Cognition and Development Flashcards
done
What did Piaget develop?
the four stages of cognitive development
What is the key element of Piaget’s theory?
the motivation to learn
What is disequilibrium?
the unpleasant sensation that occurs when new information does not fit into an existing schema
what is equilibration?
what we achieve when we adapt to the new situation / adding new information to an existing schema
what is a schema?
a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information
what dies Piaget say about schemas regarding children?
children are born with a small number of schema, enough to allow them to interact with the world and other people
‘me schema’
what is assimilation?
when we understand a new experience and equilibriate by adding new information to our existing schema
what is accommodation?
takes place in response to dramatically new experiences
child had to adjust by either radically changing current schema or forming new ones
what is the first stage?
Sensorumotor stage (approx. 0-2 years)
what happens in the Sensorimotor stage?
babies focus on physical sensations and on developing some basic physical co-ordination
object permanence (8 months)
what is object permanence?
the awareness that things continue to exist even when not percieved
how did Piaget develop object permanence?
observed babies looking at objects and watched as the objects were removed from sight
noted that before 8 months, babies imeediately switched their attention away from the object once it was out of sight
at around 8 months they continue to look for it
what is the second stage?
Pre-operational stage (approx. 2-7 years)
what happens in the pre-operational stage?
toddler is mobile and can use language but still lacks adult reasoning ability = means they display some characteristic errors in reasoning
conservation
egocentrism
class inclusion
what is conservation?
mathematical understanding that if something changes shape it is still the same quantity
how did Piaget develop conservation?
- Piaget placed 2 rows of 8 identical counters side by side, children said they were the same, when the counters where pushed together pre-operational children struggled to conserve and usually sadi there were fewer counters in that row
- liquid conservation procedure = found that when 2 identical containers were placed side by side with the same contents and height, most children spotted that they contained liquid, however if the liquid was poured into a taller vessel younger children typically believed there was more liquid in the taller vessel
what is egocentrism?
to see the world only from the one’s own point of view
how did Piaget develop egocentrism?
Piaget and Barbel Inhelder (1956)
3 mountains task
children were dhown 3 model mountains each with different features (a cross, a house or snow), a doll was placed at the side of the model so that it faced away from a different angle from the child, the child was asked to choose what the doll would ‘see’ from a range of pictures, pre-operational children tended to find this difficult and often chose the picture the matched scene from their own POV
what is class inclusion?
the idea that objects fall into categories
how did Piaget develop class inclusion?
Piaget and Inhelder (1964) found that children under the age of 7 struggle with the more advanced skill of class inclusion, the idea that classifications have subsets, so when they showed 7-8 years old children pictures of 5 dogs and 2 cats and asked ‘are there more dogs or animals’ children tended to respond to respond that there were more dogs
interpreted this as meaning that younger children cannot simultaneously see a dog as a member of the dog class and the animal class
what is the third stage?
stage of concrete operations (approx. 7-11 years)
what is the stage of concrete operations?
although children now have much better reasoning abilities (operations) these are strictly concrete i.e. can only be applied to physical objects in the child’s presence
children struggle to reason about abstract ideas and to imagine objects or situations they cannot see
what is the fourth stage?
stage of formal operations (11+)
what is the stage of formal operations?
when children become capable of formal reasoning
means that children become able to focus on the form of an argument and not be distracted by its content
how can formal reasoning be tested?
- pendulum task / syllogisms
-e.g., Smith et al: ‘all yellow cats have 2 heads. I have a yellow cat called Charlie. How many heads does Charlie have?’ The correct answer is 2 - Piaget found that younger children became distractedd by the content and answered that cats do not actually have 2 heads
- Piaget believed that once children can reason formally, they are capable of scientific reasoning and become able to appreciate abstract ideas
what’s the difference between Piaget’s theory of cognitve development and Vygotsky’s ?
