Cognitive Developmental Theory Introduction
- Cognitive developmental theory was advocated by Jean Piaget who had worked with Alfred Binet on the first intelligence test (Stanford Binet Scale). The theory proposes that child (human) behaviour and personality evolve out of intellectual maturity
- The mental ability of children was tested with a series of questions. The number and kind of incorrect answers was gauged by Piaget. He discovered that children of the same age gave the same kind of incorrect answers. He also observed that younger children were not less intelligent but their thought process was different.
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- The theory also advocates that the child’s behaviour at a point of time is dependent on the level of intellectual maturity at that time. The cognitive developmental theory is another mode to reason out and understand child behaviour in the dental operatory.
- It is useful in deciding the right choice of behaviour management technique to be employed for the child. Primitive techniques such as modelling are applied to younger children from 3½ to 4½ years of age.
- A child learns desirable behaviour in the operatory by observing an older child of the same sex displaying good behaviour in the dental chair when being treated. Techniques such as Tell-ShowDo resort to children older than 4½ years of age.
- The treatment method is described, followed by a demonstration and then by performing the treatment.
Growth Of Cognitive Structures
A cognitive structure or scheme is described as an organised pattern of thought or action that an individual (child) develops to make sense of some aspect of self-experience.
At birth, children have primitive or less complex cognitive structures. Thy are active and curious explorers who construct a newer understanding of the world around them based on their experiences.
In this process, their cognitive structures become more complex. The growth in cognitive structures takes place in four steps, namely assimilation, disequilibrium, accommodation and organisation.
Equilibrium refers to a balanced, harmonious relationship between one’s cognitive structures and the environment.
- Assimilation: It is a process by which children interpret new experiences by incorporating them into their existing schemes.
- Disequilibrium: It refers to imbalances or contradictions between one’s thought process and the environmental events
- Accommodation: It is a process by which children modify their existing schemes in order to adapt to new experiences and solve the disequilibrium.
- Organisation: It is a process by which existing schemes have completely been upgraded to higher, more complex schemes, which enter into equilibrium.
Figure Explains the steps involved in the growth of the cognitive structure of a child.
Stages In Cognitive Theory
There are four distinct stages in cognitive development theory and they follow an invariant development sequence pattern. It means that the sequence of stages is fixed and common to everyone (universal). No stage can be skipped and each stage is built on the achievements of the earlier stage.
The ages of entry into each stage are a rough approximation. Individual differences and sociocultural influences can accelerate or retard intellectual growth. The four major stages are listed below followed by a description of each stage:
- Sensorimotor stage (birth to 2 years): There are six sub-stages
- Pre-operational stage (2–7 years): There are two sub-stages
- Stage of concrete operations (9–11 years)
- Stage of formal operations (11 years and above)
- Sensorimotor Stage The sensorimotor stage involves the evolution of a reflexive infant with limited knowledge into a strategic problem solver. This evolution happens through six sub-stages.
- Stage of reflex activity (0–1 month)
- The infant exercises only innate reflexes such as the suckling reflex.
- The infant accommodates any object that is encountered, such as the blanket, into these reflexes (for example sucking the blanket).
- Stage of primary circular reaction (1–4 months)
- The infant discovers non-reflexive schemes that emerge by chance. Based on the responses, the infant retains the pleasurable schemes (for example thumb sucking).
- The cognitive schemes or the action schemes are centred on the infant’s body and are hence called primary.
- As these acts give pleasure, the infants become repetitive and are hence called circular.
- Stage of secondary circular reaction (4–8 months)
- The infant discovers interesting experiences by chance, with objects outside their bodies (for example squeezing a rubber duck toy that it quacks).
- The infant learns the limits of self and outside.
- As objects of gratification are outside, the stage is called secondary
- Stage of co-ordination of secondary schemes (8–12 months)
- The first planned acts of childcare were performed.
- If a favourite toy is hidden partially under a cushion, the infant can lift the cushion to acquire the toy.
