piagets theory of cognitive development

• key term - cognitive development

  a general term describing the development of all mental processes, in particular thinking, reasoning and our understanding of the world. Cognitive development continues throughout the lifespan but psychologists have been particularly concerned with how thinking and reasoning develops through childhood.
• key term - schema

  a mental framework of beliefs and expectations that influence cognitive processing. They are developed from experience.
• key term - assimilation 


  a form of learning that takes place when we acquire new information or a more advanced understanding of an object, person or idea. When new information does not radically change our understanding of the topic we can incorporate (assimilate) it into an existing schema.
• key term - accommodation 


  a form of learning that takes place when we acquire new information that changes our understanding of a topic to the extent that we need to form one or more new schema and/or radically change existing schema in order to deal with the new understanding.
• key term - equilibrium

  takes place when we have encountered new information and built it into our understanding of a topic, either by assimilating it into an existing schema or accommodating it by forming a new one. Once assimilation or accommodation have taken place, everything is again balances and we have escaped the unpleasant experience of lack of balance - disequilibrium
• piagets theory of cognitive development

  Maturation causes changes in the way children think.

  Piaget (1926, 1950) produced and influential theory of cognitive development asserted that children do not know less than adults, they actually reason & think differently.

  Based on this understanding he developed childhood into stages – each on represents the development of new ways of reasoning.
• piagets theory of cognitive development - maturation

  Maturation is key to how children’s thinking changes – it is not just a matter of learning more. Piaget also looked at children’s learning, particularly two aspects:

  •The role of motivation in development

  •The question of how knowledge develops
• schema 


  schema are units of knowledge

  Our knowledge of the world is represented in the mind and organised in schema. As children develop they construct more and more detailed and complex mental representations of the world – stored in form of schema.
• piagets view on schema in children

  Piaget – children are born with few schema – just enough for them to interact with the world & other people. But they construct new ones during infancy. Including the ‘me-schema’ – in which all of the child’s knowledge about themselves is stored.

  Cognitive development (as adults) involves the construction of progressively more detailed schema for people & objects, physical actions and later more abstract ideas = morality & justice.
• the motivation to learn: disequilibrium and equilibrium 


  Disequilibrium creates motivation to learn and equilibration is the preferred mental state.

  When a child cannot make sense of their world because existing schema are insufficient, they feel a sense of disequilibrium which is uncomfortable.

  To escape this, and adapt to the new situation the child explores and learns more. This results in a state of equilibrium.

  Equilibrium is a pleasant state of balance and occurs when experiences in the world match the state of our current schema.
• how learning takes place - accommodation

  Any experience that is very different from our current schema cannot be assimilated. Accommodation involves the creation of whole new schema or wholesale changes to existing ones.
• accommodation example 


  e.g. a child with pet cats who has not come across dogs (no dog schema) on meeting a dog will initially try and incorporate the dog into their cat schema.

  When the dog acts differently (sitting when told, barking), the child needs to do something more dramatic than assimilation.

  The child will accommodate by forming a separate schema dog-schema. Both development and equilibration have taken place
• how new learning takes place - assimilation

  New experiences understood within existing schema.

  Any new experience creates disequilibrium because it does not yet fit our existing schema.

  Assimilation takes place when the new experience does not radically change our understanding of schema so we can incorporate the new experience into our existing schema. E.g. a child in a family with dogs can adapt to the existence of different dog breeds by assimilating them into their dog schema.
• strength of piagets theory of cognitive development = supporting evidence

  Howe et al 1992 put 9-12 year olds in groups to discuss how objects move down a slope. They found that the level of children's knowledge and understanding increased after the discussion. Crucially though, the children did not reach the same conclusion or pick up the same facts about movement down a slope. This supports Piaget’s theory that children learn through forming personal mental representations.
• strength of piagets theory of cognitive development = it revolutionised teaching 


  Activity-orientated classrooms allow children to learn in a more natural way. The children actively engage in tasks that allow them to construct their own understanding of their curriculum. E.g. in early years classrooms learning is focused around play and discovering new aspects of the world. This is a strength of Piaget’s theory because it has had a positive impact directly on education and we continue to seek out active ways of allowing learning to occur.
• limitation of piaget's theory of cognitive development = underestimates the role of other people 


  Piaget recognised teachers are important for setting up discovery situations for children but other theories suggest that the role of others in learning is more central. E.g. Vygotsky argued that learning is more of a social process and more advanced learning is possible only with the help of experts or peers. This suggests that Piaget’s theory is somewhat limited in its explanation of the cognitive development process.
• limitation of piagets theory = the role of equilibrium may be overemphasised 


  Piaget believed that disequilibrium and removal of its associated discomfort was the motivating factor in cognitive development. However, not all children are equally motivated to remove disequilibrium. Piaget studied children from middle class families who may have been more motivated to learn than other children. As the role of equilibration was a central part of his explanation this weakens the validity of his theory
• limitation = the role of language is not acknowledged

  To Piaget language is just a cognitive ability that develops in line with other abilities. Other researchers such as Vygotsky have placed a lot more importance on language development suggesting it is crucial to boarder cognitive development. If language is central to learning and it is not fully examined in the theory then, the theory is limited in its validity.