Theories of Cognitive Development
Children’s cognitive world is described as “creative, free and fanciful.”
Children’s memories become stronger, and they can remember in detail.
There are 3 major theories of cognitive development.
1: Piaget’s theory: The preoperational stage
The term “operational’ is used to indicate an action or mental representation carried out
through local thinking.
Preoperational thinking: Illogical thinking, which implies that children are not yet ready to
engage in logical mental operations.
The preoperational stage lasts from the age of 2-7 years old and generally is subdivided into
the symbolic or preconception period (age 2 – 5 years) and the intuitive period (between 4-7
years).
o The symbolic period is characterised by the increasingly complex use of symbols or
mental representations, like words, numbers, or images to which the child attaches
meaning.
o During the intuitive period, children begin to use primitive reasoning and want to
know the answers to all kinds of questions.
This stage is called the intuitive stage because young children seem so sure
about their knowledge and understanding yet are unaware of how they know
and what they know.
This means they know something but know it without the use of rational
thinking.
A. ADVANCES IN PREOPERATIONAL THOUGHT
È A major development during this stage involves symbolic or mental representation.
O This is evident in skills such as spoken language and symbolic play.
È These abilities start developing during the last stage of the sensorimotor stage.
È During the preoperational stage, these abilities become more advanced, while this
stage is marked by the pervasive, enduring, and flexible use of symbolism to represent
objects and experiences mentally.
O Children can think in the conventional sense - they can reflect on absent objects
and people, recall the past, and imagine future events.
, È The most evident development during the preoperational period is the development of
spoken language.
B. IMMATURE ASPECTS OF PREOPERATIONAL THOUGHT
È The main impediments to logical thinking are perceptual centration, irreversibility,
egocentrism, animism, and transductive reasoning.
È Perceptual centration
O This is the tendency to attend to only 1 attribute of what one observes and to
ignore the rest.
O Preoperational thinkers seem unable to explore all aspects of a stimulus.
They tend to centre their attention on what appears to be the more salient.
O They are not able to process multiple characteristics and dimensions, they tend to
make perceptual errors.
Eg. They think that pouring water from a short, wide glass into a taller,
thinner glass means that there is no more water, or spreading cookies out in
a row means that they now have more cookies, or when a ball of clay is
stretched out in an elongated form there is now more clay.
This means they do not grasp the concept of conservation.
O Conservation: The understanding that matter can change in appearance without
changing in quantity.
O There are 3 well-known conservation problems of number, liquid quantity, and mass.
Conservation Beginning State (All Identical) Transformation Tending State (Something
Problem changed)
Number
Are these the same number of Stretch out one row Are there now the same number of
cookies in each row, or does one row cookies in each row, or does one
have more? row have more?
Liquid quantity
Is there the same amount of juice in Pour 1 glass of juice into Is there now the same amount of
each glass, or does 1 glass have a taller glass juice in each glass, or does one
more? glass have more?
Mass
,Is there the same amount of clay in Role one ball into a Is there now the same amount of
each ball, or does 1 ball have more? sausage clay in each shape, or does one
have more?
È Irreversibility.
O This is an inability to reverse an operation.
Eg. Mentally, young children cannot pour the water from the tall glass back
into the short wide glass. Similarly, they do not understand the logic behind
simple mathematic subtraction (reversal) problems such as 2 + 3 = 5;
therefore 5 – 3 = 2.
È Egocentrism.
o This refers to the tendency of young children to view the world from their own
perspective.
o Piaget's demonstration of egocentrism involves a problem known as the three-
mountain task,
The child is shown a three-dimensional scene with three mountains of
different sizes and colours. From a set of drawings, they are instructed to
pick out the one that shows the scene the way they see it. Most pre-
schoolers can do this without difficulty. Then the examiner asks the child to
pick out a drawing that shows how someone else sees the scene, such as a
doll or the examiner.
Most pre-schoolers choose a drawing that shows their own view of
the mountains.
o Conclusion:
Preoperational children cannot imagine a point of view different from their
own.
Pre-schoolers think that natural events serve their own needs:
Tend to think that everyone knows what they know.
È Animistic thinking.
o This is the tendency of young children to assume that non-living objects such as
the sun, moon, wind, rocks, and dolls have thoughts, feelings, and motives.
Eg. On a very hot day, a three-year-old said, "I wish the sun would go to the
clouds."
È Transductive reasoning.
, o This refers to preoperational thinkers’ tendency to reason from 1 particular
instance, linking 2 events that occur close together in a cause-and-effect fashion,
whether it is logical or not.
Eg. A child may think that their parents divorced because they were
naughty.
è Limitations in preoperational thought concern the ability to classify and categorise, as
well as their concept of numbers.
o By the end of the pre-operational period, children can classify and categorise
objects based on one dimension, such as colour, but not on more than one, such as
colour and shape.
They are not capable of multiple classifications.
è Piaget and Inhelder also believed that although preoperational children may be able to
count, they do not have a number concept.
o They do not have the basic number skills such as:
Ordinality (comparing quantities such as more or less, bigger, or smaller).
Cardinality (The absolute numerical number or size)
Eg. When asked to count 6 cookies, they will recite the name of the
number but not say how many cookies there are.
Number Transformations (Simple addition and subtraction).
Estimation.
Eg. Guess if something is more or less than something else.
è Characteristics of preoperational thinking:
Thinking Patterns Description Example
Perception-bound Pre-schoolers solve problems based in what When a mother cuts her child’s meat into small
thinking stands out vividly and perceptually. pieces, the child comments, “Now you have given me
much more to eat.”
Perceptual Preoperational thinkers can only perceive In the liquid conservation problem, children notice
centration and thus reason about one dimension of a the volume level line of the liquid, but do not
situation at a time. consider the size and the shape of the glasses.
Egocentrism Pre-schoolers believe that others think, feel, A pre-schooler is drawing a picture in the living room
and perceive in the same way as they do. and asks her mother, who is in the kitchen if she likes
her drawing. The child is unable to realise that her
mother cannot see the drawing.
Animism Pre-schoolers believe inanimate objects have A child announces that her doll is sleepy and needs