- This is not a random act and is a planned act. This marks the beginning of symbolic problem-solving.
- Stage of tertiary circular reactions (12–18 months)
- The infant begins experimental activity and invents new methods of producing interesting results with common objects. For example, the infant experiments with the toy duck that quacks on squeezing. The duck is stamped or thrown hard against a wall to explore if there are more interesting results.
- Since newly planned attempts are made, this stage is called tertiary.
- Symbolic problem-solving stage (18–24 months)
- The infant begins to internalise behavioural schemes to construct mental symbols or images. For example, if their favourite toys of the child are constantly kept in a box accessible to the child, he constructs a mental symbol that the favourite things may be reached by opening the lid of the box. The child also internalises a behavioural scheme to make a conscious effort to travel to the box and intentionally open it and retrieve the toy. Thus, the ‘problem-solving strategy’ helps to get over boredom.
- This is used to guide future conduct of problem-solving in a more organised manner as the child grows older.
- Stage of reflex activity (0–1 month)
- Pre-operational Stage (2–7 years) Children enter the pre-operational stage with the potential to use mental symbols to represent objects, situations and events they encounter. Piaget focuses on the limitations or deficiencies in the thought process of children in this stage. The stage is called pre-operational as preschool children are considered as not having acquired the cognitive ability to think logically. This stage consists of two sub-stages as mentioned earlier. This stage involves a transition from a curious, less-informed toddler into a meticulous pre-schooler.
- Pre-conceptual stage (2–4 years): Th cognitive processes of 2–4-year-old children are primitive to adult standards. Five major developments occur in this phase.
- The emergence of symbolic thought: Th children develop the ability to represent an object by another word, object or event. Language is the best form of symbolism that young children display. For example, a horse can be correlated with animals and an elephant is related to ‘huge’.
- Pretend play: Pre-schoolers mimic superheroes (boys), mothers (girls), doctors and so on. The children play these roles with properties around them, for example, a wooden stick instead of a gun for a warrior, a shoe box instead of a cradle for the ‘baby’ and so on.
- Animism: Pre-schoolers lack the skill to classify animate (living) and inanimate (non-living) entities in the environment. They consider inanimate also to be living and attribute life and life-like qualities to non-living objects. This is termed animism, for example mock-feeding a doll (non-living) explaining that it is hungry (life attribute); explaining that the Sun (non-living) has gone to take rest (life attribute) at night.
- Transductive reasoning: When two events occur together, the child feels that one has happened because of the other. For example, when a pendulum clock strikes 6 o’clock and the sky is turning dark, the child feels that darkness has set in just because the clock stroke six times.
- Egocentrism: This is the tendency to view the world from one’s own perspective. It makes the child feel that the whole world sees only the scene that his eyes have perceived. For example, when a child is asked about the location of his school, he says that it is next to the tall blue building (instead of the locality name). The child has a view that the whole world knows ‘this tall blue building’ near his school.
- Intuitive period (4–7 years): The major features are recognised in this stage.
- Centration: Achildunderstandsanobjectorevent with attention to only one point; it may be the most salient one. As the emphasis is on the most salient point, the child lacks the cognitive maturity to consider the other accessory/associated features. This feature where the attention of the child is centrally emphasised on one point about an object or an event is called centration (see the example given in the following text).
- Class inclusion inability: It is the inability to compare a class of objects with its subclass. For example, a box contains wooden balls in two sizes – small and large. Larger wooden balls are more in number than their smaller counterparts. If a child of 4–7 years is asked if there are more large balls or small balls, the child answers right. If he is asked if there are more wooden balls or larger wooden balls, he sticks to the same answer of larger wooden balls. This shows that the child is unable to comprehend on class–subclass association. He is unable to perform class inclusion and is centred on the feature of size (large/small).
