Chapter 2 Continued

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Chapter 2 (Continued)

• Biological Bases of Cognitive Development

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Developmental Systems Approach

• 1.  levels inside and outside the individual
• environment
• behavior
• neural activity
• genetic activity

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Interacting components

• 2. There is lots of activity going on both
  within and between each level
• environment _______________
• behavior _______________
• neural activity _______________
• genetic activity _______________
• Individual
  Development

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Epigenesis

• 3.  all this activity causes the emergence of new
  structures and functions in the individual
• -epigenesis the emergence of new structures and
  functions during the course of development
• -bi-directional relation between all levels of
  biological and experiential factors
•  
• genetic activity (DNA ?? RNA ?? proteins) ??
  structural maturation ?? function, activity

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Development

• 4. development increasing complexity of
  organization
• -as these new structures and functions are
  emerging, this is causing increasing complexity
  of organization over time
• -constraints genes and the environment
• -timing of experience and development
• -sensitive period can be acquired at other
  time, just more difficult
• -critical period cant be acquired at another
  time

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Bronfenbrenners Ecological theory

• 1. Microsystem the child and his/her biological
  make-up
• 2. Mesosystem immediate environment of the
  child home, school, neighborhood play area,
  child care, church or synagogue
• 3. Exosystem next level out extended family
  and friends, mass media, parents work places,
  the school board, community health and welfare
  services
• 4. Macrosystem the farthest level out broad
  ideology, laws, and customs of the culture

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Interaction of Genes and the Environment

• because of all this interaction, genes with be
  expressed differently in different environments
  leading to different patterns of development
• Then why are there these universals in
  development? Why do almost all members of a
  species develop in a species-typical pattern?
• -we inherit two things
• 1.     species-typical genes
• 2. species-typical environment

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5 roles of the experience

• 1. induction the organism bust have a certain
  experience in the environment in order for a
  developmental endpoint to occur
• - with the experience, the outcome (e.g, a
  cognitive ability) will develop
• - without it, it wont develop
• - intermittent levels, wont develop as fully
• - the most fundamental role of experience

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Induction
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5 roles of the experience

• 2. facilitation experience facilitates the
  dev. of the outcome (e.g., a cognitive ability)
• -with the experience, the ability develops sooner
  than it would without the experience
• -it still develops even without the experience,
  just later

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Facilitation
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5 roles of the experience

• 3. maintenance experience is necessary to keep
  an outcome (e.g., a cognitive ability) that is
  already achieved (regardless of how it developed
  in the first place)
• -without the experience, the ability is lost

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Maintenance
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5 roles of the experience

• 4.  canalization a narrowing of responsiveness
  or an ability as a consequence of experience
• 5. malleability experiences that lead to
  enhanced plasticity (the opposite of
  canalization)

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Reaction Range

• -each genotype has a certain phenotypic range
  that is possible
• -the actual phenotype expressed by a genotype
  depends on the environment in which development
  takes place
• -so the genotype determines the reaction range
  and the environment determines where in the range
  the phenotype occurs

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Reaction Range
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Reaction Range

• -strengths
• -intuitively appealing, not too difficult to
  grasp
• -fit with some of the older experiments with
  selective breeding
• -weaknesses
• -but, didnt fit with the next generation of
  studies
• -deterministic theory (but development is
  probabilistic)

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Genotype ? Environment Theory

• 1. passive parents (who are genetically related
  to the child) provide the environment in which
  the child is raised, since the parents provide
  both the genes and the environment, the effects
  of each can not be separated
• -the influence of passive effects declines as
  children develop

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Genotype ? Environment Theory

• 2. evocative the childs genotype elicits
  certain type of physical and social responses
  from others (these responses are thus part of the
  childs environment)
• -the influences of these effects are constant
  over development

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Genotype ? Environment Theory

• 3. active an individual seeks out environments
  that are compatible with his or her genotype
• -the influence of active effects increase with
  age (more ability to choose environments as gain
  independence from parents)

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Genotype ? Environment Theory

• -strengths
• -in a very broad way, shows how genotypes might
  influence environments (although misses the steps
  in between)
• -weaknesses
• -assumes phenotype genotype