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A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development, 7th edition John W. Santrock
Cognitive Development
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Piaget’s theory stresses that children actively construct their own knowledge of the world
Create mental structures to help us adapt to our world
Discusses systematic changes in children’s thinking
Processes of development:
Schemes
Actions or mental representations that organize knowledge
Assimilation
Children use existing schemes to incorporate new information
Accommodation
Adjusting schemes to fit new information and experiences
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Organization
Grouping isolated behaviors and thoughts into higher-order, more smoothly functioning cognitive system
Continual refinement of organization is a part of development
Equilibration
How children shift from one stage of thought to the next
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Sensorimotor Stage:
Lasts from birth to 2 years
Infants construct an understanding of world by coordinating sensory experiences (such as seeing and hearing) with physical, motor actions
6 Substages:
Simple reflexes
First month after birth
Sensation and action are coordinated through reflexive behaviors
Infant begins to produce behaviors that resemble reflexes in absence of the usual stimulus
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
First habits and primarily circular reactions
Develops between 1-4 months of age
Coordinate sensation with:
Habit – scheme based on a reflex that has become completely separated from its eliciting stimulus
Primary circular action – scheme based on attempt to reproduce an event that initially occurred by chance
Habits and circular reactions are stereotyped – repeated the same way each time
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Secondary circular reaction
Between 4-8 months of age
Infants become more object-oriented, moving beyond preoccupation with the self
Secondary circular reactions are when schemes are repeated because of their consequences
Infant also imitates simple actions and physical gestures of others
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Coordination of secondary circular reactions
Between 8-12 months of age
Infant coordinates vision and touch, hand and eye
Actions become more outwardly directed
Infant readily combines and recombines previously learned schemes in a coordinated way
Presence of intentionality
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Tertiary circular reactions, novelty, and curiosity
Between 12-18 months of age
Tertiary circular reactions are schemes in which an infant purposely explores new possibilities with objects, continually doing new things to them and exploring the results
Internalization of schemes
Between 18-24 months of age
Infant develops ability to use primitive symbols
Symbol – internalized sensory image or word that represents an event
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Object permanence Example
Understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be seen, heard, or touched
Important accomplishment made during first year of infancy
A-not-B error Example
Occurs when infants make mistake of selecting a familiar hiding place (A) rather than a new hiding place (B) as they progress into substage 4 of sensorimotor stage
Older infants are less likely to make this error because their concept of object permanence is complete
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Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Perceptual development and expectation
Several theorists argue that infants’ perceptual abilities are highly developed very early in life
Presence of certain cognitive abilities much earlier than Piaget’s theory predicts
Evidence that infants see objects as bounded, unitary, solid, and separate from their background, possibly at birth or shortly thereafter
Definitely by 3 or 4 months of age
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Core knowledge approach
Infants are born with domain-specific innate knowledge systems
Space, number sense, object permanence, language
Strongly influenced by evolution, infants are prewired to make sense of their world
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Preoperational Stage
Lasts from approximately 2 to 7 years of age
Children begin to represent the world with words, images, drawings
Form stable concepts and begin to reason
Do not yet have understanding of operations
Reversible mental actions that allow children to do mentally what before they could only do physically
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Symbolic function substage
Occurs between ages 2 to 4
Child gains the ability to mentally represent an object that is not present
Scribble designs to represent people, houses, cars, etc.
