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Developmentalist (developmental scientist)
Researchers and practitioners whose professional interest lies in the study of human lifespan.
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Child Development
The Scientific study of development from birth through adolescence.
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Lifespan development
The scientific field covering all of the human lifespan
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Adult development
The scientific study of the adult part of life.
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Gerontology
The scientific study of the aging process and older adults
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Normative transitions
Predictable life changes that occur during development.
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non-normative transitions
Unpredictable or atypical life changes that occur during development.
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Context of development
Fundamental markers, including cohort, socioeconomic status, culture, and gender, that shape how we develop throughout the lifespan.
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Cohort
The age group with whom we travel through life.
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Baby boom cohort
The huge age group born between 1946 and 1964.
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Average life expectancy
A person's fifty-fifty chance at birth of living to a given age.
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Twentieth-century life expectancy revolution
The Dramatic increase in average life expectancy that occured during the first half of the twentieth century in the developed world.
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Maximum lifespan
The Biological limit of human life (about 105 years).
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Young-old
People in thier sixties and seventies.
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Old-old
People age 80 and older
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Emerging adulthood
The phase of life that begins after high school, tapers off toward the late twenties, and is devoted to constructing an adult life.
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Socioeconomic status (SES)
A basic marker refering to status on the educational and- especially- income rungs.
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Developed world
the most affluent countries in the world
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Developing world
The more improverished countries of the world.
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Collectivist cultures
Societies that prize social harmony, obedience, and close family connectedness over individual achievement.
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Individualistic cultures
Societies that prize independence, competition, and personal success.
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Traditional behaviorism
The original behavioral world view that focused on charting and modifying only "objective," visible behaviors.
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Operant conditioning
According to the traditional behavioral perspective, the law of learning that determines any voluntary response. Specifically, we act the way we do because we are reinforced for acting in that way.
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reinforcement
Behavioral term for reward.
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Cognitive behaviorism (social learning theory)
A behavioral worldview that emphasizes that people learn by watching others and that our thoughts about the reinforcers determine our behavior. Cognitive behaviorists focus on charting and modifying people's thoughts.
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Modeling
Learning by watching and imitating others.
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Self-efficacy
According to cognitive behaviorism, an internal belief in our competence that predicts whether we initiate activities or persist in the face of failures, and predicts the goals we set.
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