COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

Cognition
Cognition refers to the inner processes and product of the mind that lead to “ knowing” These processes
include all mental activities:
•Thinking
• Knowing
•Remembering
•Judging
•Problem-solving.
•Attending
•Reasoning
•Planning
•Categorizing.
•Creating
•Fantasizing
 COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY
Cognitive psychology is the scientific study of the mind as an INFORMATION PROCESSOR.
focuses on learning based on how people perceive, remember, think, speak and problem-solve.
Cognitive psychologists try to build up cognitive models of the information processing that
goes on inside people’s minds, including:
•Perception
• attention
•Language
•Memory
•thinking
•consciousness
 JEAN PIAGET(1896 - 1980)

Jean Piaget was born in Switzerland in 1896.

Piaget (1936) was the first psychologist to make a systematic
study of cognitive development.
He became intrigued with the reasons children gave for their
wrong answers to the questions that required logical thinking.
He was more interested in the way in which fundamental
concepts like the very idea of number, time, quantity, causality,
justice and so on emerged in children rather tthan just measuring
their intelligence.
His contributions include a theory of child cognitive
development, detailed observational studies of cognition in
children, and a series of simple but ingenious tests to reveal
different cognitive abilities.
 COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENTAL THEORY
PIAGET’S THEORY OF DEVELOPMENT, which views children as
actively constructing knowledge as they manipulate and explore
their world and regards cognitive development as taking place in
stages.
Piaget did not believe that children’s learning depends on
reinforcers , such as rewards from adults.
Also human infants do not begin as cognitive beings.
They build their cognition out of their perceptual and motor
activities.
They organize ways of making sense to experiences that permit
them to adapt to the environment.
 In Piaget's view, early cognitive development involves processes
based upon actions and later progresses to changes in mental
operations.
 ASSUMPTIONS
Children are active and motivated learners.
Children construct knowledge from their experiences.
Children acquire their knowledge in the form of SCHEMES( Groupings of similar actions or
thoughts)
Children learn through the processes of ASSIMILATION and ACCOMODATION.
Interaction with one’s physical and social environment is essential for cognitive development.
 concepts of piaget’s theory

ADAPTATION- Adaptation involves building schemes through direct interaction with the
environment. It consists of two complementary activities:
ASSIMILATION is the use of our current schemes to interpret the external world.
ACCOMODATION is creating new schemes or adjusting the old ones after noticing that our
current way of thinking does not capture the environment completely.
 A steady comfortable state where children are not changing much, they assimilate more than
they accommodate, it is called COGNITIVE EQUILIBRIUM.
 During times of rapid cognitive change, children are in discomfort or COGNITIVE
DISEQUILIBRIUM.
 EQUILIBRIATION
Children realise that new information does not match their current schemes, they shift from
ASSIMILATION to ACCOMODATION. After modifying their schemes , they move back towards
ASSIMILATION, exercising their newly changed structures until they are ready to be modified again.
Piaget’s term for this back and forth movement between equilibrium and disequilibrium is
EQUILIBRIATION.
 STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
THE SENSORIMOTOR STAGE: During this stage, infants and
toddlers acquire knowledge through sensory experiences and
manipulating objects. It was his observations of his daughter and
nephew that heavily influenced his conception of this stage. At this
point in development, a child's intelligence consists of their basic
motor and sensory explorations of the world. Piaget believed that
developing object permanence or object constancy, the
understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot
be seen, was an important element at this point of development. By
learning that objects are separate and distinct entities and that they
have an existence of their own outside of individual perception,
children are then able to begin to attach names and words to
objects.
The Preoperational Stage: At this stage, kids learn through pretend play but
still struggle with logic and taking the point of view of other people. They also
often struggle with understanding the ideal of constancy. For example, a
researcher might take a lump of clay, divide it into two equal pieces, and then
give a child the choice between two pieces of clay to play with. One piece of
clay is rolled into a compact ball while the other is smashed into a flat pancake
shape. Since the flat shape looks larger, the preoperational child will likely
choose that piece even though the two pieces are exactly the same size.

•The Concrete Operational Stage: Kids at this point of development begin to

think more logically, but their thinking can also be very rigid. They tend to
struggle with abstract and hypothetical concepts. At this point, children also
become less egocentric and begin to think about how other people might think
and feel. Kids in the concrete operational stage also begin to understand that
their thoughts are unique to them and that not everyone else necessarily shares
their thoughts, feelings, and opinions.

•The Formal Operational Stage: The final stage of Piaget's theory involves an
increase in logic, the ability to use deductive reasoning, and an understanding of
abstract ideas. At this point, people become capable of seeing multiple potential
solutions to problems and think more scientifically about the world around them.
STAGES OF COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT
 PIAGET AND EDUCATION
DISCOVERY LEARNING: In Piagen classroom, children are encouraged to discover for themelves
through spontaneous interaction with the environment. Teachers provide a rich variety of
including art, games, puzzles, etc.
SENSITIVITY TO CHILDREN’S READINESS TO LEARNING: Teachers introduce activities tha build
on children’s cureent thinking,challenging their incorrect ways of viewing the world.
ACCEPTANCE OF INDICIDUAL DIFFERENCES: Piaget’s theory assumes that all children go thrugh
the same sequence of development, but at different rates. Teacher evaluate the child on the
basis of his previous development.