Child Development From Infancy to Adolescence. Laura E. Levine
is not unusual for students in child and adolescent development courses to expect that by the end of the semester, they will have simple answers to a number of very complex questions. Of course we can seldom provide these simple answers. Instead, we need to help students understand that the science of child development is an ongoing endeavor and that we continue to build and add to our understanding each day. Although it is important that students learn about our current best knowledge, this information is more meaningful when students understand it in the context of our evolving ideas about a given topic. To help students better understand this material, we keep the focus of the text on the current state of knowledge and use the Journey of Research feature to provide the historical contextual information on the topic. This helps students understand that what they learn today in their class may be information that changes—sometimes substantially—in the future as our body of knowledge grows. This is, after all, how the scientific process works.
Learning Questions and Self-Testing Review
There is a growing body of evidence that the best way for students to retain the information they are learning and to transfer that knowledge to new situations is by testing their understanding for themselves. Other study approaches such as rereading, highlighting, and even summarizing have not been found to be as effective as self-testing. On the student webpage that accompanies this text, we provide chapter quizzes as well as flash cards for students to test themselves. However, we believe it also is important to provide this opportunity within the book. For this reason, we begin each chapter with a set of Learning Questions that help guide students as they read. These Learning Questions then appear in the summary at the end of each chapter where students can use them to test their recall of what they have learned. In addition, we provide two types of questions at the end of each section within the chapters in a feature called Check Your Understanding. Knowledge questions help students review the information they are learning. Critical thinking questions push students beyond the basic information to apply and integrate ideas. Answering these questions will promote greater understanding and retention of what they are learning and increase the likelihood that they will be able to apply this knowledge in useful ways.
Graphics, Artwork, and Videos
Because many individuals learn best when there is a visual component to instruction and because child development is a field rich in imagery, each chapter contains photos, graphics, and links to videos that illustrate important concepts in a memorable way. Many of the photos in the text include questions embedded in their captions that prompt the student to think further about the topic. Some important concepts are further illustrated through videos developed by SAGE that show children in natural and experimental settings, teacher commentary, and college students responding to some of the true/false questions with follow-up discussion by the authors. These videos are found in the interactive eBook.
Key Topics
Neuroscience
To reflect the burgeoning interest in the field of neuroscience and its implications for child development, we have included new and updated information on brain function for each stage of development throughout the book. This information is presented in a way that makes it accessible to the student of child development who may not have a strong background in biology.
Examples of topics in the area of neuroscience include
Plasticity of the brain and how the brain is shaped by an individual’s experiences
Early brain development and autism spectrum disorder
The role of brain development in emotion regulation during early childhood
Neurological functioning and anxiety in middle childhood
Neuroscience and intelligence
The vulnerability of the adolescent brain to neurotoxins
Diversity and Culture
Because an understanding of diversity and culture is essential for anyone working in the field of child development, these topics are integrated into each chapter to give the broader picture of how each aspect of development is influenced by the many different circumstances that constitute children’s lives around the world.
Examples of topics concerning diversity and culture include
Cultural differences in birthing practices and the transition to parenthood
The effects of poverty and homelessness
World-wide sex-trafficking of children
Culture, identity, and bilingualism
Cultural and religious differences in acceptance of gender-atypical adolescents
International differences in attitudes and policies regarding adolescent sexuality
Developmental Psychopathology
Coverage of topics related to psychopathology or developmental differences gives students a better understanding of the continuum of human behavior. Rather than relegating these topics to a separate, stand-alone chapter or to feature boxes, we include them within the chapters where they give students a deeper understanding of how these differences relate to the full range of development of all children.
Examples of topics in developmental psychopathology include
Reactive attachment disorder
Effects of child maltreatment and trauma
Specific learning disorders
Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder
Depression and suicide in adolescence
Resilience
What’s New in the Second Edition
Critical Thinking exercises at the end of each section encourage students to think more deeply about what they have read.
The Test Your Knowledge feature has been enhanced with videos of students answering some of the true/false questions, with follow-up commentary by the authors.
The chapters on cognitive development at each age level have been reorganized and expanded to provide more continuity in coverage of the basic cognitive processes: attention, memory, executive function, and social cognition.
Information relating to cultural concepts such as individualism and collectivism has been refined to reflect the most recent research in this area.
The continuity between chapters and topics has been enhanced through call-outs to information from previous chapters or alerts for information in upcoming chapters.
More tables are provided to give students a summary of information detailed in the text.
Almost 1,100 new references have been added.
Numerous topics have been added, updated, or expanded throughout the book. The following list highlights some of the most important ones, but there are many others in each chapter.
Chapter 1. Issues and Themes in Child Development
A new section on Getting the Most From Your Textbook introduces students to the pedagogical features they will find throughout the book and provides advice on how to use them.
New topics include positive psychology, intersectionality, and emerging adulthood as a life stage.
The WIC program is presented as an example of social policy in action.
New or expanded discussion of cultural issues includes cultural differences