Vygotsky saw cognitive development as a social process of learning from more experienced others
Knowledge us intermental and then intramental
saw language as a much more important part of cognitive development than Piaget
why are there cultural differences in cognitive development?
because if reasoning abilities are acquired from the more experienced individuals with whom a child had contact, it follows that the child will acquire the reasoning abilities of those particular people
what did Vygotsky develop?
the zone of proximal development (ZPD)
what is the Zone of Proximal Development?
a gap between a child’s current level of development and what they can potentially understand after interaction with more expert others
what does expert assitance allow a child to do?
cross the ZPD and understand as much of a subject or situation that they are capable
what did he believe about higher mental functions?
that they could only be acquired through interation with more advanced others
what is scaffolding?
all kinds of help adults and more advanced peers give a child to help them cross the ZPD
who researched scaffolding and what is it sometimes called?
Jerome Bruner
the Vygotsky-Bruner model
what did David Wood, Jerome Bruner and Gail Ross (1976) note about scaffolding?
the particular strategies that experts use
in general the level of help given in scaffolding declines from level 5(most) to level 1(least)
an adult is more likely to use a high level of help strategies when first heping, then to gradually withdraw the level of help as the child grasps the task
what are the levels of scaffolding?
5= demonstration
4= preparation for child
3= indication of materials
2= specific verbal instructions
1= general prompts
whats the research support for ZPD?
Antonio Roazzi and Peter Bryant (1998)
- gave children aged 4-5 years the task of estimating the number of sweets in a box
- one condition the children worked alone and in another they worked with the help of an older child
- in expert help condition the older children were observed to offer prompts, pointing the younger children in the right direction
- most 4-5 years recieveing this kind of help successfully masterred the task
what does this support show?
that children can develop additional reasoning abilities when working with a more expert individual
suggests that the ZPD is a valid concept
what is the research support for scaffolding?
- Roazzi and Bryant
- David Conner and David Cross (2003)
- used a longitudinal procedure to follow up 45 children, observing them engaged in problem-solving tasks with the help of their mothers at 16, 26, 44 and 54 months
- distinctive changes in help were observed over time - the mothers used less and less direct intervention and more hints and prompts as children gained experience
- mothers also increasingly offered help when it was needed rather than constantly
what does this support mean?
adult assitance with childrens learning is well described by scaffolding
what is the support in practical application in education?
- have been highly influential
- raised expectations of what children should be able to achieve
social interaction in learning (through group work, peer tutoring and individual adult assistance) has been used to scaffold children through their ZPD - Hilde Van Keer and Jean Pierre Verhaeghe (2005)
- found that 7 yr olds tutored by 10 yr olds (as well as whole-class teaching) progressed further in reading than controls who just had standrad whole-class teaching
- Alborz et al. (2009) reviewed the usefulness of teaching assistants - concluded that teaching assistants are very effective at improving the rate of learning in children
what is the counterpoint of this?
- may not be universal
- Charlotte Liu and Robert Matthews (2005)
- pointed out that in China, classes of up to 50 children learn very effectively in lecture-style classrooms with very few individual interactions with peers or tutors
- should not be possible according to Vygotsky
- means Vygotsky may have overestimated the importance of scaffolding in learning
what did Baillargeon suggest?
that young babies had a better understanding of the physical world than Piaget sugegsted
what is one of Baillargeon’s technique’s?
Violation of expectation VOE
what is the VOE used for?
used to test object permanence
what is the VOE research?
- Baillargeon and Marcia Graber (1987)
- showed 24 babies aged 5-6 months a tall and a short rabbit passing behind a screen with a window as it fits our expectations of object permanence
- two conditions = one expected event, one unexpected event
- a baby with object permanence should show surprise when shown the unexpected event
what did Baillargeon and Marcia Graber find?
