Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development

 

ü Jean Piaget's Stages of Cognitive Development

According to Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development, children's intelligence evolves with age. A kid's cognitive growth involves more than just knowledge acquisition; the youngster also needs to create or develop a mental model of the world.

Children go through a number of phases as they grow cognitively, which is influenced by both natural abilities and external factors.

Four stages of development are suggested by Piaget's theory of cognitive development.

Ø Sensorimotor stage: birth to 2 years

Ø Preoperational stage: 2 to 7 years

Ø Concrete operational stage: 7 to 11 years

Ø Formal operational stage: ages 12 and up

The order of the stages is constant (unchanging) and follows a universal pattern across all civilizations. Every child experiences the same phases in the same order (but not all at the same rate).

 

Ø Sensorimotor Stage

Birth to 2 years

The child spends the first stage, known as the sensory-motor stage, concentrating on his physical senses and developing bodily coordination.

Significant traits and developmental modifications during this stage:

• Realize that things continue to exist even when they cannot be seen (object permanence);

• Know the world through movements and sensations;

• Learn about the world through fundamental actions like sucking, grasping, looking, and listening;

• Realize that they are separate beings from the people and objects around them; • Realize that their actions can cause things to happen in the world around them.

 

The infant is in the present tense at this time. It lacks a sense of item permanence since it does not yet have a mental image of the world stored in its memory.

Something does not exist if it is not visible. This explains why you can hide a toy from a baby while it observes, but once it is out of sight, the baby won't look for it.

Object permanence, or understanding that an object still exists even if it is hidden, is the key accomplishment at this stage. It necessitates the capacity to create a mental schema (i.e., representation) of the item.

 Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development

 

Ø Preoperational stage

2 to 7 years old

One of Piaget's phases of intellectual development is the pre-operational stage. It occurs between the ages of 2 and 7. Since the infant is not yet using operations, thinking at this stage is more impacted by how things appear than by logical thinking.

A youngster is unable to preserve, which indicates that the child is unaware that quantity always remains constant regardless of appearance.

The youngster is also egotistical; he assumes that everyone else sees the world the same way he does. The three mountains investigation has demonstrated this.

 

Major traits and developmental shifts during this period include:

• Learning to think symbolically and representing items with words and pictures

• Getting better with language and reasoning, but still having a tendency to think in very concrete terms.

• Tend to be egocentric and struggle to view things from others' perspectives.

 

Children have made some headway toward separating their thoughts from the physical world by the age of two. But have not yet achieved the latter stages of logical (or "operational") cognition.Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development

The child's thinking is still egocentric (focused on the child's own perspective of the world) and intuitive (based on subjective judgments about situations).

 

 

Ø Concrete Operational Stage

 7 to 11 years old  

By the start of the concrete operational stage, the child can utilize operations (a set of logical rules) to conserve quantities, he has become more adept at inclusion activities, and he has decentered himself enough to recognize that other people see the world differently than he does. Children still struggle with abstract thought.

 

Major traits and developmental shifts during this stage include:

• Starting to reason logically about actual experiences.

• Start to grasp the idea of conservation, such as how a short, wide cup holds the same quantity of liquid as a tall, thin glass.

• Though still very concrete, thinking becomes more rational and ordered.

• Start applying inductive logic, or extrapolating a general principle from a set of specific facts.

 Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development

Children can think rationally much more successfully if they can use actual (concrete) items or drawings of them, which is why the stage is called concrete.

Because it heralds the onset of logical or operational thought, Piaget saw the concrete stage as a crucial turning point in the cognitive development of the child. This indicates that youngster is capable of solving problems for themselves (rather than physically trying things out in the real world).

By the age of 6, children can save bulk and weight (age 9). The concept of conservation states that something remains the same in amount even though its appearance changes.

However, a youngster can only use operational thought in this situation if they are asked to make arguments about things that are actually there. When challenged to think critically about hypothetical or abstract issues, young children have a tendency to make mistakes or become too anxious.

 Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development

 

Ø The Formal Operational Stage

 Age 12 and Up

Around age 11, the formal operational time starts. Adolescents who pass through this stage develop higher-order thinking skills, the capability to integrate and classify items in increasingly complex ways, and the ability to think abstractly.

Adolescents are capable of deductive reasoning and systematic thought about both what is and what might be (not everyone achieves this stage). This enables individuals to engage in scientific reasoning as well as understand politics, ethics, and science fiction.

Adolescents are capable of handling abstract concepts, such as division and fractions, without needing to physically divide things apart. Solve fictitious (imaginary) issues.

 

Significant traits and developmental changes at this stage include:

·        Starts to think abstractly and reason through potential issues

·        Begins to utilize deductive logic, or reasoning from a general principle to specific information,

·        To think more critically about theoretical and abstract concerns in moral, philosophical, ethical, social, and political realms.

 

Children can follow the structure of a logical argument without reference to its substance starting around the age of 12. People learn to think abstractly throughout this period and learn to examine hypotheses logically.

In this stage, scientific thought begins to take shape, and when a problem arises, abstract theories and hypotheses are developed.

Jean Piaget's Theory and Four Stages of Cognitive Development