Child Psychology certificate

UKDLP

1. The First Year of Life

Infant reflexes; Social development during the first year of life including the social smile and onset of fear of strangers.

2. The Formation of Attachments

Imprinting; Attachment (Bowlby) including cross-cultural studies; Harlow and surrogate mothers;

Relevance of animal studies in child development.

3. Consequences of Breakdowns in Attachments

Maternal deprivation; Implications of theories of attachment and maternal deprivation when

placing children with surrogates.

4. The Home, Family and School

Group vs family care and the studies of effects of maternal employment and father absent families;

importance of peers and siblings.

5. Basic Principles of Research Methods

Nature and purpose of research, the features of experiment, supporting and refuting hypotheses,

independent and dependent variables, control of variables, standardised instructions and procedures,

methods of sampling, design of investigations.

6. The Development of Visual Perception

Introduction to the nature/nurture debate on visual perception; Fantz: form perception; Gibson and

Walk: depth perception; how the physiology of the human visual system helps us judge depth and

distance; Bower: size constancy; animal experiments on early sensory deprivation.

7. The Development of Language and Communication

Development of non-verbal communication in humans, gestures etc.; comparisons with non-human

primates; outline of language development in humans; including naturalistic observational in humans;

innate and reinforcement theories.

8. Intelligence and Intelligence Testing

Definitions of intelligence; mental age and IQ; tests of intelligence; advantages and disadvantages of

IQ testing.

9. The Nature/Nurture Debate in the Study of Intelligence

Twins studies; stability of IQ; Are early experiences decisive for later development?

10. Data Collection and Interpretation

Tables and histograms, correlation and scattergrams; Mean; Range; Drawing conclusions from data.

11. How Children Think

Piaget’s theory of cognitive development including studies of egocentrism and criticisms of his work.

12. Learning Theory & How Behaviour is Acquired

Learning and conditioning classical conditioning and operant conditioning; positive and negative reinforcement; Social Learning

13. Freud’s Psychodynamic Theory an Alternative Approach

Personality structure, 5 stage theory, criticisms.

14. Moral Development

Definition in psychological terms; investigation of moral behaviour, moral feelings and moral

judgement.

15. The Development of Gender Roles

Sex-typing; Gender identity; Biological, social and cultural theories.

16. Aggression in Children

Biological basis of aggression; psychological theory and aggression; Aggression as a learned response;

imitation of aggression; viewing violence; punishment for aggression; sex differences in aggression.

17. Methods Used in Child Development Research

Observational, Survey, Correlational, Experimental advantages and disadvantages.

18. Play

The importance of play to learning; Piaget’s theory of play; forms of play; Relevance of psychological theories to pre-school education; Play and learning in nursery schools; Play therapy.

19. Learning in School

Programmed learning and its relationship to learning theory advantages and disadvantages.

Discovery learning and its effectiveness.

20. Behaviour Modification

Explanation and examples; relationship to learning theory; Points systems, advantages and disadvantages.

This course would suit someone who wishes to take the first step towards a career in child psychology, or childcare in general. It would also be suitable for parents/guardians who want to understand their own children better.

There are no formal requirements for this course.

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