Child Psychology (Level 4)

Child Psychology Level 4

Child psychology is the study of the mental, social and emotional development of children from birth through to adolescence. It examines changes in motor skills, cognitive development, language acquisition, and identity formation.

This in-depth Child Psychology course will provide you with a fundamental knowledge of the development of children and will give you an integral insight into why children behave the way they do.

What Can I Do After Taking This Course?

Whether you are a parent or work within the childcare profession this course will provide you with the skills and knowledge to help a child to reach his or her maximum potential.

The course has been designed for someone without any prior knowledge of the subject and will allow the student to study the course at their own pace in their own home, either online or paper-based.

Build your career. If you wish to build your career in child psychology, you could continue your training and education to become a child psychologist working in schools, hospitals, mental health clinics, and more, with a starting salary of £25,000*/year. You could even open your own practice.

Child psychologists often work with a range of clients – from infants and toddlers to children and teens – though sometimes they specialize in working with a particular age group. Child psychologists help to understand, prevent, diagnose and treat developmental, cognitive, social and emotional issues.

Module 1 – The first years of Life

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Analyse the ‘for’ and ‘against’ arguments with regard to innate and learned behaviour.
• Identify evidence for early social behaviours and how these change during the first year of life.

Module 2 – The Formation of Attachments

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Describe in your own words ‘Attachment’ and ‘Imprinting’.
• Investigate how studies of animal behaviour and reactions can be applied to human psychology

Module 3 – Consequences of Breakdowns in Attachment

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Analyse your feelings regarding maternal deprivation.
• Knowing the effects of Maternal Deprivation.

Module 4 – The Home, Family and School

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Discuss the implications of day care for young children, giving both positive and negative aspects.
• Consider the importance of father, sibling and peer relationships to a child.

Module 5 – Basic Principles of Research Methods

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Explore how to form a hypothesis for an experiment. 
• Identify how to locate the independent and dependent variable for an experiment.

Module 6 – The Development of Visual Perception

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Evaluate the development of Visual Perception.
• Identify problems in studying new-born infants.

Module 7 – The Development of Language and Communication

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Investigate and outline the three main stages of language development.
• Define the term ‘language’ as you understand it.
• Discuss why you think animals are capable of acquiring language via hands.
• Describe two theories of language development.

Module 8 – Intelligence and Intelligence Testing

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Discuss one alternative to IQ testing.      
• Explain one of the theories of intelligence testing.

Module 9 – Intelligence: The Nature/Nurture Debate

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Describe how much of a child’s intelligence is genetically determined showing how much is due to his/her environment.

Module 10 – Data Collection and Interpretation

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

Assess the use of several techniques of data collection and interpretation including:

• Tables
• Graphs
• Histograms
• Scattergrams
• Mean
• Range

Module 11 – How Children Think

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Analyse how long the children were studied for.
• Explain your understanding and the advantages of longitudinal study and rating scales. 
• Describe and name the stage which these eight year olds have reached according to Piaget’s theory.
• Evaluate two criticisms which have been made of Piaget’s work.

Module 12 – Learning Theory: How Behaviour is Acquired

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Explain primary and secondary reinforcement.
• Discuss advantages and disadvantages of learning theories.  
• Evaluate your understanding of the social learning theory showing why theorists have been criticised.

Module 13 – Freud’s Psychodynamic Theory

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Describe types of evidence which Freud used in formulating his theory on the role of the unconscious.

Explain what is meant by the term ‘libido’ and describe the following in detail:

• Id
• Ego
• Superego    
• Define in detail your understanding of the oral stage and anal stages.
• Discuss the term ‘Oedipal Conflict’ in boys and show in which psychoanalytical stage this conflict was resolved.
• Assess Freudian theory concluding its advantages and disadvantages.

Module 14 – Freud’s Psychodynamic Theory

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Describe the major way in which moral behaviours are learnt and the factors that influence a child’s moral behaviour.
• Define the critical event in the development of morality.        
• Explain the different pairs of stories in which Piaget told children to investigate their judgements about stealing and lying.
• Analyse Kohlberg’s levels of moral development and show what is meant by ‘invariant order’.

Module 15 – The Development of Gender Roles

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Evaluate what you would say the typical masculine and feminine sex roles consist of and include the three tribes studied by Margaret Mead.        
• Describe what types of male and female behaviour are now seen as acceptable which would not have been acceptable 50 years ago.
• Discuss what conclusions could be drawn from the studies with monkeys who were injected with testosterone.

Module 16 – Aggression in Children

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Define the concept of ‘aggression’ and investigate the two main methods of investigating the biological bases of aggression. 
• Investigate what is meant by the ‘frustration-aggression’ hypothesis.
• Discuss what Steuer, Applefield and Smith found in their investigation into children’s viewing of violent and non-violent cartoons.

Module 17 – Methods used in Child Development Research

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• List disadvantages of the Experimental Method of investigation.       
• Evaluate when correlation studies are most often used and their main disadvantage.       
• Discuss why a psychologist might choose to conduct a naturalistic observational study rather than an experiment.
• Describe what increase has taken place in JoJo’s vocabulary between the ages of one and five and show why it was important that the chimpanzee’s handlers used only sign language in her presence.

Module 18 – Play

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Define play and analyse why it is important.
• Discuss the three types of play, which Piaget describes.
• Identify what types of play activities best encourage intellectual development according to the findings of The Oxford Pre-School Research Project.

Module 19 – Learning in School

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Examine the basic principle on which programmed learning is based and introduce two programmes.
• Discuss the effects Atkinson noted when children were taught to read through programmed learning and give disadvantages.        
• Explore two different methods of discovery learning.

Module 20 – Behaviour Modification

On successful completion of this module the candidate will be able to:

• Investigate behaviour modification showing the kind of conditioning it is derived from.   
• Discuss what is meant by behaviour shaping.
• Identify and explain one type of behaviour therapy based on classical conditioning.

Entry Requirements

Our Child Psychology is openly available to anyone wishing to learn more about Child Psychology and has a keen interest in the subject, plus an intention to progress a career.

• Learners will need sufficient numeracy and literacy
• Students should have access to a computer and the internet throughout your study period.
• Learners should have basic PC skills in order to navigate our Support Portal
• You should be fully committed to your studies.