Question 1

According to Erikson, the psychosocial task of middle childhood is to develop industry, which is the willingness to work to achieve goals.

Accepted Answer

Erikson believed that the psychosocial task of middle childhood (ages 6-12) is to develop a sense of industry, which is the motivation to work towards and achieve goals.

Question 2

By age eight, a child will take into account the intentions of another person when the child is making a moral judgment about the other person's behaviour or actions.

Accepted Answer

According to research in developmental psychology, children as young as eight years old take into account the intentions of another person when making moral judgments about their behavior or actions.

Question 3

During play, a child protests, "Those are the rules!" when confronted with others who want to change the rules. This is an example of moral relativism.

Accepted Answer

This is actually an example of moral absolutism, where the child believes that rules are fixed and not open to change. Moral relativism, on the other hand, acknowledges that what is right or wrong can depend on cultural or individual perspectives.

Question 4

Shared interests and activities are a critical part of friendships in middle childhood.

Accepted Answer

Shared interests and activities provide a common ground for children to bond over and deepen their friendships in middle childhood. Research has shown that having common hobbies, sports, or play activities can increase children's sense of belonging and social confidence in their friendships.

Question 5

Across middle childhood, children's descriptions of others focus less on abstract characteristics and more on specific, concrete characteristics.

Accepted Answer

Across middle childhood, children's descriptions of others shift from focusing on specific, concrete characteristics to more abstract traits, such as personality characteristics.

Question 6

Freud believed that children between age 6 and puberty repress libidinal desires to concentrate on developing friendships and social skills.

Accepted Answer

This is true. Freud's theory of psychosexual development proposes that children between the ages of 6 and puberty enter the latency stage, during which their libidinal energy is repressed and directed towards the development of social skills and intellectual pursuits.

Question 7

Social approval helps to maintain aggressiveness and may cause interventions aimed at reducing aggressiveness to be ineffective.

Accepted Answer

Social approval reinforces aggressive behavior as individuals seek recognition and validation from their peers. This may lead to interventions such as punishment or counseling being ineffective in reducing aggressive behavior as the individual may continue to seek approval from their social group.

Question 8

Popular children tend to be attractive and physically larger than their peers, characteristics they have no control over.

Accepted Answer

Research has shown that physical attractiveness and size are positively correlated with popularity in children, and these are characteristics that children are born with and cannot control.

Question 9

Relational aggression tends to increase among boys and girls during the 6-to 12-year-old period.

Accepted Answer

Relational aggression tends to increase among girls more than boys during the 6-to 12-year-old period, as girls are more likely to engage in social forms of aggression, such as excluding others or spreading rumors, during this developmental stage.

Question 10

Mothers are more likely to give greater autonomy over behaviour to boys than to girls; they are also more likely to hold girls to a higher standard of accountability than they do boys.

Accepted Answer

Studies have shown that mothers tend to give boys greater autonomy over their behaviour and hold girls to a higher standard of accountability. This may contribute to gender differences in self-esteem, decision-making, and other aspects of development.

Question 11

Aggressive/rejected children are often disruptive and uncooperative, and they realize that their peers dislike them.

Accepted Answer

The answer of Aggressive/rejected children are often disruptive and uncooperative,...

Question 12

During the stage of industry versus inferiority, if children fail to read and write, they will enter adolescence with feelings of inferiority.

Accepted Answer

During the stage of industry versus inferiority, children develop a sense of competence and accomplishment by mastering skills such as reading and writing. Failing to acquire these skills can lead to feelings of inferiority, which can affect their self-esteem in adolescence and beyond.

Question 13

Boy are simply more aggressive than girls.

Accepted Answer

This statement is a blanket stereotype and is not true for all individuals. Aggression levels can vary based on a variety of factors such as upbringing, environment, and personal temperament, regardless of gender.

Question 14

The level of social and emotional support from parents lessens once a child reaches adolescence.

Accepted Answer

During adolescence, children start to seek independence and may feel the need to distance themselves from their parents. This can result in a decrease in the level of social and emotional support that they perceive from their parents.

Question 15

During the middle childhood years, children begin to integrate other-gender interactions and activities into their relationships and typically develop a substantial number of cross-sex friendships.

Accepted Answer

The answer of During the middle childhood years, children begin...

Question 16

Bandura used the term "reciprocal determinism" to refer to an individual's belief in her capacity to cause an intended event to occur.

Accepted Answer

Bandura used the term "reciprocal determinism" to describe the interaction between an individual's behavior, environment, and personal factors, rather than solely focusing on an individual's belief in her capacity to cause an intended event to occur.

Question 17

Children who have been harmed by a peer but did not retaliate may be vulnerable to bullying in the future, and they may be seen as socially incompetent by other children.

Accepted Answer

Children who do not retaliate against bullying may be seen as an easy target for future bullying, and they may also be perceived as socially incompetent by their peers.

Question 18

Freud claimed that children concentrate on developing friendships and social skills during the latency stage.

Accepted Answer

According to Freud's psychosexual theory, the latency stage (between ages 6 to puberty) is when children's sexual and aggressive impulses go dormant and they focus on developing social skills, learning new tasks, and forming same-sex friendships.

Question 19

Researchers have found that parents may hold girls accountable to a higher standard of self-regulatory behaviour than they hold boys to.

Accepted Answer

This statement is supported by research. Girls are often expected to be more compliant, obedient, and self-controlled than boys, and may be punished more severely for the same behaviour. This can lead to gender differences in self-regulatory behaviour and overall development.

Question 20

Children describe their own personalities with increasing degrees of precision across the middle childhood years.

Accepted Answer

This statement is supported by research and is true. As children develop cognitively and socially, they become better able to reflect on their own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, and thus describe their personalities with greater precision.

Quiz 10: Social and Personality Development in Middle Childhood