Jean Piaget

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Jean Piagets Theory of Cognitive Development
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Outline

• (1) General introduction.
• (2) Sensory-Motor period.
• (3) Pre-operational period.
• (4) Concrete operations.
• (5) Formal operations.
• (6) Evaluation.

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I Terms and concepts.
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Genetic Epistemology A constructivist theory

• No innate ideas...not a nativist theory.
• Nor is the child a tabula rasa with the real
  world out there waiting to be discovered.
• Instead, mind is constructed through interaction
  with the environment what is real depends on how
  developed ones knowledge is

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How does Piaget describe developmental change?

• Development occurs in stages, with a qualitative
  shift in the organization and complexity of
  cognition at each stage.
• Thus, children not simply slower, or less
  knowledgeable than adults ? instead, they
  understand the world in a qualitatively different
  way.
• Stages form an invariant sequence.

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Stages of Cognitive Development

• (1) Sensorimotor (0-2 years)
• (2) Pre-operational (2-7 years)
• (3) Concrete Operational (7-11 years)
• (4) Formal Operational (11-16 years)

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What develops? Cognitive structures

• Cognitive structures are the means by which
  experience is interpreted and organized reality
  very much in the eye of the beholder
• Early on, cognitive structures are quite basic,
  and consist of reflexes like sucking and
  grasping.
• Piaget referred to these structures as schemes.

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How do cognitive structures develop?

• Through assimilation and accomodation.
• Assimilation The incorporation of new
  experiences into existing structures.
• Accommodation The changing of an old structures
  so that new experiences can be processed.
• Assimilation is conservative, while accommodation
  is progressive.

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Why accommodate?

• Normally, the mind is in a state of equilibrium
  existing structures are stable, and assimilation
  is mostly occurring.
• However, a discrepant experience can lead to
  disequilibrium or cognitive instability
• Child forced to accommodate existing structures.

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Active view of development

• Child as scientist
• Mental structures intrinsically active ?
  constantly being applied to experience
• Leads to curiosity and the desire to know
• Development proceeds as the child actively
  refines his/her knowledge of the world through
  many small experiments

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Instructional learning viewed as relatively
unimportant

• Teachers should not try to transmit knowledge,
  but should provide opportunities for discovery
• Child needs to construct or reinvent knowledge ?
  adult knowledge cannot be formally communicated
  to the child
• Limited importance of socio-cultural context
  importance of peer interaction.

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II The Sensorimotor Period (0-2 years)

• Only some basic motor reflexes? grasping,
  sucking, eye movements, orientation to sound, etc
  
• By exercising and coordinating these basic
  reflexes, infant develops intentionality and an
  understanding of object permanence.

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II The Sensorimotor Period (0-2 years)

• Intentionality refers to the ability to act in a
  goal-directed manner ? in other words, to do one
  thing in order that something else occurs.
• Requires an understanding of cause and effect

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II The Sensorimotor Period (0-2 years)

• Object permanence refers to the understanding
  that objects continue to exist even when no
  longer in view.
• Need to distinguish between an action and the
  thing acted on.

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Stage 1 (0-1 month)

• Stage of reflex activity.
• Many reflexes like reaching, grasping sucking
  all operating independently.
• Objects like "sensory pictures".
• Subjectivity and objectivity fused.
• Schemes activated by chance No intentionality.

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Stage 2 (1-4 months)

• Stage of Primary Circular Reactions.
• Infants behaviour, by chance, leads to an
  interesting result is repeated.
• Circular repetition.
• Primary centre on infant's own body.
• Example thumb-sucking.

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Object concept at stage 2

• Passive expectation if object disappears, infant
  will continue looking to the location where it
  disappeared, but will not search.
• In the infant mind, the existence of the object
  still very closely tied to schemes applied to
  experience

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Intentions at stage 2

• Intentionality beginning to emerge infant can
  now self-initiate certain schemes (e.g.,
  thumb-sucking)

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Stage 3 (4-8 months)

• Stage of Secondary Circular Reactions
• Repetition of simple actions on external objects.
• Example bang a toy to make a noise.

