Development 1: Cognitive Development

Josée L. Jarry, Ph.D., C.Psych.

Introduction to Psychology

Department of Psychology

University of Toronto

July 7, 2003

Developmental Psychology

• The study of changes that occur in people's abilities and disposition as they grow older

• Most studies of development focus on changes that occur in infancy and childhood

Universal Constructivism

• Jean Piaget (1896-1980)– the pioneer in early research in

developmental psychology– Piaget built his theory from the

observation of his own children's successes and failures in exploring the physical world

– primary method was to ask children to solve specific problems and to question them about the reasons for the solutions they offered

Children as Scientists– Mental development derives from the

child's own actions on the environment– At first, infants react towards events in

the environment only through automatic, wired in reflexes

– Later, they gradually gain voluntary control of their actions as they develop internal, mental representations of the kind of actions they can perform on particular categories of objects

Schemes

• Mental blueprints for a class of actions that can be performed upon entities in the environment

• The earliest schemes are closely tied to specific objects and are called forth only by the objects’ immediate presence

• As children grow older, new, more sophisticated and abstract schemes develop

Assimilation & Accommodation

• Assimilation– the process by which new experiences

are incorporated into existing schemes

• Accommodation– the process by which existing schemes

expand or change to accommodate new objects or events

• Infants are most fascinated by experiences that require moderate accommodation

Sensorimotor Stage

• 0 to 24 months– sensorimotor schemes provide a

foundation for acting on objects that are present only

– thoughts and overt physical actions are one and the same

– an important task of this stage is to develop classes of schemes specific for different categories of objects

Object Permanence

• The principle that objects continue to exist even when out of view

• The understanding of the physical properties of objects

• Achieving object permanence is the major task of the sensory motor stage

Simple Hiding Problem

• 0-5 months– an attractive toy is shown to the baby

and then is placed under a napkin as the baby watches

– children typically follow the toy with their eyes as it disappears under the napkin

– but no active search

• Mastered between 6 and 9 months

Changed Hiding Place• 8-12 months

– the toy is first placed under napkin A for a series of trials and the baby retrieves it each time

– then the toy is a hidden under napkin B, next to the first, in plain view of the child

– despite having watched the object disappear under the new napkin, the baby reaches under the original napkin

• Mastered between 10 and 12 months

Invisible Displacement• 12-18 months

– the infants watches as the researcher's hand closes around the toy, hiding it from view

– the researcher's closed hand then moves under a napkin and deposits the toy

– when the hand is brought back into view, the infant looks in and under the hand, but not under the napkin

• Mastered by 18 months

Preoperational Stage• 2 to 7 years

– preoperational schemes emerge from sensory motor schemes and free the child's thoughts from strict control by the here and now

– allow the representation of absent objects

– but no mastery of reversibility– exemplified in conservation problems

• Operations are mastered by approximately 7 years of age

Egocentrism & Precausal Reasoning

• Egocentrism– refers to the incapacity of the child to see

or adopt others' perspective

• Precausal reasoning– the absence of true mental operations

precludes cause and effect reasoning– preoperational children think

transductively, from one particular to another, rather than inductively or deductively

Concrete Operational Stage

• 7 to 12 years– concrete operational schemes allow

reasoning about the reversible consequences of actions

– provide the basis for understanding physical principles such as conservation of substance and cause and effect links

– these schemes are still tied closely to the child's actual experiences in the world

• Do not allow abstract reasoning

Formal Operational Stage

• From adolescence onward– formal operational schemes represent

principles that apply regardless of the specific situation

– allow the person to think theoretically and to apply principles even to actions that cannot actually be performed

– formal operational thinkers can extend principles into hypothetical realms that neither they nor anyone else has actually experienced

Criticism to Piaget's Theory

• Early object permanence• Non-egocentric reasoning in the

preoperational stage• Overestimation of age differences

in ways of thinking• Vagueness about the process of

change• Underestimation of the role of the

social environment

Information Processing Perspective

• the mind is a system, analogous to a computer, written for analyzing information from the environment

• basic machinery includes attention mechanisms for bringing information in, working memory for actively manipulating the information, and long-term memory for passively holding information so that it can be used in the future

• the mind contains specific strategies and rules for analyzing particular types of information or solving particular types of problems

Information Processing Limitations

• Attention– young children's attention is easily

captured by external stimuli which interrupts information processing

• Limited memory– younger children have more limited

memory than do older ones• Limited strategies

– a strategy is a deliberately selected action performed for the purpose of attaining a particular goal

Information Processing Limitations

• Attention– young children's attention is easily

captured by external stimuli which interrupts information processing

• Limited memory– younger children have more limited

memory than do older ones• Limited strategies

– a strategy is a deliberately selected action performed for the purpose of attaining a particular goal

Memory Strategies• Rehearsal

– consists of repeating the material that one is trying to memorize

• Memory organization– consists of mentally grouping the

material to be remembered in meaningful clusters of closely associated items

• Metacognition– consists of knowledge about one’s own

cognition or memory

Acquiring Specific Rules to Solve Problems

• mental development occurs not just through improvements in the all-purpose mental machinery

• also through the acquisition of particular rules and strategies for solving particular categories of problems