"Describe and assess one theory of cognitive development."

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“Describe and assess one theory of cognitive development.”

Cognitive development (CD) refers to way in which a person’s style of thinking changes with age.

Piaget argued that CD is based on the development of schemas. This refers to a psychological structure representing all of a person’s knowledge of actions or objects, e.g. gripping or driving. To perform a new skill which the person has no schema they have to work from previous skills that they have. This is called assimilation, where they have pulled previous schemas together then adapted and changed them to fit their task through accommodation. For example when a person is learning to juggle a person can already grasp, throw and catch so they use the schemas that they have for these skills to perform the skill of juggling. When a person feels confident and comfortable with the task that they are performing they are said to be in a state of equilibrium.

Piaget believed that children go through 4 stages of CD; Sensori-motor (0-2yrs)- in this stage children have no object permanence. So if they were playing with a toy and it fell out of sight they would not realise it had even existed. Piaget said that the skill of object permanence came at about 9 months. The second stage of CD is the pre-operational stage (2-7yrs), at this stage language is developing but children are unable to conserve (understand that shapes can change without the mass or size having to change) or decentre (can’t understand things from another persons point of view). This is also known as the theory of mind. In the concrete operational stage (7-11yrs) children have developed the theory of mind and are also able to conserve if the problem is ‘concrete’/visual. The final stage is Formal operational stage (11yrs- onwards). In this stage children are able to work things out abstractly so this is the stage in which children start to be taught algebra.

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The above ideas about CD were based on Piaget’s own research. Most of the studies were carried out solely on his own three children. The studies were carried out in the form of clinical interviews and tasks and all the results and observation were recorded in a diary.

One strength of Piaget’s theory comes in the detailed supporting evidence, which he himself provided. One of his tasks investigated object permanence. He gave a baby a toy and they played happily with it. But then he covered the toy with some cloth. Even though the baby had seen the toy ...

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