Use language and engage in pretend play
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Egocentrism Example
Inability to distinguish between one’s own perspective and someone else’s perspective
Preschool children often show the ability to take another’s perspective on some tasks but not others
Animism Example
Belief that inanimate objects have lifelike qualities and are capable of action
Failure to distinguish between appropriate occasions for human and nonhuman perspectives
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Intuitive thought substage
Second substage of preoperational thought
Between ages 4 to 7 years old
Children use primitive reasoning and want to know the answers to all sorts of questions
“Why?” questions signal emergence of interest in figuring out why things are the way they are
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Centration Example
Focusing of attention on one characteristic to the exclusion of all others
Conservation
Awareness that altering the appearance of an object or substance does not change its basic properties
Conservation may appear earlier than Piaget thought
Attention is especially important in explaining conservation
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Concrete operational stage
Lasts from approximately 7 to 11 years of age
Children can perform concrete operations and logical reasoning as long as it can be applied to specific or concrete examples
Concrete operations allow a child to consider several characteristics rather than to focus on a single property of an object
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
New skills at concrete operational stage:
Classify and divide into different sets or subsets
Consider interrelationships among objects
Capable of seriation
Ability to order stimuli along a quantitative dimension (such as length)
Transitivity
Ability to logically combine relations to understand certain conclusions
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Formal operational stage
Appears between 11 to 15 years of age
Begin to think in abstract, more logical ways
Develop images of ideal circumstances
Deductive reasoning
Develop hypotheses, or best guesses, and systematically deduce which is the best path to follow in solving the problem
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Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory
Adolescent egocentrism
Heightened self-consciousness of adolescents
Reflected in beliefs that others are as interested in them as they themselves are
Imaginary audience
Feeling one is the center of attention and sensing one is on stage
Personal fable
Sense of personal uniqueness and invincibility
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Applying and Evaluating Piaget’s Theory
Piaget’s theory applied to teaching children:
Take a constructivist approach
Children learn best when active and seeking solutions for themselves
Facilitate rather than direct learning
Design situations where students learn by doing
Consider child’s knowledge, level of thinking
Teachers need to interpret what students are saying and respond in a way not too far from student’s level
Important to examine children’s mistakes to help guide to a higher level of understanding
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Vygotsky’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Vygotsky also emphasized that children actively construct their knowledge and understanding
Emphasized the role of the social environment in stimulating cognitive development
Society provides tools to support cognitive development
Cognitive development is shaped by cultures in which we live
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Vygotsky’s Theory of Cognitive Development
Zone of proximal development (ZPD)
Range of tasks that are too difficult for children to master alone but can be mastered with guidance and assistance from adults or more-skilled children
Lower limit of ZPD is level of skill reached by child working independently
Upper limit of ZPD includes additional responsibility child can accept with assistance of an able instructor
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Vygotsky’s Theory of Cognitive Development
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Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development
Scaffolding
Changing level of support over the course of a teaching session
More skilled person adjusting guidance to fit child’s current level of performance
When student is learning a new task, skilled person can use direct instruction
As student’s competence increases, skilled person gives less guidance
Dialogue is an important tool of scaffolding
Through dialogue, child’s concepts become more systematic, logical, and rational when met with skilled person’s concepts
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Vygotsky’s Cognitive Development Theory
Children use speech not only for social communication but to help them solve tasks
Private speech – language of self-regulation
Involves talking to oneself to guide through a task
As children age, they can act without verbalizing and self-talk becomes internalized into inner speech
Inner speech becomes their thoughts
Children use private speech more often when tasks are difficult, when they have made errors, and when they are not sure how to proceed
Children using private speech are more attentive and improve their performance more than children who do not
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Vygotsky’s Cognitive Development Theory
Vygotsky’s theory applied to education:
Use child’s ZPD in teaching
Teachers should begin teaching toward zone’s upper limit so child can reach goal with help and move to a higher level of skill or knowledge
Simply observe child and provide support when needed
Use more-skilled peers as teachers
Children also benefit from support and guidance of more-skilled children
