The Psychology of Social and Emotional Development (PSY341 Section EF) 
Monday and Wednesday, 1:00- 2:15 P
Flipse Building (5665 Ponce de Leon, attached to Parking Garage) Room 401

Baby Picture2   Working Syllabus - Fall 2006   Baby Picture1

You are responsible for having an up-to-date copy of this syllabus (only available on-line)
https://dmessinger.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/www/c_c/SD/sd_syll06.html
BlackBoard


Daniel Messinger, Ph.D.
[email protected]
Homepage
Office Hours (Flipse 341): Mondays 2:15 - 3:15, Wednesdays 12:00 - 1:00, and by appointment 

Teaching Assistant: Carolyn Kinnamon
(305) 284-3719 [email protected]
Office Hours: Wednesday and Friday from 2:30 to 3:30, Flipse 366

The goal of the course is to review contemporary theory, research, and methods that will give you deeper understanding social and emotional development, especially during childhood.  We will do this in two main ways.

1) Every week, we will address one or two critical questions related to topics such as early interaction, the origins of individual differences, early interaction, emotional development, the origins and consequences of secure attachment, the origins of intentional communication, sibling and peer relationships, the development of gender differences, and intimacy (see below).  My lectures - most of which will be available on-line - will focus on these critical questions, as will your readings. Readings will be original research articles and chapters. We will also discuss and debate critical questions these issues, watch videotaped examples, do small group exercises, in-class projects and quizzes to deepen our understanding of what babies are all about. Using these resources, you will, each week, hand in a 300 word answer to one of the week's critical questions. 

2) FINAL PROJECT. This course has a large research component in which you will be reading original empirical articles. For your final project, you will choose one of the course critical questions - or one of your own choosing that you ok with me. The basis of your final project will be a critical reading the scientific literature. This will involve a 2,000 word critical literature review summarizing and synthesizing five or more articles and/or reviews and/or scholarly books (books are equivalent to more than one article/review) on a topic of your choosing in social and emotional development. Different people learn differently and excel in different areas. In addition to your paper, you will present your final project as a brief PowerPoint lecture to the class, as a poster at a class poster session, and as a traditional paper. Writing resources are available here.

Your final project will also involve a small empirical (scientific) study in which you actually do research to get a sense of what the topic is really about. Depending on the topic, I may be able to help provide resources for this empirical study. (A final project that is a more extensive and formal empirical study is also a possibility, particularly for those of you conducting relevant research with psychologists in the department, could provide you with honors credit, and is required of students currently working in my lab.) 

The basis of your final project will be writing summary/critiques of these individual articles/reviews that you will turn in throughout the semester. I will help you with the selection of articles and with instruction on how to summarize and critique them. Your final project should reference any relevant material and assigned readings from class, but these do not count for your five readings ("extra" reading can count). Sources for papers for the final projects. Unless ok'd by me, every empirical paper that you review should focus primarily on social and emotional development and be published in one of the following journals (so, no Dissertations): Child Development, Infant Behavior and Development (through 1999), Infancy, Developmental Psychology, Developmental Review, Developmental Psychopathology, Pediatrics,  Social Development, Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, Journal of Family Psychology, Psychological Bulletin, or the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. If you know what journal an article is in, you can also search psychology journals here or review all of UM's electronic journal databases here. (Go here to learn more about doing research from off-campus.) Most of the PowerPoint lectures contain a list of helpful references as the final slide. Also, see the "References" section (p. 415) of Development for finding specific articles and chapters on a particular topic. More references for final projects are on the syllabi of my graduate student courses which you can find here). References from UM faculty are available at http://scholar.library.miami.edu/facpubs02. Google scholar may be helpful as well (http://scholar.google.com/). Finally, the Mental Measurements Yearbook, useful for empirical projects, can be searched at
http://iiiprxy.library.miami.edu:5057/webspirs/start.ws?customer=c14878&databases=YB (looks like Psychinfo but its not).

