Jean PiagetBy Tracey Wilson

Jean Piaget • Child Psychologist

• Carl Jung

• Cognitive Theory

• Developmental Psychology

• Most Influential Developmental Psychologist to Date

• Theory of Cognitive Development

Theory of Cognitive Development

• A comprehensive theory about the nature and development of human intelligences

• Consists of Four Stages

Sensorimotor (ages 0-2)

• Cognitive development comes through use of body and senses

• No object permanence until later in this stage

• Language absent until end of period

• Egocentrism

Preoperational (ages 2-7)

• Begins using symbols; no manipulation

• Realism, animism, irreversibility

• Beginnings of representation

• Egocentric and socialized speech

Concrete Operations (ages 7-11)

• Can perform mental operations with the use of concrete objects

• Classification and number concepts

• Verbal understanding

Formal Operations (ages 11 and up)• Released from the restrictions

of tangible and concrete

• May separate real from the possible

• Hypothetic/deductive reasoning

• Logico-mathematical structures

• Language freed from concrete, able to express the possible

Vocabulary

• Scheme- way of responding to the world

• Assimilation- new experience consistent with present scheme

• Accommodation- new experience that requires modification of old scheme or formation of new scheme

• Equilibration- attempts to adjust prior scheme with new experiences that do not fit