Kyle Lewis

Professor Bengi Sullu

PSY 3059
17 December, 2020
Literature Review: The Cognitive Maturation of Human Beings From Childhood to Adulthood

The lifespan development of human beings is an important psychological process in

which one’s life starts from birth and from then, the mind will mold and take form. The

questions in mind are this: how different and how similar is the cognitive development of human

beings from childhood to adulthood? How big or how small are the changes the in development

from childhood to adulthood? The cognitive development of a person during childhood will be

analyzed, and so will the cognitive development of a person during adulthood. The mind of a

child will be compared to the mind of an adult, which includes how people learn, contemplate

and overall process information. Specifically, the findings and literary works gathered will

convey those differences as well as similarities, and to what extent also. The cognitive changes

will also be relayed. All the sources utilized in this literature review are scholarly literary works

that are academic and scientific and consists of mostly peer-reviewed work.

How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School: Expanded Edition (2000) is a

book about the human brain and its development especially of people during childhood and is

very relevant regarding the cognitive development process. As in the title, major focuses of this

work include how children learn in a classroom environment, how they are taught, and various

examples of teaching and learning as well as other miscellaneous information that are related.

Adults are referred to briefly in this source, but most of the work is concentrated on children.

Humans do possess advanced cognitive skills at even a very young age as children, but the

detailed nuances of learning (as well as teaching) can differ from one person to another, and

those skills require practice and exercise to be improved upon further. Learning has its

foundations and new information is acquired not from nothing but from already established
concepts and ideas. Also, how children learn as well as how they are taught are also factors that

can impact their cognitive development. This source also goes into some depth regarding humans

who have learned and/or already obtained knowledge and even dives into historical context on

the process of learning itself. However, there is not much that focuses on the development of the

mind in adults, and the comparisons between one who has yet to learn and one who has learned

is discussed too little.

On Cognitive Development by John H. Flavell is very narrowly about the development of

the mind of a human being as a child as well as how the process of cognitive development

works. Many concepts related to cognitive development including Jean Piaget’s theory about

four different stages of development, acquisition of knowledge, and heterogeneity and

homogeneity are discussed. Information on cognitive development is mostly exclusive to the

childhood stage during development and growth of a human being, as well as the process of

cognitive development itself; there are mentions and references to other stages of one’s life

which further explains cognitive development. Identifying cognitive development as either a

“stagelike” or a “nonstagelike” process is also a very important element in this work of literature.

What stands out in this work is cognitive homogeneity and heterogeneity, and consistency. It is

suggested that at any point in one’s life, learning new information being constant across all ages

of person is possible. This source barely touches on cognitive development as an adult but does

compare cognitive abilities at different ages. Cognitive development is explained very

thoroughly, and connections are made to Piaget (Lev Vygotsky is even referred to sometimes).

“Cognitive Development Milestones” by Kendra Cherry is focused on the very early

years of growth of human beings (from birth to up to only five years of age), and the specific

cognitive skills from across different age gaps. Each age gap is also explained. This article is
very condensed and immediately gets to the topic it is about. It is not long but conveys a lot

about cognitive development very early on and breaks it down very clearly. Direct comparisons

and contrasts between childhood and adulthood are absent, but there are mentions of ample

cognitive skills that one acquires from birth to the age of five, skills that are applied at older

ages. Processing surroundings and telling apart one thing from another are among the skills that

people learn already as infants. This work conveys that humans learn as early as birth and learn a

lot of cognitive skills.

Beatriz Luna’s “Developmental Changes In Cognitive Control Through Adolescence” is

concentrated on cognitive development during the adolescence stage. Various cognitive-related

concepts and defined scientific terminology including “myelination” are talked about in this

source. A significant portion of this work is linked to maturation during adolescence, and the

work also gets very technical and complex. The recurring sentiment that permeates is that with

the adolescence stage of human beings, comes a more advanced and more mature mental state.

