Lecture 3 - Theories of Cognitive Development

Question 1

(lecture summary):

Summary: This lecture introduces major theories of cognitive development: Piagetian stage theory, sociocultural theories, core knowledge, and information processing, and dynamic systems theories. The researchers who first introduced these perspectives are presented within a historical context and examples of methodologies used are given.

Answer 1

(lecture summary):

Question 2

(lecture):

Study question: What is one factor that differentiates sociocultural and core knowledge theories?

Answer 2

(lecture):

Question 3

(reading):

Siegler, R., Saffran, J., DeLoache, J., Gershoff, E. T. & Eisenberg, N. (2017). How Children Develop. Chapter 4.

Answer 3

(reading):

Question 4

(lecture):

Describe Piaget’s methods.
Describe Piaget’s stage theory.

What does object permanence mean?

Answer 4

(lecture):

Methods:
- Interviews with children
“clinical” method
- Largely based on interactions with his own children
BUT many findings still maintained over time

Stage Theory:

• Sensorimotor stage
• Preoperational Stage
• Concrete operational stage
• Formal operational stage

See slide 7

Object permanence -theknowledgethatobjectscontinuetoexistevenwhentheyareoutofview

Question 5

(lecture):

Describe Lev Vygotsky: sociocultural theories.

Answer 5

(lecture):

• Children viewed as social beings and social learners
• Development seen as continuous, with quantitative change
• Humans inclined to teach each other and to learn from each other
• Thought is process in which speech is internalized

Question 6

(lecture):

What is social scaffolding?

(part of Piaget’s theory)

Answer 6

(lecture):

“a process in which more competent people provide a temporary framework that supports children’s thinking at a higher level than children could manage on their own” (p. 176)

Question 7

(lecture):

Describe intersubjectivity.

Answer 7

(lecture):

• Involves mutual understanding that people share during communication
• Serves as the foundation of human cognitive development
• Sets the stage for joint attention
• Continues to develop well beyond infancy

Question 8

(lecture):

Describe Michael Tomasello’s approach.

Known for extending Lev Vygotsky’s theory.

Answer 8

(lecture):

• Extended Vygotsky’s theory
• Proposed that the human species has unique characteristics that are crucial to the ability to create complex, rapidly changing cultures
• Included the inclination to teach others of the species and to attend to and learn from such teaching

Question 9

(lecture):

Describe Spelke’s methods.
Describe Elizabeth Spelke’s core knowledge theory.

Baillargeon, Spelke, & Wasserman, 1985

Answer 9

(lecture):

Methods:

• Visual habituation paradigms
• Violation of expectation
• 5-month-old infants

*Contrast to Piaget: Object permanence before 9 months

Core Knowledge Theory:

1. Knowledge emerges early in development
2. Initial knowledge is domain-specific (e.g., physics, psychology, biology)
3. Initial knowledge encompasses fundamental constraints on the entities in a domain
4. Initial knowledge is innate
5. Initial knowledge constitutes the core of mature knowledge
6. Initial knowledge is task-specific

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/01/science/insights-in-human-knowledge-from-the-minds-of-babes.html?_r=0

Read slide 27

Question 10

(lecture):

Describe Siegler’s methods.

Describe the overlapping-waves theory.

Answer 10

(lecture):

Uses Microgenetic approaches:
- Characterised by variability in responses
- More measurements over shorter periods of time are important for identifying these strategies
- Choice of efficient strategy develops over time
- Example in Mathematics:
Base knowledge, by memory (e.g., 2+3 = 5)
Using Fingers
Counting from largest number
Using tangible counters

According to overlapping-waves theory, children use a variety of approaches to solve problems.

• At any given time, children possess several different strategies for solving a given problem.
• With age and experience, the strategies that produce more successful performance become more prevalent.
• Overlapping-waves theories also hypothesize that children benefit from this strategic variability.

The term continuous applies in two senses:

• Important changes are viewed as constantly occurring, rather than being restricted to special transition periods between stages.
• Cognitive growth is viewed as typically occurring in small increments rather than abruptly.

Cognitive development arises from children’s gradually surmounting their processing limitations through:

• Increasing efficient execution of basic processes
• Expanding memory capacity
• Acquisition of new strategies and knowledge

Question 11

(lecture):

Describe Thelen’s Dynamic Systems theory.

Answer 11

(lecture):

“Development can be envisioned as a changing landscape of preferred, but not obligatory, behavioral states… rather than as a prescribed series of structurally invariant stages leading to progressive improvement.”

• Emphasize how varied aspects of the child function as a single, integrated whole to produce behavior
• View how change occurs over time in complex systems
• Focus on relations among motor activities, attention, and other aspects of children’s behavior
• Emphasize children’s innate motivations to explore the environment (Piaget)
• Emphasize precise analysis of problem-solving activity (information-processing)
• Emphasize early emerging competencies (core-knowledge)
• Emphasize the formative influence of other people (sociocultural)
• Dynamic-systems theories view development as a process of self-organisation.
• Self-organisation involves bringing together and integrating components as needed to adapt to a continuously changing environment.
• The organisational process is sometimes called soft assembly, because the components and their organization change from moment to moment and situation to situation.

See slide 39