You can expect that this will be a difficult class, and that I will help you learn as much as you can, be available to meet, respond to your emails, return your assignments in a timely fashion, and help you tackle the new material you will be encountering. At the end of the course, you will know how to investigate an interesting subject in psychology by reviewing the scientific literature and will have experience in presenting your work in different forms. You will have an opportunity to read studies and make observations that are of special interest to you.

Grading. Attendance is mandatory. Assignments will typically be assigned a percentage grade from 1 to 100 or 1 to 5 (where 1=20 and 5=100). Occasional assignments will be graded pass/fail. You will receive feedback on your writing assignments. Your final grade is based on 3 components. In addition to turning in your assignments when they are due, you are responsible for collecting all your work for your final project and copies of the articles/reviews you used - in an individual portfolio.

This course will abide by the UM Honor Code: "On my honor, I have neither given nor received any aid on this paper." This involves following the Rules for citing research articles (please review them now).

Readings are available on-line (click the indicated reading; they are in Acrobat which can be downloaded here). Other readings will be distributed in class. If a reading assignment does not specify page numbers, the entire article is assigned. If a reading assignment is marked as "Extra," it is not required. Almost all lectures will be available from the links below and you can print them out as PowerPoint handouts before class.

All assignments should be submitted on BlackBoard before the class for which they are due and a hard copy should be turned in at the beginning of class. All regular weekly writing assignments should be about and no longer than 1 single-spaced page (300 words). The class is structured so that regular weekly writing assignments are due Wednesdays. Assignments related to your final projects are due Mondays (additional references for final projects are the syllabi of my graduate student courses which you can find here). (Honors credit is available and includes a more elaborate empirical and final project. Ask me.)

Writing (Writing Resources). All written assignments should be in complete sentences and use a terse style in which every word helps make your point. You should use the stylistic guidelines found in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (4th or 5th ed.) which is in the library and the bookstore. These will be particularly important for citing references and preparing bibliographies when you are writing your article summary/critiques and your empirical research reports. How to cite articles.

Lateness Policy. All papers received after the class period in which they are due but before the start of the next class will receive a maximum of 50% credit. After this point, no credit will be given for a late paper. If an emergency prevents you from handing in an assignment on time, please provide me with documentation from a relevant professional (Dr., ER, therapist, etc).

BlackBoard. Use BlackBoard to email all students in the class, myself, and the Teaching Assistant simultaneously. In general, use BlackBoard to ask and respond to questions about the reading, assignments, whatever is relevant to what we are studying. WHEN YOU HAVE A QUESTION FOR ME THAT MIGHT BE HELPFUL TO OTHERS, EMAIL IT TO EVERYONE AND I WILL RESPOND. If you send me an email which does not contain personal information, I will forward it to the class. Participation in this class-wise email exchange is a form of class participation and will count toward that segment of your grade. I will not be able to accept any documents that contain computer viruses.

You will need to be able to both send and receive emails from me. I will use this service for class-wide updates such as revised instructions on assignments, and feedback on your work. To receive these updates, you will need to have an email account that you regularly check, which is registered with the University system. You can check this and make changes at MyUM or BlackBoard (we are primarily using BlackBoard only for email communication and posting assignments and an occasional lecture).

Reading: Greenspan & Shanker (2004) (focus on first 2 pages and last 2 tables) and Erikson (1950). Eight Ages of Man. 

Final Project A. Choose a preliminary (non-binding) final topic question from this syllabus (or select one of your own). Submit hard copy and through BlackBoard --> Assignments, upload your assignment and click Submit (not Save)

Extra: Thompson (2001). Development in the first years of life.  The Future of Children, 11(1), 20-33.

Social and Emotional Overview: Temperament, emotion, attachment, the self, and the broader context of social and emotional development.

Greenspan & Shanker. Describe Greenspan and Shanker's (G&S) description of the transformation in emotional and intellectual growth. How do they relate to Erikson's (E) levels? Using G&S (or E), identify times in your own development that correspond to their levels? Describe times in the development of someone younger than yourself and someone older than yourself in terms of Greenspan and Shanker's levels. If appropriate, use the "developmental highlights" video from class to illustrate your discussion.

