NAME: MAHAM JAMIL

ROLL NO: 1420

ASSIGNMENT: PRACTICAL WORK

EXPERIMENTATION IN DEVELOPMENTAL PSYCHOLOGY

DR.SYEDA SALMA HASAN

PROFESSOR
DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY
G.C UNIVERSITY
LAHORE
 Lack of Conservation in Preoperational Children

Problem: To study the different dimensions of Piaget’s conservation task with preoperational
child.

Introduction: The cognitive world of the preoperational children (2-7years) is very creative,

magical, Symbolic and prelogical. In this stage the children’s cognitive understanding of the

world improves. According to Piaget (2001) children organize their cognitive world by making

use of assimilation and accommodation processes. At preoperational stage, when children come

across new things, new information incorporates into their existing schemas through

assimilation. For instance, a child seeing a cow calls it a doggie, because his schema is restricted

to the labeling all animals as doggie, so he assimilates the cow (new information) with the label

doggie. As the child’s cognition confronts perceptual disequilibrium (cow is perceptually

different from a doggie) he learns a new label through the process of accommodation modifying

his existing schema, to bring back mental equilibrium (Santrock,2002, Bee,1994). Piaget (2001)

categorized these children in the preoperational stage of cognitive development, in which

children are unable to carry out operations that represent internalized actions, allowing them to

do mentally what they have done previously physically (Santrock, 2002). Children begin to

reason about the things and other experiences at this preoperational stage, signifying their

prelogical and irrational thinking patterns. That is why Piaget called a preoperational child

intuitive, because he seems so sure about his knowledge on one hand and is unsure of how he

knows and what he knows on the other hand (Santrock, 2002).

NOTE: These case studies conducted by Dr.Syeda Salma Hasan , G.C University, Lahore,
Dr. Aneeq Ahmad Hendersen State University, Arkadelphia, AR 71999, USA and Dr. M.
Asir Ajmal ,G.C University , Lahore were presented in Developmental Psychology
Conference,2012 and the Paper is in Press in the proceedings of the Developmental
Psychology Conference.
The specific characteristic of the preoperational child’s thinking is centration-focusing

only one characteristic of the object and excluding all the others, resulting in failure at

conservation tasks. Conservation task involves “awareness, that altering an object’s or substance

appearance does not change its basic properties” (Santrock, 2002, p.214). Piaget’s famous

experiment on conservation liquid exhibited that by pouring equal amounts of water in two wider

beakers lead the child to say, “yes, water is equal in two beakers”. However, when water from

one of the wider beakers was poured into a taller one, the child remarked, “there is more water in

the taller beaker now”. This led to the suggestion, that children mentally fail to reverse physical

actions performed externally. Piaget claimed that if a child failed at this task he would also fail at

conservation task of number, mass, length, and area.

Children at preoperational stage could not mentally reverse the actions. Not qualifying

the conservation tasks indicate that the children are at preoperational stage.

Hypothesis

Four year old child will lack conservation concept.

Sample

For our first study we solicited boy 4-years old in preoperational stage of cognitive

development through parental consent. The child had two brothers and two sisters, he is middle

born. He belonged to a nuclear family.

Instruments

To carry out different dimensions of the conservation task, for volume, we used two

regular glasses, a graduated cylinder (500 ml), 14 beans made out of plasticine clay, two balls of

plasticine clay, two lavender colored sticks with pink ends (32 cm long) and two marble slabs.
Procedure

To establish rapport with the child we asked him questions about his age, siblings and

preschool. When the experimenter (SSH) felt that the child was comfortable with her testing

began on a variety of Piagetian conservation tasks (as cited in Santrock, 2002) as described

below:

Conservation of Liquid. In this test, equal amounts of water were poured in two glasses

with the help of a graduated cylinder, and placed on a table in front and in plain sight of the

child. The child was then asked, “do these two glasses contain the same quantity of water?” To

which the child said “yes”. The water from one of the glass was then poured into the graduated

cylinder and asked, “Are the quantities of water the same in both glasses?” The child answered

“no”, and added that the level of water was fuller and higher in taller glass (by pointing to it)

than the wider glass (see picture 1).

Picture 1

At this point the experimenter poured the water back from the graduated cylinder into the

glass to make him understand that the amount of water stays the same. The child on seeing that

was still confused unable to understand how the water goes up in the taller beaker.

