Undergraduate Course: Developmental Psychology (PSYL10012)
Course Outline
| School | School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Course type | Standard |
Availability | Available to all students |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Credits | 10 |
| Home subject area | Psychology |
Other subject area | None |
| Course website |
None |
Taught in Gaelic? | No |
| Course description | This course addresses the general issue of what develops, and what declines, during the human lifespan. It explores the nature of developmental change by considering the inter-relationships between:
- different aspects of development (cognitive, linguistic, social) and between component skills within these areas
- different stages of the lifespan.
- biological and environmental influences on development
- typical and atypical development.
The course is in three sections, each addressing specific topics that are used to illustrate one or more of the above themes. The first section focuses on socio-cognitive development and, in particular, on some of the non-verbal perceptual and cognitive skills (e.g. face perception, gaze, gesture, self-knowledge) that underpin children's social experience and that may be impaired in some developmental disorders. The second section focuses on language development and, in particular, on evaluating the adequacy of social and cognitive explanations of how children learn word meanings and assessing the interplay between biological and environmental influences on language development. The third section considers issues that integrate episodic memory, semantics and information processing across the lifespan, focusing on executive function and memory, both from the standpoint of their growth and, in particular, their decline during ageing.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
Students MUST have passed:
Psychology 2 (PSYL08002)
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
| Additional Costs | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Visiting students should have at least 3 Psychology courses at grade B or above (or be predicted to obtain this). We will only consider University/College level courses. |
| Displayed in Visiting Students Prospectus? | Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes
- To critically assess empirical evidence regarding some of the ways in which cognitive, linguistic and social aspects of development are inter-related.
- To understand relationships between different components of cognitive ability (e.g. selective attention and face processing; memory and executive functioning).
- To describe the nature of development change across different stages of the lifespan (e.g. pre-verbal communication in infancy as a precursor to verbal communication in childhood; how episodic memory develops in infancy and childhood and how it declines in old age).
- To understand some of the ways in which biological factors underpin developmental growth/decline and how these interact with environmental influences (e.g. cognitive neuroscience of language acquisition; brain changes that may underlie memory/cognitive ageing).
- To give examples of how comparisons between typical and atypical development contribute to our understanding of the nature of developmental change.
- To describe and evaluate theoretical accounts of the nature of developmental growth and decline (e.g. cognitive and social approaches to explaining the development of word meaning; theories of cognitive ageing such as decline in processing speed)
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Assessment Information
| Degree examination (100%) |
Special Arrangements
| None |
Additional Information
| Academic description |
Not entered |
| Syllabus |
Not entered |
| Transferable skills |
Not entered |
| Reading list |
Not entered |
| Study Abroad |
Not entered |
| Study Pattern |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Morag Donaldson
Tel: (0131 6)50 3437
Email: |
Course secretary | Ms Fiona Graham
Tel: (0131 6)50 3440
Email: |
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