Cognition and Development A03 Flashcards
Piaget- object permanence
Piaget believed that infant aged 0-2 = in sensorimotor stage of intellectual development.
They use their mouths to explore the world and understand the objects within them.
but infants have a lack of understanding that objects continue to exist even when we mo longer see them (object permanence).
Suggestion= children develop knowledge of object permanence through interactions with objects and ‘trial and error’ learning.
By age of 8 months, aware objects do exist when can’t see
2 years - objects can move and continue to exist in a new location
strength-controlled exp have shown the age at which object permanence develops
-Ev - Piaget hid a you under a blanket whilst the child was watching. He observed whether the child searched for the hidden you. if the child searched for it it was evident they had object permanence. Infants only searched for the hidden you around the age of 8 months.
In a second experiment, Piaget moved a toy from blanket A to B. Found before 2 years of age, infants continued to search for the toy under blanket A (original hiding place) rather than correct location B.
-Ex - suggests object permanence begins to develop at around the age of 8 months and a full understanding of object permanence is made by 2 years. This supports Piagets theory of intellectual development; that object permanence develops by age through biological maturation (as brain develops)
but Piaget is making inferences as to why the infants are continuing to stare or reach out. Failure to search for an object may not necessarily mean they don’t have object permanence
-Ev - 85 could be due to a limited working memory. Another study found that children were more successful at the A not B hidden you task when it took less than 1 second to move the toy.
-Ex - Therefore, the results could be more due to a limited working memory than an ability to have object permanence.
Another criticism of Piagets methodology is that the blanket can act as another distractor
-Ev - Two psychologists had 12 infants at 5 months old and observed whether they continued to reach for an object on a mobile above their cot after the lights went out and they did.
-Ex -This shows Piagets method was flawed due to having another object hiding the first one, distracting the infant from the previous object. So he underestimated infants as they have object permanence at a younger age than he supposed (5 not 8m)
-L - However, Piaget supposed that intellectual development is constructed and fixed by age. Didn’t accept that intellectual development was more gradual and that the role of experts was important in enabling children to develop intellectually by showing them how to interact with objects.
Paiget - conservation
Piaget believed that infants aged 2-7 years are in the pre-operational stage of intellectual development. During this stage they are developing an understanding of how to conserve objects, e.g. developing an understanding that the volume and quantity remains the same even though the appearance may change.
_Strength: scientific evidence to support the fact that children helps the age of 7 cannot conserve.
-Ev** - Piaget had 2 beakers with same amount of liquid in each. asked child be between age of 2-7 and above 7 years if liquid in them was same or different. Both said same.
When liquid was poured from one beaker into a thinner one the children aged 2-7 said more liquid as the appearance of the liquid was higher up.
Older than 7 - said same.
-Ex - Implies that children cannot conserve properly until 7 and base their knowledge of volume and quantity on appearance which is inaccurate. So intellectual development improves with age (biological maturation) in fixed aged stages as Piaget said.
But other psychologists criticised due to repeated questioning within the studies. Could lead to children changing their answers to please the researcher (social desirability) of which children are highly susceptible to doing
-Ev - Proven in a study where the researcher told the children the beakers had the same amount of liquid. poured into second beaker - asked Q is the liquid amount the same or diff?. Found children older than 5 years made less errors.
-Ex - so Piaget underestimated the age at which children can correctly conserve based on a knowledge of liquid remaining the same volume rather than appearance, as children can do this aged 5 rather than 7 as long as not questioned more than once.
But don’t mean ability to conserve isn’t biologically driven by age
-Ev - The children that were questioned once still needed to be aged 5 years to conserve without basing it on appearance. So piaget’s stage theory that we intellectually develop by age is still valid.
-Ex - So Piaget’s constructivist theory that we construct knowledge as we age in fixed ranges (both innately due to age but nurture due to trial and error) is more valid than other theories.
-L - However, Piaget didn’t accept that intellectual development was more gradual and he ignored the role of experts as being important in enabling children to develop intellectually by being taught about volume and quantity by parents and teachers.
Piaget - egocentrism
Paiget believed that infants aged 2-7 years are in the pre-operational stage of intellectual development. during this stage child new are egocentric and are only capable of seeing the world from their own perspective and the ability to do this develops after age of 7.
