Disciplinary Research Project

Roniesha Williams

Integrated and Liberal Studies Program, Delaware State University

LIBS 390: Survey of Liberal Studies

Dr. Turhan Potter

February 25, 2024

 My emphasis area is education. The discipline I am researching is psychology. I'm

interested in this discipline because it goes hand in hand with education. The scholar who works

in the discipline I am researching is Jerome Seymour Bruner.

Jerome Burner, an American psychologist, was born, blind, on October 1, 1915 in New

York, New York. At the age of two he had cataract surgery to restore his vision. He noted once

that in those two years he was able to create his own view of the world, which many scholars

believe contributed to his success as a scholar. Bruner accomplished many things in his lifetime.

He graduated from Durham, North Carolina's Duke University with a degree in psychology in

1937. In 1939 and 1941, he graduated from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts,

with a master's and doctorate in psychology. In 1945, having served in military intelligence

during World War II, he joined Harvard's faculty. He taught the Colloquium on Culture,

Lawyering Theory, among other subjects. “In 1960 he co-founded the interdisciplinary,

iconoclastic Center for Cognitive Studies at Harvard, serving with George Miller as co-director,

until he departed the university in 1972 to take a position at Oxford University.” ( In Memoriam:

Jerome Bruner, 1915-2016 ). Bruner's cognitive ideas had a significant impact on the American

educational system and contributed to the development of cognitive psychology.

The Cognitive Revolution, led by Jerome Burner, elevated cognition to the center of

psychology research in America and ended behaviorism's dominance. He made important

advances in the domains of education and cognitive psychology. Bruner's research was

conducted in a number of fields, such as educational psychology, cognitive psychology, and

educational philosophy. Bruner was very important to the growth of cognitive psychology,

especially in the areas of memory, perception, and handling problems. Bruner's ideas had a huge

effect on how we teach. He pushed for a learner-centered method and stressed how important it
was for students to be involved in their own learning. He is famous for his ideas about

"discovery learning," which say that kids learn best when they actively look for and build on

what they already know. Bruner came up with the idea that there are three ways to express

something: physically, visually, and symbolically. From concrete, action-based experiences to

more abstract and symbolic ones, these styles show the different stages of learning and

understanding.

Through the Delaware State University library database I came across Jerome Bruner’s

journal article “Play, Thought, and Language.” In this, he discusses his theory on the

interrelationship of play, language, and thought. He believed that a child's development is closely

related to how we approach education and engage in activities prior to lessons. He concentrated

on how to set up play activities for kids in playgroups so that they can reach their full potential.

Along with two of his colleagues, Kathy Silva and Paul Genova, he carried out an experiment

with a group of children aged 3-5 to show that children learn best when they are allowed a

particular kind of independence. The kids were given an assignment to get a piece of chalk from

a clear box that was positioned out of their reach. The objective of the assignment was for them

to collect the colored chalk while still sitting in their chair a considerable distance away. They

were given a variety of tools including string, clamps, and sticks. Bruner and his colleagues

separated the group of kids into three groups. Group one was allowed to freely play with the

supplies, while the children in group two each got a brief educational demonstration explaining

how to link two strings together with a clamp, etc., and the kids in the third group were given

some basic demonstrations of the material's characteristics and acquainted them with the type of

substance they would be playing with. The children in group one solved the task better than the

kids in groups two and three. Compared to the other groups, group one was less likely to
abandon the task when facing difficulties, they had an easier time using suggestive hints that

were given to them, and completed the task with less frustration.

He concluded the approach in which teachers present topics is vital to the outcome of

student success; children are more engaged in an activity when certain principles are applied to

the learning experience. When given the chance to actively participate in the learning process,

make discoveries, receive the necessary support, and recognize the relevance of the subject to the

context, students are more interested in an activity. These ideas are consistent with a

constructivist and learner-centered approach to education. Jerome Bruner's theories have had a

long-lasting effect on psychology and education, impacting both fields' approaches to studying

cognitive development and how teachers approach their lessons. His focus on culture, active

learning, and the significance of discovery continues to influence these areas' conversations. On

June 5, 2016, Jerome Bruner passed away. He left behind a body of work that has had a

significant impact on both cognitive psychology and education.

This exercise helped me understand the significant impact psychology has on education. I

was able to look at new approaches to teaching and broaden my perspective on a more learner-

centered approach. My worldview and teaching philosophy align with Jerome Bruner's, and I

might not have come across his work if it weren't for this task. Studying his approaches gae me

more confidence entering the education field.

 Work Cited

Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia (2024, February 22). Jerome Bruner. Encyclopedia

Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jerome-Bruner

Bruner, J. (1983). Play, Thought, and Language. Peabody Journal of Education, 60(3), 60–
69. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1492180

Department of Psychology, H. (n.d.). Jerome Bruner.

https://psychology.fas.harvard.edu/people/jerome-bruner

Greenfield, P. M. (2016, July 13). Jerome Bruner (1915–2016). Nature News.

https://www.nature.com/articles/535232a

Law Magazine, N. (2016, June 6). In Memoriam: Jerome Bruner, 1915-2016. In

Memoriam: Jerome Bruner, 1915-2016 | NYU School of Law.
https://www.law.nyu.edu/news/in-memoriam-jerome-bruner