Cognitive

• Changes in Cognition (Thinking)


  The expansion of thought during adolescence is as significant as any of the physical changes associated with adolescence
• In the last decade, scientists have made tremendous gains in understanding brain maturation and how adolescents think
• Five main ways in which adolescent thinking differs from that of children

  • Think about possibilities, as opposed to focusing only on real
  • Think about abstract concepts
  • Think about thinking (metacognition)
  • Think in multiple dimensions rather than limited to a single issue
  • See knowledge as relative (relativism), rather than absolute
• Thinking about possibilities


  Unlike children, adolescents wonder about how their personalities might change in the future or how they might have been different had they grown up under different circumstances
• Whereas children's thinking focuses on the concrete events that can be directly observed, adolescents have the ability to think about "what might be"
• Thinking about possibilities


  • Reflected in math and science curricula
  • Adolescents appear to become better arguers and don't accept someone else's view unquestioningly
• Thinking about possibilities


  1. Deductive reasoning

  2. Hypothetical thinking

  3. "If-then" thinking
• Thinking about possibilities


  • Playing devil's advocate
• Thinking about possibilities


  Helps youth to argue and make better choices
• Thinking about abstract concepts

  Abstract concepts refers to thinking about things that cannot be direct experienced through the senses
• Ability to comprehend higher-order abstract logic explains increased interest in topics such as interpersonal relationships, politics, philosophy, religion and mortality
• Kids Talking About Love


  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkUGSNNy4dI
• Thinking about thinking (Metacognition)


  Monitoring one's own cognitive activity during thinking
• Interventions designed to improve meta-cognition increase reading, writing, test taking and performance on homework
• Thinking about thinking (Metacognition)

  • Increased introspection: thinking about our own emotions
  • Increased self-consciousness: thinking that others are thinking about us
• Adolescent Egocentrism


  Extreme self-absorption
• Adolescent Egocentrism sometimes results in problems for young adolescents
• Imaginary audience


  • Believe that everyone is watching
  • Behavior is the focus of other's concern
• Brain imaging studies show that adolescents self-perceptions rely more heavily than adults on what others think of them
• Personal fable


  • Belief that his or her own experiences are unique
  • Can lead to risky behavior
• Research is unclear of whether the personal fable ends in adolescence or extends into adulthood
• Thinking in multiple dimensions


  Ability to view things from more than one aspect at a time
• Adolescents can give much more complicated answers than children
• Thinking in multiple dimensions

  • More sophisticated understanding of probability
  • Understand that people's personalities aren't one sided and social situations can have multiple interpretations
  • Adolescents develop far more complicated self-conceptions and relationships
  • Understand sarcasm
• Adolescent relativism


  Ability to see things as relative rather than as absolute
• Compared to children, adolescents are more likely to question others' assertions and less likely to accept "facts" as absolute truths
• This can often times cause difficulties to arise between teenagers and their parents
• Theoretical perspectives on adolescent thinking

  • Piagetian Perspective
  • Information Processing Perspective
• Piagetian view of adolescent thinking

  • Cognitive-developmental view of intellectual development
  • Cognitive Development proceeds through a fixed sequence of qualitatively distinct stages
  • Adolescent thinking is fundamentally different from childhood thinking
  • Adolescence develop a special type of thinking that they use across a variety of situations
• Piagetian stages of cognitive development

  • Sensorimotor Period (Birth-2yo)
  • Preoperational Period (2yo-5yo)
  • Concrete Operations (6yo- early adolescence)
  • Formal Operations (Adolescence to adulthood)
• Each stage is characterized by a particular type of thought
• Earlier stages are incorporated into new, more advanced and adaptive forms of thinking and reasoning
• Piagetian view


  • Transitions into higher stages occurs when the child is biological ready and the environment demands more advanced thinking skills
  • Biological x environmental interaction
  • Abstract, logical reasoning is what differentiates adolescent thinking from childhood thinking
• Limitations of Piagetian theory

  • Piaget's perspective emphasizes a stage-like progression of cognitive skills and little research actually supports this
  • Cognitive development occurs gradually and continuously (like a ramp and not a staircase!)
  • Better to think of advanced cognitive reasoning skills as skills used more by older versus younger children, by some adolescents more than others and situation specific
• Information-processing view of adolescent thinking

  Attempt to understand specific skills/abilities that improve during this time
• Five main areas of improvement in information processing during adolescence

  • Attention (Selective attention and divided attention)
  • Memory (Working and long-term memory, autobiographical memories)
  • Processing speed
  • Organization
  • Metacognition
• Attention


  • Improvements in both selective attention (focusing on one stimulus while tuning out another) and divided attention (paying attention to two or more stimuli at once)
  • Explained by improvements in brain development systems that regulate control of impulses
• Information overload


  • New research on adolescent stress has identified "information overload" as one possible "digital stressor" experienced by todays youth
  • How do you think that continuous access to information has impacting things like attention? Do you think there are positive and negative aspects?
• Memory


  • Working memory: ability to remember something for a brief period
  • Long Term memory: recall something from long ago
  • Autobiographical memory (memories from our past) stabilizes during adolescence
• Reminiscence bump


  • Adults can remember people, places, and events that occur during adolescence better than other years
  • Not the result of memory or first experiences- we remember boring things too!