Thinking Critically About Child Development

Thinking Critically About Child Development

In the updated Third Edition of Thinking Critically About Child Development, previously titled Child Development: Myths and Misunderstandings, Jean Mercer offers 59 essays that confront popular misconceptions and fallacies about the field. Intriguing vignettes and critical thinking questions frame each essay, encouraging readers to think like social scientists and become better consumers of media messages and anecdotal stories. Timely topics and DSM-5 references make the book an engaging supplement for both chronologically and topically arranged child development texts.

Thinking Critically About Child Development

With a unique focus on inquiry, Thinking Critically About Child Development presents 74 claims related to child development for readers to examine and think through critically. Author Jean Mercer and new co-authors Stephen Hupp and Jeremy Jewell use anecdotes to illustrate common errors of critical thinking and encourage students to consider evidence and logic relevant to everyday beliefs. New material in the Fourth Edition covers adolescence, adverse childhood experiences, genetics, LGBT issues for both parents and children, and other issues about sexuality, keeping readers up to date on the latest scholarship in the field.

Thinking Critically about Child Development