo
 Rapid growth, cell and organ differentiation
 Placenta and umbilical cord develop
3. The fetal stage
 End of embryonic stage – birth
 Developing organism called fetus
 During 3rd month sex organs appear
 4th month becomes more human, mother can feel fetus move
 7th month boundary between viability and non-viability
 9th month baby is ready to be born 2.8-4.2kgs
 Any external factor that has a negative effect on the normal
development of an unborn child is a teratogen
• Time of exposure – embryonic phase is usually more vulnerable than fetal phase
• Genetic vulnerability – see genetic makeup of both child and mother, some are
genetically more vulnerable than others
• The degree or intensity of the factor – the more the mother smokes/drinks, the
greater the chances of harming the unborn child
• Each teratogen has a different effect on the unborn child

PRENATAL • The damage is not always evident at birth – especially psychological problems

ENVIRON
The age of the parents

• If the mother is younger than 20 or older than 35, greater risk of giving birth to

MENTAL
children with psychological and physical defects
• Mothers 15 and younger run risk of having stillbirths/ premature babies
• Women older than 40 have longer and more difficult birth processes

INFLUENC Nutrition of the mother

ES
• The unborn child is directly dependent on the mother for all nutritional needs
• Baby obtains nutrition from mothers bloodstream via the placenta
• Link between mothers inadequate diet and various abnormalities
• Link between maternal malnutrition and mental disorders such as
schizophrenia, mood and personality disorders

Radiation

• Cells in the process of division and differentiation are exceptionally vulnerable

to radiation (and x-rays)
• 10 days – 12 weeks is exceptionally dangerous
PRENATAL ENVIRONMENTAL
INFLUENCES
Diseases during pregnancy
The use of medication and drugs
Aspirin, antihistamines, anti-depressants, antibiotics, sedatives could
Sometimes agents are small enough to enter the placenta have an adverse effect on the unborn child
AIDS can spread through pregnancy or breastfeeding Fetal nicotine syndrome: Poor fetal growth, premature births, stillbirths,
 50% of transmission of HIV happened during birth process when cot deaths, undersized and deformed babie
 Smoking may negatively effect the cognitive performance of children
umbilical cord separates form the placenta resulting in a change of blood
 Nicotine penetrates the placenta and blocks the oxygen supply to the fetus, while the
 Babies with early transmission can die in the first 2 years toxic properties affect the growth of the fetus
 Also found in breast milk of smokers
Rubella (German measles) can cause heart defects, deafness,
blindness, intellectual disability, cataracts and liver and Fetal alcohol syndrome: mental retardation, slow physical growth,
pancreas defects facial abnormalities, cardiac defects, poor attention, below average
 Miscarriages and still births can occur weight, height and skull size
 Especially dangerous in the first 3 months of pregnancy A baby whose mother who uses drugs that cause physical dependency
can experience withdrawal symptoms like respiratory problems and
Syphilis can lead to abnormalities such as intellectual convulsions
disability, blindness or deafness The emotional state of the mother
 40% of untreated fetuses may abort, be stillborn or die soon after birth
 Infection takes place only after 4 or 5 months Mothers emotions may cause hormones such as adrenaline and
noradrenaline into her bloodstream
Congenital herpes infects skin and nervous system, causing These hormones permeate the placenta and thus affect the fetus’s activity
sores on sex organs
 Herpes can penetrate placenta but most infections occur during birth Mothers emotional stress may be linked to spontaneous abortions,
process premature births, low birth weight and difficult deliveries
 30% babies die, 25% suffer brain damage High maternal stress may affect the early development of the brain
 • The Neonatal phase: refers to the period between birth and when the baby is four weeks old

• Previously this phase was just thought of as reflex movements but is now seen as much more

• The appearance of a newborn: swollen, purple face, flat nose, skew ears. The head is
disproportionally big for the body.

• Majority of babies develop jaundice (yellowish colour of skin)

THE
• Average weight of 2.5 – 4.5. kg

• Average length is 45-56cm

NEONATA Perception of a neonate

Vision: can already blink but struggle to tell the differences between colours, their visual acuity

L PHASE
(ability to distinguish between elements in the visual field) is very poor so considered legally blind.
Takes two weeks to be able to distinguish between mothers face and a stranger's face

Hearing: Within a few hours after birth, a baby can differentiate between sounds such as their
mothers voice

Smell: They can distinguish between smells (can smell their mother’s breast vs a strangers)

Taste: their taste is not very sensitive but their sucking movements change for sweet and bitter food.

