Book Description
Building on the strengths that have made it successful through three editions, this new Fourth Edition presents a topical approach with an up-to-date, accurate, and balanced treatment of child psychology. The text captures the themes and emphases that characterize contemporary thinking in the field. In every respect--organization, emphases, and new material--this edition represents the most thorough-going revision of Child Psychology yet.
In this Fourth Edition, new coauthor Shari Ellis brings her expertise on the sociocultural perspective on development. Together, Shari Ellis and Scott Miller continue Ross Vasta's vision for the text.
* New author, Dr. Shari Ellis, highlights the sociocultural perspective on development.
* An even stronger emphasis on cultural diversity and the cultural context for development. This emphasis helps students appreciate that development always occurs within a cultural context, and that this context--and also some aspects of development--may be different from what they are familiar with in their own culture.

Book Info
State Univ. of New York, Brockport. Introductory textbook presents a topical approach with an up-to-date, accurate, and balanced treatment of child psychology. Offers new emphasis on the sociocultural perspective and includes new coverage of development in the context of schools and the family. Also offers questions for critical thinking. Previous edition: c1998.

The publisher, John Wiley & Sons
Integrating the contextual influences of family and school into chapters on the various aspects of development, it focuses on current models and controversies including the role of action in perception, psychoteratology, Vygotsky's sociocultural model of intelligence and the role of temperament in the assessment of attachment. Investigates child pyschology from the perspective of three principal traditions that characterize the discipline today: the cognitive/developmental approach, the environmental/learning approach and the ethological approach. Carefully selected research findings, actual examples, a running glossary and end-of-section summaries prove extremely helpful to students.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

This updated topically organized text examines child psychology from the perspectives of three principal traditions which characterize the discipline today--the cognitive-developmental, environmental-learning and ethological orientations. It emphasizes the very latest issues and findings including the microgenetic research method, gene therapy, psychoteratology, the social bases of early memory and family contributions to peer relations. This edition contains social policy applications, 1000+ new references and end-of-chapter questions designed to foster critical thinking.

FROM THE CRITICS

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