Child Psychology

Begin your study of child psychology with a thorough examination of the first twelve months of life – a period of extraordinary and rapid development that lays the biological and social foundations for everything that follows. This module explores the infant's repertoire of reflexes at birth – the rooting reflex, the Moro reflex, the grasp reflex – and examines how these primitive responses give way to voluntary motor control as the nervous system matures. Social development during the first year is examined in detail: the emergence of the social smile at around six weeks, the development of joint attention, early proto-conversational exchanges between infants and caregivers, and the onset of stranger anxiety at around seven to eight months – a reliable indicator that the infant has formed a specific attachment to familiar figures. The module introduces the role of temperament in shaping early social development and considers how individual differences in infants interact with caregiving quality to influence developmental trajectories.

Examine one of the most influential and widely researched topics in all of developmental psychology: the formation of emotional attachments between infants and caregivers. This module introduces John Bowlby's evolutionary theory of attachment, presenting it as a biologically prepared system that evolved to keep vulnerable infants in proximity to protective adults. Learners examine the evidence from ethology that inspired Bowlby's thinking, including Lorenz's work on imprinting in precocial birds, and consider how Bowlby applied these concepts to human development. Harry Harlow's landmark experiments with rhesus monkeys and surrogate mothers are examined in depth: Harlow's demonstration that contact comfort, not feeding, is the primary basis of attachment represented a fundamental challenge to the behaviourist account of love and dependency. Cross-cultural attachment research is reviewed, and the module considers the strengths and limitations of animal studies as a source of insight into human development, as well as the ethical questions they raise.

Investigate the profound and lasting consequences of disrupted, distorted, or absent attachment relationships in early childhood. This module examines Bowlby's maternal deprivation hypothesis – his controversial claim that continuous care from a primary caregiver during the first two to three years is essential for mental health – and evaluates the empirical evidence for and against this position. Rutter's influential critique of the hypothesis is considered alongside longitudinal studies of children raised in institutional care, including the Romanian orphan studies that provided some of the most compelling evidence about sensitive periods in socio-emotional development. The module explores the concept of reactive attachment disorder and its manifestations, examines the implications of attachment theory for decisions about fostering, adoption, and residential care placements, and considers how practitioners in education, social care, and health settings can use attachment frameworks to understand and support children who have experienced early adversity.

Analyse the major environmental contexts that shape children's psychological development beyond the primary attachment relationship. This module examines the empirical literature on the effects of different family structures and childcare arrangements on children's development, including comparative studies of group versus family care, research on the effects of maternal employment, and studies of outcomes for children in father-absent families. The importance of peers and siblings is explored: how sibling relationships provide children with their first sustained experience of negotiation, conflict, and co-operation with near-equals, and how peer acceptance and rejection during childhood predicts a range of adolescent and adult outcomes. The school is examined as a developmental context in its own right – how teacher expectations, classroom climate, grouping practices, and the quality of teacher–pupil relationships influence children's motivation, self-concept, and academic attainment.

Develop the methodological literacy needed to evaluate psychological research on child development critically and intelligently. This module introduces the nature and purpose of research, distinguishing between descriptive, correlational, and experimental approaches. Learners examine what constitutes a well-designed experiment – the formulation of hypotheses, the identification and operationalisation of independent and dependent variables, the control of confounding variables, and the importance of standardised instructions and procedures. Sampling methods are explored: random sampling, opportunity sampling, volunteer sampling, and stratified sampling, along with their respective advantages and limitations. Ethical considerations specific to research with children – including the requirements for informed parental consent, child assent, the right to withdraw, and protection from harm – are examined in detail. The module also considers observational research designs, including naturalistic observation, which is particularly important in developmental psychology.