Reading: Caspi, 2000

Weekly Paper 1: Social and Emotional Overview. Hard copy and BlackBoard --> Assignments --> Weekly 1 to upload-->Submit (not Save).

Extra: Schwartz, C. E., Wright, C. I., Shin, L. M., Kagan, J., & Rauch, S. L. (2003). Inhibited and uninhibited infants "grown up": Adult amygdalar response to novelty. Science, 300(5627), 1952-1953.

Fox, N. A., & Henderson, H. A. (1999). Does infancy matter? Predicting social behavior from infant temperament. Infant Behavior & Development, 22(4), 445-455.

See me for: Eliot 290-303 (neural basis of emotion) 316-321 (temperament). Development 328-344.
 
Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Temperament:

What is temperament?
Describe your temperament using Thomas/Chess, Fox/Henderson or Caspi types
What is goodness-of-fit (give examples)?
What are pros and cons of laboratory behavioral and parent report measures of temperament?
What are three types of infants distinguished by Fox/Henderson and how do they develop?
Reference the DVD illustrating these infants from class.
Do you favor a person-centered or variable-centered approach to temperament and why?
What does 3 year old behavioral type predict in Caspi's studies?
What does it mean that the child is father to the man?

CBQ, Labtab, Kagan & Henderson videos

Final Project B. Select and read first final project article (article search) (see also http://www.library.miami.edu/research/r_p.html).

and post citation (author, year, title, journal, volume, pages) of article to class along with your current version of your final topic question. Rules for citing research articles.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers

Discrete emotions.

What evidence suggests suggests facial expressions of emotion are universal and what are the limitations of that evidence?

Do you think infants can have emotions without being reflectively aware of what they are feeling? What about the infants in the training tape?

What are key tenets of  discrete emotion theory?

What evidence suggests infant emotion is discrete what evidence suggests it is not?

Describe a study distinguishing between emotion and facial expression.

When do people smile?

What evidence suggests that emotions are not discrete and may be more dynamic and functional?

Extra: What are the biological bases of emotion? Are there feelings before there is a sense of self? What is emotion? Do facial expressions express emotions? Does this change with age? What emotions exist at what ages? How does emotion become regulated with age?  

Reading: Messinger ('Positive and negative' & 'Afterword' & "Smiling"  

 Weekly Paper 2. Temperament or Discrete Emotion 

Extra: Segal et al.

Facial expression site:

Carvajal, F.; Iglesias, J. (2001). The Duchenne smile with open mouth in infants with Down syndrome. Infant Behavior & Development, 24, 341-346.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Intensification [PowerPoint is posted on BlackBoard.]: What evidence suggests that some smiles are more positive than others? What evidence suggests that the same facial actions are associated with more intense of stronger positive and negative emotions? What implications does this have for discrete emotion theory and how we understand the link between facial expression and emotion?

Do infant smiles express a single index of positive emotion or different emotional qualities (like arousal)?

What do portraits of facial expressions in time tell us about emotion and what program creates them? What do joystick ratings tell us about emotion and interaction?

Reading: Keltner: Summary

Final 1: Write out your final project question. Summarize article. Indicate how first article answers question. Indicate your next reading. (300 words). How to write your summary.

Extra: Fredrickson, B. L., & Joiner, T. (2002). Positive emotions trigger upward spirals toward emotional well-being. Psychological Science, 13(2), 172-175.,

Keltner: Year-book smiles; Adolescents

Emotion Outcomes: How might positive emotion and its expression affect life outcomes? Describe how expressed emotion relates to: a) Adolescent behavior problems; b) The course of grieving in widows; c) Life outcome in college women. What is a functionalist emotion theory? What is emotion regulation? What is positive psychology?

