This is a sample of Walden DPSY 8215 Discussion Week 5 assignment. It is written in APA format and has been graded (A).

1. Post a brief description of the developmental milestone you selected. Then, explain the
impact of missing and meeting the milestone as it relates to cognitive, physical, and social-
emotional development in infancy and/or toddlerhood.
For healthy infants and toddlers, language development milestones begin with crying and
babbling preceded by speaking clear words, phrases, and sentences (Alston, & St James-Roberts,
2005). However, their at-risk counterparts usually show signs of language and communication
difficulties around 8 to 10 months old (Alston, & St James-Roberts, 2005). Using the Ward
Infant Language Screening Test, Assessment, Acceleration and Remediation tool, Alston, and St
James-Roberts (2005) discovered that most at-risk infants and toddlers (ARIT) spend fewer
social interactions (e.g., playing and babbling) with parents and caregivers than their healthy
counterparts do.
This finding correlated with data which showed that ARIT babble far less than their non-ARIT
do. They concluded that such disparity contributes to ARIT pre-language difficulties (Alston, &
St James-Roberts, 2005). Similarly, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2016) reported
that although ,in the United States, medical personnel identify most birth defects within the first 12
months of life, they may occur at any time during pregnancy but are most prevalent during prenatal
due to formation of vital organs. And, that while some birth defects have unknown origins (e.g.,
genetic factors), others like fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) occurs when mothers are exposure to
teratogenic agents like alcoholic drinks.
Some characteristics of FAS include (a) irritability, (b) unusual sleeping (e.g., less than two
hours-intervals), feeding (e.g., constant yet brief), and crying patterns, as well as (c) facial
abnormalities (Glass, & Mattson, 2017). All of which depict how meeting and missing
developmental milestones may influence infants and toddlers’ cognitive, physical, and social-
emotional development (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2016; Glass, & Mattson,
2017).
References
Alston, E.,& St James-Roberts, I. (2005). Home environments of 10-month-old infants.
International Journal Language Communication, 40(2), 123-136. doi:
10.1080/1368282040000686.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2016). Birth defects. Retrieved from
http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/birthdefects/index.html.
Glass, L., & Mattson, S. (2017). Fetal alcohol spectrum disorders: A case study.
J Pediatr Neuropsychol, 3(2): 114–135. doi:10.1007/s40817-016-0027-7.