Conservation of Number. The two identical rows of seven beans were laid out in front

of the child. The spacing between two beans was roughly kept at a distance of .5 cm. The child
was asked whether the two rows of beans have equal number of beans? The child replied “yes”.

Then the experimenter spread out the beans in the second row, making the space between two

beans roughly equaling 1.5 cm, and asked, “Are there equal number of beans in two rows?” To

which the child said, “no, the second row has more” and pointed to it (see picture 2).

Picture 2

The experimenter showed him that the number beans did not change remained the same

for the short and long rows. The child counted seven beans in both rows and understood that the

two rows contained the same number of beans.

Conservation of Matter. We showed two rounded balls of plasticine clay to the child,

and asked, “do these balls have equal amounts of Plasticine in them?” and he said, “yes” then

one of the ball was elongated to look like a snake, in front of the child. When questioned again,

the child said the ball that turned into a snake was bigger because it was longer. On making him

to realize that the amount of clay stayed the same and nothing was added or taken away the child

nodded in affirmative realizing that amount of matter stayed the same.

Conservation of Length. For this test the child was shown two sticks of equal length

placed in parallel in front of him aligned end-to-end. To the question, “are they equal in length?”

the child said “yes”. But when the experimenter extended the top stick leftwards of the child, he

remarked, “the upper stick was longer than the one at the bottom, because it was higher

(extended)”. The experimenter made attempts to make him understand that both sticks are of
equal size but he continued to say, “no the upper is longer” (see picture 3).

Picture 3

Conservation of Area. To test whether the child could accomplish conservation of area,

we showed him two marble slabs in vertical orientation. When the child asked, “do they cover

the same area?” The child replied, “yes”. Turing the orientation of one of the slab in the

horizontal direction made the child reply with “no” to the question, “do they cover the same

area?” and added that the slab in a horizontal position is covering more area as it is resting. The

experimenter tried to make him understand the concept of conservation of area but the child said

the slab in horizontal was resting therefore covering more area (see picture 4)

Picture 4

Results

The observations made in the above tests support the idea that 4-year old children have

difficulty performing conservation tasks.

Table 1

Four year old child’s performance on Piaget’s conservation tasks

Tasks Responses Reason Response

Volume More water in cylinder It goes up Confused
Number The spread out row has more beans They seem to cover more Nodded
space
Mass Elongated shape has more clay It is greater in length Nodded
Upper stick is longer
Length It is on the upper side Unable to understand
Area Horizontal slab covers more area It is resting Unable to understand

Discussion

The observational study supports the Piaget’s description of the specific characteristics of

the child in preoperational stage of cognition; he focuses on one characteristics of the object and

excludes all the others. Keeping in view the results of this case study we can say that children of

4-years centre their attention on only one particular characteristic, which restrict their perceptual

ability and results in failure at some of the conservation tasks. On the other hand this case study

partially supports the Gelman (1969) and Gelman and Williams (1998) viewpoint that training

sessions can help the child to move from lower stage to higher stage of cognitive development.

As in this case study when child was shown that how conservation tasks were carried out he

indicated the understanding of conservation of matter and number where as he failed to develop

the understanding of conservation of length and area.

This study also supports that Piaget’s conservation is presented as a conservation of

identity than as a conservation of equivalence and this alters the perceptual field of the child.

The child anticipates that the appearance would remain the same and gets confused when the

appearance of the substance changes (Elkind, 1969). This study showed that it is easier for the

child to develop the understanding of the conservation of number than the other conservation
dimensions. The understanding of conservation of number is good due to informal learning by

the parents as they teach young children counting, alphabets etc., before their children begin their

formal elementary schooling. The case study indicated a very interesting picture with regards

conservation of length, when the upper stick was moved leftwards the child said that it is longer

because it is high which indicated that the concept of longer is not clear to the child by longer he

means higher. Similarly, another interesting response he gave when we tested him on the

conservation of area the child said that horizontal slab covers more area because it is “resting and

laid ’’whereas the vertical slab is “standing” and covers less area.

The child gained the concept of conservation of number and matter when explained how

the substance stays the same. So we can say that training sessions can enable the child to pay

attention to other aspects of the object and it modifies his mental schemas. On the other hand

conservation task which he was unable to understand showed that he did not experience mental

dis equilibrium otherwise he would have tried to accommodate the new information to attain a

mental equilibrium state.

This observational case study of a 4-years old child also indicated that because of their

elementary language skills they fail to explain their responses more appropriately. On the basis

of our observations we can say that Piaget masterfully presents his concepts for the scholar of the

cognitive development of younger children.

