Evaluation on Piaget's theory of cognitive development

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P - opposing evidence for egocentrism (Hughes)

Ev - similar to the three mountain task Hughes found that children as young as 3 and half were able to position the boy doll where one of the policeman could now see him 90% of the time. 4 years old could do it without 2 policemen being able to see him

Ex - Piaget’s theory suggests that he underestimated the age at which children can overcome egocentrism

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P - opposing evidence for class inclusion (Siegler and Svetina)

Ev - tested 100, 5 year olds from Slovenia and found that after instruction about the nature of class inclusion these children were able to understand that gods were a subset of animals

Ex - this refutes Piaget as he believed children as young as 5 were unable to understand this as concept

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P - opposing evidence for conversion (McGarrigle and Donaldson)

Ev - replicated the counter task with 4-6 year olds, but added “naughty teddy” which pushed the counters back together. When this happened, 72% of children gave the correct. Children were able to understand conservation when questioned in a different way

Ex - the way children are questioned impacts the ability to conserve, Piaget was wrong about age

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