-babies looked for 33.07s on average at the unexpected event compared to 25.11s at the expected event
-interpretered this as the babies being surprised at the unexpected condition
-demonstrates a good understanding of object permanenece
what is Baillargeon’s theory of infant physical reasoning?
an infants understanding of the physical world and the ability to learn more details easily
what do we intially have and what does it become?
a primitive awareness of the physcial properties of the world and this becomes more sophisticated as we learn from experience
when does occlusion take place?
when one object blocks the view of another
why does the unexpected event capture the babies attention?
because the nature of their physcial reasoning system means they are predisposed to attend to new events that might allow them to develop their understanding of the physical world
what did Bower (1982) do?
investigate Baillargeons theory with an experiment in which infants heart rates were measured during a possible and impossible
what did Bower (1982) find?
the babies heart rates increased when presented with an impossible event
what did Wang et al (2003) and what did they find?
investigate Baillargeons theory and found thar 4-month-old infants shows VOE in tasks involving hidden objects even without the usual habituation phase
what are the strengths of Baillargeons theory?
VOE is now a widely used technique in research of object permanence - reliable
cross cultural
what are the weaknesses?
almost impossible to understand a baby’s behaviours (Rivera et al 1999)
what is social perspective?
taking into consideration what someone else is thinking
what did Selman propose?
that the development of social perspective taking is a seperate process
what did Selmas (1971) do?
looked at changes that occured with age in children’s respinses to scenario’s in which they were asked to take the role of different people in a social situation
what was the procedure of Selman (1971)?
30 boys, 30 girls (20 4 year olds, 20 5 year olds, 20 6 year olds)
individually given a task designed to measure perspective taking
what are the findings of Selman (1971)?
level of perspective correlated with age, suggesting a clear developmental sequence
what were the 4 stages of development in Selman’s theory of social perspective taking?
stage 0 (3-6 years) - Egocentic
stage 1 (6-8 years) - social-informational
stage 2 (8-10 years) - Self-reflective
stage 3 (10-12 years) - Mutal
stage 4 (12+ years) - Social and conventional system
what was apart of stage 0 - Egocentric?
toddlers cannot reliably distinguish between their own emotions and those of others
cannot generally identify emotional states
do not understand what social behaviour might have caused them
what was apart of stage 1 - Social-informational?
toddlers can tell the difference between their own pov and others
usually focus on one
what was apart of stage 2 - Self-reflective?
toddlers can put themselves in the position of anothor person and fully appreciate the other’s perspective
can only take on board one pov at a time
what was apart of stage 3 - Mutual?
now able to look at a situation from their own and another’s pov at the same time
what was apart of stage 4 - Social and conventional system?
children able to see that sometimes understanding other’s viewpoints is not enough to allow people to reach agreement
what did Selman believe development is based on?
maturity and experience
who recognised that there were 3 aspects to social development, additional to Selmas theory?
Schultz et al (2003)
what were the additional 3 aspects recognised by Schultz at al (2003)?
Interpersonal understanding
Interpersonal negotiation strategies
Awareness of personal meaning of relationships
what is Interpersonal understanding?
what Selman measured in his perspective taking research
what is Interpersonal negotiation strategies?
understanding what others think in social situations
what is the awareness of personal meaning of relationships?
social development also requieres the ability to reflect on social behaviour in the context of different relationships
how did Selman support his theory?
tested 60 children using scenario’s
there was significant positive correlations between age and the ability to take different perspectives
how did Gurucharri and Selman (1982) support Selman’s theory?
followed children over a period of time and recorded improvements in their perspective-taking ability
what is a strength of Selman’s theory?
good validity - control of individual differences whereas cross-sectional studies dont
solid support from different lines of research
how is perspective taking supported?
observational study of child-parent interaction in toyshops and supermarkets
how do Moniek Buijizen and Patti Valkenburg (2008) support selmans perspective taking?