Conclusion

We conclude that the conservation of liquid, length and area could not be inculcated in
this young child. However, explanations to conservation of number and matter tasks were met
with affirmative nods, pointing to a possibility of learning and understanding on some
dimensions of conservation tasks at this early stage.
Simple logical operations with concrete operational children.
Problem: To study the simple logical operations with concrete operational children.

Introduction:

Children in concrete operational stage can carry out simple logical tasks, like mentally

reversing actions, classifying and arranging objects, and understanding the underlying relations

in transitivity tasks to derive conclusions. They can easily perform seriation tasks by arranging

the objects from the shortest to the tallest or vice versa. They can also understand the

interrelationships among family members, and can pay attention to several characteristics of the

object under scrutiny (Santrock, 2002). Children who pass the tests of conservation qualify for

the concrete operational stage, and this usually happens by age 7, when children make

sophisticated observations and develop an understanding of the basic properties of the objects in

question (Santrock,2002) their ability to cognize the invariance of the substance in pre- and post-

transformations improves (Halford & Boyle, 1985).

Hypothesis: Children at concrete operational Stage can perform simple logical activities.

Sample

In this study we used one boy, 7-years old, and one girl 10-years old in their early and

late phase of concrete operational stage.

Instruments

Instruments included pictures of animals, stickers, chart of family generation tree and

other transitivity problems.

Procedure

The two children were tested individually; order of testing for the two was the same that
is they were first tested on classification, followed by seriation and transitivity. They were asked

questions about their siblings, parents and school to put them at ease.

Classification. Children were shown the pictures of animals (Picture 5 and 6). They were

asked to classify these pictures into three categories of farm animals, domestic animals and

Jungle animals. The children correctly classified the animals into three categories. The 7-year

old boy took more time than the 10 year old girl.

Pictures 5 and 6

Table 2:

Classification of animals into different categories by the subjects.

Farm Animals Domestic Animals Jungle Animals

Horse Cat Lion
Cow Dog Tiger
Goat Parrot Elephant
Giraffe

Family Generation Tree. In this task children had to explain the relationship among the four-

generation family members. The children were shown a family generation tree (Pictures 7 and 8).

This model was developed by (Furth & Wachs, 1975 as cited in Santrock, 2002). They were told
that Mr. A has three sons B, C and D all married. Each son in turn had two children (E, F, G, H,

I, and J). And that one of the child (I) of Mr. D was also married. The children were asked to

describe the relationships between family members, in particular, relationship of Mr. D has in the

four generation family. The children were asked to describe the relationship of Mr. I with Mr. A,

Mr. C, Mr. D and Mr. K; Ms. L and Mr. M. The children correctly explained the relationship

among the family members of the four generation tree and they correctly explained that Mr. D at

the same time was a son, a father, a grandfather and a brother.

Pictures 7 and 8

Seriation. We asked the children to arrange the sticks in ascending order (Pictures 9 and

10). Both performed seriation tasks easily.

 Pictures 9 and 10

Transitivity. The children were asked to infer the tallest character from the shortest. The

Boy was asked: Tauseef is taller than the Ahmad, and Ahmad is taller than Iqran. Who is the

tallest of them? He took longer time in understanding the quantitative dimension of the task but

answered correctly Tauseef. Similarly, 10-years old girl was asked Saba is taller than Zara and

Zara is taller than Sarah. Who is the tallest of all? She replied Saba is the tallest.

Results

Table 3:

Performance of children at concrete operational stage on simple logical tasks.

Cognitive task 7-year old Boy 10-year old girl

Classification of animals Yes Yes
Four generation Family Tree Yes Yes
Seriation Yes Yes
Transitivity Yes (Slower) Yes (Faster)

The experiment showed that younger children could perform simple logical activities. It

also showed that according to Piaget seven years mark the beginning of the concrete operational

stage and a child who just has entered into the seventh year of his life can perform successfully at

simple logical activities.

 Discussion

The findings support the Piaget’s theory that concrete operational stage can easily

perform successfully simple logical activities. At this age they can arrange, classify and

understand relations in transitivity problems. The case study supports (Dougherty & Ray, 2007;

Piaget & Inhelder 1969; Piaget, 1962) that by seven years children participate in games which

make them to develop understanding of social realities. The case studies indicated that children

in concrete operational stage find it easier to carry out the classification and seriation tasks. This

shows that at this stage child improves their mental schemas by accommodating the information.