Engage with one of the oldest and most enduring debates in all of psychology: to what extent is perception innate and to what extent is it the product of experience? This module uses the development of visual perception in infancy and childhood as a vehicle for exploring the nature/nurture debate in its purest and most empirically tractable form. Fantz's preferential looking paradigm – a methodological breakthrough that allowed researchers to investigate what infants can see by measuring where they direct their gaze – is examined in detail, along with the findings on form and pattern perception in newborns. Gibson and Walk's visual cliff experiments are reviewed as evidence for early depth perception. The physiological mechanisms that underlie judgements of depth and distance are explained, including binocular disparity, motion parallax, and pictorial depth cues. Bower's work on size constancy is evaluated, and the module concludes with a review of animal deprivation studies – including Hubel and Wiesel's visual cortex research – and the implications of these for our understanding of sensitive periods in perceptual development.

Trace the remarkable journey through which human infants progress from pre-linguistic communication in the first weeks of life to fluent speakers of their native language by the age of four or five. This module begins with the development of non-verbal communication – gesture, pointing, facial expression, and gaze – and considers how these pre-linguistic capacities are shared with, and differ from, those of non-human primates. Learners then examine the stages of language acquisition: cooing and babbling in infancy, first words at around twelve months, the vocabulary explosion in the second year, and the gradual emergence of grammatical competence. Two major theoretical accounts are evaluated in depth: the nativist theory, associated most strongly with Chomsky's concept of the Language Acquisition Device, and the social learning / operant conditioning account associated with Skinner. Vygotsky's sociocultural theory – and its implications for the role of adult scaffolding in language development – is also introduced. Naturalistic observational studies of child language are critically evaluated.

Critically examine the concept of intelligence – one of psychology's most contested and consequential constructs. This module begins by asking what intelligence actually is: is it a single, general capacity (Spearman's 'g'), a collection of specific abilities (Thurstone's primary mental abilities), or a family of relatively independent competencies (Gardner's multiple intelligences)? The psychometric tradition of intelligence testing is examined, from Binet and Simon's original scale through to modern individually administered tests such as the Wechsler scales. The nature/nurture debate in intelligence is addressed through twin studies, adoption studies, and research on the heritability of IQ, alongside consideration of environmental factors – nutrition, stimulation, schooling, socioeconomic status – that contribute substantially to measured intelligence. The Flynn effect – the secular rise in IQ scores across generations – is explored. The module also addresses the controversial question of group differences in measured intelligence and the methodological, ethical, and political dimensions of this debate.

Examine how children develop the capacity for moral reasoning – the ability to distinguish right from wrong, to empathise with others, and to act with concern for fairness and justice. This module presents and evaluates the two most influential stage theories of moral development: Piaget's pioneering account, derived from his observations of children playing marbles and responding to moral dilemmas, which proposed a progression from heteronomous to autonomous morality; and Kohlberg's more elaborated stage model, which extended Piaget's framework into adolescence and adulthood and proposed six stages of moral reasoning organised into three broad levels – pre-conventional, conventional, and post-conventional. The module evaluates the empirical evidence for both theories and considers the critiques – Gilligan's feminist challenge to Kohlberg's male-biased dilemmas; cross-cultural evidence; and the question of whether moral reasoning translates into moral behaviour. The role of empathy, prosocial behaviour, and emotional development in moral conduct is also explored.

Conclude your study of child psychology with a comprehensive examination of adolescence – arguably the most complex and dramatic developmental period outside of infancy. This module begins with the biology of puberty: the hormonal changes that trigger physical development, the timing of puberty and its psychological consequences, and the effects of early or late maturation on self-concept and peer relationships. Erik Erikson's theory of identity development – and the concept of identity crisis – is examined as a framework for understanding adolescent psychological preoccupations. The development of formal operational thought, as described by Piaget, is reviewed alongside research on adolescent risk-taking and the neuroscientific account of the still-developing prefrontal cortex. Peer relationships, romantic development, and the role of the peer group in adolescent identity formation are explored, as are patterns of delinquency and antisocial behaviour. The module concludes by considering the transition to adulthood – the concept of emerging adulthood as a distinct developmental stage, and the factors that support positive outcomes as young people navigate the demands of adult life.