Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory

Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory Lori Decker EDU 6655

Overview • Background • Key Ideas • Stages 1-4 • Inconsistencies in Stage 4 • Metacognition • Universality of Theory • Educational Effects

Background • Piaget was a stage theorist, meaning children construct new ways to interpret environment • He was a self-defined genetic epistemologist • Also a naturalist in the sense of observing naturally occurring things • He used the Quasi-experimental tradition of cognitive development in Geneva 1920s • And an inductive approach – took specimens of thinking and then classified it into stages

Key Ideas • Assimilation – a fight between the child and the environment so the organism changes, often through imitation • Accommodation – information pulls child’s mind in opposite directions so he must change his thinking to adapt • Participation – an active process of two things acting upon one another (object and child)

Stage 1 Sensorimotor - Ages 0-2 • Repeating physical actions to form new schemes or action patterns • There are 6 stages • Object permanence forming at the end of this stage as well as seeing self as separate objects

Stage 2 Preoperational – Ages 2-7 • Symbols • Greater language use • More make-believe play • Parallel play • Egocentric • One to one correspondence but can’t conserve

Stage 3 Concrete Operations – Ages 7-11 • Conservation is learned • Classification is acquired • Cooperative play is practiced • Starting to overcome egocentrism

Stage 4 Formal Operations • Reasoning is evident • Child can control variables • Correlation and proportion are developing • Child can form categories within categories and has thinking about own thinking (operations on operations), or metacognition

Inconsistencies in Formal Operations • In a 1972 article “Intellectual evolution from adolescence to adulthood” Piaget disputes his own claim about formal operations • He claims that all adults go through formal operations but adds they are affected by quality/frequency of opportunity of experience • Conclusion: formal operations may not show across all domains and maybe only to those areas exposed

Metacognition • Marker of formal operations • Metacognition – thinking about own thoughts and be able to communicate them -self as subject -other points of view exist • Self-Regulation develops with metacognition -deliberate direction of thoughts and control of one’s emotions

Universality • Piaget asserted his theory was cross-cultural through these beliefs: • Adaptive process – organism learns to adapt in different settings • Construction process-organism and environment are always interacting • Variations in cognitive development– include formal education and other ways the culture affects a child

Universality continued… • A study in Papua New Guinea showed the theory not the method of testing is cross-cultural • If you test with a relevant tool (string bag for New Guineans versus sticks – Piaget’s students) • Conclusion: formal operations is a higher cognitive level • Higher is not always better, like Western norm

Educational Effects • To further formal operations, it is important to consider the appropriate design of education • Teachers should encourage abstract thought, metacognition, self-regulation • Interaction with peers is crucial for autonomy • Teacher as collaborator, not master

References Boddington, E. (2009).Cognitive process of development in children. Retrieved from http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICDocs/ data/ericdocs2sql/content_storage_01/0000019b/80/44/ac/c5.pdf. Crain, W. (2005). Piaget’s Cognitive-Development Theory. In Prentice Hall, Theories of development (pp. 112-141). New Jersey: Prentice Hall. Fox, E. & Riconscente, M. (2008). Metacognition and self-regulation in James, Piaget, and Vygotsky. Educational Psychology Review, 20, 373-389,doi: 10.1007/s10648-008-9079-2 Kuhn, Deanna. (2008). Formal operations from a twenty-first century perspective. Human Development,51, 48-55. doi: 10.1159/000113155 Maynard, A. (2008). What we thought we knew and how we came to know it: four decades of cross-cultural research from a Piagetian point of view. Human Development, 51, 56-65. doi: 10.1159/000113156. Valsiner, J. (2005). Participating in Piaget. Society, 57-61, Retrieved from http://www.springerlink.com/content/y837m3jxxa8nt703/

Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory