Infancy
Infancy begins with birth and lasts until about two years of age.
There are dramatic changes in the child during this stage. In physical development, height and weight are increasing faster than at any other point in time.
The normal birth weight and height is 5.5 – 10 pounds and 14-20 inches. Most infants double their birth weight by the fifth month and triple it by the end of their first year. Babies grow about 10 inces in the first year. During the second year, this growth continues but the pace slows.
Babies are born with reflexes that serve as survival skills. One is the Palmer reflex. It is also called the grasping reflex.
The Moro reflex will have the child throw his arms and legs out and then bring them back into a fetal position when startled.
The rooting reflex results in a child turning its head toward a gentle stimulus applied to the corner of the mouth or cheek and then start sucking.
Most of these reflexes disappear over the first year because reflexes are replaced by learned behaviors.
As far as their senses, infant’s visual abilities are not very developed. In fact at birth, babies are legally blind. Two-month olds preferred to look at human faces rather than anything else. They also prefer to look at faces that resemble real faces and not jumbled up ones. Infants have been shown to develop depth perception by the time they crawl.
Approximate ages for motor development are as follows:
- 1-3 months - can lift head and sit with support
- 4-8 months - sits without support for brief periods, hold head still ooks around
- 8-12 months - coordinated hand activities, controls trunk and sites witout support, walking with help
- 14 months - standing and walking alone without assistance
- 18 months running
A psychologist named Harry Harlow worked with baby monkeys to find out what was the most important thing babies needed for healthy development. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and chose to work with rhesus monkeys because they are genetically similar to us
Harry Harlow became interested in his work because of a condition called the Marasmus syndrome that existed in orphanages. The symptoms of this condition were apathy, withdrawal and a high death rate. Harlow wanted to see what was missing from these children. He could not work with human babies so he chose a close genetic substitute, the rhesus monkey.
Harlow set up three conditions, baby monkeys with monkey mothers, surrogate wire mothers with baby monkeys and surrogate soft wire mothers with monkey babies. The results of his research demonstrated the importance of contact comfort which is the soft touch and feel of another object.
Harlow’s work was extended by a psychologist name Mary Ainsworth. She studied infants around the world and found out that at first they just want to be held, by anyone.
By four months children form specific attachments to their main caregivers. Ainsworth talked about two types of attachment.
Secure attachment means that the infant seeks proximity, contact, and interaction with the caregiver after separation. Insecure attachment means that the infant cannot be calmed or ignores the caregiver after separation.
Language development beings with crying, cooing and babbling but these are not considered true language since they do not use symbols with specific meanings. These sounds, though, are the beginnings of verbalization.
Here is the sequence of language development:
- Cooing - vowel-like sounds such as ooh and aah, during the 2nd month
- Babbling - sound sof speech such as da, ba, ma; these do not hold any meaning, they begin in the 4th month
- One Word Stage - usually nouns such as doggie, mama, baba; around 1 year
- Two word Telegraphic sppech - want milk, me go, no ball; around 2 years
Cooing and babbling are universal and it is not until the one and two word stages that unique vocal patterns and accents emerge. Language contains three basic elements: phonemes which are the sounds, morphemes which are the basic units of meaning and syntax which is the grammar of language. We will cover language development more fully later.
A psychologist named Noam Chomsky put together the language acquisition theory. This theory states that we are born with the ability to speak. Our brains are hardwired for speech and we need to observe and imitate speech to acquire it correctly. Here again we see the nature/nurture idea. We are born with the ability to speak (nature) but we need the environment to teach us the way to speak (nurture).
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