Physical Growth and Cognitive Development in Infancy · Infancy • Can you remember hearing comments such as: “Wah! your baby has changed so much!” “Hey! Your baby has grown

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Physical Growth and Cognitive

Development in Infancy

Study Unit 1 - Chapter 2 - Topic 1

Learning Outcomes

• Name the key physical milestones in infancy.

• List the key cognitive development in infancy.

• Identify the main characteristics of Piaget’s sensorimotor stage

of cognitive development.


At the end of the study topic, you will be able to:


Infancy

Source:

Gobucks2 available under a Creative Commons Attribution Licenses 2.0 at

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Infancy: From Birth to 2 Years Old

2 years

Physical

Growth

Motor

Development

Sensory and

Perceptual

Development

1 2 3

Key focus: Physical Development

to

BirthSource:

Six pounds, three ounces

by Carbonnyc available

under a Creative Commons

Attribution Licenses 2.0 at

http://www.flickr.com/photos

/carbonnyc/40442605/


Infancy

• Can you remember hearing comments such as:

� “Wah! your baby has changed so much!”

� “Hey! Your baby has grown so much since the last time I saw her, which is just

a week ago.”

• Indeed, infants’ physical development in the first year of life is extensive.

• Beginning with a gigantic head (relative to the rest of the body), infants become

capable of sitting anywhere, standing, stooping, climbing and usually walking at

the end of one year of life.

• During the second year, growth decelerates, but there is a rapid increase in

activities such as running and climbing.

• Check out your textbook for more details on the growth of human body during

infancy stage.


Pattern of Growth - Cephalocaudal

Sequence of growth

occurs from top to

bottom.

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Pattern of Growth - Proximodistal

Growth sequence

begins at

center of body

and moves

toward extremities.

Source:

Gobucks2 available under a Creative

Commons Attribution Licenses 2.0 at

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0527538/sizes/z/in/photostream/


Height / Weight

• Very rapid GROWTH.

• An average Singaporean newborn is 40cm long and weighs about 3.2kg.

• In the first several days of life, most newborns lose 5 to 7 percent of their body

weight before they learn to adjust to neonatal feeding.

• Weight:

� Double birth weight at 4 months.

� Triple it by 1st year.

• Height:

� average 2.5 cm per month in 1st year.

� By 2 years, would have achieved ½ of adult height.

• Nature and Nurture factors - both heredity and environment are responsible.


The Brain and Early Experiences

• An infant begins life as a single cell and nine months later is born with a brain and

nervous system that contains tens of billions of nerve cells or neurons.

• At birth, the newborn’s brain is about 25% of its adult weight.

• By second birthday, the brain is about 75% of its adult weight.

• However, the brain’s areas do not mature uniformly.

• Some areas, such as the primary motor areas, develop earlier than others such as

the primary sensory areas. See Figure 4.4 (Santrock, 2013) for a graphic

representation of the growing brain.

• Early experiences and the brain –In an enriched and stimulated environment, infant’s

brain reflects more activities compared to those of deprived environment.


The development of the

nervous system and the

body’s physical

properties, including its possibility for movement.

The goal the child is

motivated to reach.

The environment

support for the skill.

Motor Development: Dynamic Systems Theory

• The perspective on motor development that seeks to explain how motor behaviours

are assembled for perceiving and acting.

• Motor development is not a result of nature alone.

• An active process in which nature and nurture work together.

For example, when infants are motivated to do something, they create a new

motor behaviour to complete the new desired act. The new behaviour is the

result of many converging factors:

1 2 3


Motor Development: Reflexes

• Newborns are not completely helpless organisms. Their basic reflexes, such as

sucking and rooting, are genetically carried survival mechanism.

• These reflexes are automatic and beyond the child’s control.

• It is a survival mechanism.

• Turns into more complex, voluntary actions.

• Other reflexes that may persist in life include:

� Coughing, sneezing, blinking, shivering and yawning.


Rooting

Reflex

(cheek)

1Sucking

Reflex

(mouth)

2

Moro Reflex

(body)

3Grasping

Reflex

(hand)

4

4 Survival Mechanisms

Click on any of the above buttons to read the explanation.