- Conservation inability: This is the inability to recognise that the structure of an object does not change when its appearance is altered in some superficial way. For example, three types of containers are given, namely a tall narrow one (jar), a shorter and wider, medium-sized one (glass) and a very short, wide one (dish) and water is poured into them. A child presumes that the water poured into the first container has taken afield tall narrow shape. When the water is poured from the first to the second container, the child presumes that the water has been altered in a shape that is not reversible. The child has the same presumption when the water is poured from containers 2 to 3 also.
- Pre-conceptual stage (2–4 years): Th cognitive processes of 2–4-year-old children are primitive to adult standards. Five major developments occur in this phase.
- Concrete Operational Stage (7–11 years) In the concrete operational stage, the meticulous preschooler evolves into a personality who can exhibit logical thought and expression. The children acquire internal mental activity that enables them to modify their mental images and symbols. They are able to think more logically about real objects and experiences. In this phase, the primitive features of earlier stages such as animism, pretend play, transductive reasoning, egocentrism, conservation inability and class inclusion inability disappears. This stage has three features, namely compensation, reversibility and seriation.
- Decentration (compensation ability): The child develops the ability to consider more than one aspect of a problem at a time. He was able to see only the most salient feature of an issue in the early stage and was not able to lay emphasis on the associated features as discussed in centration. In this stage, the child is able to attend to multiple features of a particular issue and a holistic view is obtained. The child is able to compensate for its reduced emphasis on the most salient feature and still make a judgement. This is termed decentration or compensation ability.
- Reversibility: Th child develops the ability to reverse action by mentally performing the opposite action. For instance, when there are three different-shaped containers and water is poured into one of them, the child understands that water takes the shape of the container. The child is also able to conceive that the change in shape is reversible and it can happen when the water is poured into a different container.
- Seriation: This is the mental ability to arrange a set of objects in series according to a quantifiable dimension such as height or weight. When the child is given sticks of varying lengths and asked to arrange them in order, he is able to understand that they have varying lengths. The child is able to arrange the sticks in the order of increasing length, from the ‘shortest’ to the ‘tallest’ or vice versa.
- Formal Operational Stage (11 Years And Above) The formal operational stage mediates the transition of a logical thinker into an individual who is capable of broader innovation. The child begins to think more rationally and systematically about real-life events or objects, abstract and non-life concepts and hypothetical events. The child is able to plan a personal study timetable and is able to assess if following the timetable yields productive results. He is also able to modify the timetable if amendments are required or when he wants to perform better. This symbolises the ability of the child to think more rationally and systematically. The child is able to foresee events and also make a judgement accordingly. The child is also able to picture and conceive extraterrestrial life or unidentified flying objects (UFO), life on the moon and so on. This is his ability to visualise and form mental images on abstract non-life concepts. The child is also able to respond meaningfully to hypothetical questions such as what changes he would bring about in the school, he is made the principal of the institution.The other features of this stage are listed as follows:
- Hypothetic–deductive reasoning: It is a style of problem-solving in which all possible answers to a problem are generated and the correct answer is arrived at after systematic evaluation.
- Imaginary audiences: This is a form of adolescent egocentrism where the children feel that the entire world is looking at them. This leads to over-consciousness about self.
- Personal fable: This is a form of adolescent egocentrism where the children feel that their opinions and feelings are the most special and highly unique. They have a prince/princess-like attitude.
Conclusion Gives an overview of cognitive development theory. According to Piaget, formal operational thinking is the structural equivalent of adult intelligence.
Cognitive Developmental Summary
- The cognitive developmental theory was advocated by Jean Piaget.
- The core logic of the theory is that the organised pattern of thought or action of a child is called a cognitive structure. This cognitive structure upgrades from primitive to more complex, elaborate structures.
- The growth of cognitive structures involves four steps. They are as follows:
- Equilibrium – Assimilation
- Assimilation – Disequilibrium
- Disequilibrium – Accommodation
- Accommodation – Organisation
- The stages in cognitive theory are as follows:
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