In the study of child development, adolescence refers to the second decade of the life span, roughly from ages 10 to 20. The word adolescence is Latin in origin, derived from the verb adolescere, which means "to grow into adulthood." In all societies, adolescence is a time of growing up, of moving from the immaturity of childhood into the maturity of adulthood. Population projections…
An adult assumes the role of parent for a child other than his or her own biological offspring in the process of adoption. Informal adoptions occur when a relative or stepparent assumes permanent parental responsibilities without court involvement. However, legally recognized adoptions require a court or other government agency to award permanent custody of a child (or, occasionally, an older indi…
Battered child syndrome occurs as the result of long-term physical violence against a child or adolescent. An estimated 2,000 children die each year in the United States from confirmed cases of physical abuse and 14,000 more are seriously injured. The battering takes many forms, including lacerations, bruises, burns, and internal injuries. In addition to the physical harm inflicted, battered child…
Childbearing is often viewed as the transition to adult female sexuality. Birth labor is divided into several stages. During the latent phase (Stage 0), which lasts from several hours to as long as three days, uterine contractions (either regular or irregular) are present, but the cervix has not dilated more than three or four centimeters. The mucus plug may be passed at this stage. The first stag…
Research has correlated birth order with such aspects of life as temperament and behavior. For example, first-born children, when compared to their siblings, tend to score slightly higher on intelligence tests and to attain a slightly higher socioeconomic status. Some psychologists believe that birth order is a significant factor in the development of personality. The psychologist Alfred Adler pio…
In psychoanalytical theory, birth trauma is the first major occasion of great anxiety in the life of an individual experienced at birth as the infant moves from the gentle comfort of the womb into a new environment full of harsh and unfamiliar stimuli. While most psychoanalytical psychologists assign a moderate degree of importance to the birth trauma in terms of its effects, some believe that the…
Bonding is the process by which parents form a close personal relationship with their newborn child. The term "bonding" is often used interchangeably with " attachment," a related phenomenon. For the purposes of this essay, bonding is confined to the newborn period. Attachment develops over the larger period of infancy and is treated in a separate entry. The way parents…
Bullying usually involves an older or larger child (or several children) victimizing a single child who is incapable of defending himself or herself. Although much bullying goes unreported, it is estimated that in the average school an incident of bullying occurs approximately once every seven minutes. Bullying occurs at about the same rate regardless of class size or school size, but, for an unkn…
For much of history, children were considered the property of parents. The family system was rarely, if ever, intervened upon by society. If a mother or father routinely abused their children, the abuse went unnoticed, or if noticed, merely ignored. It was largely considered a parent's prerogative to do whatever he or she wanted with their child. Over the past several decades, however, the …
The first detailed scientific study of child development was probably Charles Darwin's Biographical Sketch of an Infant (1877), based on a log he had kept on the development 1877 Charles Darwin's Biographical Sketch of an Infant, observations on development of his eldest child. 1880 G. Stanley Hall, the "father of child psychology in America," publishes The Contents of …
Child psychologists study human development from the earliest stages of life through adolescence and adulthood. These scientists focus on many areas of growth. In the early years of life they include motor skills, perceptual analysis and inference, language and speech, social behavior, and the emergence of basic emotions of fear, sadness, anxiety, shame, and guilt. The two important strategies for…
The future adult begins not at birth but at conception, with the creation of a unique set of genes, half from the mother, half from the father. This genetic blueprint is called the genotype; its outward manifestation is the phenotype. Sometimes the phenotype is controlled directly by the genotype, for example, eye color. More often, the phenotype represents the interaction of the genotype and the …
Developmental delay refers to any significant retardation in a child's physical, cognitive, behavioral, emotional, or social development. The two most frequent reasons for classing a child as having developmental delay involve those psychological systems for which there are good norms. This is especially true for motor development and language development. Because it is known that all child…
Developmental psychologists, by and large, study the way humans develop from an embryo into a full grown adult, focusing mainly on the factors that contribute to intelligence, personality, morality, and lifestyle. Of special interest are the effects certain stimuli have on the development of humans. For instance, does genetics pre-program a person to be introverted, or is that personality trait th…