Survival Mechanisms - Rooting Reflex


Rooting

Reflex

(cheek)

1

Source:

Gobucks2 available under

a Creative Commons


http://www.flickr.com/photos/

ohiostate/2790527134/sizes/

z/in/photostream/

Survival Mechanisms - Sucking Reflex


Sucking

Reflex

(cheek)

2

Source:


a Creative Commons



ohiostate/2790527538/sizes

/z/in/photostream/

Survival Mechanisms - Sucking Reflex


Moro Reflex

(body)

3

Source:


a Creative Commons




/z/in/photostream/

Survival Mechanisms - Grasping Reflex


Grasping

Reflex

(hand)

4

Source:


a Creative Commons




/z/in/photostream/

Motor Development: Gross Motor Skills

• Involve large muscle activities such as moving one's arms and walking.

• Milestones in gross motor skills, such as sitting alone, crawling and taking

the first step reflects the transformation of helpless babies from being

unable to lift their heads to being able to do things on their own.

• It is important to note that the timing of these milestones varies by as much

as two to four months. This is especially true among older infants, where

their experiences can modify the onset of subsequence motor

accomplishments.

• The development of posture.

• Learning to walk.

• Development in the second year.

• Cultural variations in guiding infant’s motor development.


1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Motor Development: Gross Motor Skills

Age (months)

Can sit without support

Stand with support

Pull self to stand

Walk using furniture to support

Stand alone easily

Walk alone easily



Motor Development: Fine Motor Skills

• Involve finely tuned movements.

• For instance, grasping a toy or anything that requires finger dexterity

demonstrates fine motor skills.

• The development of reaching and grasping becomes more refined during the first

two years of life (Keen, 2005).

• Initially, infants move their shoulders and elbows crudely, but later they move their

wrists, rotate their hands, and coordinate their thumbs and forefingers.

• Actions that requires finger dexterity:

– Grasping toys.

– Using a spoon.

– Buttoning.

– Co-ordination of arm, hand and fingers.

• Two types of grasping:

– Palmer grasp.

– Pincer grasp.

• Perceptual-motor co-ordination.


Piaget’s view on

Cognitive Processes

The sensorimotor

Stage of

Development

(Piaget)

Language

Development

Cognitive Development in Infancy

Infant cognition

• What does the infant know at birth and soon after?

• Innate versus learned factors?

• Do infants construct their knowledge or whether they know their world

more directly?


In this section we will look at:

1 2 3

Piaget’s View on Cognitive Processes

• What processes do children use as they construct their knowledge of the world?

• Piaget’s Theory (1952) is a theory of how biology (nature) and experience (nurture)

both shape the cognitive development of the child

• Children adapt and construct their own cognition

• Piaget developed concepts to explain how children construct their knowledge


Cognitive Processes

Defined by Piaget:

A. Schemes

B. Assimilation

C. Accommodation

D. Organisation

E. Equilibrium

F. Equilibration

Individuals Go Through 4

Stages of Development:

• Sensorimotor Stage

(birth to 2 years of age)

• Pre-operational Stage

• Concrete operational Stage

• Formal operational Stage

Cognitive Processes (Piaget) - 1(A)Schema

• The developing brain creates schemes which are actions or mental

representations that organise knowledge.

• Piaget (1952) said that as the child seeks to construct an understanding of the

world, the developing brain creates schemes, which are actions or mental

representations that organise knowledge.

• Behavioural schemes (physical activities – from simple action of sucking to

walking) characterise infancy.

• Mental schemes (cognitive activities- strategies and plans for problem solving)

develop in childhood.


Cognitive Processes (Piaget) – 1(B)Assimilation & 1(C)Accommodation

• Assimilation occurs when children incorporate new information into their existing

knowledge (schemes).

• Accommodation occurs when children adjust their schemes to fit new information and

experiences.

• These are two concepts Piaget adopts to explain how children use and adapt their

schemes.

• Consider a toddler who has learned the word ‘car’ to identify the family’s car. The

toddler might call all moving vehicles on roads as ‘cars’

including motorcycles and trucks.

• This example shows that the toddler has assimilated these

objects to his/her existing scheme.

• But the child soon learns that motorcycles and trucks are not

cars and fine-tunes the category to exclude motorcycles and

trucks. By doing this, the toddler is accommodating his/her

scheme.