The study strongly supports that children in concrete operational stage can understand the

underlying relations in transitivity task to derive conclusions (Santrock, 2002). However, the

study showed that 7-year-old boy was slower than the 10-year-old girl on transitivity task,

suggesting that this task may be more difficult than others at an early phase of development than

later.

The observational studies showed that by seven years a child qualifies the simple logical

activities, which is the onset of concrete operational stage. Both studies indicated that children

have the understanding of the role-relationship in a four-generation family tree. Keeping in view

the understanding of subjects regarding different familial roles we can say that this could be

because of our collectivistic culture where the close relationships are closely knitted and valued

since childhood.

Conclusions

These case studies strongly support the Piaget’s conceptual framework of concrete operational

stage and his assumptions about cognitive ability of this stage. We conclude that Pakistani

children in concrete operational stage performed without errors on all the tasks.
 The case studies support Piaget’s theory which postulates that when preoperational

children represent objects symbolically their thinking is hampered by one-way logic as reversible

thinking is weak in them. On the other hand, concrete operational children can perform simple

logical tasks but demands “hands on thinking ”. Their world is tied with the physical existence of

objects .At concrete operational stage children find it challenging to engage in abstract

hypothetical problem solving tasks which later becomes easier when they enter into the formal

operational thinking stage (Woolfolk,1998).

References

Dougherty, J., & Ray, D. (2007). Differential impact of play therapy on developmental

levels of children. International Journal of Play Therapy, 16(1), 2-19.

Elkind, D. (1969). Piaget’s conservation problems. Journal of Child Development, 38(1),

15-27

Gelman, R. (1969). Conservation acquisition: A problem of learning to attend to relevant

attributes. Journal of Experimental Psychology Child Psychology 7, 67-87.

Gelman, R., &Williams, E. (1998). Enabling constraints for cognitive development and

learning : Domain specificity and epigenesist. In D Kuhn and R. Siegler (Eds.).

Cognition, perception and language. Vol.2. Handbook of Child Psychology (5th ed). (pp.

575-630). W. Damon, Editor in Chief; New York: John Wiley and Sons.

Halford, G. S & Boyle, F. M. (1985). Do young children understand conservation of number.

Child Development, 56(1),165-176.

Harris, P. L & Basset, E. (1975). Transitive inferences by-year-old children. Developmental

Psychology, 11(6), 875-876.

Piaget, J. (1962). Play, dreams and imitation in childhood. New York: Norton.

Piaget, J. (2001). Studies in Reflecting Abstraction. Hove, UK: Psychology Press.

Piaget, J. & Inhelder,B. (1969). The psychology of the child. New York: Basic Books.

Pervaiz, M. (1992). Concrete operational thought as a construct and its relevance to school

education in Pakistan. PhD thesis. National Institute of Psychology.

Price-Williams, D., Gordon, W., & Ramirez M. III. (1969). Skills and Conservation:

A study of pottery-making children. Developmental Psychology, 1(6) 769.

Santrock, J. W. (2002). Life-Span Development. (8th ed). Boston: McGraw Hill Company.

Vygotski, L. S. (1963). Learning and mental development at school age (J. Simon, Trans.). In B.

Simon & J. Simon (Eds.), Educational psychology in the U.S.S.R. (pp. 21-34). London:

Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Hypothetical Deductive Reasoning in Adolescents

Problem: is to study the hypothetical deductive reasoning ability of adolescents.

Introduction: human development characterize adolescence as a period of an

Awakening of new, powerful, and pervasive abilities and talents. Such was the claim of G.

Stanley Hall (1904, cited in Grinder 1967, p. 358) who noted that “adolescence is… the only

Point of departure for the super anthropoid that man is to become". Similarly, Piaget (1972;

Inhaler & Piaget, 1958) held that adolescence is the period in which new and powerful forms of

Reasoning emerges. The definition highlights three general components: recruiting the

imagination, making inferences about imagined states of affairs, and interpreting the real world

consequences of the states imagined. Hypothetical Thinking as the process of generating

hypotheses, arguments, fictions, alternative event Sequences, or pretend scenarios involves the

imagination. . Piaget believed that what he referred to as "hypothetical-deductive reasoning" was

essential at this stage of intellectual development. At this point, teens become capable of thinking

about abstract and hypothetical ideas. They often ponder "what-if" type situations and questions

and can think about multiple solutions or possible outcomes. Science and mathematics often

require this type of thinking about hypothetical situations and concepts. . The individual will

approach problems in a systematic and organized manner, rather than through trial-and-error.