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Vygotsky’s Cognitive Development Theory
Monitor and encourage use of private speech
Be aware of change from externally talking to oneself in preschool years to privately talking to oneself in elementary school
Encourage elementary school children to internalize and self-regulate their talk
Place instruction in meaningful context
Provide students with opportunities to learn in real-world settings
Transform the classroom with Vygotskian ideas
Kamehameha Elementary Education Program (KEEP) based on Vygotsky’s theory
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Vygotsky’s Cognitive Development Theory
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Vygotksy’s Cognitive Development Theory
Social constructivist approach
An emphasis on social contexts of learning and construction of knowledge through social interaction
Criticisms:
Vygotsky’s theory not specific enough about age-related changes
Does not adequately describe how changes in socioemotional capabilities contribute to cognitive development
May have overemphasized the role of language in thinking
Collaboration and guidance may be “too helpful” in some cases
Children may become lazy and expect help when they could have done something on their own
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Cognitive Change in Adulthood
Adolescents often view the world in terms of polarities
Right/wrong
We/they
Good/bad
With age, adults become aware of diverse opinions and multiple perspectives of others
Reflective, relativistic thinking of adulthood
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Cognitive Change in Adulthood
Emotional maturity may impact cognitive development in adulthood
Negative emotions may produce distorted and self-serving thinking
Emerging adults high in empathy, flexibility, and autonomy are more likely to engage in complex, integrated cognitive-emotional thinking
In middle age, individuals become more inwardly reflective and less context-dependent in their thinking than young adults
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Cognitive Change in Adulthood
Postformal thought
Thinking that is reflective, relativistic, and contextual
Recognition that the correct answer to a problem requires reflective thinking and may vary from one situation to another
Become more skeptical about the truth and seem unwilling to accept an answer as final
Understand that thinking can’t always be abstract; in some instances, it must be realistic and pragmatic
Understand that thinking is influenced by emotions
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Information-Processing Approach
Information-processing approach
Analyzes how individuals manipulate, monitor, and create strategies for handling information
Involves attention, memory, and thinking
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Information-Processing Approach
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Information-Processing Approach
Mechanisms of change are important in advances in cognitive development:
Encoding
Process by which information gets into memory
Automaticity
Ability to process information with little or no effort
Strategy construction
Creation of new procedures for processing information
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Information-Processing Approach
Metacognition
Knowing about knowing
Assists in self-modification in children’s information processing
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Information-Processing Approach
How fast information is processed influences what we can do with information
Reaction time assesses processing speed
Speed at which tasks are completed improves dramatically across childhood
Continues to improve in adolescence
Begins to decline in middle adulthood and continues to slow into late adulthood
Due to decline in functioning of brain and central nervous system
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Information-Processing Approach
How fast children can process information linked with competence in thinking
Strategies that people learn through experience may compensate for decline in processing speed with age
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Attention
Attention
Focusing of mental resources
Different allocations of attention:
Selective attention Example
Focusing on specific aspect of experience that is relevant while ignoring others that are irrelevant
Divided attention
Concentrating on more than one activity at the same time
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Attention
Different allocations of attention (continued):
Sustained attention
Ability to maintain attention to selected stimulus for a prolonged period of time
Executive attention
Action planning, allocating attention to goals, error detection and compensation, monitoring progress, dealing with novel or difficult circumstances
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Attention
Orienting/investigation processes dominates attention in first year
Directing attention to potentially important locations in environment and recognizing objects and features
Habituation What if...?
Decreased responsiveness to a stimulus after repeated presentation
Dishabituation
Increase in responsiveness after change in stimulation
Parents do novel things and repeat them often
Stops or changes behaviors when infant redirects his/her attention
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Attention
Joint attention
Two or more individuals focus on the same object or event
Requires:
Ability to track another’s behavior, such as following a gaze
One person directing infant’s attention
Reciprocal interaction
Joint attention skills frequently observed by end of first year
Infants begin to direct adults’ attention to objects
Increases infants’ ability to learn from other people
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Memory
Memory
Retention of information over time
Encoding, storage, and retrieval are basic processes required for memory
Failures can occur in any process
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Memory
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Memory
Schema theory
People mold memories to fit information that already exists in their minds
Schemas – mental frameworks that organize concepts and information
Influence encoding, making inferences, and retrieving information
Often gaps are filled in when memories retrieved
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Memory
Infants as young as 3 months show a limited type of memory
Infants can remember perceptual-motor information
By 2.5 months, baby’s memory is detailed
Implicit memory
Memory without conscious recollection
Explicit memory
Conscious memory of facts and experiences
Infants do not show explicit memory until after 6 months
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Memory
Most infants’ conscious memories are fragile and short-lived
Except for memory of perceptual-motor actions, which can be substantial
Conscious memories improve across second year of life
Maturation of hippocampus and surrounding cerebral cortex, especially frontal lobes, makes advances in explicit memory possible
Less is known about areas of the brain involved in implicit memory in infancy
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Memory
Infantile amnesia
Most adults can remember little, if anything, from first three years of life
Elementary school children do not remember much of their early childhood years
Immaturity of prefrontal lobes of the brain plays a role in memory difficulty in recalling events from infancy and early childhood
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Memory
Long-term memory
Relatively permanent and unlimited type of memory
Short-term memory
Retention of information for up to 15-30 seconds without rehearsal of information
Individuals can retain information longer using rehearsal
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Memory
Working memory
A mental “workbench” where individuals manipulate and assemble information when making decisions, problem solving, and comprehending written and spoken language
More active in modifying information than short-term memory
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Memory
Long-term memory and eyewitness testimony:
Age differences in children’s susceptibility to suggestion
Individual differences in susceptibility
Interviewing techniques produce distortions in children’s reports about highly salient events
Children’s long-term memory improves more as they move into middle and late childhood years
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Memory
Strategies for processing information:
Rehearsal and organizing
Strategies employed by older children and adults
Creating mental imagery
Using imagery to remember verbal information works better for older children
Elaboration
Engaging in more extensive processing of information
Thinking of examples and self-reference
Adolescents more likely to use elaboration
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Memory
Fuzzy trace theory
Memory is understood by verbatim memory trace or gist memory representations
Verbatim memory trace - precise details of information
Gist – central idea of information
Young children tend to store and retrieve verbatim traces
During elementary school years, children begin to use gist more
Improves memory and reasoning because fuzzy traces are more enduring and less likely to be forgotten than verbatim traces
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Memory
Knowledge influences what people notice and how they organize, represent, and interpret information
Affects ability to remember, reason, and solve problems
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Memory
Episodic memory
Retention of information about the where and when of life’s happenings
Autobiographical memory – personal recollection of events and facts
Reminiscence bump in which adults remember more events from second and third decades of their lives than other decades
Found mostly for positive life events
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Memory
Semantic memory
A person’s knowledge about the world, including:
Fields of expertise
General academic knowledge
“Everyday knowledge”
Meanings of words, names of famous individuals, important places, and common objects
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Memory
Source memory
Ability to remember where one learned something
Contexts may include physical setting, emotional context, or identity of speaker
Failures in source memory increase with age
Prospective memory
Remembering to do something in the future
Some researchers find declines in prospective memory with age
Related factors include nature of task and what is being assessed
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Thinking
Thinking
Manipulating and transforming information in memory in order to reason, reflect, think critically, evaluate ideas, solve problems, or make decisions
Concepts are key aspects of infants’ cognitive development
Concepts – cognitive groupings of similar objects, events, people, or ideas
Unsure how early concept formation begins
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Thinking
Executive functioning
Higher-level cognitive processes linked to development of brain’s prefrontal cortex
Managing one’s thoughts to engage in goal-directed behavior and to exercise self-control
In early childhood, executive functioning involves advances in cognitive inhibition, cognitive flexibility, and goal-setting
Linked to school readiness
Significant advances in executive functioning unfold over middle and late childhood years
Increased efficiency in cognitive control
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Thinking
Critical thinking
Thinking reflectively and productively, evaluating evidence
Mindfulness is an aspect of critical thinking
Mindfulness – being alert, mentally present, and cognitively flexible
Schools critiqued for not teaching students to think critically
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Thinking
Executive functioning strengthens during adolescence
Controlling attention and reducing interfering thoughts are key aspects of learning and thinking in adolescence and emerging adulthood
Self-oriented thoughts of worry, self-doubt, intense emotionally-laden concerns may interfere with focusing attention
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Thinking
Dual-process model
Decision making is influenced by analytical and experiential cognitive systems
Systems compete with each other
Experimental system may benefit adolescent decision making
Monitoring and managing actual experiences
Adolescents may not benefit from analytical approach
Reflective, detailed, higher-level cognitive analysis
Some disagree – adolescents benefit from both systems
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Thinking
Expertise
Extensive, highly organized knowledge and understanding of a particular domain
Expertise shows up more among middle-aged or older adults
Distinguishing novices from experts:
Experts rely on accumulated knowledge to solve problems
Experts have better strategies and shortcuts
Experts are more creative and flexible in problem solving
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Thinking
Education, work, and heath influence cognitive functioning of older adults
Older adults with less education have lower cognitive abilities
Frequent engagement in cognitive activities improves episodic memory
Increased emphasis on complex information processing likely enhances intellectual abilities
Illnesses may have negative impact on cognitive functioning
Exercise linked to improved cognitive functioning
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Thinking
Aging, brain, and cognitive functioning
Neural circuits in prefrontal cortex decline
Linked to poorer performance on complex reasoning tasks, working memory, episodic memory tasks
Older adults are more likely to use both hemispheres of brain
Compensate for aging declines in attention, memory, and language
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Thinking
Use it or lose it
Older adults benefit from activities such as reading books, crossword puzzles, attending lectures and concerts
Disuse may promote atrophy of cognitive skills
Cognitive training
Training can improve cognitive skills of many older adults
Loss in plasticity in late adulthood
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Metacognition
Metamemory
Knowledge about memory
Includes:
General knowledge about memory
Knowledge about one’s own memory
Metacognition helps people perform cognitive tasks more effectively
Critical thinking skills
Generate hypotheses for problem solving
Solve math problems
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Metacognition
Theory of mind
Awareness of one’s own mental processes and mental processes of others
Linked to cognitive processes
From 18 months-3 years, children begin to understand:
Perceptions
Emotions
Desires
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Metacognition
2-3-year-olds understand that desires are related to actions and simple emotions
Refer to desires earlier and more frequently than cognitive states such as thinking and knowing
Key development is understanding others’ desires may differ from their own
Between 3-5 years, children come to understand that the mind can represent objects and events accurately or inaccurately
False beliefs – beliefs that are not true
In most children, understanding of false belief developed by age 5
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Metacognition
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The Concept of Intelligence
Intelligence
Ability to solve problems
Capacity to adapt and learn from experience
Can only be evaluated indirectly
Individual differences measured by intelligence tests
Designed to tell whether a person can reason better than others
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The Concept of Intelligence
Binet Tests
Core of intelligence consists of complex cognitive processes
Memory, imagery, comprehension, and judgment
Mental age
Individual’s level of mental development relative to others
Compared to chronological age to determine intelligence quotient
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The Concept of Intelligence
Intelligence quotient
Mental age divided by chronological age multiplied by 100
IQ scores approximate a normal distribution
Symmetrical, bell-shaped curve with a majority of cases falling in the middle of the range of possible scores
Few scores appearing toward the ends of the range
Stanford-Binet Tests among one of the most widely used intelligence tests
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The Concept of Intelligence
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The Concept of Intelligence
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS-III)
Designed for adults
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-IV)
Designed for children and adolescents between 6-16 years old
Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence (WPPSI-III)
Designed for children age 2 years 6 months-7 years 3 months
Overall IQ score but also yield composite scores
Verbal comprehension, memory, processing speed
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The Concept of Intelligence
Intelligence tests predict school and job success
Moderately correlated with work performance
Many other factors contribute to success in school and work
Motivation to succeed, physical and mental health, and social skills
Intelligence tests used in conjunction with other information
Developmental history, medical background, school performance, social competency, family experiences, etc.
