DEVELOPMENTAL THEORIES: PIAGETS THEORY OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

Jean Piaget- Swiss psychologist, best known for his pioneering work on the development of intelligence in
children. His studies have had a major impact on the fields of psychology and education.
- (18961980) Swiss psychologist who became leading theorist in 1930s
- Developmental psychologist who introduced a 4 stage theory of cognitive development
- Believed these stages were biological and occurred in same order but environment & culture could
change how fast we progress through them.
- Believed that children actively try to make sense out of their environment rather than passively
soaking up information about the world.
- Piaget believed that children are active thinkers, constantly trying to construct more advanced
understandings of the world.
Basic Cognitive Concept
1. Schema
- Cognitive structure by which individuals intellectually adapt to and organize their environment.
Concepts or mental frameworks that people use to organize and interpret information. Sometimes called
schemes. A persons picture of the world.
2. Assimilation
Process of fitting a new experience into an existing or previously created cognitive structure or
schema.
Interpreting a new experience within the context of ones existing schemas.
The new experience is similar to other previous experiences.
3. Accommodation
Process of creating a new schema.
Interpreting a new experience by adapting or changing ones existing schemas.
The new experience is so novel the persons schemata must be changed to accommodate it.
4. Equilibration
Achieving proper balance between assimilation and accommodation.
Piagets Stages of Cognitive Development
1. Stage 1: Sensory-Motor Stage
- Birth to Age 2
- This is the stage when a child who is initially reflexive in grasping, sucking, and reaching becomes
more organized in his movement and activity
- Information is gained directly through the senses and motor actions
- In this stage child perceives and manipulates but does not reason
- Symbols become internalized through language development
Object
-

Permanence
Ability of a child to know that an object still exist even without of sight.
The awareness that things continue to exist even when they cannot be sensed
Occurs as babies gain experience with objects, as their memory abilities improve, and as they
develop mental representations of the world, which Piaget called schemas
Before 6 months infants act as if objects removed from sight cease to exist
Can be surprised by disappearance/reappearance of a face (peek-a-boo) or Out of sight, out of
mind

2. Stage 2: Pre-Operational Stage

- Stage covers from about 2-7 years old.
- The child can now make mental representation and is able to pretend, the child is now ever closer
to the use of symbols. The word operations refers to logical, mental activities; thus, the
preoperational stage is a pre-logical stage.
a. SYMBOLIC FUNCTION-Ability to represent objects and events. A symbol is a team that represent
something else. Ability to use words, images, and symbols to represent the world.
b. EGOCENTRIC- inability to take another persons perspective or point of view. This is the
tendency of the child to only see his point of view and to assume that everyone also has his
same point of view
c. CENTRATION- tendency to focus, or center, on only one aspect of a situation, usually a
perceptual aspect, and ignore other relevant aspects of the situation. This refers to the
tendency of a child to only focus on one aspect of thing or event and exclude other aspect.

d. IRREVERSIBILITY- Pre-operational children still has the inability to reverse their thinking. The
child cannot mentally reverse a sequence of events or logical operations back to the starting
point.
e. ANIMISM- Tendency of a children to attribute human like traits or characteristics who in animate
objects.
f. TRANSDUCTIVE REASONING- PRE-operational childs type of a person that is neither inductive
nor deductive.
3. Stage 3:Concrete Operational Stage
- This stage is characterized by the ability of the child to think logically but only in terms of a
concrete.(between 8-11 years)
- Ability to think logically about concrete objects and situations
- Child can now understand conservation
- Classification and categorization
- Less egocentric
- Inability to reason abstractly or hypothetically
a. DECENTERING- Ability of the child to perceive the different features of objects and situations.
The capacity to consider multiple aspects of a situation or problem.
b. REVERSIBILITY- The child can now follow that certain operations can be done in reverse. An
example of this is when you put the water back to its own container, the amount will stay the
same.
c. CONSERVATION-This is the ability to know that certain properties of objects like number, mass
and volume or area do not change if there is a change in appearance.
d. SERIATION- This refers to the ability to order or rearrange things in a series based on one
dimension such as weight, volume or size.
4.
-

Stage 4: Formal-Operational Stage

The highest point of cognitive development.
Final stage of formal operations covering ages 12-15.
They can now solve abstract problems and can hypothesize.
a. HYPOTHETICAL REASONING- Ability to come up with different hypothesis about a problem and to
gather and weigh data in order to make a final decision or judgment.
b. ANALOGICAL REASONING- Ability to perceive to narrow down possible answers in another similar
situation of problem.
c. DEDUCTIVE REASONING- This is the ability to think logically by applying a general rule to
particular instant of situation.
Piagets Theory Principles
Children will provide different explanations of reality at different stages of cognitive development.
Cognitive development is facilitated by providing activities or situations that engage learners and
require adaption.
Learning materials and activities should involve the appropriate level of motor or mental operations
for a child of given age.
Use teaching methods that actively involve students and present challenges.

Assessing Piagets Theory

Scientific research has supported Piagets most fundamental idea: that infants, young children, and
older children use distinct cognitive abilities to construct their understanding of the world
BUT

Piaget underestimated the childs ability at various ages.

Piaget confused motor skill limitations with cognitive limitations in assessing object permanence
during infancy.
Piagets theory doesnt take into account culture and social differences.
Piagets Theory Challenged
New studies indicate infants do more than sense and react
One study had 1-month-old babies suck one of two pacifiers without ever seeing them
When shown both pacifiers, infants stared more at the one they had felt in their mouth
This requires a sort of reasoning
Rene Baillargeon used visual tasks, rather than manual tasks, and found that three-and-a-halfmonth-old infants could mentally represent objects that had disappeared from view
Critique of Piagets Theory
Underestimates childrens abilities
Overestimates age differences in thinking
Vagueness about the process of change
Underestimates the role of the social environment
Lack of evidence for qualitatively different stages
Some adults never display formal operational thought processes outside their area of expertise