Instruments: 30 colored pictures.

Procedure: A boy of 15 years was given a very simple task of verbal reasoning. The

experimenter verbally explained that Jamal is taller than Kamal and Kamal is taller than Salman

which is the tallest of all .He correctly answered Jamal. After that he was tested on a hypothetical

task to identify the picture that an experimenter carries in his mind. The subject was shown thirty

pictures colored pictures of different objects. These 30 pictures were arranged in five rows and

each row consisted of 6 pictures. The hypothetical thinkers can guess it correctly in six or seven
questions. The experimenter answered the subject’s questions only in Yes OR No. The Subject

correctly identified the picture in six questions.

RESULTS

Questions asked by the subject to guess the picture the experimenter carries in his mind

Questions Answers

Is it an animal? Yes
Is it a pet? No
Does it live in Water? No
Does it live in Jungle? Yes
Is it a Leapord Yes

Discussion: Theoretical reasoning is a transformative capacity, empowering teenagers to

comprehend reality in light of conceivable outcomes, in this way accomplishing what Inhaler and

Piaget (1958) proposed to be interestingly procured by and transformative for teenagers:

subjecting reality to potential outcomes. In the above examination the kid was given anerrand of

verbal thinking which he addressed effectively.

After that the experimenter gave him 30 pictures and asked him do think about what picture was

in his psyche. Subsequent to posing 6 inquiry the kid had the option to figure the image

effectively. These discoveries distinguish the improvement of abilities to manage double logical

and Experiential procedures, regarded important for objective and efficient speculative

reasoning. In this way, we presume that the kid had the option to theoretically derive the

outcomes which demonstrate that young people are speculative deductive masterminds.
Conclusion

This experiment led us to conclude that adolescents are hypothetical deductive thinkers.

Reference

Santrock, J. W. (2002). Life-Span Development. (8th ed). Boston: McGraw Hill Company.

Symbolic Activity in Children

Problem: To examine the symbolic activity of a 4 year old child in substitute pretend play.

Introduction:  Symbolic activity is the ability of children to use objects, actions or ideas to

represent other objects, actions, or ideas as play. Play is regaining its importance in preschool

education. Despite the numerous definitions of play proposed by various authors using different
criteria, all have in common the recognition of the importance of play for children's development

and learning, especially in the preschool period (Moyles, 1995). Piaget divided a child’s

cognitive development into four periods or stages, by age. At around 18 months of age, children

use one object to represent another object and engage in one or two simple actions of

pretend play. Symbolic play continues to evolve and become increasingly complex throughout

childhood. Symbolic activities describe the flow of computations disregarding actual conditions

on processes execution, i.e. constraints on interactions with actual contexts are ignored. They

may include symbolic interactions as the origin or destination of flows as far as they can be

performed in isolation. Play consists of activities performed for self-amusement that have

behavioral, social, and psychomotor rewards. Play is directed towards the child, and the rewards

come from within the individual child; it is enjoyable and spontaneous” Symbolic play in

children can usually be observed during the beginning of the second year of life and it has been

linked through the studies and experiments to the cognitive problem solving skills, creative

abilities, and emotional well-being. The child may pretend to play using an object to represent

other objects, playing without any objects and pretending that they are indeed present. Or the

child may pretend to be someone else and imitate adults and experiment what it means to be an

adult in a role they are exposed to in their surrounding environment.

Hypothesis:

A 4 year old child can understand the transformations of physical environment into symbolic

one.

Subject: 4 year old child.

Instrument:

Probe questions, warm up exercises and Stories.

Procedure:

Experimenter asked three types of questions probe questions, warm up exercises and practice

syllogism. Experimenter asked the child about the animals. After that the child did some warm

up exercises. The child gave all the answers correctly and was able to imagine the different

scenes that the experimenter asked him to do.

Results

Probe Questions Responses

What is the color of the cat? Black& White

What do horse Eat? Grass

How do Elephants move? With his foot

Where do fish live ? water

Imaginary Warm up Excercises

Can you imagine the horse? Yes
Can you imagine horse flying? Yes
Is Horse flying on earth or Sky? Sky
Syllogism questions
All horses eat grass, Can you imagine a Yes

horse eating grass?