observed interactions including those in which parents refused to buy things their child wanted
noted coercive behaviour in the children - example of social behaviour
found negative correlations between coercive behaviour and both age and perspective taking ability
suggests that there is a relationship between perspective taking abilities and healthy social behaviour
what did Luciano Gasser and Monika Keller (2009) discover about perspective taking?
assessed perspective-taking in bullies, victims nad non-participants
bullies displayed no difficulties in perspective-taking
suggests perspective-taking may not be a key element in healthy social development
what is a limitation of Selman’s thoery?
too cognitive! / too narrow
focused on cognitive factors alone and far more to children’s social development than increasing cognitive abilities
it fails to take into account the full range of other factos that impact on a childs social development
other internal factors include the development of empathy and emotional slef-regulation
there are also-important external factors including perenting style, family climate and opportunities to learn from peer interaction
what did Shali Wu and Boaz Keysar (2007) do regarding selmans theory?
compared american and matched Chinese children, found that Chinese children were significantly more advanced
suggest culture infuences might be important
what does the Theory of Mind refer to?
the ability to ‘mind read
belief of what is in someone elses mind
what can ToM first be seen?
in toddlers by means of intentional reasoning research
when can a sophisticated level of ToM be assessed?
in 3-4 year solds
using false belief tasks
who researched intentional reasoning in toddlers?
Andrew Meltzoff (1988)
what did Andrew Meltzoff do?
provided convincing evidence to show that toddlerrs of 18 months have an understanding of adult intentions when carrying out simple actions
what was the procedure of Andrew Meltzoff (1988)?
children observed adults placing beads into a jar
experimental condition = adults appeared to struggle, some beads fell outside f the jar
control condition = adults placed beads into a jar successfully
what were the outcomes of Andrew Meltzoff (1988)?
in both conditions, toddlers successfully placed the beads in the jar - dropped no beads in the experimental condition
suggests they were imitating what the adults intended to do rather than what they did
what did Andrew Meltzoff (1988) show?
that very young children have simple theory of mind
why were false belief tasks developed?
to test whether children can understand that people can believe something that is not true
who developed false belief tasks?
Heinz Wimmer and Josef Perner (1983)
what Heinz Wimmer and Josef Perner (1983)’s false belief task involve?
they told 3-4 year olds a story in which Maxi left chocolate in a blue cupboard and then went to the playground
Maxi’s mother used some of the chocolate and put the remainder in the green cupboard
children were asked where Maxi would look for his chocolate
what were the outcomes of Heinz Wimmer and Josef Perner (1983)?
most 3 year olds incorretly said the green cupboard because they assume Maxi knows what they know
most 4 year olds said blue cupboard
what were the findings of Heinz Wimmer and Josef Perner (1983)?
it suggested that ToM undergoes a shift and becomes more advanced around age 4
who conducted the Sally-Anne study?
Simon Baron-Cohen et al (1985)
what story were the children told in the Sally-Anne study?
Sally places a marble in her basket, but when Sally isnt looking Anner moves the marble into her box
what was the task in the Sally-Anne study?
to work out where Sally will look for her marble
what was the procedure of the Sally-Anne study?
story given individually to 20 autistic children, 27 non-autistic children and 14 children with Down syndrome
what were the findings of the Sally-Anne study?
85% of children in control groups correctly identified where Sally would look for her marble
only 4 autistic children (20%) were able to answer
Baron-Cohen argued that this difference showed that autism involves a ToM deficit and that this may be an explanation for autism
what were the results of false belief tasks on older autistic children and adults without a learning disability?
succeed on false belief tasks
what is an eyes task?
involves reading complex emotions in pictures of faces just showing a small area around the eyes
what did Baron-Cohen et al (1997) find?
that many autistic adults without learning disabilities struggled with eyes task
what are the limitations of Baron-Cohen ?
reliance on false belief tasks to test his theory
problems with validity - Bloom and German 2000
false belief tasks require other cognitive abilities, such as visual memory-failure
perspective-taking and ToM are related but require different cognitive abilities
Sally-Anne = task designed to measure ToM may actually measure perspective-taking
what are the strengths of Baron-Cohen?
