Building upon this, Fischer then organizes skills into skill levels and tiers. Levels representationally show qualitative changes in how skills are organized, particularly in complex activities (Fischer, 1980). Fischer differentiates himself from Piaget firstly in stating that the activities of children are not evidence for clear ladder-like ascension through phases; there is vast variation in the activities of children which shift and change dependent upon the environment the child is in at any given moment. Therefore, while development may occur within an approximation to age, skill development is not as dependent upon age inasmuch as it is the current environment. What skill levels do show that phases of development do not is qualitative changes in how skills are organised—particularly in complex activities. Lastly, skills theory is also different from stage-type theories of development in that the skill levels are used to organize a child’s, skills but not the child personally. Due to the variation in environment and the variation of individual cognition for each individual child, it should be expected that everyday skills will be performed at many different skill levels. Therefore, Fischer suggests that if skill theory is to be applied to a particular child, a cognitive profile will need to be produced. Having appreciated individual differences in cognitive profiles, Fischer does acknowledge that the most pronounced changes in organization do correspond with Piaget’s primary circular reactions, secondary circular reactions, tertiary circular reactions, representations, concrete operations and formal operations (1936/1952) and semi-logic (Piaget, Grize, Szeminska & Bang, 1968, as cited in Fischer & Yan, 2002).
Resulting from the research of levels, Fischer groups them into a series of four tiers. Tiers were initially identified by Fischer because of “dramatic changes” (Fischer & Yan, 2002, p. 485) in the second year of age regarding the level of skill utilized for representational (or pretend) play. An example of this representational play would be how a child plays with a stuffed bear; when a child sets a stuffed bear in his bed on a pillow, covers it in blankets, and states, “Bear is sleeping,” this demonstrates several systems coming together to produce a new skill. The systems in this example would be the action system for manipulating the bear and the action system of sleeping. Between four months and roughly twelve years of age, Fischer identified seven levels and then after discovering a system of tiers, he defined a further five levels of skill preceding into infancy and following from roughly ten years of age into adulthood. These twelve levels are then grouped into three tiers which demonstrate different skill developments: Sensory-motor sets, representational sets and abstract sets (see Table 1). Differentiating himself again from Piaget, Fischer is fast to state that just because a skill is demonstrated crossing into the new tier, this is only relative to the skill itself and not the overall development of the individual child or across children as a whole. It is very likely that the child in question will display skills that do not cross into the new tier either because the environment has changed or transformation of the skill has not occurred. Referring back to the previous example, the child may have produced representational play because he had the stuffed bear in his bedroom, but the skill might not be produced again if the child is given a different toy and a room with a sofa instead of a bed.
Following description of the levels and tiers, Fischer then goes on to define the transformational rules. The transformational rules are the ways by which a currently
existing skill is transformed into a more advanced skill, ascending the skill through the levels and tiers. Fischer felt that this was absolutely necessary when developing skills theory because there was a gap in developmental psychology literature and a need for rules accounting for the conditions and circumstances by which development progresses from level to level (Beilin, 1971; Brainerd, 1976; Flavell 1963; Kessen, 1966; Van den Daele, 1976 as cited in Fischer, 1980). Also, Fischer argued that defining transformational rules laid the groundwork for investigating atypical development in learning or problem solving. The transformational rules defined in Fischer’s original work are intercoördination, compounding, focusing, substitution, and differentiation. Intercoördination is how skills are combined and how a child relates two separate skills to each other. Compounding is when two or more skills are combined to produce a new skill. Focusing is the shift of attention from the mapping of one specific skill to another and evaluate or predict the outcome of an action. Substitution is similar to generalisation and use of a skill from a situation where the skill was successful to a new situation. This may or may not be successful dependent upon the environment and task the time. Differentiation, is then similar to substitution in that it is the generalisation of an existing skill to a new situation, but it is different in that the skill is adapted to accommodate the new environment and task successfully.
