Topic guide · Development across life / Emotion, motivation and sleep / Social and cultural behaviour
What changes during adolescence?
Connect biological change, relationships and research design while retaining individual variation.
Topic guide · Development across life / Learning, memory and education / Personality and individual differences
What changes in cognition as we age?
Distinguish kinds of performance and separate age differences from evidence of change.
Topic guide · Development across life / Cells, circuits and brains
How do minds and brains change as we grow?
Compare developmental questions at behavioural and brain levels, then examine what different study settings let researchers observe.
Topic guide · Personality and individual differences / Development across life / Methods, evidence and reproducibility / Evolution and other minds
How do genes and environment influence behaviour?
Interpret family and twin comparisons, population heritability and developmental experiments without turning them into percentages of a person or claims of inevitable outcomes. This route explains foundational inference, not personal genetic risk or modern genome-wide prediction.
Topic guide · Cells, circuits and brains / Development across life
What do glial cells contribute beyond supporting neurons?
Use microglia as a research example while preserving the distinction between different glial cell types.
Topic guide · Language and communication / Development across life
How do children acquire a language?
Connect theories of acquisition with observable evidence, especially when children cannot explain what they know.
Lectures and explanations
Selections below prioritise source-checked annotations. Inclusion does not assess scientific correctness.
NIMH · Source-checked annotation
Director's Innovation Speaker Series: Youth Suicidal Behaviors: Where Do We Go From Here
Arielle Sheftall discusses research on suicidal behaviour among young people, including preteen trends and racial disparities.
CARTA · Source-checked annotation
CARTA: The Biology of Grandmaternal Love
James Rilling explores evolutionary and biological hypotheses about grandmaternal caregiving.
Open Yale Courses · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 16 - Everyone but Me: The Pervasive Reach and Powerful Influence of Food Marketing on Food Choices
Examines food advertising, character licensing, product placement and marketing within schools, with particular concern for children.
CARTA · Source-checked annotation
Delayed neuronal maturation in humans
Carol Marchetto examines hypotheses about prolonged neuronal maturation in humans compared with other primates.
Open Yale Courses · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 5 - What Is It Like to Be a Baby: The Development of Thought
Introduces Piaget’s approach and the study of infant cognition, then asks how different kinds of development relate.
iBiology · Source-checked annotation
Beth Stevens (Boston Children’s) 1: Microglia States in Health and Disease
Beth Stevens introduces microglial states and their roles in brain development, health and disease.
NIMH · Source-checked annotation
Director’s Innovation Speaker Series: Youth-Centered Approaches to Media Research
Jenny Radesky and Megan Moreno discuss approaches that include young people’s perspectives in digital-media research.
MIT OpenCourseWare · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 10: Development, Nature & Nurture I
Examines how cortical organisation develops during infancy and childhood, with attention to genes and experience.
iBiology · Source-checked annotation
Beth Stevens (Boston Children’s) 2: How Microglia Sculpt Brain Circuitry in Health and Disease
Beth Stevens explains research on how microglia alter neural connections, including synaptic pruning in development and disease.
MIT OpenCourseWare · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 18: Adult Development
Extends developmental psychology into adolescence, adulthood and ageing, including cognitive, emotional and physical change.
Open Yale Courses · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 20 - Schools and Nutrition: Where Health and Politics Collide (Guest Lecture by Marlene B. Schwartz)
Marlene Schwartz discusses school-food policy, research on policy changes and her experience as a parent advocate.
Greater Good Science Center · Source-checked annotation
Daniel Siegel: Why Teens Seek Novelty and Danger
Daniel Siegel explains adolescent novelty seeking and risk taking through his account of brain changes during adolescence.
MIT OpenCourseWare · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 11: Development, Nature & Nurture II (2018)
Continues the discussion of genes, experience and cortical organisation, extending the question to change in adulthood.
MIT OpenCourseWare · Source-checked annotation
Lecture 17: Child Development
Introduces infancy and cognitive development through historical stage theories, learning and questions about other minds.
NPTEL — National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning
Lec 8: Other variables: CPH and ToM
“Lec 8: Other variables: CPH and ToM” is listed in Fundamentals of Language Acquisition. Its place in the course provides the learning context; an individual account of the lecture's content has not yet been checked.
NPTEL — National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning
Lec 20: Dual and Single Route Models
“Lec 20: Dual and Single Route Models” is listed in Fundamentals of Language Acquisition. Its place in the course provides the learning context; an individual account of the lecture's content has not yet been checked.