real world application
offers explanation for why some autisitic people may find social interactions difficult
real world relevance
what did Tager-Fulsberg (2007) suggest about ToM?
not every autistic person experiences ToM issues, nor are ToM issues limited to autistic people
lack of ToM cannot explain the cognitive strengths of autistic people
there must be other factors involved in autism
what did Josef Perner et al (2003) suggest about ToM?
the ToM is an innate ability which develops alongisde other cognitive abilities largely as a result of maturity
what did Liu et al (2004) find regarding ToM?
found similar patter of ToM in different cultures, but not necessarily at the same age
what did Janet Wilde Ashington (1998) suggest regarding ToM?
a Vygotskian explanation
ToM is a consequence of interactions with others, then internalised
who discovered mirror neurons?
Giacomo Rizzolatti et al (1992
how did Giacomo Rizzolatti et al discover mirror neurons?
they were studying electrical activity in a monkey’s motor cortex when a researcher reached for his lunch and the monkey’s motor cortex lit up in the same way as the researchers
what are mirror neurons?
mirror activity in another individual
what did Vittorio Gallese and Alvin Goldman (1998) suggest regarding mirror neurons?
that mirror neurons respond not just to observed actions but to intentions behind behaviour
suggested that we stimulate others actions in our motor system and experience their intentions using out mirror neurons
what did Vilanur Ramachandran (2011) suggest regarding mirror neurons?
that they shaped evolution
the uniquely complex social interactions we have require a brain system that facilitates an understanding of intention, emotions and perspective
without these, we couldn’t live in the large groups with complex social roles and rules that characterise human culture
suggest that mirror neurons are absolutely key to understanding the way humans have developed as a social species
how can a dysfunctional mirror system explain autism?
the ‘broken mirror’ theory
who developed the ‘broken mirror’ theory?
Ramachandran and Lidsay Oberman (2006)
what is the ‘broken mirror’ theory?
idea that neurological deficit that include dysfunction in the mirror neuron system prevent a developing child imitating and understanding social behaviours of others
problems with the mirror neuron system lead to challenges in social communication
what are the strengths to the mirror neuron system and autism?
theres evidence from neuroscience to support a role for mirror neurons in a range of human behaviours
Helene Haker et al (2012)
Marco Lacobi et al (2005)
Hadjikhani (2007)
Nishitani et al (2004)
what did Helene Haker et al (2012) do regarding the mirror neuron system?
scanned the brains of people as they watched a film of people yawning
levels of activity in Brodmann’s area increased when participants yawned in response
therefore contagious yawning is widely believed to be the result of empathy
what did Marco Lacobi et al (2005) do regarding the mirror neuron system?
showed that activity in the inferior frontal gyrus increased significantly when the participants tried to understand the intentions behind a hand-grasping gesture
mirror neurons encoded why an object was being grasped
what did Hadjikhani (2007) do regarding the mirror neuron system?
showed evidence to support a link between autism and dysfunctions in the mirror neuron system
e.g., brain scans have shown a smaller average thickness of the par operculairs in autistic people compared with neurotypical people
area thought to be rich in mirror neurons
what did Nishitani et al (2004) do regarding the mirror neuron system?
used scanning method that showed activity rather than just structure
found lower activity levels in regions of the brain believed to be associated with high concentrations of mirror neurons in autistic people compared with neurotypicals
what are the limitations of the mirror neuron system and autism?
measuring neuron activity is ethically impossible on humans - involves impaling electrodes in the brain
Antonia Hamilton (2013)
what did Antonia Hamilton (2013) do regarding the mirror neuron system?
reviewed 25 studies that supported a link between autism and abnormal structure or function in the mirror system and concluded that the evidence was highly inconsistent and results were hard to interpret
means there may not be a link between autism and mirror neuron activity
