What the exam asks
- Multiple Choice (Section I): You will read short vignettes about how traits develop (e.g., a shy toddler becoming a shy adult, or a child suddenly grasping conservation) and identify which theme is illustrated. In research-focused sets, you will identify whether a study is cross-sectional or longitudinal and spot threats to validity like cohort effects or attrition.
- Free Response (Section II): In the Article Analysis Question (AAQ), you may need to critique a developmental study’s generalizability or identify how age was operationalized. In the Evidence-Based Question (EBQ), you can use developmental themes (such as continuous vs. discontinuous growth) or methodological limitations (such as cohort differences) as the outside psychological concept in Parts B(ii) or C(ii) to explain how source evidence supports your claim.
Core ideas
Chronological Order vs. Thematic Lenses
Developmental psychologists organize the lifespan chronologically (tracking physical, cognitive, and social milestones from infancy through older adulthood) and thematically (examining how underlying mechanisms work across all ages). Three enduring themes frame every topic in Unit 3:
| Developmental Theme | Core Question | Key Concepts & Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Stability and change | Do our early traits persist through life, or do we become different people as we age? | Stability: Temperament and core personality traits (like extraversion) tend to remain relatively consistent. Change: Social attitudes, coping strategies, and emotional regulation often shift with life experience. |
| Nature and nurture | How do genetic inheritance (nature) and environmental experiences (nurture) interact? | Rather than acting alone, nature and nurture constantly interact. For example, a biological predisposition for height (nature) requires adequate childhood nutrition (nurture) to be fully expressed. |
| Continuous and discontinuous | Is development a gradual, cumulative process or a sequence of distinct, abrupt stages? | Continuous: Gradual quantitative changes, like an acorn steadily growing into an oak tree (e.g., vocabulary size, information-processing speed). Discontinuous: Qualitative shifts through distinct stages, like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly (e.g., Piaget’s cognitive stages). |