Piaget - Cognitive Theory

Piaget's Cognitive Theory describes four stages of development and relates them to an individuals' ability to understand and assimilate new information.

1. Sensorimotor: 0-2 years.

• Retains images of objects
• Develops primitive logic in manipulating objects
• Begins intentional actions
• Play is imaginative
• Begins to understand signals (i.e. a babysitter's arrival signals mom's leaving)
• In the last part of this stage, begins to understand symbols & language

2. Preoperational: 2-7 years.

• Language development enables symbolic functioning
• Progress from concretism to abstract thinking
• Can comprehend past, present, future
• Acquires words, math symbols, music symbols, and other codes
• Magical thinking may occur
• Thinking is not generalized and is concrete, irreversible, egocentric (unable to see another POV) & centered on one detail or event.

3. Concrete Operations: 7-11 years.

• Beginnings of abstract thought
• Plays games with rules
• Cause-effect relationships are understood
• Logical implications are understood
• thinking is independent of experience
• Thinking is reversible
• Rules of logic are developed

4. Formal Operations: 11-maturity

• Higher level of abstraction
• Construction of ideals
• Planning for future
• Thinks hypothetically
• De-centers through interactions with peers and elders
• Assumes adult roles and responsibilities