Child Development

A Practical Introduction

Kevin Crowley

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781526412737
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Educational Psychology

Focusing on the earliest years (0-8), the new edition of this bestselling textbook continues to provide a comprehensive overview of the research, theory, and current practice in the field of child development.

The new edition is fully up to date with current policy and legislation and now includes;

· New 'Research boxes' in each chapter helping students link theory to practice

· Increased coverage on children's social and emotional development

· A brand new companion website including a selection of free SAGE Journal articles, annotated further readings, weblinks and useful online materials.

1 Introduction to Child Development

By the end of this chapter you should

• be aware of the various domains of development that are of interest to researchers in this field
• understand some basic issues in the study of development including the role of nature versus nurture, and whether development proceeds in a continuous or discontinuous manner
• be aware of the different theoretical approaches to development including psychoanalytic, learning theory, cognitive-developmental, ethological and evolutionary psychology, and bioecological approaches
• have a basic understanding of some specific theories from the various approaches.

Why you should read this chapter

This book focuses on the study of child development from birth to 8 years. From our own observations of children, we are all aware of the tremendous changes that take place during this period: in the space of a few years, not only do children grow in the physical sense, they also acquire skills in language and communication, the capacity to think and reason about the world, and skills in social interaction. The study of child development is not just fascinating in its own right; knowledge gained from studying development can also impact on many practical issues regarding the care, education and wellbeing of children. This book presents an overview of research and theory in various aspects of child development, but before we look at these, this chapter and Chapters 2 and 3 will aim to provide some basic context for the study of development as a whole. In this chapter we will look at some basic issues in child development and some of the broad theoretical approaches to understanding development.

The nature of development

Development can be seen as the way in which individuals grow and change over the course of their lifespan and this can take place in different domains: biological, which includes features such as physical growth and developments in motor skills; cognitive, which refers to changes in thought processes such as memory, reasoning and problem solving, imagination, and creativity and language; emotional, where the focus is on changes in emotional experience and understanding; and social, which refers to changes in our understanding of ourselves and other people and how we relate to others. While the division of development into different domains may be useful from the point of organising our own thinking about the nature of development, it is important also to recognise that development itself is a holistic process and each domain influences and is influenced by the others. For example, development in a child’s motor skills, such as crawling and reaching and grasping (physical development), will allow them to explore both their environment and the objects in that environment, leading to a greater understanding of their surroundings (cognitive development).

A central issue in development is the nature versus nurture debate, in other words, the relative roles played by biological and genetic factors as opposed to environmental factors in shaping development. Nature refers to the role of biology and genetics and nurture to the role of experience and other environmental factors. Advocates of the nature position see development as a process of maturation, with physical and psychological change unfolding according to a genetically predetermined ‘plan’ inherited from our parents. The nurture viewpoint sees development occurring as a result of learning. One of the first developmental psychologists, G. Stanley Hall, was a strong proponent of the role of nature in development, and very much influenced by evolutionary theory. This can be seen in his recapitulation theory of play (Hall, 1904), in which he argued that children’s play emerged in a way that reflected the evolutionary history of the human species. For Hall, children’s play (and development generally) was essentially acting out this history, for example acts such as play-fighting and chasing reflect the ‘playing out’ of instincts related to the the hunting-and-gathering behaviours of our ancestors. On the other hand, John Watson (1930), who founded the behavioural school of psychology, took the view that environmental experiences and learning were of most importance and claimed that he could use the environment to shape the development of any child:

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed and my own specified world to bring them up in, and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select – doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief, and yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations and race of his ancestors. (1930: 104)

Watson’s views on the role of the environment will be covered later in this book.

Today, most theorists do not take a rigid position on the role of nature and nurture and see development occurring through the interplay of both factors. For example, it is widely accepted that babies are born with different temperaments which can be classed as ‘easy’ or ‘difficult’, and there is likely to be an inherited basis for either. However, research by Thomas and Chess (1986) has also indicated that the nature of the parenting received by babies is also important in the long-term outcomes of temperament, and a difficult baby will not necessarily grow into a difficult child or adult. Thus, a child may have a particular genetic predisposition, but environmental influences (such as quality of caregiving in this example) can also influence the outcome. However, it has been pointed out that genes may also influence the environment in that people may seek out environments that are compatible with their genetic dispositions, such as a musically talented child joining the school band. This phenomenon is known as niche picking (Scarr and McCartney, 1983). Another interesting issue is the extent to which abilities and behaviour are canalised (Waddington, 1975). This refers to the observation that the emergence of some abilities and behaviours is strongly influenced by genetic factors and their emergence is robust across a variety of environments. The development of motor skills in infants would be an example of a strongly canalised process, as all infants will eventually roll over, reach for objects, sit up, crawl and walk, and it would take extreme circumstances to alter this pattern. On the other hand, personality characteristics such as temperament and intelligence, while having a genetic component, are seen as less strongly canalised and can be altered by the environment in which the infant is raised.

Another aspect of development that has been subject to debate is whether it proceeds in a continuous or discontinuous manner. Continuous development implies a gradual but smooth pattern of change over time. Essentially, babies and children are seen as having the same basic capacities as adults and changes take place in the efficiency and complexity of their abilities until they reach the mature, adult levels. Change is then essentially quantitative in nature. Just as children grow taller and can run faster as they get older, their psychological characteristics also change in the same way; for example, they can remember more and their thought processes become more complex and sophisticated. The alternative discontinuous view is that development proceeds as a series of abrupt changes and with each change the child moves to a more advanced level of functioning. In this view, the child moves through a series of developmental stages, and with each new stage their behaviour, abilities or thought processes are qualitatively different to what they were in the preceding stage. The issue of whether development follows a continuous or discontinuous pattern has been the subject of much debate, but many developmental psychologists accept that both types of change occur and Miller (2002) points out that there can be a reciprocal relationship between the two. For example, as a child gets older they may be able to process information more quickly (quantitative change) and this greater efficiency may allow them to develop strategies for processing information that were previously not in evidence (qualitative change), such as learning a list of items by organising related items together. It has also been suggested that whether development appears to follow a continuous or discontinuous pattern may depend on the frequency with which we take measures of development. For example, a study by Adolph et al. (2008) measured the development of motor skills in infants by taking daily measures of their skills over a period of 18 months. However, in their analysis they also simulated longer sampling intervals by removing some of the daily observations and comparing over intervals of 2–31 days, and found that when infant skills were compared on a daily basis development appeared to follow a continuous course, but in the simulated longer intervals development appeared more stage-like.

Theories of development

A theory is essentially a set of organised observations that are used to explain an interesting phenomenon. There are a number of broad theories of child development and some of these will be reviewed in t...