Strength-scientific evidence to support the fact that children below the age of 7 = egocentric
-Ev - Piaget created a 3 mountains task where a doll was placed on the opposite side of the mountains to the child.
The child was asked to look around the maintains and describe what they could see. Then what the doll could see. 2-7 gave their own perspective rather than the dolls. whereas children older than 7 years described what the dolls could see accurately which was different to their own perspective.
-Ex - so children below 7 are unable to consider that other people have info or views that are different to the ones they hold. But with bio maturation children develip the ability to consider views diff to theirs.
But the methodology of the 3 mountains task was unrealistic and abstract to children aged 2-7
-Ev - Study tested ability of children to see a situation from 1 or 2 viewpoints using a model with 2 intersecting walls and 3 dolls (a boy and 1/2 police officers). Once familiarised with the task, children as young as 3.5yrs were able to position the boy doll where one police officer could not see him 90% of the time. 4 year olds could do this 90% of the time where thee was s2 police officers to hide from.
-Ex - So Piaget’s theory underestimates greatly younger children’s ability to decentre and perspective take as children as young as 3.5 years rather than 7 could consider a viewport diff to their own when they see the relevance of the task (hide and seek)
However this doesn’t mean egocentrism isn’t biologically driven by age
-Ev - The children that were given a task with better mundane realism still had an age limit as to when they were still egocentric. still fits into age range that Paiget gave (2-7). Ur may be that psychologists are taking the age limit too literally and that it is more of a guide. So Piaget’s stage theory that we intellectually develop by age is still valid.
-Ex - So Piaget’s constructivist theory that we construct knowledge as we use in fixed age ranges (both innately due to age but nurture due to interacting though ‘trial and error’) is more valid than other theories.
-L - But Piaget didn’t accept that intellectual development was more gradual, and he ignored the role of experts as being important in enabling children to dev intellectually by being encouraged to consider other perspectives by parents and teachers. May explain why some children lose their egocentrism earlier than others.
Paiget - class inclusion
piaget believed that infants aged 2-7 are in the pre-operational stage of intellectual development. During this stage they are developing an understanding of class inclusion. This is where children develop an advanced classification skill where they can recognise that there are subsets in classes of objects. Children within the pre-operational stage struggle to classify objects into more than one category.
Strength: scientific evidence to support the fact that children below 7 years cannot class include
-Ev - Piaget showed chimsbre between ages of 2-7 and older than 7 years models of 5 dogs and 2 cats. They were asked are there more dogs or animals?.
children between 2-7 said dogs. Older more animals.
-Ex - so children older than 7 understood that dogs and cats are a subset of the classification ‘animals’ so there were 7 animals and 5 dogs. Children below 7 could only understand one classification which is dog or cat but not the larger category of animal.
But other psychologists criticised this as didn’t consider the role of experts teaching children an understanding of class inclusion
-Ev - 2 psychologists tested 100 5 yr old children who were taught class inclusion by an expert. They received feedback after each session. e.g. more animals than dogs as 9 animals and 6 dogs. They would then have another class.
The second group received no taught feedback and found the group that had an expert giving feedback were able to class include compared to ones that had none.
-Ex - so Piaget underestimated the age at which Children could correctly class include as children could do this aged 5 not 7 as long as taught what class inclusion is and given feedback to help scaffold their learning.
So piaget underestimated the importance of social interactions in intellectual development believing that learning takes place independently through children exploring the world through ‘trial and error’
-Ev - Piaget did he love that both bio she and interactions in the env construct children’s ability to class include but not jesus did social interactions with others. He was introverted and this may have affected the methodology designed and the theory he developed.
-Ex - Whereas Vygotsky was an extrovert and valued the time of others, parents, peers and teachers in developing intellect. So when given feedback through social interactions with others, children can develop quicker than Piaget supposed.
-L - But this doesn’t remove the fact that children still only developed the ability to class include (5 years) within the age range that Piaget suggested (2-7). Therefore Piaget is still right to suppose that there is a biological maturation to developing our intersect as well as how we construct info from interactions in our env.
