PIAGET’S THEORY OF

CHILD
DEVELOPMENT
HASNA AZIZAH-20202241063
SUKMA ALJANNATA-20202241069
KHARISMA MAULIDA-20202241075
DEWI MUMPUNI-20202244107
PIAGET’S THEORY OF CHILD
DEVELOPMENT
• He offered a systematic approach
to the study of children’s thinking
and development from birth to
adulthood.
• Piaget’s theory grew out of careful
observations of his own children
and his interest in identifying
aspects of child development that
might be universal.
• He defined intelligence as a basic
life function that helps organism to
adapt to their environment.
Piaget’s
Concept
 Organisation: interacting with the environment, mental structured created, then combined.
 Adaptation: comparing and adjusting developmental scemes to match what they
encounter in their environment.
 Adaptation: assimilation and accommodation
 Assimilation: interpreting new knowledge in terms of old models/schemes they already
possess.
 Accommodation: modifying the exsisting structures to fit the new knowledge.
 Piaget’s Stages Of Development
 Stage 1 0–2 years: sensori-motor stage Stage 2 2–7 years: pre-operational stage
 Repetitive motor habits (e.g. kicking)
 Animism (attributing lifelike qualities to
inanimate things, such as teddy bears)
 Goal-oriented behaviour (e.g. reaching out to grab)
 Egocentrism (seeing the world from one’s
 Active curiosity (e.g. trying to put a block inside own point of view without appreciating
another one)
others’)
 Imitation (e.g. actions of adult, accompanying a  Centration (attending to one aspect of a
jointly recited nursery rhyme) task only)
 Object permanence (e.g. looking for an object where
it was last seen)
Pre Operational Stage: 2-7 year old
Piaget characterised these children as ‘ego-centric’, unable to imagine
any other perspectives but their own and they lack of ability to
‘conserve’.
 ‘Three mountain experiment’

Children under the age of 7 were asked what the doll could see and
tended to describe their own view rather than the doll’s view, and
they consistently responded that the doll could see the big mountain
(in front of him).
 Conserve

When water is poured from a short wide glass into a long narrow glass, most pre-
operational children say that the amount of the water changed, as perceptually the level is
higher in the first container, which is the taller and narrower one.
Games
Gamesand
andDrama
Drama
Children between the ages of 2 and 7 make Games and drama activities can stimulate
important progress in their development, these children’s language development,
they enjoy and participate effectively in creative imagination, and willingness to take
repetitive games where the same scenario is on playful roles.
acted out over and over again. ‘Make
believe’ play, which over time becomes
more complex, develops into socio-dramatic
play.
 Conclusion on pre -
operational stage

They cannot understand complicated instructions and they cannot work with tasks that
require coordinating perspectives, evaluating options or reasoning in a formal manner. They
enjoy spontaneous language play (Nicholas and Lightbown 2008) and simple, repetitive
tasks, games and stories.
 Stage 3 7–11: concrete operational stage
At age 7: intellectual revolution (Wood 1998: 23)
 Operational thought (ability to think in a logical
fashion)
 Using analogy competently (If A is smaller than
B and C is smaller than B, then . . .)
 Full emergence of symbolic thought (e.g. an
ability to make one thing stand for another, i.e. a
map for a town)
 Reversibility and conservation (e.g. mentally
undo/change back an action)
Appreciating causality (reasoning from particular
to particular)
Development of hierarchical classification (e.g.
putting furniture and chair together rather than chair
and breakfast)
 De-centration (ability to deal with more than one
aspect of a task)
 A gradual loss of/decline in egocentricity
 Relational logic (mentally order a set of stimuli
along a dimension)
 The Concrete Operational Stage Ages: 7 to 11 Years
Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes
 During this stage, children begin to thinking logically
about concrete events
 They begin to understand the concept of conservation; that
the amount of liquid in a short, wide cup is equal to that in
a tall, skinny glass, for example
 Their thinking becomes more logical and organized, but
still very concrete
 Children begin using inductive logic, or reasoning from
specific information to a general principle
 Children become less egocentric
 Children 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 Ages: 12 and up

Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes:

 At this stage, the adolescent or young adult begins to think abstractly and reason about
hypothetical problems
 Abstract thought emerges
 Teens begin to think more about moral, philosophical, ethical, social, and political issues
that require theoretical and abstract reasoning
 Begin to use deductive logic, or reasoning from a general principle to specific information
Example study 1.1 Shaffer (1973): Differences
between concrete operational and formal operational
thought

A study by Shaffer (1973) compared concrete operational and formal operational children’s
responses to the same task. The task is how humans might benefit from a third eye and they were
asked to draw some innovative solutions.
 Most younger children (9-year-olds in the concrete operational stage) drew a third eye in the
middle of the forehead, between the two eyes and did not think of extra functions for it.
 Older children (13-year-olds, in the formal operational stage) were more creative, suggesting
interesting new functions for the third eye, such as hiding it behind the hair at the back of your
head, so that you can see things behind your back.
Formal operational children were much more adept at generating more abstract and hypothetical
solutions than were the younger children.
Criticism of Piaget

Piagetian’s Stages that were criticised the most :

- The Pre-Operational Stage

- The Formal Operational Stage

Why?
Because Piaget were too harsh and underestimated children and overestimated young
adolescents.
What was the problem with Piaget’s pre-operational children?

Donaldson (1978) Proposed :

- The language of the experiments was unnatural and difficult to understand.
- The questions used in the experimental tasks were ambiguous and confused children.
- The task were never heard and rarely happened in daily life.
- Lack of understanding between the experimenter adult and the child.
Based on Donaldson Claims,
We Can Conclude :
- Children may be able to think in logical ways if the tasks are made meaningful and the
instructions are clear.
- ‘egocentrism’ is not just a young child specific phenomenon. It is more a ‘mode of
thinking’.
- When we’re familiar with the context, fully understand and have sufficient esperience, we
are more likely to demonstrate ‘non-egocentric’ ways of thinking.
 On ‘Ego-Centrism’

Donaldson (1978) was claimed that we’re all ego-centric through the whole of our lives in
some situations and very well able to decentre in others.
Piaget wouldn’t disagree with the claim. The dispute is only about the extent and the
developmental significance of egocentrism in early childhood.
 On The Differences Between
Pre-operational and Operational Children

The differences are not quite as significant as was suggested by Piaget and his collegues.
The supposed abrupt change around the age of 7 seems more likely to be a gradual,
cotinuous change, in that older children can achieve higher levels of within-stage consisteny
with fewer ‘decalages’.
Why Piaget’s assessment on the Formal Operational stage has also
been criticized?

- Even adult can be ‘tricked into’ giving the wrong answer in an operational problem-
solving task. (Winer, Craig and Weinbaum 1992)
- Adult do not always think according to the rules of formal logic. (Wood (1998) and
Donaldson (1978))
- There is plenty evidence suggesting that development is nowhere near complete by 12
years of age.
 On Developments Beyond The Formal Operational
Stage

Despite these criticisms, Piaget’s legacy still lives on.

It is because even though Piaget’s claim seem over-confident regarding adolescent thought,
there’s plenty of evidence coming from other research to suggest that important
developments take place around puberty (age 11-13). (Wood 1998:200)
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