Reading: Tronick.  Kochanska1,

Weekly 3. Intensification or Emotion Outcomes

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Face-to-face interaction and still-face: What does it mean that interaction is bidirectional? How, specifically, do baby and parent influence each other?
How does infant behavior in face-to-face interaction change during the first six months of life?
Does the still-face procedure show evidence that infants are intentional (what does the developmental evidence show? evidence from modified still-faces)?
What does still-face behavior predict? Do infants have expectations of social interactions? When and how can we know? Timing early expressive behaviors: How do infants coordinate expressive actions in time and how does this change with age? What is an event-based approach? Which pairs of infant expressive behaviors are coordinated in time (facial expressions and vocalizations, facial expressions and gazes at a parent's face, and/or vocalizations and gazes) and what does this suggest for the role of facial expressions? Indicate two patterns in which infant gazes and smiles are coordinated with mother smiles? How do all these patterns  change with age? What does this suggest about infant-mother interaction?

What does early interaction predict? How does conscience develop? What factors predict internalization of parental and cultural roles?

NICHD_Early_Child_Care_Research_Network. (2006). Child-Care Effect Sizes for the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development. American Psychologist, 61(2), 99-116.

Crouter, A. C., & Bumpus, M. F. (2001). Linking Parents' Work Stress to Children's and Adolescents' Psychological Adjustment. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 10(5), 156-159.

Final 2: Write out your final project question. Summarize article. Indicate how second article answers question, integrate with previous article(s), and indicate your next reading (300 words).

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

nWhat impact does poverty have on children?

nWhat do within-child designs contribute to understanding the effects of poverty?

nAre the effects of poverty (and the estimated effects of a reduction in poverty) greater or less if the child's caregiver has a partner? if the child's caregiver is employed? What accounts for these effects?

nWhat are the effects of familial instability on children's adjustment problems?

nHow does parental work stress impact  the parent-child relationship?

nHow is the quantity and quality of child care associated with peer competence? Specifically, how does experience in child-care settings impact observed skill in peer play? And, what impact does quality of child care have on socioemotional and peer outcomes?

nNEW: What are risk factors for high SES high schoolers Are they the same or different than those of low SES high-schoolers?

nWhat are two dimensions of parenting and how do they combine to form three-four styles of parenting?

nWhat are the characteristics of the three main styles of parenting?

nWhat are the characteristics of children raised with those styles?

nHow would you characterize your own parents' parenting style and what style of parenting would you favor as a parent?

Extra:

Social class and expectations, "28 Up".

How does social class affect social development?

 

Reading: Maccoby.

Extra: Weinberg

Donnellan, M. B., Trzesniewski, K. H., Robins, R. W., Moffitt, T. E., & Caspi, A. (2005). Low Self-Esteem Is Related to Aggression, Antisocial Behavior, and Delinquency. Psychological Science, 16(4), 328-335.

Robins, R. W., & Trzesniewski, K. H. (2005). Self-Esteem Development Across the Lifespan. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 14(3), 158-162.

Sex differences. What infant sex differences are described by Weinberg et al. find? How can biological factors and differential social expectationsinfluence sex differences? Describe Maccoby's theory of peer group sex-segregation and socialization. That is, how does children's peer play reflect and create gender differences? What is relational victimization? What is the male brain theory of autism? Describe empathizing and systemizing.
 

Reading:

Mosier, C. E.; Rogoff, B. (2003). Privileged Treatment of Toddlers: Cultural Aspects of Individual Choice and Responsibility. Developmental Psychology, 39, 1047-1060.
 

Extra:

Tronick, E. Z., Morelli, G. A., & Ivey, P. K. (1992). The Efe forager infant and toddler's pattern of social relationships: Multiple and simultaneous. Developmental Psychology, 28(4), 568-577.

Extra: Messinger & Freedman

 

Bornstein, M. H. and L. R. Cote (2003). "Cultural and parenting cognitions in acculturating cultures: 2. Patterns of prediction and structural coherence." Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 34(3): 350-373.

