Post on 20-Dec-2015
4 Theories of Cognitive Development
1. Piagetian Theory
2. Information Processing Theories
3. Core-Knowledge Theories
4. Sociocultural Theories
Cognitive vs. Social Development
Cognitive Development ~ development of perception, attention, language, problem solving, reasoning, memory, and conceptual understanding
Social Development ~ development of emotions, personality, family and peer relationships, self-understanding, aggression, and moral understanding.
Piagetian Theory: Child as Scientist
• He offered a constructivist theory (the active child)--child is motivated to learn does not need rewards to do so.
• Saw children as generating
hypotheses, performing experiments, and drawing conclusions
3 Processes
• Assimilation = translate new info into a form you already have/understand
• Accommodation = When this new info doesn’t fit you need to restructure your “theories”
• Equilibration = balancing assimilation and accommodation to create stable understanding
Piaget’s stage theory
pre-operational
sensori-motor
formal operations
concrete operations
10-13yr0-2 yr 2-6 yr 7-10 yr
Sensorimotor Stage (birth - 2 years)
• [No need to know specific substages]
• Begin with simple reflexes and sensory-motor skills and through assimilation/accommodation learned (theory is weak on HOW such concepts were acquired)
*Over this stage infants increase their ability to hold mental representations
• Infants live largely in the present --“out of sight, out of mind”
Object Permanence• Piaget claimed that until 8 mths of age infants did not
understand object permanence--that objects continue to exist even when they are out of view
• (e.g. failed to reach under cloth for toy that was just hidden) BUT…
Deferred Imitation
• Deferred imitation is the repetition of other people’s behavior after a delay
• Occurs around 18-24 mths
• Evidence of persisting mental reps.
Preoperational Stage (ages 2 - 7)
• They acquire symbolic representation--the ability to see one thing to stand for another (e.g. seen in their pretend play and in their language acquisition).
Scale model studies
Preoperational Stage (ages 2 - 7)
• viewed by Piaget as only being able to focus on one aspect of an event of problem--even when multiple aspects are important
Centration: Centering attention on one dimension.
Preoperational Stage (ages 2 - 7)
• Children in this stage are viewed by Piaget as not being capable of operations (i.e. pre-operational)--that is, they can’t perform reversible mental activities
• E.g. conservation concept
Preoperational Stage (ages 2 - 7)
• Egocentrism: According to Piaget, children at this stage are also limited in their ability to take someone else’s perspective--they only see it from their own point of view
The 3 Mountain Task
Concrete Operational Stage (ages 7-12)
• understand conservation.• begin to reason logically about concrete objects but
have difficulty with abstract concepts and hypotheticals.
• Difficulty reasoning systematically
(e.g. --the pendulum problem).
Formal Operations Stage (ages 12+)
• begin to think abstractly and hypothetically– E.g. Fondness for SciFi/Fantasy– E.g. Comments like “what would you do if you
could be 13 again?” “Do you think there is another planet out there with another ‘you’ on it?”
• now capable of systematic and scientific reasoning
• Unlike the other stages Piaget believed that some adults never reach this stage.
Strengths A good overview of children’s thinking at different
points Appealing due to its breadth Fascinating observations
Weaknesses/Criticisms Stage model depicts children’s thinking as being more
consistent than it ischildren are more cognitively competent than Piaget
recognizedunderstates contribution of the social world vague about cognitive processes/mechanisms that
produce cognitive growth
Where Piaget Left Us