Supplementary to Fischer’s skills theory, optimal levels, functional levels and contextual support are also key factors to be taken into consideration when testing for skill performance. Optimal level is “the best performance the child shows, which is presumably a reflection of both practice and the upper limit of his or her processing ability” (Fischer, 1980, p. 485). Functional level, defined some time later, is the level of performance that is everything below optimal, but represents the majority of tasks performed daily. Contextual support then became relevant when assessing for skills theory. Fischer found through his own research for almost a decade (1977-1985, as cited in Fischer & Yan, 2002) that optimal and functional levels of performance varied greatly, even within minutes of each other in virtually identical tasks. The difference identified was contextual support—where children were assessed in comparison of little support in tasks versus high support from experimenters in tasks. What Fischer discovered was that context has direct influence on skill performance, particularly during assessment. For this reason, Fischer defined developmental range to denote how all people’s skill capacities are never fixed and instead vary across a range of levels. Once developmental range is considered in human development, Fischer asserts that most real-world activities take place well below the optimal level and that functional limits are another benchmark for measurement of skill levels and tiers.
As a “neo-Piagetian” theory of human development, Fischer’s skill theory (later described as “dynamic skill theory”) differentiates itself from stage style theories of development in several key ways. Firstly, the breakdown of breakdown into actions, sets, skills, levels, and tiers is a trademark of Fischer’s behaviourist roots; The value of measuring behaviour in detail and only categorising skills based upon observed behaviour are cornerstones to behaviourism which contradicts Piaget’s attempts to attribute the internal workings of the mind producing behaviour (i.e. egocentrism and the mountain task). Also, skill theory places the development on the skill and not the person or group. Whereas a stage style theory of development will seek to label development to an age group—skill theory emphasizes how separate skills transform to produce new skills. Also, where stage style theories of development are inflexible in requiring several specific characteristics to be present in the category, skill theory is flexible in that it can allow for variance in skill development, placing skills in different levels and tiers at the same time. Transformation rules also give full explanation as to how skills develop into more advanced skills which is an improvement on stage style theories of development that do not explain how behaviour evolves to ascend up a linear developmental ladder. Lastly, skill theory recognises the importance of contextual support relating to optimal performance when conducting experiments measuring human development. Fischer acknowledges that when a child performs at optimal level in a laboratory with experimenter support, this false environment does not sufficiently replicate the real world environment where development actually occurs at the functional level with a medium level of support taking place somewhere between full experimenter support conditions and no support control conditions.
Fischer’s skill theory is an ever evolving approach to explaining human development. Since the technological developments of brain scanning, cognitive research, and flexibility to reach out to other schools of psychology, it is now known as dynamic skill theory in recognition of its role as dynamic constructivism. Fischer himself feels that dynamic skills theory “moves beyond neo-Piagetian structuralism” and is a developmental theory in its own right (Fischer & Yan, 2002, p. 501). Due to the theory’s focus on skill development, skill organization, transformational rules and recognition of environment and contextual support, Fischer’s skill theory will continue to stand out as a unique theory of human development.
References
Bruner, J. S. (1970). The growth and structure of skill. In K. J. Connolly (Ed.), Mechanisms of motor skill development. New York City, New York, U.S.: Academic Press.
Fischer, K. W. (1980). A theory of cognitive development: The control and construction of hierarchies of skills. Psychological Review, 87, (6), 477-531.
Fischer, K. W. (2008). Dynamic cycles of cognitive and brain development: Measuring growth in mind, brain and education. In A. M. Battro, K. W. Fischer & P. Léna (Eds.), The educated brain (pp 127-150). Cambridge, England, U.K.: Cambridge University Press.
Fischer, K. W. & Yan, Z. (2002). The Development of Dynamic Skill Theory. In R. Lickliter & D Lewkowicz (Eds.), Conceptions of development: Lessons from the laboratory (pp. 279-312). Hove, England, U.K.: Psychology Press.
Piaget, J. (1952). The origins of intelligence in children (M. Cook, Trans.). New York City, New York, U.S.A.: International Universities Press. (Originally published, 1936).