Cote, L. and M. H. Bornstein (2003). "Cultural and parenting cognitions in acculturating cultures: 1. Cultural comparisons and developmental continuity and stability." Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 34(3): 323-349.

Final 3: Write out your final project question. Indicate how previous articles answered questions (stating what they found in a total of 3-5 sentences), then indicate how third article answers question (300 words). Reference these articles (APA) and put citations at end and indicate your next proposed reading.

Extra: Kochanska2   Moore_et_al. Yale_et_al_2003

Special speaker.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

What is cultural psychology (give examples)?

Is the psychology we've been studying cultural psychology?

How are toddlers' desires for objects handled differently in Salt Lake City and San Pedro? Do toddlers or siblings end up with object in each community and what do mothers believe about this?

What are differences between American and Japanese toddlers in toddler task and do they reflect differences in autonomy and interdependence — have reference to videotapes examples

What types of attributions characterize traditional Japanese child-rearing? What is the developmental discontinuity in Japanese development?

Reading:  

de_Waal, F. B. M. (2000). Primates--a natural heritage of conflict resolution. Science, 289(5479), 586-590.

Bard, K. A.; Myowa-Yamakoshi, M.; Tomonaga, M.; Tanaka, M.; Costall, A.; Matsuzawa, T. (2005). Group Differences in the Mutual Gaze of Chimpanzees (Pan Troglodytes). Developmental Psychology, 41, 616-624.

SBT and ROM

Weekly 5. Cultural Psychology, Gender differences, or Self Esteem

NICHD overview

Reading:  

Extra:  Bolger

Final 4: Write out your final project question. Indicate how previous articles answered questions (stating what they found in a total of 3-5 sentences), then indicate how fourth article answers question (300 words). Reference these articles (APA) and put citations at end and indicate/label your next proposed reading.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Child maltreatment. Define the four types of maltreatment? What are some features that of families in which maltreatment occurs? What are potential consequences of maltreatment? What did Bolger find were the consequences of maltreatment? Why might these consequences occur? How might a child be "buffered" from adverse effects?

Reading: Lamb et al. Development 371-393

Weekly 6: Cultural Psychology or Child Maltreatment or Gender differences

Follow links for how to code the Strange Situation.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Attachment defined: What are the levels of attachment organization?
How does attachment work and what are its evolutionary functions?
What is the difference between attachment behaviors, the attachment system, and the attachment bond?
What are key attachment concepts and what evidence is there that monkeys evidence these concepts (review Harlow)
What is the difference between being attached and being securely attached?
What is an attachment disorder and what is evidence of an attachment disorder?
Is child-caregiver attachment the whole relationship or is one (organizing) system in the relationship?

Attachment through the life cycle: What predicts security and what security predicts

Reading: Development 385-393

Final 5: Write out your final project question. Indicate how previous articles answered questions (stating what they found in a total of 3-5 sentences), then indicate how fourth article answers question (300 words). Reference these articles (APA) and put citations at end and indicate/label your next proposed reading.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Describing secure and insecure attachment: How is security of attachment assessed in the Strange Situation? Describe secure attachment and avoidant, anxious, and disorganized attachment?  Use descriptions of strange situations observed in class to inform your paper.

Reading:

Assignment: Register for and complete www.citiprogram.org. See Human Subjects Protection for details.

Weekly 7: Define attachment and describe secure and insecure attachment.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Predicting attachment security: What different roles might infant temperament have in predicting security of attachment?
What is the experimental evidence that caregiver sensitivity factors predicts secure attachment? 
What is the meta-analytic evidence that caregiver sensitivity factors predicts secure attachment? 

Reading: van IJzendoorn et al (Child_Outcomes or Infant_Parent) 

Final: Propose your empirical project (300 words) and a draft of your consent letter if you are using human subjects. Submit a draft of your questionnaire for your empirical project (if you are using one) and a draft Consent Form (sample consent form). You may not conduct your empirical project with live human beings without an approved Consent Form. More on Human Subjects Protection.