The study of the emotional development of infants and children is relatively new, having been studied empirically only during the past few decades. Researchers have approached this area from a variety of theoretical perspectives, including those of social constructionism, differential emotion theory, and social learning theory. Each of these approaches explores the way infants and children develop…
Family is broadly defined as any two people who are related to each other through a genetic connection, adoption, marriage, or by mutual agreement. Family members share emotional and economic bonds. The term nuclear family is used to refer to family members who live together and share emotional, economic, and social responsibilities. The nuclear family is often comprised of a married couple who ar…
Family size is a significant factor in child development, but must be considered as only one part of a larger picture, however. Other factors, such as the parents' personality traits, and the gender and spacing of the children, contribute significantly to the formation of a child's personality. Children of large families have a greater opportunity to learn cooperation at an early age…
The study of children reared in complete or nearly complete isolation from human contact can provide important information to psychologists studying various aspects of socialization. After their return to human society, feral children often continue to be seriously retarded, raising the question of whether or not such children manifested abnormalities before their removal from society. Interest in…
Fine motor skill involves deliberate and controlled movements requiring both muscle development and maturation of the central nervous system. Although newborn infants can move their hands and arms, these motions are reflexes that a baby cannot consciously start or stop. The development of fine motor skills is crucial to an infant's ability to experience and learn about the world and thus pl…
The concept of gender constancy, influenced by the cognitive development theory of Jean Piaget, was introduced by Lawrence Kohlberg (1927-1987). Addressing the formation of gender identity in terms of cognitive development, Kohlberg advanced the idea that the development of sex roles depends in large part on a child's understanding that gender remains constant throughout a person's l…
Hand-eye coordination begins developing in infancy. Although it is an instinctive developmental achievement that cannot be taught, parents can hasten its progress by providing their children with stimulating toys and other objects that will encourage them to practice reaching out for things and grasping them. Until the age of eight weeks, infants are too nearsighted to see objects at distances far…
Compared to the young of other mammals, human infants are precocious in some ways—notably sensory development—and relatively helpless in others, such as physical strength and mobility. At birth, the average American infant weighs approximately 7.5 pounds (3.37 kg), although a baby born 28 weeks after conception may weigh as little as two pounds (0.9 kg). The average length of an Amer…
Human infants are acutely attuned to the human voice, and prefer it above all other sounds. In fact, they prefer the higher pitch ranges characteristic of female voices. They are also attentive to the human face, particularly the eyes, which they stare at even more if the face is talking. These preferences are present at birth, and some research indicates that babies even listen to their mother&#x…
French psychologist and educator Alfred Binet theorized that a child who appears to have limited mental abilities is able to perform on a level characteristic of younger children; conversely, a child who appears to be gifted is able to perform on the level of older children. In 1905 Binet, in collaboration with Thèophile Simon, developed a scale on which mental age could be compared to the …
Moral development involves the formation of a system of values on which to base decisions concerning "right" and "wrong, " or "good" and "bad."fi Values are underlying assumptions about standards that govern moral decisions. Although morality has been a topic of discussion since the beginning of human civilization, the scientific study of mor…
Night terrors, known medically as pavor nocturnus, are episodes that apparently occur during the non-dreaming stages of sleep in some children. Episodes of night terrors are most common in the preschool and early school years. Night terrors usually occur within an hour or two after the child has fallen asleep, and generally do not recur with any frequency or regularity. Many children experience on…
Sigmund Freud first suggested the existence of what he would later call the Oedipus complex in The Interpretation of Dreams (1900). In this work, he describes a subconscious feelings in children of intense competition and even hatred toward the parent of the same sex, and feelings of romantic love toward the parent of the opposite sex. He felt that if these conflicting feelings were not successful…
Of the many different relationships we form over the course of the life span, the relationship between parent and child is among the most important. Not surprisingly, students of child development have devoted considerable attention to the parent-child relationship, in order to understand how it develops and functions over the lifespan. Among the many questions researchers examine are those concer…
