Piaget's 4 stages

1) Sensorimotor stage: (0-2 years)

baby’s focus on physical sensations and development of motor skills
they learn control of their body through trial and error and that they can eventually move other objects
these two years see the infant learning that they are separate from others, and some basic language skills
by 8 months they also acquire some OBJECT PERMANANCE

What is object permanence?

understanding that objects still exist when they are out of sight
prior to 8 months old, Piaget believed children where unable to do this and once an object is out of an infants visual field, the infant is no longer aware of it’s existence
hence why peek-a-boo is so entertaining for a baby

2) Pre-operational stage (2 - 7 years)

by this stage the stage is mobile and is using language but there are still some errors in reasoning
in other words, children are thinking differently from adults and so making mistakes in some of their tasks
* conservation, egocentrism, three mountains task, class inclusion

What is conversion?

ability to realise that quality can stay the same despite what it looks like
Piaget asked children to identify which beaker had more liquid. Both beakers had the same amount however were difference in appearance which tested conservation
the researcher poured the liquid into a different beaker in front of the children however they still stated there was more liquid
Pre-operational child = amount of water was different, unable to conserve that quantity stayed the same despite difference in appearance

What is egocentrism?

is the child’s tendency to only see things from their own point of view. Pre-operational children are unable to hold mental representations of another’s perspective as well as their own
this can apply to both physical objects and point f view in terms of their own perspective in an argument
Piaget demonstrated this through his famous 3 mountains task

Three mountains task

Piaget showed children a large model of 3 mountains, each with 3 different features - cross, a house or snow
a doll was placed facing the scene but so that it would have a different view from the child
from a range of different pictures of the model, the child was asked to choose what the doll would see
Pre-operational children often chose the picture that represented their own perspective rather than that of the dolls

What is class inclusion?

Piaget believed that whilst pre-operational children were able to categorise objects into different classes, they struggled to form and recognise subsets of these categories - this is called class inclusion
Piaget found when showing pre-operational children pictures of dogs and cats, where there were more dogs than cats, and then asking the children, “Are there more dogs than animals?” the children replied more dogs
the child was unable to simultaneously see a dog as a member of the dog class AND animal class

3) concrete operations (7 - 11 years)

by 7 years, most children were able to master the skills outlined above = can conserve and perform better on tasks of egocentrism and class inclusion
they are able to think logically and can apply that to different situations
* e.g. I might be sick if I eat too many sweets
they have also gained the skill of reversibility
* e.g. 2x4 = 4x2
however, they are unable to think in abstract terms of for imagined objects. They are unable to reason “what might be” for situations outside their experience

4) formal operations

children were able to start reasoning about things that were outside their experience and not get distracted by the content of arguments
Smith et al
  * Premise - Ali yellow cats have two heads, I have a yellow cat called Charlie
  * Question - How many head does Charlie have?
  * Correct answer - Two
Piaget argued that it was only when children reached the formal operations stage that they were able to follow this abstract argument through = “Charlie will have two heads”, as opposed as being distracted by their own knowledge that cat’s don’t really have two heads