Cognitive development: not easily observed, cannot observe the processes within the brain.
Piaget: put forward idea of genetic developmental epist. Which is how an individual engages
with environment and how they act within the environment.
Constructivist: developed by Piaget. Believed there were several processes and structures:
cognitive schemes – structures that help to understand environment, organise patterns of
thought, interpret experiences, starts to develop from birth, initial schemes are different
from those used later in life. Equilibrium – always striving for balance between what we
understand and already know from past experiences and the current environment, aim to
understand environment.
Cognitive schemes: behavioural – children only learn about things they can interact with.
Symbolic – develop better patterns of thought. Operational – …
Modifying cognitive schemes: big question is can they develop? Organisation – grouping
together schemes, develop through adaption. – assimilation – if it fits into existing scheme
then assimilation used though if it is new and would be incorrect in existing scheme then
need accommodation to account for new information.
Piagets stages: stage theory. You cannot skip a stage, must pass through all stages in a
particular order which is common across all people – invariant. Though specified that not all
children will go through stages at the same rate.
Sensorimotor: from birth. Six different sub stages of development through stage. Reflexes –
gripping. Primary circular – starts to be able to do different movements but is centred
around own body, e.g. Coordination in Sucking own thumb. Secondary – begin to interact
with world e.g. Toys however reactions become quite repetitive (circular), coordination
secondary – goal directed, coordinated, controlled. Tertiary – … Symbolic – symbolic
schemes start to come in where children have mental representations of world.
Milestone around coordination secondary.
Object permanence: children under the age of eight months, do not look for object if it is
not see and is hidden, is partially hidden then children of four months will look for object.
Imitation: referred imitation – children cannot imitate after a delay, new evidence suggests
children can learn to imitate much earlier than Piaget suggestion. From birth can often
imitate (around an hour after birth). Object permanence: a not b errors – show a child a toy
in the same location and they will look for it, when moved to a different location they won't
look for it.
A not b: object permanence as know where it is when in repeated first location but when it
is moved to second location the child looks to first location and does not learn that is was
moved even when it was seen to be placed there.
,Neo nativitists: Idea is that children have difficulties inhibiting their response to looking for
object in the first learned location. Eye tracking studies show that children look to second
location (b) but cannot inhibit motor movements towards first location (a).
Bail: habituation, idea that children will look for longer at things that are novel, children
looked longer at the bigger carrot passing behind shorter screen as novel as carrot should
have been seen. Interpret this as children understanding objects and object properties.
Though people argue it is not testing for the same.
Pre operational: gross spurt 18-24 months in vocabulary.
Animism – think about how things move and whether emotion is attributed to them and
thought like behaviours to things that do not have thoughts or emotions. Adults do it too
but are aware that the objects do not have thoughts or emotions whereas children have
difficulties in this understanding.
Egocentrism – three mountains task developed by Piaget. Asked what can be seen from
their perspective and takes different views, then asked what another person sees on the
other side and at three to four years of age they say the other person can see what they
themselves can see. Only see world from own perspective, cannot understand that other
people have a different perspective. Around age of six or seven they can pass this task.
No appearance/reality – idea of knowing what you are saying and being based in reality.
Run test with six year old children, show cat to children and ask what noise it would make.
Children meow, cat then partially behind screen and given a dog mask. At three years
children says it will woof as it appears to be a dog even though the reality is that it is a cat.
At age six children will say meow and will know that it is still a cat. Three year olds do not
understand differences in appearance and reality.
Continued from pre operational stage: intuitive period – still see some deficits e.g. Children
unable to show reversibility. Children at this stage struggle with conservation tasks – define.
Cannot mentally reverse action to go back to previous stage to make accurate judgements.
Critiques and new data: depends on how task is presented as a child from country will be
more used to presentation of hills than children from city. Rational imitation – had little box
on table and children saw experimenter hit box with head and light came on. When
experimenter had arms wrapped up and pressed with head then children pressed box with
hand but when experimenter had hands free and pressed with head then children will
Imitate and press with head.
If naughty teddy moves apart blocks then children will say it's the same as it is described as
a wrong doing.
Concrete: more cognitive processes coming in. No longer focus on one salient thing.
Serration tasks – idea that you should be able to place things in an order, a sequence or
series. Begin to use logical instead of intuitive reasoning. Can now pass conservation tasks.
Can think about more than one aspect of a problem at one time.
Formal: no end to this stage. No longer basing how you think on concrete reality but can
think through ideas, hypothetical deductive reasoning. Only ever reach formal operations in
own fields studied. Being able to think through and apply ideas to different concepts.
2
, De lisi: pendulum task, three different majors and three different problems.
Evaluation: influential in teaching. He did say culture might make a difference though did
not incorporate it into theory.
Vygotsky: social and cultural influences and that you only learn through interactions with
others.
Levels of analysis: phylo – idea that species has had impact over own development. Socio –
laws, technology.
Perspective: theory not stage like (difference to Piaget), talks about it in terms of a general
process. Biologically ready for certain functions though physically limited. We all have ability
to count and to learn but language can have influence and either limit or facilitate learning
to count. E.g. Welsh numbers after ten have logical named whereas English numbers after
ten have no relations in terms of logical word structures.
Zone of proximal development – levels between what the child can learn alone without
guidance and with an active partner and assistance of others. Children develop within the
zone. Learning to read is example of learning in zone.
(3): scaffolding – partner changes instructions based on what child is doing, change based to
the child's level, contingent on what the child is already able to achieve, as they get better
then learning is made more difficult so in continuous process of learning. Guided
participation – ??
Thinking and speech: …
Evaluation: comparisons with Piaget.
Developmental: Vicky. 1-3-16
Adolescence
Definition: Not always seen as a separate stage of development across cultures, U.K. Does
see it. There are also emotional changes.
Puberty: - physical changes, people often say that the start of adolescence is when puberty
starts. Often when we talk about males we talk about spermarche – first time male has an
ejaculation. Menarche – first time menstrual cycle however this happens in the middle of
puberty as changes occur beforehand e.g. Breast growth. Puberty is happening earlier than
reported, may be linked to body fat – more body fat initiates puberty onset earlier. Time in
which you become sexually mature.
Table includes mainly secondary characteristics, primary characteristics focus around the
development of the sex organs.
Body image and puberty: females generally enter puberty earlier than males. Pressure to be
certain weight. Often where body image and self esteem issues come in.
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