Theories of Development

• nature vs. nurture relationship


  there is an influence of nurture on nature
• domain specific


  information about a particular content area
• Jean Piaget


  interested in describing and explaining how cognition is acquired, research approach focused on systematic observation of children (asked children questions and their rationale),constructivist theory
• constructivist theory


  theory that children construct an understanding of their world (cognitive development) based on observations of the effects of their behaviors
• stage theory


  theory that depicts development as a series of relatively discrete periods (stages), all kids go through the same stages in the same order but can be in one stage for some tasks and another stage for others
• how development occurs according to Piaget


  biological maturation allows changes to occur that will allow for increased cognition, such as the ability to organize information and adapt to an environment
• children make use of maturation by...


  interacting with their environment + people
• scheme


  mentally stored system for how to perform an action/understand a concept, the building blocks of cognition
• assimilation


  use existing schemes to interpret new information

  
  

  ex: a young child learns the word "dog" for the family pet, when he sees other canines at the park that fit the characteristics of his pet (four legs, tail, furry) he calls these a dog too
• accommodation


  change existing schemes to create new schemes to interpret new information

  
  

  ex: if a child learned that a dog has four legs and barks, then they see a cat that also has four legs but doesn't bark, they would have to make a new schema to fit this new animal
• disequilibrium


  an imbalance when you do not have an exact scheme for new information so you use assimilation or accommodation which changes your thinking
• operation


  internalized (just think it) action that is reversible, know the action is not permanent and can undo it
• Piaget's stages


  sensorimotor: 0-2 years

  pre operational: 2-7 years

  concrete operational: 7-11 years

  formal operational: 11-adult
• sensorimotor


  0-2 years

  - main focus is on senses and motor movement

  - primary achievements: develops object permanence, goal directed actions, and can reverse an action (NOT reversible thinking)
• pre-operational


  2-7 years

  - main focus is use of symbolic forms (pretend playing with objects)

  - schemes for actions become symbolic (words, gestures, signs, images)

  - kids are egocentric
• still lacking in preoperational


  operational thinking: & reversible thinking
• concrete operational


  7-11 years

  - main focus is use of mental tasks to think about objects and situations

  - can solve conversation tasks

  - can classify objects focusing only on one characteristics (classify one group as a part of another)

  - can perform seriation (arranging things in a series)
• formal operations


  11-adult

  - main focus on solving abstract problems with many variables

  - more scientific thinking

  - do not have to experience a situation to imagine it

  - develop concern for social issues

  - requires more formal practice than other stages
• egocentric speech (piaget)


  child is showing he/she only views the world from his/her perspective, young children talk to each other to produce individual monologues, when kids can take each other's perspectives they can engage in dialogue, focuses on the symbolic nature of language
• language development


  language develops during the pre-operational stage, domain-general view -> language is one form of cognitive development, mostly a nurture theory (with maturation dependent on nature)
• domain general


  intelligence, memory, general way to explain how development happens
• still lacking in concrete operational


  the ability to solve hypothetical, abstract problems
• operational thinking


  thinking about an action rather than doing it
• reversible thinking


  for conversation tasks, can't focus on reversing the action if more than one dimension changes

  
  

  ex: same amount of water in two cups, one larger one smaller