Cognitive Development

Question 1

What is Piaget’s theory?

Answer 1

Development occurs in stages as a structured whole, it is universal and comes from maturation rather than any particular experiences.

Question 2

What are the basic principles of Piaget’s theory?

Answer 2

Children construct reality, maintain a system of equilibrium and disequilibrium through schemes

Question 3

How do children learn according to Piaget’s theory?

Answer 3

Adaptation, assimilation, and accommodation.

Question 4

When is the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 4

Birth - 2 years

Question 5

What is substage 1 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 5

Birth - 1 month; reflexes form building blocks of sensorimotor thinking

Question 6

What is substage 2 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 6

1 - 4 months; gaining of control over actions through primary circular reactions

Question 7

What is substage 3 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 7

4 - 8 months; learn about reactions that manipulate objects based on voluntary actions of the secondary circular reaction

Question 8

What is substage 4 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 8

8 - 12 months; coordination of secondary circular reactions to deliberately create new reactions and the beginnings of object permanence which causes A not B search error

Question 9

What is substage 5 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 9

12 - 18 months; tertiary circular reactions allow for advanced understanding of object permanence and complete accurate A-B searches.

Question 10

What is substage 6 of the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 10

18 - 24 months; use of mental representations of events to be able to solve problems using trial and error and deferred imitation and begin the use of make believe play.

Question 11

What is a primary circular reaction?

Answer 11

Repetition of interesting events based on actions driven by basic needs to create new schemes.

Question 12

What is a secondary circular reaction?

Answer 12

Repetition of interesting events based on involuntary actions instead of basic needs to create new schemes.

Question 13

What is a tertiary circular reaction?

Answer 13

Repetition of interesting events with variations in the actions used to create them to create new schemes.

Question 14

What is analogical problem solving?

Answer 14

application of previous solutions to new, relevant problems

Question 15

What occurs in the pre operational stage?

Answer 15

Advances in mental representations and language, dual representation of an object can be used in make believe play

Question 16

What happens in the concrete operational stage?

Answer 16

Thought becomes logical, flexible, and organized, use of conservation, decentration and reversibility to solve problems, advanced classification and seriation, advanced understanding of spatial reasoning

Question 17

What are milestones of spatial reasoning in the concrete operational stage?

Answer 17

8 - 10 years; production of accurate cognitive maps, 10 - 12 years; ability to comprehend scale

Question 18

What happens in the formal operational stage?

Answer 18

capable of hypothetic-deductive reasoning and propositional thought problems, increased egocentrism, emergence of imaginary audience and personal fables

Question 19

What is the imaginary audience and the personal fable from the formal operational stage?

Answer 19

Personal belief that the adolescent is the focus of everyone’s attention and therefore the heightened self importance of the adolescent.

Question 20

What are aspects of Piagetian education?

Answer 20

Discovery learning, sensitivity to readiness to learn, acceptance of individual differences.

Question 21

What findings contradict the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 21

The findings that 2-3 month olds can group objects and have some concept of object permanence with facilitated learning

Question 22

Why is the stage concept of development now rejected?

Answer 22

Variations in knowledge and experience have been able to account for uneven skills across categories

Question 23

What is the core knowledge perspective?

Answer 23

The theory that infants are born with core domains of thought permitting grasping of new information and supporting of early development

Question 24

What is physical knowledge?

Answer 24

Understanding of objects and their effects on one another

Question 25

What is numerical knowledge?

Answer 25

Ability to keep track of multiple objects and do simple addition/subtraction with small quantities

Question 26

What is the naive theorists theory?

Answer 26

When children see something they use innate concepts to create theories that can be revised when necessary, which leads to stage-like changes in theories

Question 27

What are learning methods prescribed by the core knowledge perspective?

Answer 27

Reciprocal teaching and cooperative learning.

Question 28

What is Vygotsky's sociocultural theory of development?

Answer 28

Children are motivated to learn and they learn through discovery but the mind is not constructed by the child, it is constructed by the social environment inhabited by the child

Question 29

What is the role of language in Piaget's theory?

Answer 29

Language becomes another tool to development once learned

Question 30

What is the role of language in Vygotsky's theory?

Answer 30

Language is a result of development, an important part of learning, and a gateway to the social environment (which is the tool used for development, not language)