Tell me what does horse eat? Grass
Now in a story , salman is a horse? Can Yes

you make a picture of salman as a horse? Yes

Now tell who is Salman ? Horse
Does salman eat grass or pizza? Grass
What is the character of salman in the Horse

story?
Discussion: In the test, unmistakably the kid comprehended everything that the experimenter let

him know. The youngster offered all the responses accurately and had the option to envision the

various scenes that the experimenter requested that he do. All answers of the youngster lived up

to our desires. Above all else, when he was asked test inquiry, he got them and reacted in the

normal way. At that point he had the option to envision a flying pony. He likewise envisioned

Salman as a pony when he was advised to do as such. He didn't mixed up Salman as a human

and told the experimenter that in the event that Salman is a pony, at that point he would eat grass.

These answers show that a 4-year-old youngster can comprehend the changes of physical

condition into emblematic one as clear from the above models. This test additionally reveals to

us that speculation of replacements happen in kids considerably after the intercession meeting of

break.

Conclusion: We conclude that 4 year old children can engage in symbolic substitute plays.

Reference:

Shamrock, J. W. (2002). Life-Span Development. (8th ed). Boston: McGraw Hill Company.

Counterfactual thinking and Future Hypothetical Thinking in Children

Problem: To examine the ability of a 5 year old child to engage in counterfactual thinking and

future hypothetical thinking.

Introduction: Counterfactual thinking is a form of thinking that considers alternative

possibilities for an event or behavior in the past. Counterfactual thinking has an adaptive

Significance for humans in that it allows us to learn from past negative experiences and to avoid
negative outcomes in the future (Byrne, 2005, Byrne, 2016, Epstude and Roese, 2008).

Moreover, counterfactual thinking has an important role in children’s cognitive development.

Counterfactual thinking during early childhood is closely associated with the following key

abilities. 5- and 6-year-olds find it difficult to use counterfactual thinking and that the

development of counterfactual thinking is a long-term process. At around the age of 4 years,

realistic counterfactuals appear in children’s everyday speech (Kuczaj & Daly, 1979), and at

around this age (e.g., Riggs et al., 1998) or even earlier (e.g., Harris et al., 1996) children can

entertain realistic counterfactuals in experimental settings. There are two types of counterfactual

thoughts, downward and upward. Downward counterfactuals are thoughts about how the

situation could have been worse; and people tend to have a more positive view of the actual

outcome. Upward counterfactuals are thoughts about how the situation could have been better.

Hypothesis: A 5 year old child can think about the counterfactual and future hypothetical

possibilities.

Procedure:

The child was seated comfortably. The experimenter asked him about his family, siblings and

school to develop rapport with the child. The experimenter told him the two stories based on

counterfactual and future hypothetical possibilities respectively. After that experimenter asked

the child questions related to counterfactual and future hypothetical possibilities to determine his

ability to reflect on multiple possibilities. The experimenter noted down the responses of the

children.

Results

Story I

Salman was making a picture of a house . He was sitting in the house garden. His mother
called him to attend his friend’s phone call. He left the picture on the table.He went inside

the house to attend the call in the mean while the wind blew and the picture got stuck in the

tree.

Story 2

Ali studies in a school which has two gates, front and the back gate. One day ali’s father

went to pick him from the school . He stood at the front gate for 45 minutes but ali came

out from the back gate.

Results

Questions Responses
Story 1 On the table

If wind had not blown where would be the

Picture of a house.
Story 2 At the back gate

At which gate ali’s father should wait if he

comes next time to pick him from school

Discussion: In the investigations revealed above, we inspected the connection between

youngsters' considering prospects in these two unique conditions. In the two analyses the

youngster reacted and informed us regarding the conceivable outcomes. There is motivation to

anticipate that future hypotheticals and counterfactuals should be connected being developed. It

is certain in considering what could practically have been the situation (in the model over, ''Ali's

dad ought to have held up at the other gate''), that there was a point in the past when either the

counterfactual occasion or the real occasion could have happened. Correspondingly, it is certain

in pondering how to maintain a strategic distance from a similar issue next time (where would it
be advisable for him to stand by tomorrow?). Likewise, in the other trial it is apparent that the

youngster had the option to consider future speculative prospects. Based on this investigation, we

may expect that kids take part in counterfactual or future speculative reasoning just on the off

chance that they can distinguish the arrangement of conceivable outcomes managed by restricted

data.