• Can you think of these two processes in young infants,

perhaps in refining their sucking schemes?


Cognitive Processes (Piaget) – 1(D)Organisation

Organisation

• Children organise their experiences cognitively in order to make sense of their world.

• Organisation is Piaget’s concept of grouping isolated behaviours into higher-order,

more smoothly functioning cognitive system.


Cognitive Processes (Piaget) –1(E)Equilibrium

Equilibrium and Equilibration

• Equilibration is a mechanism that Piaget proposed to explain how children shift from

one stage of thought to the next.

• The shift occurs as children experience cognitive conflict or disequilibrium in trying to

understand the world.

• Eventually, they resolve the conflict and reach a balance or equilibrium of thought.

• According to Piaget, there is considerable movement between states of cognitive

equilibrium and disequilibrium as assimilation and accommodation work in concert to

produce cognitive change.

• Piaget’s theory is a general, unifying story of how biology

and experience sculpt the infant’s cognitive development;

where assimilation and accommodation always take

a child to a higher ground. Thus according to this

perspective, the motivation for change is an internal

search for equilibrium.


Cognitive Processes (Piaget) - Organisation & Equilibrium Example


Where did the

“extra” liquid

come from?

Maintaining Equilibrium Through Adaptation and Organisation

Assimilation

Stimulus Modified

Equilibrium

Adaptation

[& Organisation]

Accommodation

Scheme Modified

27©2013 SIM UNIVERSITY. All rights reserved.


Sensorimotor Stage: Object Permanence

• Object permanence refers to the understanding that objects and events continue to

exist even when they cannot be seen, heard, or touched.

• Acquiring the sense of object permanence is one of the infant’s most important

accomplishments.

• The principle was that object permanence is studied by watching an infant’s reaction

when an interesting object disappears. If infants search for the object, it is assumed

that they believe it continues to exist.


Click this link to watch the video clip entitled “object-

permanence”.

Language Development

• Visit http://www.youtube.com

Search for the video clip entitled “Wild

Boy of Aveyron”, uploaded by

kkastendick (duration 5:03)

Watch the video clip.

• Think about the issue of nature versus

nurture in language development.

• All human languages have some

common characteristics, include infinite

generativity and organisational rules.

• Infinite generativity is the ability to

produce an endless number of

meaningful sentences using a finite set

of words and rules.


Language’s rule system - the 5 systems

of rules that organise a language are:

1. phonology (sound system)

2. morphology (word formation)

3. syntax (sentence formation)

4. semantics (meanings of

words/sentences)

5. pragmatics (appropriate use of

language in different context)

Environment & Language Development

Research has shown that language environment of children is linked to their

vocabulary development. When children grow up in impoverished circumstances,

and when their parents do not use a large number of vocabulary words in

communicating with them, their vocabulary development suffers.


Reflective Question

Piaget believed that children grow through 4 stages of cognitive

development. Moreover, there are rather specific cognitive processes within

an individual when it comes to processing information around us.


What are some implications of Piaget’s theory of infant

development for parenting?

Click the button to listen to the explanation.

Explanation

Reflective Question

Piaget believed that children grow through 4 stages of cognitive

development. Moreover, there are rather specific cognitive processes within

an individual when it comes to processing information around us.


What are some implications of Piaget’s theory of infant

development for parenting?

Summary


• There are specific milestones of physical and cognitive development

in infancy.

• There are 4 stages of cognitive development (according to Piaget)

and the first stage happens during infancy.

• The sensorimotor stage at infancy can be further divided into 6

substages.

• Language development in infancy is influenced by both nature as well

as nurture.

In this topic, you learnt that:

References and Additional Learning Resources

• Santrock, J. W. (2013). Life-Span Development (14th Edition),

McGraw-Hill International (Selected topics from Chapter 4 & 5).

• Jean Piaget's Object Permanence Developmental Stages:

Theoretical Outline, Modern Critique and Parental Advice! Available

at http://www.positive-parenting-ally.com/object-permanence.html

• Note: All references not listed here are based on the text in Santrock

(2013).


Documents

Physical Growth and Cognitive Development in Infancy · Infancy • Can you remember hearing comments such as: “Wah! your baby has changed so much!” “Hey! Your baby has grown