B2 L3 - Piaget's stage theory

constructivism

concern with how the child actively constructs understanding of the world, a ‘third way’ in the nature/nurture debate (both innate endowments and experience)

adaptation

saw intelligence as a special form of adaptation to the environment, creation of ever more satisfactory ‘theories’ is main engine for cognitive change

cognitive schema

basic component of intelligance is the schema (eg sucking, grasping); first schemas are reflexes

two complementary and simultaneous processes of cognitive schemas

assimilation (diff objects become assimilated into the schema) and accomodation (schema changes to accomodate diff objects); equilibrium req for creation of consistent internal models

stage theory

famous emphasis on discontinuities in development, stages can be seen as major points of equilibration, sequence of stages fixed

sensorimotor stage (0-2)

infants are able to hold a ‘representation’ of the object in memory

sub-stage 1 (0-6 wks)

sub-stage of reflexes, practice of innate reflexes such as sucking, grasping (adualism)

sub-stage 2 (6 wks-4 mo)

sub-stage of primary circular reactions, repetition of body movements for their consequences (sucking thumb); infants cannot repeat an action on the environment to repeat its consequences

sub-stage 3 (4-8 mo)

sub-stage of secondary circular reactions, repetition of actions that have interesting effects on environment (kicking to shake cot and produce sound), can retrieve partially occluded objects but not fully occluded

sub-stage 4 (8-12 mo)

sub-stage of means-end behavior, infant can combine actions to achieve results; can retrieve fully occluded objects but A not B error

A not B error

object only exists as end result of her own search, so will look at location A even after experimenter moves object to location B

sub-stage 5 (12-18 mo)

sub-stage of tertiary circular reactions, infant begins to experiment to discover new means to ends (can manage A not B, not invisible displacements)

sub-stage 6 (18-24 mo)

sub-stage of representation, infants become able to image the consequences of their planned actions (full object permanence)

pre-operational stage (2-7 years)

egocentrism, centration, conservation, lack of reversibility and animism

egocentrism

children have problems decentering, manifested in determination by appearances and centration

centration

excessive focus on a single aspect of a phenomenon

perspective-taking

Piaget’s claims about egocentrism imply that children can’t take others’ POVs, young child is ‘rooted in his own viewpoint’

the three mountains task

asked to choose what represents a doll’s view, 4 and 5 yo children tend to chose the picture that represents their own point of view, correct answers not given until 8-9 years

conservation

test of the understanding that basic properties of matter are unaffected by changes in appearance (eg quantity, mass), Piaget claimed success req concrete operational thinking

lack of reversibility

correct use of operations requires reversibility - being able mentally to ‘retrace your steps’, can’t simultaneously represent two diff perspectives

animism

example of children’s naive theories about how the world works, children attribute animate and mental qualities to inanimate objects as another form of egocentrism

concrete operations (7-12 years)

children now pass all the tasks they failed in the pre-operational stage

formal operations (11+ years)

ability to think abstractly, hypothetical or inferential reasoning, third-eye problem and pendulum task

critiques of Piaget’s theory

underestimated children’s abilities, ignored social influences on cognitive development

object permanence

with different methodologies, can infants show precocious understanding of object permanence? → dishabituation

dishabituation

infant habitues to event (interest decreases with repeated presentation), stimulus is changed, look to see whether infant renews attention to changed stimulus and if so can infer that the infant has perceived the change

Baillargeon & Graber, infants familiarized with tall or short rabbit moving behind occluder, fixation time measured for ‘possible’ and ‘impossible’ events

infants attended longer to impossible than possible event, argued infants understand the object cont to exist and that it retains its physical dimensions when it can’t be seen

perspective-taking and conservation tasks

the language issue, the problem of ‘human sense’

language issue

criticisms that pre-operational children’s failure may be due to language issues; Piaget’s tasks linguistically demanding, many other cognitive tasks known to relate to verbal ability

problem of ‘human sense’

criticism that children fail these tasks because they don’t make sense, if alter task to make it more ‘relevant’ to child’s experience, performance will improve

counter critique: object permanence

infants may have executive problem with inhibiting prepotent action (location A reinforced, can’t change to location B), infants deemed to have acq knowledge only when they can use it to inform their action

counter critique: perspective taking

Hughes’ tasl (is there really conflict in perspective, also merely learning?), crucial point is being unable to decentre from one’s own perspective

critique: animism

Piaget overestimated tendency to engage in animism, evidence that the animate-inanimate distinction might be innate and child might not have not had understanding of event

counter critique: formal operations

overstimated abilities, many adults struggle with pendulum task or abstract thinking