Chapter 5: Cognitive Growth: Information Proessing Approaches Flashcards
cognition
mental process of knowing, including aspects such as awareness, perception, reasoning, and judgement
Piagets Theory
- primarily studied children
- Action = Knowledge
schemes
mental representations that organize knowledge (a framework), organized patterns of sensimotor functioning
-framework that organize and interpret information
analogy to schemes
folder on your computer=-has a label
contains “like”info
example :Michaela at zoo
assimilation
incorporating new information into existing knowledge schemes, understand an experience in terms of current stage of cognitive development and way of thinking
accommodation
adjusting schemes to fit new information and experiences, changes in existing ways of thinking that occur in response encounters with new stimuli or events
Piagetian Processes
Assimilation and Accomodation
first try to assimilate, then learns to accommodate
ex/ baby-sandbox
exploring with touch
sally puts everything in mouth
Piagetian Processes
Organization
Grouping isolated behaviors into a higher-order, more smoothly functioning cognitive system; the grouping arranging of items into CATEGORIES
(to make sense of world, children organize their experiences)ex/ grocery store
Piagetian Proccesses
Disequilibrium and Equilibration
Explain how children shift from one stage of thought to the next
Disequilibrium
shift occurs as children experience cognitive conflict
Equilibration
confliict is resolved through assimilation and accommodation, to reach a new balance or equilibrium of thought
Stages if Development
cognition is qualitatively different from one stage to the next
motivation for change in each stage
internal search for equilibrium to become more _______ competent
What makes the stages differ from one another?
each stage consists of a different way of understanding and interpreting the world
Piagets four stages
- sensorimotor
- preoperational
- concrete operational
- formal operational
Sensorimotor Stage
birth to 2 years
infants contruct understanding of world by coordinating sensory experiences with motoric actions
Substage 1 (first month of life)
Simple Reflexes
Substage 2 (1-4 months)
First Habits and Primary Circular Reactions-
coordinate what were seperate actions into single, integrated activities
Substage 3 (4-8 months)
Secondary Circular Reactions-
infants take major strides in shifting cognitive horizons beyond themselves and begin to act on the outside world
Stage 4 (8-12 months)
Coordination of secondary circular reactions-
begin to use more calculated approaches to producing events, coordinating several schemes to generate a single act. Achieve object performance during this stage
Substage 5 (12-18 months)
Tertiary circular Reactions-
deliberate variation of actions that bring desirable consequences. Rather than just repeating enjoyable activities, infants appear to carry out miniature experiments to observe the consequence
Substage 6 (18 months to 2 years)
Beginnings of thought-
mental representation or symbolic thought. Infants imagine where objects that tehy cannot see might be
object permanence
understanding that objects and events continue to exist even when they cannot directly be seen, heard or touched
- fully developed by end of sensorimotor stage
Preoperation Stage (2 to 7)
children represent world with words, images, and drawings
-think of things that are not there presently
operations
organized, formal, logical, mental processes (not in preoperation stage)
symbolic function (2-4) *1st substage of preoperational thought
ability to use a mental symbol, word, or object to stand for or represent something that is not physically present
ex/ imaginative, drawings, scribbles, pretend play
egocentrism
inability to distinguish between one’s own and someone elses perspective
symbolic functions example
phone conversation with a 2-4 year old
“three mountain task”
Intuitive Thought Substage
(4-7 years)
Children begin to use primitive reasoning and want to know the answers to all sorts of questions
WANT TO LEARN
animism
belief that inaminate objects have lifelike qualities and are capable of action
ex/ that floor hurt me