| A | B |
|---|
| developmental psychology | the branch of psychology that studies the emotional, physical, cognitive, biological, personal, and social changes that occur throughout an individual’s life |
| grasping reflex | an infants clinging response to a touch on the palm of his or her hand |
| rooting reflex | an infant’s response in turning toward the source of touching that occurs anywhere around his or her mouth |
| maturation | internally programmed growth of a child that occurs as a result of automatic, genetically determined signals |
| telegraphic speech | the kind of verbal utterances offered by young children in which articles, prepositions, and parts of verbs are left out, but the meaning is usually clear |
| schema | an idea or mental framework a person uses to organize and interpret information and make sense of the world |
| assimilation | the process of fitting objects and experiences into ones schemas to deal with new situations and to understand the environments |
| object permanence | a child’s realization that an object exists even when he or she cannot see, hear, or touch it |
| representational thought | the intellectual ability of a child to picture something in his or her mind |
| conservation | according to Piaget, the principle that a given quantity does not change when its appearance is changed |
| egocentric | a young child’s inability to understand another person’s perspective |
| imprinting | inherited tendencies or responses that are displayed by newborn animals when they encounter new stimuli in their environment |
| critical period | a stage or point in development when certain skills or agilities are most easily learned |
| authoritarian family | family in which parents attempt to control, shape, and evaluate the behavior and attitudes of children in accordance with a set code of conduct |
| democratic/ authoritative family | family in which adolescents participate in decisions affecting their lives |
| permissive/ laissez- faire family | family in which children have the final say; parents are less controlling and have a non-punishing, accepting attitude toward children |
| socialization | the process of learning the rules of behavior of the culture within which an individual is born and will live |
| identification | in psychoanalytic theory, the process by which a child adopts the values and principles of the same-sex parent; the process of seeing oneself as similar to another person or group and accepting the attitudes of another person or group and accepting the attitudes of another person or group as one’s |
| sublimation | the process of redirecting sexual impulses into learning tasks; redirecting a forbidden desire into a socially acceptable desire |
| role taking | an important aspect of children’s play that involves assuming adult roles, thus enabling the child to experience different points of view first hand |
