CHAPTER 10.1: Lifespan Development

Question 1

what is developmental psychology? what does it allow us to observe?

Answer 1

study of how people change throughout life!

allows us to see trends in different age groups. also let us understand that some changes in development happen in stages/are continuous

Question 2

what is the cross sectional design

Answer 2

used to measure people at different ages at a given point in time.

so many groups and each group is made of people of the same age. ex. can go out and study a group of ten year olds vs twenty year olds, etc

Question 3

what is a drawback to the cross sectional design?

Answer 3

risk of cohort effects

Question 4

what are cohort effects? give an example.

Answer 4

a confounding variable that inhibits us from making the conclusion that age is what is affecting a particular ability.

ex. people in their teens have had more access to video games than people in their eighties, so they are more likely to be better at video games, but doesn’t indicate that you get worse at video games the older you get

Question 5

what is a longitudinal design

Answer 5

tracking the same people throughout their life. makes it more easy to see if the loss/gain of an ability is due age or envrionment

Question 6

what are some drawbacks with longitudinal design?

Answer 6

long and costly, risk of attrition (sample size diminishing)