Conclusion

We conclude that 5 year old child can engage in counterfactual and future hypothetical thinking.

Reference

McNamara, P., Durso,R., Brown, A. & Lynch, A. (2003). Counterfactual cognitive deficit in

persons with parkinson’s disease. Journal of Neurosurg Psychiatry,74, 1065-1070

Beck,S.R.,Robinson,E.J.,Caroll,D.J.&Apperly,I.A.(2006). Children’s Thinking About

Counterfactuals and Future Hypotheticals as Possibilities. Child Development,

77,( 2) Pages 413 – 426

Moral Development

Problem: To examine the moral reasoning stage of the subject with reference to Kohlberg’s

theory of moral development.

Introduction:  Lawrence Kohlberg (1958) agreed with Piaget's (1932) theory of moral

development in principle but wanted to develop his ideas further. He believed follows a series of
stages. Kohlberg defined three levels of moral development: preconventional, conventional,

and post conventional. During the preconventional level, a child’s sense of morality is externally

controlled. Children accept and believe the rules of authority figures, such as parents and

teachers, and they judge an action based on its consequences during the conventional level, an

individual’s sense of morality is tied to personal and societal relationships. Children continue to

accept the rules of authority figures, but this is now because they believe that this is necessary to

ensure positive relationships and societal order during the post conventional level, a person’s

sense of morality is defined in terms of more abstract principles and values. People now believe

that some laws are unjust and should be changed or eliminated. Drawing on the Kantian

rationalist tradition, most early moral psychologists posited that morality is based on reasoning

and develops through the maturation of children’s cognitive functions as the child interacts

socially (Kohlberg, 1969; Piaget, 1932; Turiel, 1998), though others like Bandura (1986) in the

social-leaning theory of moral development emphasize the importance of adult reinforcement

and imitation. In line with the rationalist perspective (Figure 1a), Piaget (1932), the pioneer in

the study of moral development, investigated the development of children's moral competencies

by probing their ability to justify their judgments about moral dilemmas.

Hypothesis: Adolescents’ morally reason in a conventional manner.

Instrument: Questionnaire

Procedure:

An eighteen year old boy served as a subject. The experimenter gave him the questionnaire and

asked him to choose one option out of six options and he was asked to give reason why he

selected this option. He selected option 4 and said that we obey the rule because it is the law.
After that the experimenter analyzed his answer in the light of kohlberg’s theory of moral

development.

Results

Why Obey a Rule ?

Which of the options you think describe that why you obey the rule.

1. So I won’t get hurt. Preconventional stage 1 Heteronomous morality”

2. Because it will pay off later Preconventional Stage 2 “Individualism, instrumental purpose

and exchange”

3. Because my friends wants me to obey. Conventional Stage 3“Mutal

interpersonal,expectations ,relationships and interpersonal conformity”

4. Because it’s the law. Conventional stage 4 Social System Morality”

5. Because obeying the rule is in the best interest of most of our society. Stage 5Post

conventional level. Stage5 Social Contract or utility and individuals’ rights”

6. Its an abstract, universal rule tht I have to live with,because its fair and just if it was not I

would not follow it. Stage6 “Universal Ethical Principles”

Give reason for choosing the option.

(Jolley & Mitchell, 1996, p.275)

Discussion: Keeping in see Kohlberg's hypothesis of Moral Development we realize that during

the regular level, a person's feeling of ethical quality is attached to individual and cultural

relationship. Where ethical quality is the acknowledgment of the differentiation between great or

evil or among good and bad, regard for and compliance to the principles of right lead; the

psychological attitude or normal for carrying on in a way planned to deliver great outcomes.

Kids keep on tolerating the guidelines of power figures, yet this is on the grounds that they
accept this is important to guarantee positive connections and cultural request. As for this

situation study we could see that when the kid was offered the decision to go for any response,

he picked the fourth alternative that is '. Since it's the law' which demonstrates that young people

are inflexible during this stage and hold fast to rules and shows.

Also, this examination bolsters the way that most dynamic individuals from the general public

stay at stage four, where profound quality is transcendently directed by an outside power, 'the

Law' in the above investigation.

Conclusion
Adolescent’s moral reasoning is influenced by the rules, laws and justice systems of the society.

Reference

Santrock, J. W. (2002). Life-span Development. (8th ed). Boston: McGraw Hill Company.

Jolley,J.M.,&Mitchell,M.L. (1996).Life span development.Chicago:Brown&Beuchpublishers.