Pain: newborns do experience pain despite misconceptions that they don’t feel any pain. This is a
time where babies face painful procedures such as circumcision, injections etc
 •From four weeks old to 2 years old
•Characterized by rapid growth and development in all areas
•Critical phase for development
•Very dangerous phase (sudden infant death syndrome)
•The infants head grows slower than the rest of the body

INFANCY •The average baby doubles their weight every four to five
months during the first year
•Closure of the fontanelle – the soft tissue between the
bones of the skull
•Teeth start to appear between six and eight months
•By the end of the first year, the brain has reached two-
thirds of its adult size
 • There is rapid growth during the first two years of life; this slows down
between two and six years.
• The brain increases to about 50 per cent of its adult weight at the age of one
year and neural networks become denser.
• Preschoolers are very physically active and improve both their gross and their
fine motor skills in this stage. Handedness is only established at about five to

MIDDLE six years of age.

• Malnutrition may stunt brain growth and cause developmental delays.

CHILDHO • Physical growth slows during the middle childhood period.

OD
• In middle childhood, there are developments in strength, coordination and
muscular control, and improved hand–eye coordination
• Three environmental factors may affect physical development in middle
childhood: quality of care that children receive, level of nutrition and illnesses.
• At around six years, the brain experiences a growth spurt, particularly in the
frontal lobes; this is important for planning and for the sequential organisation
of thoughts and actions
COGNITIVE
DEVELOPM
ENT
 PIAGET’S STAGES OF
COGNITIVE
DEVELOPMENT
• Focuses on how children think and on how their thinking changes over time
• Development reflects children’s efforts to understand the world
• Piaget: ‘children naturally try to make sense of the world creating theories like
scientists and doing experiments to see what will happen when I push this toy off the
table’
• He broke the child's way of thinking into four stages
• Children come to understand the world by using schemes (mental categories of related
events, objects and knowledge) which be describe as a psychological template
• Adaption: as children gain new experiences, they have to deal with information that
seems to be in conflict with hat they already know. This involves 2 processes:
• Assimilation: the tendency to interpret new experiences in terms of an existing
scheme
• Accommodation: the schema is adapted or changed because of the new
information acquired through assimilation.
• The process of striving for a stable balance between assimilation and
accommodation is called equilibration
Early childhood
• object permanence: Infants realise that objects
and people continue to exist even when they are
no longer visible.
Middle childhood
• Conservation: Children they recognise that
properties of objects or substances do not change
because their form changes
• Reversibility: Children realise that one operation
can be reversed by the effects of another
• Compensation: Children can mentally compare
changes in two aspects of something, and can say
that the changes in one aspect compensate for the
changes in the other aspect
• Decentration. Children can simultaneously focus
attention on several attributes of an object or
event and understand that those attributes can be
separated.
• Seriation. Children can arrange objects in order
along quantitative dimensions such as weight,
length or size.
• Transitivity is the ability to recognise relations
among a number of ordered objects
 •Babies initially use undifferentiated crying to communicate
their needs.
•At six to eight weeks, babies start making cooing sounds.
•At four months, babies utter consonant–vowel
LANGUA combinations in long strings.

GE •The first word comes at about 12 months; the child uses

holophrases (one word sentences) to convey fuller

DEVELOP
meanings.
•By 18 months, the child has about 50 words.
MENT •At about 24 months, children use telegraphic speech (three-
word ‘sentences’).
•Between three and six years, vocabulary and sentence
length increase.
 Recognized that intrinsic development is important

Children need intellectual tools provided by their cultures (language,

memory aids, numerical systems, writing and scientific concepts)

VYGOTSK Zone of proximal development

• Difference between the level of performance a child may achieve when working independently

Y’S
and the higher level of performance when working under guidance of more skilled adults/peers
• Working within a child’s zone allows him to respond to his environment in a more competent
way

SOCIOCUL
• Accomplished through prompts, clues, modeling, explanation…
• Emphasis on children’s potential for intellectual growth rather than intellectual abilities
Scaffolding: temporary assistance provided by one person to a less-skilled
person when learning a new task
TURAL Guided participation: participation of an adult in a child’s activity in a

THEORY
manner that helps to structure the activity

For Vygotsky, infants learn language in interacting with their caregivers; this
happens in stages:
• Birth to three years: social stage
• Three to seven years: egocentric stage, characterised by external speech
• After about seven years: thought processes become internalised as inner (private) speech.

