Chapter 10 Emotional Development DEP 3103 Unit 4 Learning Objectives 1 Describe the functionalist approach to emotion What are emotions How do emotions affect cognitive processing social behavior and health Provide examples a Functionalist approach to emotion the functionalist approach to emotion emphasizes that the broad function of emotions is to energize behavior aimed at attaining personal goals i Functionalist theorists believe that emotions are central in all our endeavors ii Emotions contribute to the emergence of self awareness 1 I e interest and excitement that babies display when acting on novel objects help them forge a sense of self efficacy confidence in their own ability to control events in their surroundings b What are emotions Emotion a rapid appraisal of the personal significance of the situation which prepares you for action i i e happiness leads you to approach sadness to passively withdraw fear to actively move away and anger to overcome obstacles ii An emotion then expresses your readiness to establish maintain or change your relation to the environment on a matter of importance to you c How do emotions affect cognitive processing social behavior and health i Cognitive processing 1 The emotion cognition relationship is evident in the impact of anxiety on performance among children and adults high anxiety impairs thinking especially on complex tasks by diverting attention from cognitive processing to task irrelevant threatening stimuli and worrisome thoughts a i e compared to their less stressed age mates preschool and school age children who were highly upset by an inoculation at the doctor s office tended to remember the event better probably because they focused more attention on the threatening experience 2 The relationship between emotion and cognition is bidirectional a dynamic interplay already under way in early infancy 1 By 3 months a complex communication system is in place in which each partner caregiver infant responds in an appropriate and carefully timed fashion to the other s cues ii Social Behavior iii Health 2 Still faced reaction occurs only when natural human communication is disrupted and is identical in American Canadian and Chinese babies suggesting that it is a built in withdrawal response baby turns away frowns or cries to caregivers lack of communication 3 Joint attention following the caregiver s line of regard infants and toddlers pick up not only on verbal information but also emotional information 4 Social referencing checking of others emotions young children learn how to behave in a great many everyday situations a i e 18 month old witnessed his newborn sister cry monitored his mother s reaction patted the baby and comforted no no Peach no tears 1 Growth faltering and psychosocial dwarfism childhood growth 2 disorders involving emotional deprivations i e stress elevates heart rate and blood pressure and depresses the immune system reactions that may explain its relationship with cardiovascular disease infectious illness and several forms of cancer 3 High concentrations of the stress hormone cortisol in saliva physiological response linked to persistent illness and learning and behavior problems including deficits in concentration and control of anger and other impulses 4 Extremely low cortisol levels interfere with release of growth hormone GH and thus can stunt children s physical growth 5 Good parenting help keeps stress levels down 2 Discuss changes in emotion from infancy into adolescence What are the basic emotions that are universal in humans What are self conscious emotions What is emotional self regulation and how does it change over the course of development What are emotional display rules a Development of emotional expression i People around the world associate photographs of different facial ii expressions with emotions in the same way In line with the dynamic systems perspective emotional expressions vary with the person s developing capacities goals and context iii Basic emotions happiness interest surprise fear anger sadness disgust are universal in humans and other primates and have a long evolutionary history of promoting survival iv Babies earliest emotional life consists of little more than two global arousal states attraction to pleasant stimulation and withdrawal from unpleasant stimulation 1 The dynamic systems perspective helps us understand how this happens children coordinate separate skills into more effective emotionally expressive systems as the central nervous system develop and the child s goals and experiences change a Sensitive contingent caregiver communication in which parents selectively mirror aspects of the baby s diffuse emotional behavior helps infants construct emotional expressions that more closely resemble those of adults v Four basic emotions happiness anger fear and sadness have received the most research attention 1 Happiness 2 Anger and Sadness a Happiness binds parents and child into a warm supportive relationship that fosters the infant s developing competencies b Social smile the smile a broad grin evoked by the stimulus of a human face First appears between 6 and 10 weeks i Social smiling becomes better organized and stable as babies learn to use it to evoke and sustain pleasurable face to face interaction c Laugher appears around 3 to 4 months i Middle of first year infants smile and laugh more when interacting with familiar people a preference that strengthens the parent child bond a From 4 to 6 months into the second year angry expressions increase in frequency and intensity b As infants become capable of intentional behavior they want to control their own actions and the effects they produce and will purposefully try to change an undesirable situation They re more persistent about obtaining desired objects and less easily distracted from those goals c Anger motivates caregivers to relieve a baby s distress and in the case of separations may discourage them from leaving again soon d Sadness occurs when infants are deprived of a familiar loving caregiver or when caregiver infant communication is seriously disrupted 3 Fear a Fear rises during the second half of the first year into the second year b Stranger anxiety expression of fear in response to unfamiliar adults which appears in many babies in the second half of the first year i Depends on several factors 1 Temperament some babies are generally more fearful past experiences with strangers and the current situation 2 The
View Full Document
Unlocking...