By

Imran niazi

Subject Specialist

GCET Mianwali

Piaget’s Development Psychology

A Swiss Biologist.

First Profound interest in epistemology.

Later developed interest in child & cognitive psychology.

In 1920, associated with the Binet Testing Laboratory in Paris.

Opposed Binet’s idea of defining intelligence in term of the number of correct responses .

Who is Jean Piaget?

Defined intelligence as the ability to adjust ,adopt or deal efficiently with one’s environment.

He & his wife devoted his early married life to study the intellectual development of their own three children.

His theory of intellectual development has no parallel in the history.

Who is Jean Piaget?

Two Aspect of Human mind

Cognitive Structure

Cognitive functioning

Unlike other creatures , the human baby is born with a few practical instincts and reflexes such as sucking ,looking, reaching and grasping.

The initial cognitive structure of infants is supposed to incorporate only those cognitive abilities which help them to do such acts such as suck, look and grasp.

Piaget named these abilities or potential as

“schemas”

Cognitive Structure

A schema represents a unit of one's cognitive structure in the shape of general potential to perform a particular class of behaviors (like sucking, grasping, calculating etc).

For example take sucking schema, it refers to one’s general cognitive ability to suck objects. It can be thought of as a cognitive structure that makes all acts of sucking possible. But specific responses to specific stimuli.

The various schemas form the basic structure of the human mind.

What is schema?

The structure of an organism is said to play a decisive role in its functioning.

Therefore , what is available to an individual in term of his schemas decides how is he going to respond to the stimuli present in his physical and social environment.

On the other hand , the individual has to adopt to his environment for survival as well as proper growth and development.

The task of such adaptation is carried out through the process of assimilation and accommodation.

Cognitive functioning

Assimilation refers to a kind of matching between the already existing cognitive structure and the environmental needs as they arise.

In a situation where a six – month old infant is given a new toy it is likely to respond by putting the toy in its mouth. This is assimilation.

Q; Why does he do so?

What is Assimilation?

In case the new toy is too big to be picked up and placed in mouth , it will certainly need a change or modification in the already existing cognitive structure .

Now the child will have to change his old way of thinking and behaving in order to adopt or adjust to the new situation .

Consequently , now instead of sucking, the child may respond by pushing or grasping the toy. This is called accommodation.

What is accommodation/adoptation?

The process of assimilation and accommodation helps the organism to adjust or maintain a harmonious relationship between himself and his environment.

This adjustment mechanism was called equilibration by Piaget.

What is equilibration?

1. The Biological inherited reflexes.

2. The change & development brought about in the cognitive structure.(The process of Natural Growth)

3. The change & development in the cognitive structure brought about through experiences.

Factors involved in cognitive makeup & functioning (Piaget)

The Sensory-motor Stage (from birth to 2 years)

Piaget called the first stage of intellectual development the

sensory-motor stage. Because:

a. It is characterized by the absence of language.

b. As the name implies, the infant uses senses and motor abilities to understand the world.

c. It is limited to direct sensory interactions with the environment.

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Stages of Intellectual Development

In this stage , the cognitive development occurs along the following pattern.

1. At birth the infant exhibits a limited number of uncoordinated reflexes such as sucking , looking , reaching and grasping.

2. During next four month the uncoordinated reflexes are coordinated into simple schemas e.g. the infant now

tries to suck anything which is put into his mouth stares at whatever he sees , reaches for everything and grasps all that put

into his hands.

The Sensori-motor Stage

(3) First his view about environmental objects is that what is out of

sight is purely out of mind.

Gradually the concept of object permanence evolves in the cognitive structure of the infant.

By the age of 8 months the infant is able to react to objects outside himself.

He begins to realize that object around are separate from himself and they have their independent and permanent existence.

The Sensori-motor Stage

While stepping into this stage , the child begins to replace direct action in the form of sensory or motor exploration with symbols.

The learning of language provides him with a good tool for thinking. He begins to utter words to ask for something rather than just reaching out to get it.

This stage can be further sub divided into 1. The Pre-Conceptual phase (2 to 4 years) 2. Intuitive phase (4 to 7 years)

Pre-Operational Stage ( 2 to 7 years)

a) In this early part, the children seem to identify object by their names but make mistakes in this process of identification and concept formation e.g. they think all men are daddy & all women are mummy.

b) Their mode of thinking and reasoning is quite illogical at this stage. (e.g. cow)

c) Their thinking is sometime too imaginative and they cannot distinguish between living and non living. (e.g. block of wood , doll)

d) They have egocentric nature. Child thinks the world is only for him.

The Pre-conceptual phase (2 to 4 )

At this stage

a) Various concepts of child are at more advanced level.

b) But what he thinks or solves is carried out intuitively, rather than logically.

c) His thinking are full of contradictions.

d) Absence of two main cognitive characteristics (1) Reversibility (2) conservation

Intuitive Pase.(4 to 7 years)

Experiment for Conservation

In this stage

a) Now he learns to deal with concepts and ideas that only in mental terms.

b) Thinking becomes more logical and systematic.

c) Develops the ability to conserve both in terms of quantity and number of objects.

d) Develops the ability to reverse.e) No longer ego-centric in his thinking.

Concrete Operational Stage (7 to 11)

At this stage

a) The intellectual development and functioning takes a very sophisticated shape.

b) Learns to deal with abstraction by logical thinking.

c) Believes that hypothetical problem can also be solved mentally as concrete problem.

d) Creative aspects are much visible.

e) High level of intellectual functioning developed

Formal Operational Stage (12 to 15)

In short , according to Piaget ,this stage is usually characterized by the presence of the most sophisticated cognitive abilities to

(a) build up multiple hypotheses & a number of solutions;

(b) verify all possible solutions in a systematic & logical way

(c) generalize & arrive at abstract that covers many specific situations.

Formal Operational Stage (12 to 15)

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