1. Early Cognitive Development
Mr. Koch
AP Psychology
Forest Lake High School

2. Jean Piaget
Highly influential Swiss developmental psychologist
Suggested nature and nurture work together
Searched for origins of intelligence in infancy and factors that lead to changes in knowledge over life span

3. Building Blocks of Cognitive Development
Schemas used to understand world
Generalizations based on experience that form basic units of knowledge
Organize past experience, provide framework for understanding future experience
Can apply to behaviors, mental symbols, mental activities

4. Building Blocks of Cognitive Development
Adaptation of schema
Assimilation
Understand new experiences by fitting them within existing schema
i.e. infants will use sucking behavioral schema to experience everything; children label many animals “doggy”
Accommodation
Process of modifying schemas to fit new experiences when familiar schema don’t work

5. Piaget’s Four Stages of Cognitive Development Believed child’s mind develops in series of stages

6. Sensorimotor Stage (Birth - 2 yrs.)
Take in information through sensory and motor interactions – seem to live in present
Before ~6 mo. seem to lack “object permanence”
Lack awareness that objects continue to exist when not perceived (“out of sight, out of mind”)
Begins developing by ~8 mo.

8. Sensorimotor Stage (Object Permanence)

9. Preoperational Stage (2 - 6 yrs.)
Too young to perform mental operations
Lack concept of “conservation”
Principle that mass, volume, number are constant despite changes in form/shape
May have difficulty distinguishing imagination/reality
“Egocentrism”
Inability to take another’s point of view
Not intentionally “selfish” or “inconsiderate”
Important period of language development

10. Preoperational Stage (Lack of Conservation)

11. Preoperational Stage (Egocentrism)
Why does the sun shine? “To keep me warm” Why is there snow? “For me to play in” Why is grass green? “Because it’s my favorite color.” How many brothers do you have? “One.” How many brothers does your brother have? “None.”

12. Concrete Operational Stage
(7 – 11 yrs.)
Begin to understand :
Conservation
Reversibility
Mathematical operations
Concrete analogies

13. Concrete (Reversibility)

14. Formal Operational Stage
(12 – Adult)
Abstract reasoning
Can think of imagined reality, symbols
Piaget believed this allowed for development of moral reasoning

15. Formal (Deductive Reasoning)

17. Current evaluation of Piaget’s theories
Helped reshape the way we view children’s thinking and its development
Challenged idea that children’s minds work like adults, but just know less information
Many believe the sequence he outlined is fairly accurate
But many now view cognitive development as more fluid and have evidence that some development happens earlier than Piaget believed