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Intentionality at stage 3

• Poor understanding of the connection between
  causes and effect limits their ability to act
  intentionality.
• Magical causality ? accidentally banging toy
  makes many interesting things happen

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Object concept at stage 3

• Visual anticipation.
• If infant drops an object, and it disappears, the
  infant will visually search for it.
• Will also search for partially hidden objects
• But will not search for completely hidden objects.

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Stage 4 (8-12 months)

• Co-ordination of secondary circular reactions.
• Secondary schemes combined to create new action
  sequences.

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Intentionality at Stage 4

• First appearance of intentional or in Piagets
  terms, means-end behavior.
• Infant learns to use one secondary scheme (e.g.,
  pulling a towel) in order that another secondary
  scheme can be activated (e.g., reaching and
  grasping a toy)

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Object concept at stage 4

• Infant will search for hidden objects.
• Does infant understand the object as something
  that exists separate from the scheme applied to
  find the object?
• No. Evidence?
• A not B error.

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The A not B task
The A not B task
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A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
1
A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
1
A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
2
A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
2
A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
2
A trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
B trials
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The A not B task
The A not B task
B trials
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The A not B task
??
B trials
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A not B error

• Infant continues to search at the first hiding
  location after object is hidden in the new
  location.
• Object still subjectively understood.
• Object remains associated with a previously
  successful scheme.

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Stage 5 (12-18 months)

• Stage of Tertiary Circular Reactions.
• Actions varied in an experimental fashion.
• Pursuit of novelty
• New means are discovered.
• Limited to physical actions taken on objects

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Object concept at stage 5.

• Can solve A not B.
• Cannot solve A not B with invisible displacement
  (Example from Piaget).

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Stage 5 and invisible displacement

• Can only imagine the object as existing where it
  was last hidden.
• Invisible displacement requires the infant to
  mentally calculate the new location of the
  object.

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Stage 6 (18-24 months)

• Can solve object search with invisible
  displacement.
• Infants now mentally represent physically absent
  objects.
• Understands object as something that exists
  independently of sensory-motor action.

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Stage 6 (18-24 months)

• Sensori-motor period culminates with the
  emergence of the Symbolic function
• An idea or mental image is used to stand-in for a
  perceptually absent object
• Trial-and-error problem solving does not need to
  enacted but can undertaken through mental
  combination.

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Summary

• Sensori-motor period culminates in the emergence
  of symbolic representation.
• Object permanence understood.
• Basic means-ends skills have emerged.

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Piaget Part 2

• Beyond the sensorimotor period

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III The pre-operational period

• Symbolic thought without operations.
• Operations logical principles that are applied
  to symbols rather than objects.
• 3 examples reversibility, compensation, and
  identity
• In the absence of operations, thinking is
  governed more by appearance than logical
  necessity.

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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
Conservation of liquid
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation

• Why do pre-operational children fail problems of
  conservation?
• Because their thinking is not governed by
  principles of reversibility, compensation and
  identity

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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
Reversibility The pouring of water into the
small container can be reversed.
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
Compensation A decrease in the height of the new
container is compensated by an increase in its
width
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation
Identity No amount of liquid has been added or
taken away.
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Pre-operational thinking and problems of
conservation

• Why do pre-operational children fail problems of
  conservation?
• Because their thinking is not governed by
  principles of reversibility, compensation and
  identity
• If children applied these principles, they would
  conclude liquid is conserved

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Characteristics of Pre-Operational Thinking

• Not governed by logical operations
• Consequently, it appears egocentric (e.g., 3
  mountains task) and intuitive (e.g., conservation
  tasks)

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3 Mountains Task
Doll 1
Doll 2
Child
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3 Mountains Task
Doll 1
Doll 2
Child
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Characteristics of Pre-Operational Thinking

• (1) Egocentric
• (2) Intuitive ? problem solving is not reasoned
  or logical

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Nature of intuitive reasoning

• No reversibility ? Cannot mentally undo a given
  action.
• Perceptual centration ?Focus on only one
  dimension of a problem.
• States versus transformations ? Transformations
  relating different states ignored.

