Jean Piaget Theory of Cognitive Development Comments on Piaget’s perspective towards adolescents` Cogitive

Piaget’s clinical method Jean Piaget a Swiss developmental biologist (1896-1980) mixed observation with self reporting. He presented children of different ages with a problem and observed how the dealt with it, often directly questioning them as they work on the problem.

Piaget’s clinical method This approach allowed him to gain insight into his subjects cognitive processes as they worked on the problems. Some pseudo scientists criticized for this approach as not being sufficiently scientifically rigorous.

Why children think differently It takes extra effort and patience for adults to stop and think about why children make the kind of mistakes that they typically make. Piaget spent decades studying "errors" made by children.

What are Schemas According to Piaget, the inquiring young mind is not a clean sheet of paper that is waiting for knowledge to be painted upon it. Instead, it actively constructs knowledge. When a child comes in contact with a piece of new information, he has to understand it in a way that fits into his already established view of the world.

Piaget’s theory Piaget viewed cognitive development as the individual's continuous adaptation to changes in the environment.

The theory Piaget is renowned for constructing a highly influential model of child development and learning. Itis based on the idea that the developing child builds cognitive structures--in other words, mental "maps," schemes, or networked concepts for understanding and responding to physical experiences within his or her environment. He also asserted that a child's cognitive structure increases in sophistication with development, moving from a few innate reflexes such as crying and sucking to highly complex mental activities.

Piaget’s key conceptions 2 Key concept of Piaget: Organization: people must organize their knowledge in a way that makes it useful. Adaptation: assimilation/accommodation

Adaptation They must also adapt or adjust to their ever-changing environment. If the experience is a repeated one, it fits easily--or is assimilated--into the child's cognitive structure so that he or she maintains mental "equilibrium." If the experience is different or new, the child loses equilibrium, and alters his or her cognitive structure to accommodate the new conditions. This way, the child erects more and more adequate cognitive structures.

Piaget’s key conceptions Four stages of cognitive development Sensorimotor Pre-operational Concrete-operational Formal-operational

Sensorimotor Piaget designated the first two years of an infants life as the sensorimotor stage. Infants learn about their world using their senses (seeing, hearing, tasting, feeling, smelling) and their motor skills (grabbing, stroking, pushing, kicking). They are attracted to facing, music and things that move. manifestations of intelligence appear from sensory perceptions and motor activities. Infants realize that an object can be moved. An important cognitive development is "object permanence".

Sensorimotor Six Stages of Sensorimotor development 1 Reflexive Stage  (0-2 months)Simple reflex activity such as grasping, sucking.  2 Primary Circular Reactions (2-4 months) Reflexive behaviors occur in stereotyped repetition such as opening and closing fingers. 

Sensorimotor 3 Secondary Circular Reactions (4-8 months) interest in objects and people (Peek-a-boo) Repetition of actions that reproduce interesting consequences such as kicking one's feet to move a mobile suspended over the crib. 4 Coordination of Secondary Reactions (8-12 months) “Object permanence” Responses become coordinated into more complex sequences.  Actions take on an "intentional" character such as the infant reaches behind a screen to obtain a hidden object

Sensorimotor 5 Tertiary Circular Reactions (12-18 months) Discovery of new ways to produce the same consequence or goal such as the infant roll, squeeze, and pull apart a piece of clay 6 Invention of New Means Through Mental Combination (18-24 months) Evidence of an internal representational system.  Symbolizing the problem-solving sequence before actually responding.  Standing in front the the TV, pointing, then saying “Elmo”. Deferred imitation, (imitating actions learnt earlier.

Preoperational 2-6 years Preoperational Phase-language acquisition Increased use of verbal representation but speech is egocentric, “my ball”.  The beginnings of symbolic rather than simple motor play.  Transductive reasoning.  Can think about something without the object being present by use of language.

Pre-Operational Intuitive Phase (4-7 years) The child is oriented to the present, thus has difficulty conceptualizing time. His thinking is influenced by fantasy, and by the way he'd like things to be -- and he assumes that others see situations from his viewpoint. It is common for them to personify objects. Speech becomes more social, less egocentric.  The child has an intuitive grasp of logical concepts in some areas.  However, there is still a tendency to focus attention on one aspect of an object while ignoring others.  Concepts formed are crude and irreversible.   Easy to believe in magical increase, decrease, disappearance.  Reality not firm.  Perceptions dominate judgment. Not able to show principles underlying best behavior.  Uses simple do's and don'ts imposed by authority.

Concrete Operational Stage The child begins to reason logically, and organize thoughts coherently. However, they cannot handle abstract reasoning.   children begin to process complex concepts such as numbers and relationships but they need concrete examples to understand these concepts. There is the ability to perform multiple classification tasks, order objects in a logical sequence, and comprehend the principle of conservation.  The child is capable of concrete problem-solving.  Some reversibility now possible (quantities moved can be restored such as in arithmetic: 3+4 = 7 and 7-4 = 3, etc.) Class logic-finding bases to sort unlike objects into logical groups where previously it was on superficial perceived attribute such as color.   Categorical labels such as "number" or animal" now available.

Piaget’s key conceptions Piaget identifies five cognitive developments that occur during this stage of formal operations; beginning at about 11 years old; where older adolescents show these cognitive developments more frequently.

5 developments within the Formal-operational stage Separating reality from possibilities Hypothetical-deductive logic Combination logic Abstratct, symbolic thought Thinking about thinking (self-reflectivity)

Separating the real from the possible Adolescents can separate themselves from their present reality and think about other alternatives, they become somewhat idealistic. For example they can consider a better family life, a better neighborhood, or a better world. This capacity is associated with adolescents sometimes being less satisfied with their lives and social conditions.

Hypothetical-Deductive Logic The ability to form a hypotheses explaining a particular phenomenon, deduce from it what should or shouldn’t happen, and test these deductions in a logical manner. Adolescents can think more logically, devising methods for problem solving, and systematically testing them. This ability allows them to think critically, analyze and detect strengths and weakness in arguments.

Combination Logic Adolescents use combinational logic to generate multiple solutions to a problem and combine properties of objects or event to solve tasks. They can plan a party and imagine different situations that might come up and imagine different outcomes for each possibility. They can generate life goals and combine them with into different possibilities, noting which goal is compatible with which. I can either become a lawyer or doctor. I can play in the nba, then be a lawyer.

Abstract, Symbolic Logic Piaget and others consider the development of abstract thought to be the most important cognitive development. Not all of us reach this. Teens develop the ability to understand the principles of justice, individual rights, freedom of speech and religion. This allows them to develop personal values and principles.

What is an abstraction? What I mean by abstraction is that as a specie, we all are empiricists; we see things, we look at things. We are also all, conceptualists; we see things and we observe patterns. We define terms; we characterize concepts. And it's all of that that I am referencing as abstraction How we think about the world impacts on how we butter our bread. It impacts on everything, because we are an attitudinal species