AP Psych: Cognitive Development

Cognitive Development

  • Piaget, Vygotsky

  • explains the way infants think, explore, and solve problems through childhood

Schemas

  • how the mind organizes information

  • formed from experiences

Assimilation

  • involved incorporating new experiences into our current schema

Accomodation

  • the process of adjusting a schema and modifying it

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

  • Sensorimotor Stage: 0-2

    • Develop Object Permanence

      • Understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be perceived

      • Children younger than 8 months of age do not grasp object permanence

    • A not B Error

      • Child looking for object in the last place it saw it

  • Preoperational Stage: 2-6/7

    • Represent things with words and images, but too young for mental operations

    • Centration

      • focusing on one part of problem/one dimensional thought

    • Pretend Play

      • imaginative scenarios and create narratives

    • Egocentrism

      • A difficulty in perceiving another’s point of view

      • believe you see the world as they do

    • Theory of Mind

      • Develop understanding of others emotions and mental states

  • Concrete Stage: 7-12

    • Basic logistics about physical objects and events

    • Logic

    • Conservation

      • Quantity remains the same despite changes in shape

  • Formal Stage: 12+

    • Logical and abstract propositions and hypotheticals (predictions)