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A Brief Introduction to
Piagets Theory
Prof. Jack Bauer
University of Dayton
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First Things to Know One of 20th centurys most influential
theorists in the sciences & beyond
Piagets interests:
Knowledge (epistemology) Knowledge is a system of mental representations
Devt of knowledge (genetic epistem.)
Not to be confused with David Letterman
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How Knowledge Develops
Knowledge emerges from action
Child actively constructs knowledge
Not absorbs it Cog. abilities develop progressively
What is cognitive development?
Increasing capacity to differentiate &integrate information
Increasing capacity to generate
knowledge
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Overview of Four Stages
Sensorimotor Stage Born with reflexes, not thoughts
Actions & perception get more complex
Traces of memory become more permanent
Preoperational Stage Simple knowledge (what things are)
Fuzzy or sporadic logic
Concrete Operations Stage Logical reasoning for observable world
Formal Operations Stage Logical reasoning for abstract world
Complex possibilities, underlying motives
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Sensorimotor Stage
Start w/ reflex motions (not thoughts!) With experience, those motions come under
control & are combined with different stimuli
Then planned actions in present moment
Gradual acquisition of object knowledge i.e., knowledge/memory that things exist
More familiar things 1st, then less familiar
Object permanence in 2nd
year of life Mental representations formed routinely for all things
Overall: Traces of procedural knowledgebuild into enduring mental representations
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Preoperational Stage
Roughly ages 2-7 (more at: pre-school years)
Child knows what things are but has limited
logic for how they operate e.g., fantasy play w/ toys & story characters
Egocentrism: Limited perspective-taking
Stage ends with conservation
General understanding that things can changeform but still be thesame thing
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Concrete Operations Stage
Roughly ages 7-12 (grade-school years)
Child can reason logically about the
concrete (i.e., observable) world
Interested in how things, people etc. work
Classifies everything into categories, rules, roles
Stage ends when child generally thinks
logically about the abstract world also
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Formal Operations Stage
Roughly ages 12 on up
Can think about complex possibilities &alternatives
Hypothetical/deductive reasoning Can ask if...then... about abstract things, like:
variables
complexities of relationships underlying values and ideologies
self in the distant future
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Discontinuous Stages?
This is how Piagets theory is often characterizedby people who arent specialists in Piaget
Sen-mot
Pre-opCon-op
Form-op
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Not-So-Discontinuous Stages
Sen-mot
Pre-opCon-op
Form-op
This is closer to how Piaget described his ownstageswith substages
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Continuous Stages
Sen-motPre-op
Con-op
Form-op
The line represents purely gradual/continous devt
The ovals represent points along the line where
functioning starts to look different than before
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Stages:
Continuity & Discontinuity
Sen-mot
Pre-opCon-op
Form-op
This is how I tend to think of Piaget: Graduallyincreasing capacities to differentiate and integrate
yield qualitatively advanced capacities to think
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Final Notes on Piaget
Focus onsequence of stages, not age Especially for personality development in adulthood
Devt to next stage is indicated byroutinefunctioning of the next stages abilities, notby the first signs of it
Devt is notabout how much info one has Rather, its about how complexly and
integratively one knows
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