Cognitive Development

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Cognitive Development

• Acquiring knowledge

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I. What is cognitive development?

• The process by which our intellectual abilities
  (problem solving, perception, reasoning, etc.)
  form evolve over time.

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Are cognitions different from behaviors?????

• From a behaviorist point of view, cognitions
  (thoughts, beliefs) are believed to be actions
  and as such are behaviors.
• The primary difference between cognitions other
  overt behaviors that can be seen is the location.
  
• Skinner argued that cognitions are really
  behaviors that occur inside the skin, which he
  called private events.

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What are cognitions??

• Knowledge
• Ability
• Problem Solving
• Others include beliefs, reasoning, perceptions

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II. Theories of cognitive development

• 1. Piagets theory
• 2. Vygotskys theory
• 3. Information-processing theory

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A. Piagets theory

• Is a stage theory of development.
• Examines how children acquire knowledge from
  birth onward.
• Examines the processes by which childrens
  thinking changes over time.

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Important contributions of Piagets theory

• 1. Focused on children being active participants
  in the learning process.
• 2. Argued that children adapt thinking learn
  from their mistakes.
• 3. Provided a broad-based view of cognitive
  development in the natural context of the
  environment.
•  
• 4. Object permanence.

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Assumptions of stage theories

• 1. Childrens thinking in earlier stages differs
  qualitatively from their reasoning in later
  stages.
• 2. At a given point in development, children
  reason similarly on many problems.
• 3. Changes from one stage to the next are marked
  by an abrupt transition.

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How do children progress from one stage to
another?

• Piaget argued that we need to adapt to our
  environment.
• Two processes are critical to adaptation
  Assimilation accommodation (mutually influence
  one another).

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1. Assimilation

• We transform incoming information so that it fits
  within our existing way of thinking.
• We add new information to our existing mental
  framework.
• (E.g., an infant grasps a new object with same
  strategy she used for grasping other objects.).

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2. Accommodation

• Adjusting our knowledge (framework) in response
  to characteristics of an object or event (that is
  often different from what weve encountered).
• Changing existing mental framework to new
  information.
• (E.g., infant changes the way she grasps a new
  object, based on its shape).

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Piagets stages of cognitive development

•  
• 1.     Sensorimotor period (birth to 2 yrs.)
• 2.     Preoperational period (2-6 yrs.)
•  
• 3.     Concrete operations period (6-12 yrs.)
•  
• 4.     Formal operations period (12)
•  

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1. Sensorimotor

• Infants use reflexes to form primitive mental
  representations of objects events.
• Symbolic thought begins, allowing infants to
  devise strategies for attaining goals solving
  problems.
• Hallmark Child learns that objects have
  permanence, even if out of sight (object
  permanence) by 8 months of age.

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A. Was Piaget correct about the timing of when
children acquire Object Permanence?

• No!!! Infants appear to have the concept of
  object permanence much earlier than Piaget
  thought.
• Piaget argued that infants show object permanence
  by 8 months or after.
• It turns out that infants as young as 3.5 months
  have object permanence concept.

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2. Preoperational Period (2-6 yrs.)

• Symbolic thought improves as language
  acquisition comes on-line. Children start
  babbling in first year of life, and start
  producing simple two-word sentences by age 2.
• Mental representations that allow children to
  think about objects in their absence develops.
• Hallmark Cannot conserve objects (changing an
  objects physical appearance does not alter
  substance of object.)

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2. stages in preoperational period

• A. Preconceptual stage (2-4 years)
• 1. Animistic thinking (the attribution of
  life to inanimate objects).
• E.g, a child believing the wind talks to the
  trees.