Functionality of the brain is also a major aspect. Comparisons and contrasts among adolescence,

childhood, and adulthood are used quite a bit in the source. Examination of the brain is also a

highlight including specifically neuroimaging and fRMI scans for analyses of the cognitive

growth of a human. There is a of exposition and context that provides details about maturation in

the brain during adolescence, but the information is there. It is conveyed that much of the

cognitive skills possessed during adolescence are also had during childhood (and even younger),

but those skills are not as refined or advanced. Adolescence is the between childhood and

adulthood and the remarkability of improvements of various cognitive techniques are stated in

the source.
 The Nature and Rate of Cognitive Maturation from Late Childhood to Adulthood (by

Jason A. Cromer, Adrian J. Schemberi, Brian T. Harel, and Paul Maruff) is about cognitive

maturation across late childhood and adulthood. This research paper is study of the process of

cognitive development in the aging period across a range of ages and documented an experiment.

The focuses of the study were how cognitive development progressed as aging went on. It was

found that across adolescence, cognitive development gradually ramped down slowly. The

process progressed much more rapidly at younger ages than older and the improvements of

cognitive abilities are more and more miniscule over time. This study is specialized to ages 10-

18, but some of the findings and what was learned can also apply to some extent outside of that

age range. The data gathered come in the form of not only text but imagery as well consisting of

charts and tables.

“Adult Cognitive Development: Dynamics in the Development Web” by Kurt Fischer,

Zheng Yan and Jeffrey Stewart is about as titulary mentioned explicitly, cognitive development

during adulthood and specifically the progression. Various theories are referenced including

Piaeget’s and the dynamic skill theory. Cognitive development in adults is also strongly

suggested to have multiple layers and an immensely wide variety of forms. Reference of other

ages and states of human growth are present to some extent, although comparisons and contrasts

involving them are absent. There is also a lack of reference of cognitive-related improvements as

an adult over adolescence, children and younger. However, a lot of charts, tables, graphs, and

imagery overall are present to support the information.

Hsiang-Ju Huang’s and Vicki Stemmons Mercer’s “Dual-Task Methodology:

Applications in Studies of Cognitive and Motor Performance in Adults and Children” consists of

assessing an applied system of techniques for a study focused on the cognitive performance (and
motor performance) of adults and children. Motor performance is connected to cognitive

performance by how executing tasks is based on how the situations and the surroundings of those

tasks are understood as signified. The dual-task method is defined in the article to be an

experiment involving subjects to perform two tasks simultaneously, and data is gathered and

interpreted based on how they handled both at once. The definition for it is provided in detail

first and foremost before proceeding with discussing both cognitive and motor skills, and the

experiment overall. Cognitive and motor performance of children are measured and weighed

against those of adults, and that data comes from the tasks that they execute. The effectiveness of

dual-task methodology was also discussed (which proved to be important and useful). Although

is there is more that still posited unanswered questions. It was found that humans at younger ages

are more prolonged and delayed with accomplishing various tasks (especially when doing so

simultaneously) while those that are older are quicker to handle them.

“Maturation of Pain Empathy from Child to Adult Shifts from Single to Multiple Neural

Rhythms to Support Interoceptive Representations” (by Jonathan Levy, Abraham Goldstein,

Maayan Pratt, and Ruth Feldman) relates empathy to cognitive development, and does so across

childhood and adulthood. This is a study in which the processing of pain across different

demographics based on age (children, adolescents, and adults) is analyzed (which involved

monitoring responses of the brain). There is quite a bit of imagery used in the source to present

the data visually, although most of information is text. The findings in the source indicated that

processing pain and overall empathy in children is much more primitive, while it is more

advanced in adults. The reported technique used (magnetoencephalography) maps activity in the

brain and was how the results came to be.

 Returning to the questions that set the direction of this review: how different is the

cognitive development of human beings from childhood to adulthood? How similar is the

process? How big or how small are the changes the in development from childhood to

adulthood? With all these literary works gathered and considered, overall findings contain

relevant information that answers those questions. All humans can undergo growth and

development in each of their own respective ways, and the maturation process can be like that of

some of the others also. Much of the cognitive abilities that one has during adulthood are

acquired at an extremely early age, although not with the improvements and refinements. Some

skills are certainly are not learned until later though. Cognitive development also progresses

much faster when younger than when older, although the actual process does not differ much

even when older. Humans are an advanced species which will be more evident over time and

even at very young ages, the potential for possessing more robust brains has been exhibited.