3) Cognition and Development - Piaget Theory of Cognitive Developmetn

Question 1

What is Cognitive Development?

Answer 1

The development of all mental processes

Question 2

Piaget discovered that children think entirely ______ than adults.

Answer 2

Different

Question 3

What is a schema?

Answer 3

Mental framework containing all information about as aspect of the world.

Question 4

As we develop, are more or less schemas made?

Answer 4

More

Question 5

How did Piaget suggest learning takes place?

Answer 5

Through adapting to new situations by either Assimilation or Accommodation.

Question 6

What is Assimilation?

Answer 6

When we acquire new information about something we already know and add(assimilate) it into a new schema.
(e.g Assimilating different dog breeds into the dog schema)

Question 7

What is Accommodation?

Answer 7

When we acquire information that radically changes a schema or makes a new one.
(Discovering a cat for the first time as a species of animal and not another animal)

Question 8

What is Equilibration?

Answer 8

The motivated to learn when our existing schemas do not allow us to make sense of something new. Leading to the feeling of disequilibrium.

Question 9

What does equilibration lead to?

Answer 9

Assimilation and Accommodation

Question 10

What happens when equilibrium is not met?

Answer 10

• The feeling of Disequilibrium occurs.

- The unpleasant experience of a lack of balance.

Question 11

Give a strength to Piaget’s theory of forming individual mental representations.

Answer 11

P - There is supporting evidence for Piaget’s theory.
E - He put children (9-12yrs) in groups of 4 to discuss the movement of objects down a slope.
E - Was found that there was an increased in their level of knowledge and understanding of the topic compared to when assessed before, but they did not come up with the same conclusions.
L - This supports Piaget’s idea that children learn by forming their own mental representations.

Question 12

Give a strength for the Application of Piaget’s work

Answer 12

P - Piaget’s idea of children learning by actively exploring their environment has revolutionised classroom teaching.
E - From 1960, Piaget’s idea became popular and changed the classroom setting from sitting silently and copying work to a more activity oriented environment where children can construct their own understandings of the curriculum.
E - In younger years, children investigate the physical properties of things such as water and sand but then learning changes at around a levels to things such as flipped learning where students are encouraged to look at the content before the lesson.

Question 13

Give a limitation of Piaget’s theory.

Answer 13

P - Piaget may have underplayed the role of other people in learning.
E - Other theories of learning suggest that other people are absolutely central to the learning process.
E - Vygotsky proposed that learning is essentially a social process and that children are capable of much more advanced learning if supported by peers.

Question 14

What are the stages of intellectual development and their ages?

Answer 14

Sensorimotor stage (0-2)
Pre-operational Stage (2-7)
Stage of concrete operations (7-11)
Stage of formal operations (11+)

Question 15

What ability is associated with the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 15

Object Permanence

Question 16

What is object permanence?

Answer 16

The understanding of objects existing when out of sight.

Question 17

Describe the experiment associated with object permanence?

Answer 17

Piaget observed babies looking at objects and and watch them as they went out of sight.

Question 18

What were the findings from the OP experiment?

Answer 18

Babies under 8 months immediately switched their attention whereas babies 8+ months would continue looking for the object.

Question 19

What abilities are associated with the pre-operational stage?

Answer 19

Conservation, Egocentrism, Class Inclusion

Question 20

What is Conservation?

Answer 20

Quantity of something is the same although the appearance can look different.

Question 21

What is the conservation experiment?

Answer 21

3 Containers (A, B, C) All containing the same volume of liquid. A and B were identical but C was taller and thinner but since it appeared taller, younger children said that C had more liquid.

Question 22

What is egocentrism?

Answer 22

To see the world from only one point of view.

Question 23

What was the egocentrism experiment?

Answer 23

Three Mountains Experiment:

• 3 Mountain Models each with a different feature.
• Child was asked to say what the doll would see from a range of pictures of what was present.
• Pre-operational children tended to find this difficult and often chose the picture that matched the scene from their own point of view.

Question 24

What is class inclusion?

Answer 24

Objects fall into categories which have subsets.

Question 25

What was the study conducted by Piaget for class inclusion?

Answer 25

• When they showed 7-8yr old children pictures of dogs and cats and asked the question “Are there more dogs or animals?” they responded with “More dogs.”.
• He interpreted this as meaning younger children cannot simultaneously see a dog as a member of the dog class and the animal class.

Question 26

At what age do children struggle with class inclusion?

Answer 26

Around 7 and under

Question 27

What happens during the stage of concrete observations?

Answer 27

• Most children can conserve better and perform better on egocentrism and class inclusion tasks.
• They now have better reasoning abilities called operations but can only be applied to physical objects in the child’s presence.
• Struggle to reason with abstract ideas and to imagine situations which they cannot see.

Question 27

What happens in the stage of formal operations?

Answer 27

• Children become capable of formal reasoning, meaning they will not get distracted by an arguments content.
• Formal reasoning can be tested through syllogisms.
  e. g
• “All yellow cats have two heads. I have a yellow cat called Charlie. How many heads does Charlie have?” Although the correct answer is two, Piaget found that younger children became distracted by the content and answered that cats do not have two heads.
• Once children can reason formally, they are capable of scientific reasoning and are able to appreciate abstract ideas.

Question 28

At what age does the sensorimotor stage occur?

Answer 28

0-2yrs

Question 29

At what age does the Pre-Operational stage take place?

Answer 29

2-7yrs

Question 30

At what age does the stage of concrete operations occur?

Answer 30

7 - 11yrs

Question 31

At what age does the stage of formal operations occur?

Answer 31

11+yrs

Question 32

Give a limitation of Piaget’s study into conservation?

Answer 32

P - It has been suggested that the children in Piaget’s conservation experiment were influenced when they witnessed the experimenter change the appearance of the counters/liquid.
E - The children could have then thought that they were meant to think that the quantity had changed when it hadn’t.
E - A variation of this study was conducted by McGarrigle and Donaldson where the counters appeared to move by accident and Piaget’s exact experiment was conducted to act as a control.
It was found that 72% said that there was the same number.
L - This shows that children aged
4-6 could conserve as long as they were not put off, so Piaget was wrong about conservation in the pre-operational stage.

Question 33

Give a limitation of Piaget’s research into class inclusion.

Answer 33

P - Replicated studies of class-inclusion go against Piaget's theory.
E - Siegler and Svetina tested 100 5-year olds who undertook 3 sessions of ten class-inclusion tasks, receiving an explanation of the task after each session.
E - Scores across the three sessions improved more for the latter groups suggesting that they had acquired an understanding of class-inclusion.
L - This contradicts Piaget's theory of children under 7 being unable to understand class inclusion.

Question 34

Give a limitation of Piaget’s theory of egocentrism.

Answer 34

P - There is research which goes against Piaget’s theory of egocentrism.
E - Hughes tested this using a model with two intersecting walls and three dolls, one being a boy and the other two being police officers.
E - After familiarising the children with the task, it was found that 3 and a half year olds were able to place the boy in a position where one police officer was unable to see it 90% of the time and in 4yr olds were able to do this with two police officers 90% of the time.
L - Studies like this go against Piaget’s theory of egocentrism.