Vygotsky’s ideas were influential in the system of outcomes-based education

 MORAL DEVELOPMENT

0-9 yrs

10-14 yrs
 SOCIAL AND
EMOTIONAL
DEVELOPMENT
TEMPERA Easy child Difficult child Slow to warm up child

Mildly intense

MENT
Moods mild to Intense and frequently
reactions, both pos and
moderate, usually pos neg moods
neg

Responds well to Responds poorly to Responds slowly to

novelty and change novelty and change novelty and change
• Temperament is the inherent and characteristic way in
which a person reacts to stimuli and the aspect personality
has to do with feelings and the expressions thereof Quickly develops
Sleeps and eats More regularly than
• Temperament traits are the core of personality feeling and sleeping
irregularly, accepts difficult child, less than
schedules, takes new
new foods slowly easy child
• Plays important role in psychosocial adjustments in foods easily
children
Suspicious of
• Temperament is changeable and environment factors can Smiles at strangers, Mildly negative initial
modify the child’s reactions and behavior strangers, adapts
adapts to new response to new
slowly to new
situations stimuli
• 9 dimensions: activity level, rhythm, distractibility, situations
approach/avoidance, adaptability, attention span and
persistence, intensity of reaction, responsiveness threshold, Accepts most Gradually develops
quality of mood frustration with little Reacts with tantrum liking for new stimuli
fuss after much exposure
• 3 groups: easy child, difficult child, slow-to-warm-up child
Adapts quickly to
Adjusts slowly to new
new routines and Adjusts gradually
routines
rules of new games
ERIKSON’S
STAGES OF
PSYCHOSO
CIAL
DEVELOP
MENT
 Family and relationships

 Most influential factors in early childhood development

 Reflect continuity (attachment) and change (establishing independence)

Parents or caregivers

a) Attachment

SOCIAL
 Preschoolers show powerful attachment to their parents but manifestation of this bond begins to change

 Less distressed when caregiver has to leave for a while

DEVELOP
 Goal-corrected partnership: be in contact with but not requiring a constant physical presence

 Securely attached preschoolers experience fewer behavioral problems

MENT
b) Parenting style

Dimensions of parenting: Warmth and nurturance, Constant control, Expectations, Communication

Parenting styles:

 The authoritative parenting style (meet standards of all four dimensions most successful style)

 The authoritarian parenting style (High in control and expectations, but low in nurturance and communication)

 The permissive parenting style (Show warmth/nurturance but not control, expectations and communication)

 The uninvolved parenting style (do not meet any dimensions)

 • Middle childhood is a period of increased emotional maturity and independence.

EMOTION
• Compared to earlier stages, emotional expression during middle childhood is more specific and more diverse.

• Peer relationships are extremely important and a lack of friends may be both a cause and symptom of depression.

AL
• Other potential emotional problems are separation issues and school phobia.

• There are increased expectations placed on children (e.g. to do chores).

DEVELOP
• For Erikson, the crisis for children between six and puberty is industry versus inferiority; children must master
important social and educational skills and teachers can support (or damage) this process.

• In middle childhood, play has an important role in physical development; lack of physical activity may have serious

MENT IN
negative physical or mental health outcomes. •Play also allows children to learn what behaviour is appropriate in their
cultural context.

• Middle childhood also sees developments in self-concept and self-esteem; this happens through messages that children

MIDDLE
receive as they interact with the environment.

• Children of school-going age begin to define themselves in psychological terms; they begin to develop an ideal self.

CHILDHO
• Self-concept and self-esteem are influenced by family circumstances (e.g. socio-economic status), as well as social
positions (e.g. gender, ethnicity and social class).

• Self-concept and self-esteem are also affected by school experiences.

OD • Girls are particularly at risk for developmental disruptions because of the limiting social expectations placed on them in
middle childhood.

• Schools are powerful agents of socialisation during middle childhood as the educational setting provides the child with
the knowledge and skills necessary for adjustment in adulthood
 • African culture is largely based on oral traditions that are

AFRICAN
narrative/oral in nature
• The African worldview is based on a holistic perspective of humans

PERSPECT
and the universe. Human behaviour can understood only in terms of
the greater whole of which the individual is a part of.

IVE ON • This perspective assumes a hierarchical view of the universe

(inanimate lifeless objects, plants, animals, humans, living dead, God)

HUMAN • Human behaviour is viewed from an anthropocentric framework.

Humans are placed in the middle of the universe from which
everything else is understood
DEVELOP • Spirituality is emphasized in this perspective.

MENT • behaviour is guided by values such as cooperation, interdependence

and communal responsibility. (Ubuntu).
• Developmental theories from an African perspective are rare
NSAMENA Nsamenang regards human development as social
ontogenesis because it is situated within the

NG’S ecological and social environment in which it takes

place

STAGES • Social ontogenesis. = development from conception to death

OF The human life span and life cycle is described as 3

phases of selfhood
SELFHOO • Spiritual selfhood: begins with conception or as reincarnation

D of an ancestral spirit
• Social selfhood: begins at birth after naming ceremony and

DEVELOP
ends with death
• Ancestral selfhood: follows the biological death of the person
and incorporation into the spiritual selfhood follows with the

MENT ritual initiations

• Social selfhood: the experiential phases of selfhood develops
through 7 stages
NSAMENANG’S STAGES OF
SELFHOOD DEVELOPMENT
ASYNCHRONO
US ACTIVITY
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