What does secure attachment predict? What evidence is there for the stability (or instability) of infant attachment security within infancy and on to adulthood? What does insecure and disorganized attachment predict in childhood? Describe and explain correspondences between parental and infant security of attachment. 

Reading: Hazan and Shaver (1994)

Extra: Furman (2002). Collins & Sroufe (1999). 

Capacity for Intimate Relationships:

A Developmental Construction

Weekly  8: Predicting security of  attachment or what  security of  attachment predicts

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

What attachment processes are active in adulthood? How do they impact intimate relationships?

Reading:

Final: Outline of your final project integrating readings and outlining empirical project. 300 words indicating how you will answer your final project question. A sentence here will correspond to a paragraph of the final paper.

Empirical Project Review.

Empirical Project Review.

Workshop on empirical project: You can collect data during this class session. 

Final: First draft of your empirical project. Indicate what steps you will take to finish the project.

Special Class.

Autism and the broad autism phenotype (see Blackboard)

Why are studies of the infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder and the concept of the broad phenotype necessary?
What are current measures of early emotional communication and joint attention? (describe each)
What are the communicative and other "red flag" deficits in the infant siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder?
 

  Human Subjects Protection

Reading: Bakeman & Adamson, 2006, Camaioni, et al., 2003, Venezia et al.

Final: Empirical project due.

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Special speaker. Gesture (give and take): Is infant communication necessarily verbal?
What is the gestural advantage?
What is the evidence that gestures have different social approach & instrumental functions? 
Do they change with age differently? 
Do they involve different expressive behaviors?
How do Anticipatory Smiles unite dyadic and triadic communication
From joint attention to self-concept.  :  

Read:Development 279-285 & 296-327

Weekly 11: Autism or Gesture 

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Gesture, Language, Autism, and Theory of Mind: What are infant initiated joint attention (IJA) and receptive joint attention (RJA)? How are they measured and what do they predict? How might early deficits in IJA associated with autism lead to more long-term deficits? What is theory of mind? How do autistic infants and infants with Down Syndrome differ?

Read: De Vaal.  Crick.

Final. Summary hand-out of poster. 

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Peers. Are siblings similar and do they share exactly the same environment?
Describe 3 levels of analysis used to understand peer relations.
Describe two dimensions of social status and how they give rise to four types of kids.
What is pro-social behavior and what type of parenting promotes it?
How does abuse affect social development and what social factor can moderate the impact of abuse?

Read: Dynamic systems approach to antisociality (Granic & Patterson, 2006).

Last Weekly. Gesture, Language, Autism, and Theory of Mind:  or Peer relationships

Critical Questions  (PowerPoint and questions for weekly papers)

Aggression: Sibling and Peer Relationships: Pro-social and anti-social influences through adolescence. In the relational model, what is the function of aggression and what determines whether there will be reconciliation? Describe genetic and environmental factors that could influence the stability of aggressive behaviors
Describe similarities in attachment representations of parents, peers, and intimate partners. What is relational victimization?  
 

Final. Prepare and display poster with summary hand-out (please bring 30 summary hand-outs) (24 point font is smallest allowed). Include questions for class in all handouts.

Poster Session. Overview of Poster and Presentation 

Oral presentations in order: MS, RB, MC, CF, LS, MH, JB

By the date of your presentation, please submit complete (revised) PowerPoint handout. Present 5 slides: 1) Question 2) Abstract (could be intro) which - point-by-point tells us what you will cover 3 & 4) 2 slides of studies and/or empirical project which demonstrate those points, 5) conclusion which answers question and mirrors your initial point-by-point (with more depth because now we know more). Please bring 25 summary hand-outs (24 point font is smallest allowed). Include questions for class in all handouts.

Oral presentations. More info on Oral Presentations

Oral presentations. More info on Oral Presentations

Final Project Paper Due Paper Example 

Paper Guidelines Paper Example (Empirical Project Focus)