Developmental Psychology - Basic, 7.5 Credits

About the course

The course explores the development of children from birth through adolescence, in a wide range of areas including biological, cognitive, linguistic, and socio-emotional development. It also covers the effects of genes, experience, and social context on children’s development. The goal of the course is to acquire an understanding of major issues of current theoretical controversy within developmental psychology, and to introduce students to a number of key methods used by developmental psychologists in their research. Students will also be encouraged to develop the capacity for critical analysis of developmental psychology research and the ability to carry out independent reading. The course presents an opportunity to understand the age-related behavior of children and youth and to identify the challenges associated with different stages of development. Fundamental issues regarding the conditions for development are covered, such as the significance of innate and environmental factors. Cognitive, emotional, social, and cross cultural aspects of development are covered. Development from a gender perspective will be presented in the context of age-periods. Current psychological research findings are a vital part of the curriculum and an integration of the different developmental facets is aimed for/strived for Methods for the study and the assessment of cognitive, social and emotional development will be introduced.

After the course the student should show:

• Familiarity with principal theories of developmental psychology. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of various models of innate and environmental factors influence during development. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of the early development of the brain, including the development of the normal brain and different types of developmental disorders and their etiology. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of cognitive development from the perspective of classical theories (Piaget and Vygotsky) and from findings of later research pertaining to socio-cognitive development. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of development from a cross-cultural perspective, including expanded knowledge of theory and methodology concerning children’s development in different cultures. •
• Understanding of development from a gender perspective, including children’s gender role development, the parental perspective in gender role development and relevant studies of methodology. •
• Familiarity with different theoretical perspectives applicable to children’s social and emotional development. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of language development from different theoretical perspectives and children’s development of lexicon, syntax and communicative competence. •
• Ability to demonstrate knowledge of general/prevalent problems of methodology in psychology, research designs specific to developmental psychology and different modes of observation.

Level of Education: Basic with academic experience

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2011-03-15