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Chapter 2:
Theories of Development
What is a Theory?
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What is a theory? What are its purposes?
How can you tell if a theory is good?
What is the relationship between theory and the goals of
research – description, prediction, control, and explanation?
Theories of Development
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Psychoanalytic
Behaviorism
Social Learning
Cognitive
Biology/Ethological
Ecological
Psychoanalytic Theory
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Importance of early childhood experiences
Emphasis on unconscious forces
Three levels of personality – Id, Ego & Superego
Psychosexual Stages of Development – correspond to
biological changes
Defense Mechanisms
Freud’s Psychosexual Stages
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Anal: birth - 18 mos.
Oral: 18 mos. - 2/3
Phallic: 2/3 - 6 years
Latency: 6-11
Genital: 11/12+
Some Defense Mechanisms
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Denial
Repression
Projection
Displacement
Reaction Formation
Psychosocial Development
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Erikson’s 8 psychosocial stages
We develop by confronting and resolving psychosocial crises
Must risk at each stage of development what we
worked so hard to acquire in the previous stage
Erikson’s Stages
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Trust vs. Mistrust: year 1
Autonomy vs. Shame/Doubt: 2nd year
Initiative vs. Guilt: 3-6
Industry vs. Inferiority: 6-11/12
Identity vs. Confusion: 10/12-20
Intimacy vs. Isolation:early adulthood, 20s, 30s
Generativity vs. Stagnation: middle adulthood, 40s-50s
Integrity vs. Despair: late adulthood, 60s+
Behavioristic Approaches
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Classical Conditioning
John Watson
Mary Cover Jones
Lil Albert
Associations, counterconditioning
Figure 2.1 Classical conditioning. In (1),
an unconditioned stimulus leads to an
unconditioned response, whereas in (2) a
conditioning stimulus does not lead to the
same response. In (3), the unconditioned
stimulus is paired with the conditioning
stimulus a number of times so that
eventually the conditioning stimulus alone
elicits the original response, as in (4).
Behavioristic Approaches
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Operant Conditioning
Patterns of reinforcement and punishment shape behavior
BF Skinner
Postive and negative reinforcement
Figure 2.2 Schematic model of operant conditioning. In (A), the operant behavior alone is not
rewarded. In (B), conditioning begins. The operant behavior takes place by chance; it is
immediately reinforced. It occurs again, by chance or deliberately, and the reinforcement is
repeated. As the timeline in the figure shows, repetition becomes more and more frequent as
the learner catches on. Eventually, the operant behavior continues even without reinforcement
at the terminal stage (C).
Social Cognitive Approach
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Albert Bandura
 Children can learn through observation & imitation
 Importance of modeling (imitation)
 Direct reinforcement
 Vicarious reinforcement
 Inhibitory effect vs. disinhibitory effect
 eliciting effect
 Self-Efficacy judgments are important – “I am an
entity capable of action and those actions have
predictable consequences.”
Figure 2.3 The four combinations
of stimulus effects that define
punishment and reinforcement.
Piaget’s Cognitive Approach
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Children construct their own cognitive world
What is the logic behind children’s reasoning?
Children advance cognitively through experience that
causes shifts in their patterns of thinking
Piaget’s Cognitive Approach
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4 stages of cognitive development
 Sensorimotor – birth to 2 (action and sensation)
 Preoperational – 2-6 years (perception rather than
logic)
 Concrete Operations – 6-11 years (reversible
actions)
 Formal Operations – adolescence and beyond (abstract
ideas)
Ethological Approach
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Imprinting, critical period
Lorenz
Figure 2.4 A model of imprinting. Under appropriate environmental conditions, exposure to
a releaser during the critical period leads to imprinting, which is manifested in predictable
behaviors. Imprinting does not occur in the absence of a releaser or if the releaser is
presented too early or too late.
Ecological Approach
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Vygotsky’s emphasis on culture and historical events
 Significant historical events can have an impact on
an entire generation
 War
 Famine/or the Great Depression
 Technology – such as space travel or the
internet
Ecological
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Urie Brofenbrenner
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Microsystem
Mesosystem
Exosystem
Macrosystem
Chronosystem
Figure 2.5 Bronfenbrenner’s
ecological view of influences
on the developing child. At
the center is the child in
immediate, face-to-face
interactions in a variety of
microsystems. Microsystems
also interact and affect one
another to define
mesosystems, which are
themselves affected by wider
social realities (exosystems).
All of these ecological
systems reflect the dominant
cultural values and beliefs of
wider society (macrosystem).
And all of them change over
time (chronosystem).