chapter 9 - the growth of knowledge

Question 1

domain-general

Answer 1

referring to a learning mechanism or representational format that applies across all domains of cognitions

Question 2

domain-specific

Answer 2

referring to a learning mechanism or representational format that applies to a specific domain of cognition

Question 3

foundational constraint

Answer 3

a constraint that is present from the start and is usually associated with nature accounts of learning and development

Question 4

emergent constraint

Answer 4

a constraint that emerges over the course of development and that reflects the influences of experience and the environment

Question 5

preoperational period

Answer 5

a stage of cognitive development occurring after the sensorimotor period, at roughly 2 to 7 years. In this stage, children are able to represent the world in symbolic terms, but have difficulty thinking nonegocentrically or considering different dimensions of situations and the relations between them because they are missing mental operators

Question 6

conservation task

Answer 6

any of the tasks designed by Piaget in which children are asked to judge whether certain physical properties of an object, such as its size, or aspects of an array, such as its number, remain unchanged when the object of an array is transformed along different dimensions

Question 7

operator

Answer 7

a formal mental tool by which people mentally represent states and changes in the world

Question 8

compensation

Answer 8

a mental operation, according to Piaget, that emerges in the concrete operational period and that enables the child to understand how a change in one dimension, such as height, might be compensated for by another change, such as in width, with a third dimension, such as quantity, remaining invariant

Question 9

reversibility

Answer 9

a mental operation, according to Piaget, that emerges in the concrete operational period and enables the child to realize that certain transformations on the physical world are reversible

Question 10

identity

Answer 10

a mental operation, according to Piaget, that emerges in the concrete operational period and that enables the child to realize that a single dimension or aspect remains the same despite dramatic changes in other dimensions

Question 11

centration

Answer 11

a mental operation, according to Piaget, that emerges in the preoperational period and that causes the child to focus on one dimension while ignoring relevant other dimensions

Question 12

classification

Answer 12

in Piaget’s theory, the ability to think about groups of things as forming classes defined by a single property or relation

Question 13

concrete operational period

Answer 13

a stage of cognitive development occurring after the preoperational period and before the formal operational period, roughly from 7 to 12 years. During this stage, children start to use mental operators such as identity and reversibility to more flexibly understand the physical world and the ways in which it can change

Question 14

formal operational period

Answer 14

a stage of cognitive development occurring after the concrete stage, at roughly 12 years old but with considerable variability. In this stage, children start to engage in deductive and logical reasoning about situations and processes and are able to consider logical alternatives and their potential consequences

Question 15

hypothetico-deductive reasoning

Answer 15

the ability to think systematically about different possibilities that might depart from the current reality and to derive predictions given that certain information is true

Question 16

class-inclusion relations

Answer 16

how different classes of things in a hierarchy relate to each other and how broad superordinate categories can encompass narrower, subordinate categories

Question 17

basic level of categorization

Answer 17

a level of categorization at which category members maximally contrast with members of the same categories

Question 18

core domains

Answer 18

a domain of knowledge and thought that is thought to have a privileged role in development, emerging early in infancy and maintaining a strong influence throughout much of development

Question 19

cognitive maps

Answer 19

a mental representation of the spatial layout, used to infer distance, direction, and a way of navigating the environment

Question 20

landmark

Answer 20

a large object in the environment that enables an organism to navigate by estimating distance and direction from the landmark

Question 21

geometric information

Answer 21

the information about an environment’s overall shape (its contour) that helps to locate oneself in space

Question 22

bootstrapping

Answer 22

building new conceptual structures out of earlier ones that serve as a framework for fostering conceptual change and growth

Question 23

animism

Answer 23

according to Piaget, the tendency of young children to attribute psychological motivations to nonliving things

Question 24

property attribution

Answer 24

assumes that the kinds of guesses a child makes about what properties apply to living things can reveal the underlying conceptual system that the child is using to think about living things

Question 25

vitalism

Answer 25

the belief that living things are imbued with a vital force that is the cause behind growth, movement, and possibly other biological activities

Question 26

essentialism

Answer 26

a tendency to assume that the surface properties of entities are caused by deeper essences

Question 27

zone of proximal development

Answer 27

a level of cognitive attainment that is the next possible achievement by a child, often made possible through adult guidance

Question 28

scaffolding

Answer 28

a process through which adults and older children structure the young child’s environment and social milieu in a manner that enables the child to move to new levels of cognitive achievement