PIAGET’S STAGES OF

COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
 Jean Paiget
Swiss psychologist, Jean Paiget was one of the most
influential theorist in the area of cognitive learning.

Paiget believed cognitive development was a way of

adapting to the environment.

Children are motivated to explore & understand things

around them.

Progress is shown through four stages:

sensory-motor stage
preoperational stage
concrete operational stage
formal operational stage
Piaget had several themes that we will see throughout the
stages he established. Piaget argued that children ‘actively
construct’ their cognitive world. There are several techniques
that they use to do this.

The first is that of a schema – these are cognitive networks

that contain our associations with certain places, people,
events, or things. Thus, we may have a schema of what to do
when eating at a restaurant or what a mom should be like or
what a plane should look like. As we gain experience with
things, we develop these schemas so that we have familiarity
with them and don’t have to encode this information EVERY
time we come into contact with them. It also helps us to
identify abnormalities – when someone does something
unexpected at a restaurant or when something doesn’t
resemble what you expect (Lisa Kudrow’s cross-over role as
Ursula, the waitress).
We can also engage in assimilation, which is how we use and
adjust our schemas. Assimilation is when individuals
incorporate new information into their existing knowledge
structure. Infants trying to grab a book flatway will fail, and
thus, will enter new information with respect to grasping into its
grasping knowledge database. You will now assimilate this
information into your existing information about child
development.

We can also engage in accommodation, where individuals

adjust to new information. People accommodate their behavior
to their understanding of the environment (the best example is
travelling – if you have ever been to a new culture or country,
you accommodate by taking in how the locals do something).
People will change behavior (I.e., accommodate) as a function
of information assimilation (we adapt to new experiences). So
the child will learn that they can’t pick up the book flatways
(assimilation), but will accommodate by using a new way to pick
up the book.
 PIAGET’S STAGES OF
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
 Sensory-Motor Stage
(Birth to 2 years old)
the first two years of life are in
the Sensory-Motor Stage
Presents with reflexes
Development of imitative
behaviors
Development of object
permanence
Development of symbolic
knowledge http://condor.de
paul.edu/lcamra
*Object permanence is the term used to describe the s/psych333/anot
awareness that objects continue to exist even when berr.html
they are no longer visible
8
Common Infant Motor Reflexes
Blinking Reflex

Response to stroking the side of

their foot

Grasping

Motor Reflex

Rooting Reflex
 The Preoperational Stage
The Preoperational Stage follows the sensory-motor stage.
It is the second of four stages.

By observing the sequences of play, Paiget was able to

show that towards the end of the second year a
qualitatively new kind of psychological functioning occurs in
the child.

Preoperational Stage Cognitive Developments:

•Representational Thought
•Fantasy Play
•Symbolic Gestures
•Egocentrism
During the preoperational stage the child will learn to use symbolic
thinking.
They will use and represent objects with images and words.
Representational thought is the building block for two hallmarks of
the preoperational stage:
Fantasy Play
Symbolic Gestures

Thinking is still egocentric in this stage making it difficult for the child
to take on the viewpoints of others.

Along with their highly imaginative minds the child will assign
emotions to inanimate objects. The theory of mind is critical in
this stage. Their increasing ability to utilize mental representations is
the foundation for their language development.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v
=OinqFgsIbh0&feature=related
 CONCRETE-OPERATIONAL
STAGE
(7-11 years of age).
Children become more flexible in their thinking
Learn to consider more than one problem at time
Demonstrate the ability to grasp principles of conservation
Cause-effect relationships with concrete objects
Decrease in egocentrism
Understand reversibility
Failure to understand abstractions

*Egocentrism: the incomplete differentiation of the self and the world, including other
people and the tendency to perceive, understand and interpret the world in terms of
the self. The term derives from the Greek egô, meaning "I." An egocentric person has
no theory of mind, cannot "put himself in other people's shoes," and believes everyone
sees what he sees (or that what he sees in some way exceeds what others see.)

*Principles of Conservation: The concept that the quantity of substance is not changed
by reversible changes in its appearance.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtLEWVu815o&feature=related
 Formal-Operational Stage
(Adolescence To Adulthood)

The Formal-Operational Stage is the last stage of

development. It presents with:

Thinking becomes systematic and logical even about

abstractions
Gain greater knowledge and experience
Are capable to understand cause and effect
Consider possibilities as well as realities
Develop and use general rules, principles, and theories
A different point of view…..
Piaget's theory differed from empiricist theories of development,
which suggest that children learn through experience, and nativist
theories that maintain we are born with innate knowledge that
gradually comes to maturation.
Modern developmentalists have frequently referred to experimental
research that contradicts certain aspects of Piaget's theories. For
example, cognitive theorists like Robert Siegler have explained the
phenomenon of conservation as a slow, progressive change in the
rules that children use to solve problems, rather than a sudden
change in cognitive capacities and schemas.
Other researchers have shown that younger and older children
develop by progressing through a continuum of capacities rather
than a series of discrete stages. In addition, these researchers
believe that children understand far more than Piaget theorized.
With training, for instance, younger children may perform many of
the same tasks as older children.
Researchers have also found that children are not as egocentric,
suggestible, magical, or concrete as Piaget held, and that their
cognitive development is largely determined by biological and
cultural influences
To view more oppositions take a look at the following link:
http://www.lifescript.com/channels/well_being/Meditations_Motivations/
piagets_theory.asp?page=3&trans=1
Online Resources:
http://www.accilifeskills.com/cognitive-development/200px-Baby_So
fia_SERRES.jpg
http://www.uea.ac.uk/menu/acad_depts/edu/learn/morphett/
piaget.gif
http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/CliffsReviewTopic/Physical-
Development-Age-0-08211-2.topicArticleId-26831,articleId-
26764.html
http://images.google.com/images?
um=1&hl=en&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&q=comm
on+infant+reflexes(ages+0-2+years)&spell=1
http://www.uic.edu/classes/psych/psych320kaj/chapter9.html
http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?title=Image:Piaget_1.jpg
http://www.warringtonwolves.org/uploads/images/
Wolves1113Pages2.jpg
http://environmentalet.org/psy111/development.htm
http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/dept/d46/psy/dev/early_adult/
ladies.jpg
Book Resources:
Morris, Charles & Maisto, Albert.2006. Understanding Psychology
Eighth Edition: Prentice Hall

Piaget, J. 1977. The Essential Piaget. Ed by Howard Gruber, New

York: Basic Books