Peer acceptance is measured by the quality rather than the quantity of a child or adolescent's relationships. While the number of friends varies among children and over time as a child develops, peer acceptance is often established as early as preschool. Factors such as physical attractiveness, cultural traits, and disabilities affect the level of peer acceptance, with a child's degr…
Peers are the individuals with whom a child or adolescent identifies, who are usually but not always of the same age-group. Peer pressure occurs when the individual experiences implicit or explicit persuasion, sometimes amounting to coercion, to adopt similar values, beliefs, and goals, or to participate in the same activities as those in the peer group. Although it is usually conceived of as prim…
Austrian psychotherapist Sigmund Freud described personality development during childhood in terms of stages based on shifts in the primary location of sexual impulses. During each stage libidinal pleasure is derived from a particular area of the body—called an erogenous zone—and the activities centered in that area. If the problems and conflicts of a particular stage are not adequat…
The word puberty is derived from the Latin pubertas, which means adulthood. Puberty is initiated by hormonal changes triggered by a part of the brain called the hypothalamus, which stimulates the pituitary gland, which in turn activates other glands as well. These changes begin about a year before any of their results are visible. Both the male reproductive hormone testosterone and female hormone …
In 1984, Newsweek printed a feature article on an "epidemic" of child abuse in day-care settings. During the next 10 years or so, numerous newspaper and magazine articles described criminal trials in which reference was made to sexual abuse, torture, and ritual worship of one kind or another. For example, in 1988 Kelly Michaels was charged with sexually abusing children in her care a…
School phobia is an imprecise, general term used to describe a situation in which a child is reluctant to go to school. According to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, refusal to go to school is most common in the period from preschool through second grade. In most cases, school phobia is a symptom of an educational, social, or emotional problem the child is experiencing. The…
Separation anxiety emerges according to a developmental timetable during the second half year in human infants. This development reflects advancing cognitive maturation, rather than the onset of problem behaviors. As illustrated in the accompanying figure, infants from cultures as diverse as Kalahari bushmen, Israeli kibbutzim, and Guatemalan Indians display quite similar patterns in their respons…
Somnambulism, or sleepwalking, affects an estimated 15% of children in the early school years. It is similar to pavor nocturnus (night terrors) in that it occurs during the non-dreaming stage of sleep, usually within an hour or two of going to bed. The sleepwalking child feels an intense need to take action and may appear alert, purposeful, or anxious as he moves about. For many years, people beli…
Many different terms have been used to describe the disorder of childhood characterized by markedly delayed language development in the absence of any apparent handicapping conditions such as deafness, autism, or mental retardation. It is sometimes called childhood dysphasia, or developmental language disorder. Much research since the 1960s has attempted to identify clinical subtypes of the disord…
The Strange Situation procedure, developed by American psychologist Mary Ainsworth, is widely used in child development research. The goal of the Strange Situation procedure is to provide an environment that would arouse in the infant both the motivation to explore and the urge to seek security. An observer (often a researcher or therapist) takes a mother and her child (usually around the age of 1…
An infant learns to recognize her parents within the first few months of birth by sight, sound, and even smell. Up until six months, a baby will usually seem interested in other adults as well, engaging in games such as peek-a-boo. After six months, many babies undergo a period of fear and unhappiness around anyone except their parents. The child may burst into tears if an unknown person makes eye…
For many years, behavioral and educational researchers have studied the psychological effects of television programs on viewers, particularly children. Substantial debate over television began as early as the 1960s. The term "TV violence" was coined in 1963 as critics accused programs of promoting antisocial violent and aggressive behavior. More contemporary discussions center on the…
Identical, or monozygotic, twins are of the same sex and are genetically and physically similar because they both come from one ovum, which, after fertilization, divides in two and develops into two separate individuals. Fraternal, or dizygotic, twins occur when the mother produces two eggs in one monthly cycle and both eggs are fertilized. The conceptions may take place on two separate occasions …
Although the term "underachiever" commonly refers to anyone, child or adult, who performs below his or her potential, psychologists typically use the term to refer to a student whose performance in academic studies falls significantly below his scores on standardized tests of aptitude or ability. A student may also be considered to be underachieving based on the educator's eva…