Cognitive Learning Theory

Jean Piaget

Cognitive theory attempts to explain human behavior by understanding the thought processes that takes place in our brains. The assumption is that humans are logical beings that make the choices that make the most sense to them. According to Piaget, a Swiss psychologist, cognitive development certain ways of thinking that are quite simple for an adult are not simple for a child. Our thinking processes change radically from birth to maturity because we constantly try to assess the world around and make sense of what we see and experience.

1. There are some assumptions that we make when we discuss cognitive theories.
2. Some learning processes may be unique to human beings like complex languages.
3. Cognitive processes being the focal point of study, it is therefore considered that mental events are central to human learning and they must therefore be incorporated into theories of learning.
4. Even though observable behaviour is the key purpose of scientific study, inferences about unobservable mental process can often be drawn from such study.
5. Individuals are active participants of learning and they are actively engaged in the learning process.
6. Learning does not mean that there has to be a change in behaviour. This is very contrary to the behaviorist position, where no learning can happen without an external behavior change.
7. An individual's knowledge is self-organized through various mental associations and structure.
8. Learning is a process of relating new information to previously learned information. Learning is most likely to occur when an individual can associate new learning with previous knowledge. This is a key concept that we count on as prior knowledge and experience while designing our lessons.

How does cognitive theory attempt to explain its influence on the development of human thinking?

Piaget identified four factors – biological maturation, activity, social experiences, and equilibration – that interact to influence changes in thinking. The first step, maturation is the unfolding of biological changes that are genetically programmed and others or the external environment has little influence or impact on this factor apart from the individual being fed a healthy diet for proper development.

How children develop their cognitive abilities

Activity results from growing up and maturity that comes through the physical growth of the body. Coordination is developed, the sense of touch, smell and other basic sensory organs develop and get strengthened. Kids observe, explore, test and finally learn to organize information. At this point in time, social transmission or learning from others takes place as language and communication skills develop. We learn a lot from each other. The amount we learn from social transmission varies according to their stage of cognitive development which I will discuss later in this post.

The final factor which leads to cognitive development is the processes of equilibration. As humans gather information through social transmission and experimentation, the information acquired needs to be absorbed, arranged and organized so that they can be used later. People are born with a tendency to organize their thinking processes into psychological structures know as schemes. In theory schemes are building blocks of thinking. They are organized systems of actions or thought that allow us to mentally represent or think about the objects and evens in our world.

Adaption of these schemes take place through assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation takes place when people use their existing schemes to make sense of the events in their world. Assimilation involves trying to understand something new by fitting it into what we already know. Accommodation occurs when a person must change existing schemes to respond to a new situation. If data cannot be make to fit any existing schemes then more appropriate structures must be developed. In theory the actual process of thinking takes place through the process of equilibration which is the act of searching for a balance. People continuously test and re-rest the appropriateness of their thinking to achieve a balance. If for example we apply a particular scheme to an event or a situation and the scheme works, then equilibrium is reached otherwise there is disequilibrium.

After the above discussion which is a brief account of how development takes place, I will now discuss the four stages that all humans go through on their journey of cognitive development.

The stages of cognitive development

Though Piaget believed that all people pass through the same four stages in exactly the same order and that these stages are generally associated with specific ages, knowing a student’s age is never a guarantee that you know how a child will think. The earliest is the sensorimotor stage which involves seeing, hearing, moving, touching, tasting and so on. During this period the infant develops object permanence which is an understanding that objects exist in the environment and whether the infant recognizes this.

The four stages of development of cognitive abilities

The second stage is the preoperational stage at which a major accomplishment is making action schemes symbolic. This means the child develops an ability to form and use symbols, words, gestures, signs, images, etc. Through the semiotic function the child can related to words and their pictures. Reversible thinking is difficult at this stage even though this is involved in many of the activities. There are issues with decentering which means focusing on more than one aspect at a time. The child also is ‘egocentric’ which means that the child assumes that you experience the same situations and the world as he/she does. Children also engage in collective monologue which is self-talk without any interaction from anyone else.