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Conversation between Piaget a preoperational
child demonstrating animalistic thinking

• Piaget Does the sun move?
• Child Yes, when one walks it follows. When one
  turns around it turns around too.
• Piaget Why does it move?
• Child Because when one walks, it goes too.
• Piaget Why does it go?
• Child To hear what we say.
• Piaget Is it alive?
• Child Of course, otherwise it wouldnt follow
  us, it couldnt shine. (Piaget, 1960, p.215)

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2. Egocentricity

• The child views world from his/her own
  perspective cant see it from others view.
• The dialogue where the sun follows the child
  illustrates the childs sense of egocentric
  thinking.

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Piagets 3-Mountain Task egocentrism

• Models of 3 mountains of different sizes are
  placed on a square table chairs are placed at
  all four sides of the table.
• The child is seated in 1 chair, dolls are
  placed in the other 3 chairs, 1 at a time.
• Child is asked what doll sees. Has to select 1
  set of drawings or use cardboard cutouts to
  construct dolls view.
• Piaget found kids couldnt consistently identify
  dolls view from each of the three views until
  9-10 yrs old.

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Criticisms of 3-Mountain Task

• 1. Piagets Models lacked salient characteristics
  that could allow kids to differentiate 1 view
  from the next.
• 2.  The task of reconstructing the display, or
  choosing the appropriate drawings may be beyond
  the ability of a young child.
• Borke (1975) had child do task, but placed
  snowcaps, trees, or houses, on the sides of the
  mountains, to make them more distinctive and also
  asked kids to rotate a small model of the
  mountain display so that they could present the
  correct view, rather than reconstruct the scene
  from drawings. This resulted in correct
  performance in kids as young as 3 years.

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B. Intuitive Stage

• Child can solve some problems, but cant tell you
  why.
• Children cannot
•  Perform a seriation task- in which objects are
  grouped on the basis of a specific dimension
  (height, length).
• Perform class inclusion problems (if child is
  given 5 toy cats 3 toy short-haired tabbies (a
  type of cat) asked whether there are more cats
  than tabbies, they cant do it.

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Limitations of Preoperational Thought

• Preoperational children cannot conserve (matter,
  liquid,etc.). Conservationaltering an objects
  physical appearance, does alter its basic
  properties.
• Conservation of liquid task. The experimenter
  shows a child 2 short wide glasses with the same
  amount of liquid.
• Then, the experimenter pours the liquid from 1 of
  the glasses into a tall skinny glass.
• The child is asked which glass contains more
  picks the tall glass.

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2. The Period of Concrete Operations

• Learn to perform operations mentally manipulate
  representations.
• Can conserve (number, matter, liquid).
• Master concept that operations are reversible
  may be organized with other operations into
  larger systems.

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3. Period of Formal Operations

• Hallmark- capacity to think abstractly.
• Learn that operations may be organized into more
  elaborate systems.
• (a girl thinking about why she is thinking
  about thinking)
• Adolescents realize that the reality they live
  in, may be one of several realities they could
  experience.

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Criticisms of Piagets theory

• 1. Piaget underestimated infant capabilities
  older childrens cognitions.
•  
• 2. Piaget was wrong about object permanence
  conservation.

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B. Vygotskys theory

• Is a stage theory.
• Childrens thinkingthe result of their
  interaction with more skilled sophisticated
  partners (parents, teachers, etc.).
• Children born with innate abilities to learn, but
  need social interaction to develop cognitively.

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Elementary and Higher Mental Functions

• Elementary functions Are innate structures
  (memory, attention, perception) that we all
  possess that influence our interaction with
  others.
• Higher mental functions (logic, abstract
  reasoning) Require complex mediators (language
  symbols) to develop.

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The Zone of Proximal Development

• The difference between a childs actual
  developmental level his/her potential as
  determined by an adult through the childs
  interaction with more capable peers adults.
• Examines childrens potential during optimal
  conditions.

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Overview of Vygotskys theory

• 1. Focused on importance of social interactions
  in cognitive development.
•  
• 2. Social contexts are important in development.
• 3. Did not specify the processes that govern
  development nor does it tell us whether they are
  the same at all