1 Prelude to Lifespan Development

You will also discover that developmental psychologists investigate key questions, such as whether children are qualitatively different from adults or simply lack the experience that adults draw upon. Other issues that they deal with include: whether development occurs through the gradual accumulation of knowledge or through shifts from one stage of thinking to another; if children are born with innate knowledge or figure things out through experience; and whether development is driven by the social context or something inside each child. From the above explanation you may be thinking already that developmental psychology is related to other applied fields. You are right. The field informs several applied fields in psychology, including educational psychology, psychopathology, and forensic developmental psychology. It also complements several other basic research fields in psychology including social psychology, cognitive psychology, and comparative psychology. Lastly, it draws from the theories and research of several scientific fields including biology, sociology, healthcare, nutrition, and anthropology.