1. Cognitive Development – Piaget
Module 10
Cognitive Development – Piaget

2. Piaget’s Cognitive Developmental Theory
Schemes
organized ways of making sense of experience
Assimilation
using current schemes to interpret the external world
Accommodation
adjusting schemes or creating new ones when current ways of thinking do not fit the environment

3. Motivation for Learning
Cognitive equilibrium – a steady, comfortable condition (more assimilation)
Cognitive disequilibrium – a state of discomfort which creates a shift toward accommodation

4. Stages of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor Birth – 2 years
Pre-Operational 2-7 years
Concrete Operational 7-11 years
Formal Operational 11 years onward

5. Sensorimotor Stage Reflexes
Circular reactions – stumbling onto a new experience caused by the baby’s motor activity
“circular” because the infant tries to repeat the event again and again

6. Sensorimotor Stage – Repeating Chance Behavior
Newborn reflexes are the building blocks of sensorimotor intelligence
By repeating chance behaviors (primary circular reactions), reflexes come under voluntary control and become simple motor habits

7. Sensorimotor Stage Primary Circular Reactions (Substages 1-2)
Centers around the infant’s own bodily sensations
Secondary Circular Reactions (Substages 3-4)
Manipulation of objects and people
Tertiary Circular Reactions (Substages 5-6)
Producing novel effects, experimental

8. Sensorimotor Substages
1) simple reflexes
2) 1st habits & primary circular reactions
3) secondary circular reactions
4) coordination of secondary circular reactions
5) tertiary circular reactions & curiosity
6) internalization of schemes

9. The Sensorimotor Stage
Primary Circular Reactions
1 (birth to 1 mo.) reflexes
2 ( 1-4 mos.) simple motor habits
Secondary Circular Reactions
3 (4-8 mos.) repeating, imitation
4 (8-12 mos.) intention
Tertiary Circular Reactions
5 (12-18 mos.) exploration
6 (18-24 mos.) mental depictions

10. Sensorimotor Stage – Intentional Behavior
Substage 4 (8-12 months)
Deliberately coordinating schemes to reach a goal or solve a problem
Object permanence – infants retrieve hidden toys
Anticipate and try to change events

11. Sensorimotor Stage – Gaining Object Permanence
Overall, search strategies improve during the first year.
Awareness of toy’s disappearance (violation-of-expectations research methods)
Looks for toy by 8 months (Piaget)
A-not-B search error
Invisible displacement (finds toy moved while out of sight)

12. Sensorimotor Stage – More Recent Research
Violation-of-expectation method – infants look longer at an impossible than at a possible event
May reflect only infant’s perceptual preferences or limited awareness
Led to conclusions that infants understand, explore earlier than Piaget believed, possibly from birth
Renee Baillargeon – possible events
Carrot and screen study
Train through the box study

13. End of Sensorimotor Stage – Mental Representations
Internal depictions of information that the mind can manipulate
Images
Concepts (categories, groups)
Sudden solutions rather than trial and error
Invisible displacement – finding a toy moved while out of sight
Deferred imitation

14. Mental Representations (Memory) More Recent Research
Piaget says 18 months; others say 8-month olds recall object locations.
Deferred imitation, present at 6 weeks (adult facial expression).
24-hour memory for activity board objects among 6-9-month olds.

15. Sensorimotor Stage - Evaluation
Piaget’s perspective – Skills acquired through learning, motor behavior
Vs.
Core knowledge perspective – babies are born with innate knowledge systems or prewired understandings
Physical numerical
Linguistic psychological

16. Pre –Operational Stage
Piaget
Pre –Operational Stage

17. The PreOperational Child
Is age 2-7
Has achieved object permanence
Initiates & explores
Uses mental representations & symbols (language)
Is not logical

18. During the Preoperational Stage – ages 2-7
The child will:
Gain ability to reconstruct in thought what is experienced in behavior
Gain in ability to use symbols – words, drawings, images
Form stable concepts
By the end of the stage show an emerging capacity to reason

19. Preoperational Symbolic Function Substage
Egocentric
– cannot take another’s point of view
Three-mountains task
Animistic
– believe inanimate objects have lifelike qualities such as wishes, feelings, intentions
Magical beliefs
Show in drawings

20. Preoperational Intuitive Thought Substage
Intuitive thought is a combination of primitive reason and fast acquisition of knowledge.
Cannot answer the question “what if?”
Asks the question “why?” frequently.
Begin to grasp functionality – that actions and outcomes are related in fixed ways.
Begin to grasp identity-the reality that some things do not change (underlies conservation)

21. Piaget’s Preoperational Stage
Cannot conserve
Unable to understand that certain physical characteristics stay the same even though outward appearance changes (identity)
Because of centration
Unable to classify hierarchically
Also lack reversibility

22. Conservation and Logic, cont.

23. Criticisms of Piaget’s Pre-Operational Stage
They are not egocentric, the 3 mountains task is the problem
Animism is overestimated because Piaget asked about objects like the moon with which children have little experience
They see magic as out of the ordinary, but they do attribute lifelike qualities to dolls and stuffed toys

24. Summary Criticism of the First Two Stages
Logic develops more gradually than Piaget believed that it did
The primary problem of Piaget’s observations was complexity of the task(s)

25. Concrete Operational Stage
Piaget
Concrete Operational Stage

26. Concrete Operational Stage
Piaget said that thought is more logical, flexible and organized at ages 7-11.
Terms for operations they can perform
Conservation
Reversibility
Classification
Seriation (but not transitive inference)

27. Concrete Operational Thought
Children are logical only when dealing with concrete information that they can perceive directly.
Example is a transitivity task compared to a seriation task.
Horizonal decalage – development within a stage (working out the logic of each problem separately)

28. Formal Operational Stage
Piaget
Formal Operational Stage

29. Piaget – Formal Operational Stage
Starts at age
Develop the capacity for abstract, scientific thinking

30. Two Major Features Hypothetico-deductive reasoning
Deduce hypotheses from theory
Start with possibility and end with reality
Piaget’s pendulum problem
Propositional thought
Algebra and geometry

31. Consequences of Abstract Thought
Argumentativeness
Idealism
Planning and indecision
Self-consciousness
Imaginary audience
Personal fable

32. Adolescent Egocentrism
Imaginary audience
Personal fable
uniqueness
destiny
invincibility

33. Do all adults reach formal operations?
No, 40-60% of college students fail the formal operations problems.
People are most likely to reach it in subjects where they have had experience.
It may be a culturally transmitted way of thinking.

34. Piaget & Education
Constructivist approach – set up classroom for exploration and discovery
Let learning occur naturally, facilitate
Consider the child’s knowledge & level of thinking – sensitive to readiness, accept individual differences
Use ongoing assessment

35. Piaget and Education
Too time-consuming to implement, requires individual portfolios
Educators have always ignored developmental maturation; the system makes it difficult to deal with individual differences

36. Summary: Evaluating Piaget
Still major cognitive theorist
Criticisms
Cognitive abilities emerge earlier than he thought
Development more gradual, not as stagelike as he thought
He ignored culture & education as factors