Professional Documents
Culture Documents
in Privileged Domains
Biological predisposition is commonly known as someone's 'nature', as opposed
to their 'nurture', or upbringing. It is the capacity we are born with to learn things such
as language and concept of self.
Areas of Research
Early predisposition to learn about some things but not others
No evidence exists that infants come into the world as "blank slates," as we once
believed. Children lack knowledge and experience, but not reasoning ability. They
show a predisposition to learn rapidly and readily, particularly physical and
biological concepts, causality, numbers, and language (Carey and Gelman, 1991).
These areas are called privileged domains. When children dont have
opportunities to develop learning in the privileged domains (e.g., deaf parents do
not speak aloud to a hearing child, nor do they expose the child to spoken language
in other ways), they often have great challenges in learning that information later.
Critical periods for learning certain types of information (e.g., language, reading,
mathematics) are related to the maturation of certain parts of the brain (e.g.,
myelination of axons).
Problem solving and reasoning
Children are born with a predisposition to organize and coordinate information,
make inferences, and discover strategies for problem solving. Although they are
inexperienced, they reason easily with the knowledge they have. Because of limited
experience and undeveloped systems for logical thinking, childrens knowledge
contains misconceptions, which influence what they understand and may hinder
their grasping new ideas.
Theories of mind
As they mature, children develop theories of what it means to learn and understand
that profoundly influence how they situate themselves in settings that demand
effortful and intentional learning (Bereiter and Scardamalia, 1989). Children
entertain various theories of mind and intelligence (Dweck and Legget,
1988). Indeed, not all learners in schools come ready to learn in exactly the same
way. Some theorists argue that there ismore than one way to learn, more than one
way to be "intelligent." Understanding that there are multiple intelligences
(Gardner, 1983) may suggest ways of helping children learn by supporting their
strengths and working with their weakenesses.
Biological Causality
Infants learn rapidly about the differences between inanimate and animate: as we
have seen, they know that inanimate objects need to be pushed or propelled into
motion. Infants as young as 6 months can distinguish animate versus inanimate
movements as patterns of lights attached to forces or people (Bertenthal, 1993).
And Spelke (1990) has shown that if two people come close together and move
1978). The child uses meaning as a clue to language rather than language as a clue
to meaning (MacNamara, 1972). Parents and other caregivers take into ACCOUNT
both context and children's emerging abilities as they help them extend their
competencies. The extremely important guiding role that caregivers have in
children's cognitive development is discussed further below.
BIOLOGICAL THEORIES
Maturational Theory
By Arnold Gesell (1880-1961)
According to maturational theory, child development reflects a specific and prearranged
scheme or plan within the body. In Gesell's view, development is simply a natural unfolding
of a biological plan; experience matters little. Like Jean-Jacques Rousseau 200 years before
him, Gesell encouraged parents to let their children develop naturally. Without interference
from adults, Gesell claimed, behaviors like speech, play, and reasoning would emerge
spontaneously according to a predetermined developmental timetable.
Ethological Theories
Ethological theory views development from an evolutionary perspective. In this
theory, many behaviors are adaptivethey have survival value. For example,
clinging, grasping, and crying are adaptive for infants because they elicit caregiving
from adults. Ethological theorists assume that people inherit many of these
adaptive behaviors.
So far, ethological theory seems like maturational theory, with a dash of evolution
for taste. How does experience fit in? Ethologists believe that all animals are
biologically programmed so that some kinds of learning occur only at certain ages.
A critical period is the time in development when a specific type of learning can take
place; before or after the critical period, the same learning is difficult or even
impossible.
One of the best-known examples of a critical period comes from the work of Konrad
Lorenz (1903-1989), a Nobel-prize-winning Austrian zoologist. Lorenz noticed that
newly hatched chicks follow their mother about. He theorized that chicks are
biologically programmed to follow the first moving object that they see after
hatching. Usually this was the mother, so following her was the first step in
imprinting, creating an emotional bond with the mother. Lorenz tested his theory by
showing that if he removed the mother immediately after the chicks hatched and
replaced it with another moving object, the chicks would follow that object and treat
it as "mother."
Ethological theory and maturational theory both highlight the biological bases of
child development. Biological theorists remind us that children's genes, which are
the product of a long evolutionary history, influence virtually every aspect of
children's development. Consequently, a biological theorist would tell Betty, the
mother of the high school graduate in the module-opening vignette, that her son's
good nature and his outstanding academic record are both largely products of
heredity.
Resources:
http://www.psicopolis.com/asped/howpeople1/ch4.html
http://thebccp2.org/readings/kail/
http://www.bercgroup.com/how-people-learn.html