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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.

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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.
• Examples
• Other conservation problems.

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Conservation of mass
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Conservation of mass
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Conservation of mass
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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.
• Examples
• Other conservation problems.

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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.
• Examples
• Other conservation problems.
• Emotion reasoning.

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Emotion reasoning
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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.
• Examples
• Other conservation problems.
• Emotion reasoning.
• Moral reasoning.

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What makes Pre-operational thinking stage-like?

• Because it appears to be a general characteristic
  of childrens thinking at this age.
• Examples
• Other conservation problems.
• Emotion reasoning.
• Moral reasoning. ? focus on consequences

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IV Concrete operational thinking (7-12 years)

• Qualitatively different reasoning in conservation
  problems.
• Flexible and decentered.
• Co-ordination of multiple dimensions.
• Logical vs. empirical problem solving.
• Reversibility.
• Awareness of transformations.

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IV Concrete operational thinking (7-12 years)

• Physical operations now internalized and have
  become cognitive
• Still, logic directed at physical or concrete
  problems

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Horizontal decalage

• Different conservation problems solved at
  different ages.
• Some claim it is a threat to Piagets domain
  general view of cognitive development
• Example volume vs mass
• But, invariant sequence observed.

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V Formal operations

• Thought no longer applied strictly to concrete
  problems.
• Directed inward thought becomes the object of
  thought.
• Advances in use of deductive and inductive logic

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V Formal operations

• Deductive thought in period of concrete
  operations confined to familiar everyday
  experience If Sam steals Tims toy, then how
  will Tim feel?
• Formal operations If we could eliminate
  injustice, would the world live in peace?
• Thinking goes beyond experience, more abstract

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Inductive reasoning

• Example Pendulum problem
• Scientific thinking from specific observations
  to general conclusions through hypothesis-testing
  

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Inductive reasoning

• Example Pendulum problem

How fast?
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Inductive reasoning

• Formal operational children will systematically
  test all possibilities before arriving at a
  conclusion

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VI Evaluating Piaget

• Difficult.
• An enormous theory.
• Covers many ages and issues in development.

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Strengths

• Active rather than passive view of the child.
• Revealed important invariants in cognitive
  development.
• Errors informative.
• Perceptual-motor learning rather than language
  important for development.
• Tasks.

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Weaknesses

• The competence-performance distinction

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Competence

• Knowledge, rules, and concepts that form the
  basis of cognition.
• Inferred from behaviour.

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Performance

• Energy level, interest, attention, language
  skills, motivation etc.
• Factors that effect the expression of a
  competence.

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Competence-performance distinction.

• Piaget attributed infants success (or lack of
  success) to competence.
• However, he gave no consideration to performance
  factors that may have constrained the expression
  of knowledge.
• Example A not B

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Performance-competence distinction and A not B

• A not B errors thought to indicate poor
  understanding of objects.
• However, motor components of the task may
  constrain the expression of infants knowledge.
• Example Baillergeon.
• Object permanence observed in 5 month-olds using
  a looking time task.

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Other examples

• Borke (1975) the 3 mountains task.
• Bruner (1966) the liquid conservation task.
• More detailed task analysis required.

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Stages?

• Stage like progression only observed if one
  assumes a bird-eye view.
• Closer inspection reveals more continuous changes
  (Siegler, 1988).

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Summary

• Piagets theory is wide-ranging and influential.
• Source of continued controversy.
• People continue to address many of the questions
  he raised, but using different methods and
  concepts.