The concrete operations stage is the stage which gives the child a hands-on thinking. The child at this stages recognizes the physical world and that elements can be changed or transformed and still conserve many of their original characteristics. With a complete mastery of identify the child can understand that if nothing is added or taken away, the material remains the same and the understanding of the concept of compensation which the child knows that an apparent change in one direction can be compensated for by a change in another direction. Understanding of reversibility means that the child can acknowledge and cancel out the change that has been make. Through classification abilities that child can focus on a single characteristic in a group of objects. This concept is also related to reversibility, the ability to reverse a process mentally. Seriation is also the idea of making an orderly arrangement from large to small or vice versa. All these ideas, skills and cognitive abilities are associated with a child at concrete operational stage.

Formal operations is the final stage of development and it should be understood that most students remain at concerete operational stage during most of their school years. At this stage a person controls and manages a set of control variables and working through a set of possibilities in acquired. The previous skills are also exercised and formal thinking is reversible, internal and organized in a system of interdependent elements. Through hypothetico-deductive reasoning, a person at this stage can reason deductively from a general assumption to specific implications. Formal operations can also include inductive reasoning or using specific observations to identify general principles. Adolescent egocentrism unlike the egocentric child at concrete operational stage, do not deny that other people may have different perceptions and beliefs; they just become confused about their own thinking. This leads to a sense of imaginary audience; the feeling that you are in the limelight and everyone is watching you.

The process of knowledge acquisition:  times of equilibrium and disequilibrium called equilibration.

It is interesting to note that most psychologists agree that there is a level of thinking more sophisticated that concrete operations and the question of how universal formal-operational thinking actually is even among adults a matter of debate.

SO WHAT?

We should understand that in a given class at any grade the level of cognitive development and students academic knowledge will vary greatly. The teacher is to determine any problems and shortcomings related to prior learning or any issues with the current learning situation of children.

An important implication of Piaget’s theory of learning is the challenge of keeping students engaged. Disequilibrium as explained in this post earlier should exist just at the right proportion for children to learn through adaptation, assimilation and accommodation. Students understand the same teaching materials at different levels of their cognitive abilities. Therefore the teacher should provide a match for the student abilities for the maximum learning to take place.

Learning is a constructive process and therefore every teacher should try to engage students fully in the lesson. It is not only the mental processes that need to be stimulated by the lessons but also ideas that could arise out of practical sessions, experiments and things which are done practically. All students should be given the opportunity to share their thinking and to challenge themselves. Concrete experiences provide the raw materials for thinking and communicating with others makes the students use, test, and sometimes change their thinking abilities.

Are there anything else to consider?

There are some reservations as what Piaget has thought about the four stages. Some psychologists question if the four stages exist separately even though they think that children go through the changes that Piaget described.

There is a lack of consistency in children’s thinking. For example children may not be able to use the concept of conservation in every situation that they are exposed to. Further, children’s thinking appear discontinuous. For example object permanence may develop gradually as child’s memory develop. A psychologist named Siegler notes that these changes can be continuous and also discontinuous and he referred to catastrophe theory to explain this. Gradual changes may seem abrupt at times too. Some have described these abrupt changes physiologically by referring to the development of the brain in spurts. It has been shown through experiments on monkeys that they develop dramatic increases in their synaptic connections which are nerve connections that relate to the brain during the periods that they master the sensorimotor problems that Piaget has explained.

Piaget may have underestimated the abilities of young children when he thought that preschool children know up to the concept of numbers. Children may have been born with a greater set of cognitive abilities that what Paiget had thought. As we know Piaget’s theory does not explain to us how very young children can perform at an advanced level in certain areas where they have highly development knowledge and expertise, like music, handcraft, games and even academically. We have seen 7-9 year olds getting straight As at the IGCSE examination in the UK which are usually target at students who are 16 plus.