language and thought piaget's theory Flashcards
what was piagets theory on language and thought?
Piaget believes that we learn by developing schemas about the world
what is a schema
a scheme is a mental framework of beliefs and expectations that influence cognative processing. We are born with some schemeas but they devleop in complexity with experience of the world.
how does Language depends on thought?
Children develop language by matching the correct word to their knowledge.
Thought and understanding comes first, language develops after.
what did piaget believe about children?
Children only understand words when they have reached the correct stage of development and are ready.
They can have language without understanding but will not be able to use it effectively.
piagets finidings on development of language
Sensorimotor stage: Children speak towards the end of their first year.
Pre-operational stage: From 2 years they talk about things not present.
piagets beliefs on logical thinking
Concrete operational stage: By 7 children’s language becomes mature and logical as they question things and create their own ideas.
what is 1 strength for piagets theory on language and thought?
A strength is that early language is not random.
When children start talking they use two-word phrases like ‘Mummy sock’, which shows they can see how objects relate to each other.
This suggests that children only start to use language when they have some understanding of it.
what are 2 weaknesses for piagets theory on language and thought?
A weakness is the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis challenges Piaget.
It states that language comes before thought as people need a word or phrase for an object in order to think about it.
This suggests that Piaget may have been wrong.
Another weakness is that schema cannot be scientifically measured.
It is very difficult to know if schema exist as we cannot directly measure them.
This shows that Piaget’s theory of language and thought is not based on solid scientific evidence.