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The Concept of Intelligence
Sternberg’s Triarchic Theory
Analytical intelligence
Ability to analyze, judge, evaluate, compare, and contrast
Creative intelligence
Ability to create, design, invent, originate, imagine
Practical intelligence
Ability to use, apply, implement, put ideas into practice
Children with high analytic ability tend to be favored in schooling
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The Concept of Intelligence
Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences
Verbal
Mathematical
Spatial
Bodily-kinesthetic
Musical
Interpersonal
Intrapersonal
Naturalist
Individuals have each type of intelligence to varying degrees
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The Concept of Intelligence
Emotional intelligence
Ability to perceive and express emotion accurately and adaptively, understand emotion, and manage emotions in oneself and others
Critics argue that emotional intelligence broadens concept of intelligence too far to be useful
Has not been adequately assessed and researched
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The Concept of Intelligence
Moderate correlation between brain size and intelligence
Frontal lobes are likely the location of intelligence
Highest levels of thinking in prefrontal cortex
Brain-imaging studies reveal a distributed neural network involving frontal and parietal lobes is related to higher intelligence
Temporal lobe, occipital lobe, and cerebellum also linked to higher intelligence to a lesser degree
Neurological speed may also play a role in intelligence
Heredity and environment contribute to brain size and intelligence
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
Genetic influences examined by comparing IQ similarity of identical and fraternal twins
Heritability attempts to distinguish between effects of heredity and environment in a population
By late adolescence, strong genetic influence suggested
Genes exist in an environment, and environment shapes gene activity
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
Environmental influences
Parent-child communication during first 3 years of life correlates with IQ scores
Socioeconomic status also influences IQ scores
Schooling influences intelligence
No formal education or for an extended period of time results in lower intelligence
Flynn effect shows worldwide increase in intelligence scores across history
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
Cross-cultural comparisons
Cultures vary in what it means to be intelligent
Western cultures emphasize reasoning and thinking skills
Eastern cultures emphasize members of a community engaging in social skills
Cultural bias
Early intelligence tests favored people from urban environments, middle socioeconomic status, and non-Latino Whites
Non-native English speakers or nonstandard English speakers at a disadvantage in understanding questions
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Controversies and Group Comparisons
Culture-fair tests
Intelligence tests designed to avoid cultural bias
Includes questions familiar to people from all socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds or no verbal questions
Most intelligence tests reflect what dominant culture thinks is important
Time limits bias groups not concerned with time
Same words may have different meaning for different groups
Different attitudes, values, and motivation could affect performance
No culture-fair tests, only culture-reduced tests
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Development of Intelligence
Crystallized intelligence
Individual’s accumulated information and verbal skills
Continues to increase across life span
Fluid intelligence
Ability to reason abstractly
Begins to decline during middle adulthood
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Development of Intelligence
Cognitive mechanics
“Hardware” of the mind
Speed and accuracy in sensory input, attention, visual and motor memory, discrimination, comparison, and categorization
Age-related declines likely due to biology, heredity, and health
Cognitive pragmatics
Culture-based “software” of the mind
Reading and writing skills, language comprehension, educational qualifications, professional skills, self and life skills
Improvement into old age is possible
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Development of Intelligence
Wisdom
Expert knowledge about practical aspects of life that permits excellent judgment about important matters
Insight about human development and life matters, good judgment, understanding of how to cope with difficult life problems
High levels of wisdom are rare
Factors other than age critical for wisdom to develop to a high level
Personality factors, such as openness to experience, generativity, and creativity are better predictors of wisdom than intelligence
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Intellectual disability
Limited mental ability in which individual has:
Has low IQ, usually below 70 on a traditional intelligence test
Has difficulty adapting to demands of everyday life
First exhibits these characteristics by age 18
About 5 million Americans fit definition of intellectual disability
Varying degrees of intellectual disability
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Organic intellectual disability
Genetic disorder or lower level of intelligence due to brain damage
Down syndrome
Cultural-familial intellectual disability
Results from growing up in a below-average intellectual environment
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Gifted
High intelligence or superior talent
IQ of 130 or higher
3-5% of U.S. students are gifted
Gifted programs in school systems often select those with intellectual superiority and academic aptitude
Tend to overlook children talented in art or athletics or other special aptitudes
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Characteristics of gifted children:
Precocity
March to their own drummer
Passion to master
Gifted children recall high levels of ability at very young ages
Prior to formal training
Strong family support and years of training and practice
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Highly gifted individuals are not typically gifted in many domains
During childhood, domains where they are gifted usually emerge
Begin to show expertise in domain
Gifted children may be socially isolated and underchallenged
Can become disruptive, skip classes, and lose interest in achieving
African American, Latino, and Native American children underrepresented in gifted programs
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The Extremes of Intelligence and Creativity
Creativity
Ability to think about something in novel and unusual ways and to come up with unique, good solutions to problems
Intelligence and creativity are not the same
Creativity requires divergent thinking, which produces many answers to the same question
Conventional intelligence tests measure convergent thinking, in which there is only one correct answer
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