Piaget’s Sensorimotor Stage of Cognitive Development

In this video I begin describing the 4 stages of Piaget’s theory of cognitive development: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational. Then I provide details of the sensorimotor stage along with more recent research suggesting that infant understanding of … Read More

Early Brain Development

In this video I discuss brain development and begin with the idea of infantile amnesia. Memories before about the age of 3 are very rare, suggesting that the infant brain is not yet developed to store episodic memories, though it … Read More

Infancy Stage: Motor & Perceptual Development

In this video I introduce some terms for understanding infant development, particularly for motor and perceptual skills. Infants are born with a number of reflexes (such as the rooting reflex and sucking reflex) which are gradually replaced with voluntary control … Read More

Prenatal Development

In this video I discuss prenatal development from conception until birth. This can be divided into the germinal stage, embryonic stage, and fetal stage. Conception occurs when a sperm cell and egg cell join to create a zygote, which then … Read More

Motivation & Goal-Setting

In this last video on motivation I consider the relationship between motivation and the goals that we set for ourselves. I discuss the importance of setting self–concordant goals which are intrinsically motivated and then discuss strategies for achieving goals. In … Read More

Conscious & Unconscious, Approach & Avoidance Motivations

In this video I discuss how motivations may be conscious or unconscious influences on behavior. I describe some of the unconscious motivations proposed by Henry Murray and David McClelland and how external conditions may activate motivations. Next I describe the … Read More

Delay of Gratification & Ironic Effects of Punishment

In this video I introduce the concept of delay of gratification and the famous Marshmallow Test. Mischel, Shoda, and Rodriguez found that the ability to delay gratification at age 4 was associated with higher social competence, coping skills, and even … Read More

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

In this video I describe one way of organizing the many other motivations that we face: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Abraham Maslow proposed that motivations could be categorized and then those categories could be arranged into a hierarchy of importance, … Read More

Masters & Johnson’s Human Sexual Response Cycle

In this video I briefly describe the work of William Masters and Virginia Johnson in identifying 4 distinct phases of the human sexual response cycle: excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution. Like these videos? Don’t forget to subscribe to the channel … Read More