Developmental Psych Section 1 Before Exam 1 Observational Learning Albert Bandura believes we are superior to animals because learning can occur just by observing how others handle a situation Imitation modeling 4 conditions required to make observational learning happen Attention if you can t pay attention or have cognitive impairment that would interfere with your attention the process will be shaky Memory Motoric ability practice Motivation some are learning better more actively engaged More wiling to devote time energy Applied Psych how can we use research findings psych knowledge to enhance human behavior life Including clinical counseling school psychologists To help remediate problems or get in touch with potential After 3 decades of research Bandura s theory leads to a new direction in applied psychology Self efficacy different from self esteem Your belief that you are able to do something handle a particular task before you even begin doing it Based on previous experiences Piaget Schemas cognitive framework that places concepts into categories association how we organize the world in our minds Start from beginning even as infants we start with basic reflex schema If you put things close to an infants lips they begin to suck the sucking schema Rooting schema when you touch a baby on their cheek they turn their head to that side and try to face the source that provides stimulation Piaget believed it is a very important fundamental ability that supports our learning later in life If you go into a room full of people who speak a different language than you and you are the only one who is not able to communicate with them you will be very nervous your schemas are not capable of handling this situation Assimilation Accommodation Equilibration fit modify new info based on what we already know changing creating schemas to fit new info Development is driven by the equilibration process Equilibrium state b w cog structure and environment balance b w assimilation and accommodation Vygotsky s sociocultural Theory All learning is social Importance of social cultural interactions in promoting cognitive growth Zone of proximal development ZPD the distance between the child s independent abilities and what the child can do with a little help Scaffolding adults help the construction of the child s understanding by providing guidance and support at the ZPD Bronfenbrenner s Ecological Theory Individuals grown and develop within a nest set of influences Microsystem family classmates neighbors churchmembers Those who have regular interactions with target person daily or weekly Mesosystem Interaction connectiveness among individuals in the microsystem Example I go to visit child s teacher Her teacher is in child s microsystem as am I Once teacher and I talk we exchange information integrate develop relationship Exosystem Those who do not have direct contact with target person but do have direct impact on those in target person s microsystem Samantha s dad has 34 colleagues They do not have direct interaction with Samantha But they do affect her dad s position money mood and affect him emotionally and cognitively he in turn brings home negative or positive reactions So they indirectly have an impact on Samantha Macrosystem The society the community Conceptual unit Things happen in society that will inevitably have an impact on target person Arizona passes law that anyone can be checked for ID etc to find illegal immigrants Cannot check minors but immediately there was a large rise in absent rates among non white children as their parents did not want to drive their children to school at the risk of being pulled over and checked Chronosystem Change over time when you expand scale and look at nowaday family structure compared to 30 years ago 50 years ago Increase in single parent household decrease in time after birth for moms to go back to work etc Developing RQ and Hypothesis Research Questions open or close ended Hypothesis a prediction often based upon theoretical ideas or observations that is tested by the scientific method directional hypothesis method A is more effective than method B Non directional hypothesis there will be a sig difference between method A and method B Operationalizing Concepts Operationalization defining a concept in a way that allows it to be measured Independent variable conceptually is the cause You manipulate the independent variable Dependent variable conceptually the result Manipulation of the independent v causes the dependent v to change How does body image affect self esteem among college women Do private school students score better on standardized tests than public school students Which is the more effective method for teaching kids to learn to read the whole language approach or phonics Sampling and Representative Samples A population those we are interested in studying or learning more about A sample a group selected from the population representative sample Sampling methods Random Sampling being selected Simple Random Sample every person in population has an equal chance of Stratified Random Sample 60 of sample is female 40 is male and you want 1000 people in sample Want 600 females and 400 male SO predetermined ratios Cluster Random Sample Instead of focusing on individuals focus on units or groups Ex interested in researching elementary school student s relationship between socio economic status and school performance Instead of performing SRS of every elem School student in Texas randomly select a number of schools and survey every student in those schools Non Random Sampling Systematic Sampling ex I only come to campus Thursday and Friday Going to run a study focused on those students who take classes on Thursday or Friday But not every student on campus gets equal chance of being selected Purposive Sampling choose who you want to invite to be selected Will send a research group to survey students reactions so they want to talk to student associations or student governments or certain departments Justified Convenient Sampling because of realistic constraints may only have access to a certain group of people and focus on them Research Design Random Assignments of participants Experimental vs Control treatment or not The treatment is the independent variable manipulation of treatment True experimental research design must have Random assignment of participants and manipulation of the independent variable Research Design Quasi Experiments and Causal