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Piaget’s Schema & Learning Theory: 3 Fascinating Experiments

Piagetian approaches to learning as a process of actively constructing knowledge have been particularly effective in education, where they challenged traditional methods of teaching that overlooked the importance of the child’s role as a learner.

In this article, you’ll gain a complete understanding of basic Piagetian theory and the strong body of experimental evidence supporting its application.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free . These science-based exercises explore fundamental aspects of positive psychology, including strengths, values, and self-compassion, and will give you the tools to enhance the wellbeing of your clients, students, or employees.

This Article Contains:

Piaget’s learning theory & constructivism, what are schemas in piaget’s theory 4 examples, assimilation, accommodation, & equilibrium, piaget’s theory vs vygotsky’s, 3 fascinating experiments exploring piaget’s theories, implications in education, 3 best books on the topic, positivepsychology.com’s relevant resources, a take-home message.

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development remains among the most complete and influential theories describing how the human mind shapes and develops through the process of learning.

At the University of Geneva in the 1960s, Piaget employed elegant experimental techniques and keen observational insight to analyze the moving pieces of cognitive development in children (Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

A biologist by training, Piaget took a pragmatic and mechanistic approach to understanding how the advanced architecture of human cognition develops, looking past the intuitive conception of the mind as something apparently complex and unapproachable to see simple and ordered principles of organization lying underneath (Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

At the core of Piaget’s theory are stages of development (Malik & Marwaha, 2021; Scott & Cogburn, 2021), a series of overall states of increasing cognitive sophistication defined principally by how the developing human ‘knows’ (i.e., understands) the world.

Learning is both the cognitive activity that occurs during these stages and the process of moving between stages. In each stage, children use a different set of cognitive tools to investigate and interpret the world and construct knowledge based on that interpretation. This, in turn, unlocks more sophisticated cognitive tools for more sophisticated learning, and so on.

The ultimate goal of this process of learning is to construct the most complete and accurate internal model of the world available at the time (Gandhi & Mukherji, 2021; Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

Sensorimotor period

The first stage occurs between birth to two years of age. In this stage, children understand their world only as far as simple physical interactions allow. For example, the world may be represented as things that can be touched and things that can be thrown .

The development of motor skills during this period allows the physical representation of the sensorimotor period to become more elaborate and finely tuned, with many potential ways of representing the world relating to different actions.

Preoperational period

In the preoperational period, occurring between two and seven years of age, children begin to understand the world using basic symbols and physical actions.

This marks the development of a more complex form of cognition but does not constitute the more advanced mental operations that emerge later in childhood (hence ‘pre-operational’).

Symbols include words, gestures, and simple imagery, and become increasingly governed by logic throughout the period.

Concrete operational period

Between 7 and 11 years of age, children begin to perform mental operations: internalized actions that are abstract and reversible. Children gain the ability to run simulations on their mental model of the world, which can be manipulated freely.

These mental operations follow a strict logical framework, and the content of these operations typically only represent concrete (i.e., ‘real’) objects.

Formal operational period

Between 11 and 15 years of age, children develop their ability to perform mental operations and expand the scope of the content of these operations to include abstract (e.g., mathematical or social concepts) and concrete objects.

Furthermore, they gain the ability to perform mental operations on mental operations themselves, such as evaluating the likelihood of something represented by a mental operation and comparing one mental operation with another.

Constructivism

A recurring theme throughout Piaget’s theory is the notion that learning is a process of construction, where the thing being constructed is the child’s internal model of the world or ‘reality’ more generally. This foundational theoretical assumption is called ‘constructivism’ (Gandhi & Mukherji, 2021).

Constructivism frames learning not as a process of absorbing knowledge that’s already out there in the world, but rather as a process of making knowledge from scratch.

This is done by using whatever cognitive tools learners have at their disposal to interpret incoming information and translate it into knowledge. Before it is interpreted, this incoming information lacks any objective content of knowledge; knowledge is something that is made after the fact.

This is contrary to the more traditional notion of learning as an individual receiving knowledge from a more knowledgeable source, such as a teacher in a classroom.

From the constructivist perspective, teachers are not a source of knowledge, but rather a source of information. Whether that information becomes knowledge or meaningless noise depends on the experience of the learner.

This framework comprises distinct structures of knowledge called schemas, which are organized and generalizable sets of knowledge about certain concepts. They typically contain a set of instructions or logical statements about a concept, as well as knowledge that can be applied to any instance of that concept.

Generalizability highlights the key function of schemas: an up-to-date set of instructions and ideas about as much of the world as possible, which can be used to predict and navigate the world in the future. Considering this, learning could more precisely be described as the process of keeping schemas up to date and developing new schemas where necessary (Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

While schemas are a constant feature of each stage of cognitive development, they change in content and sophistication, just as the stages do.

In the sensorimotor stage, a schema might be chewing, which encodes a set of instructions relating to how to chew and the motivations for chewing (e.g., chewing feels satisfying and stimulates hunger).

Within the schema for chewing are relevant categories of information, such as sets of objects that can and can’t be chewed. Likewise, objects that can be chewed might contain further categories: those that taste good, those that are particularly soft, and so on. All of the pertinent information for chewing is contained in the schema.

A preoperational stage schema might involve instructions for basic forms of communication. For example, a preoperational schema might involve all the information pertinent to waving, including what waving represents in a basic sense, when to wave, and the basic physical actions involved.

In the concrete operational period, schemas contain more detailed representations of the properties of objects. For example, a concrete operational schema for flowers might contain the typical features uniting all flowers, such as shapes, colors, locations, and also features that depend on mental operations, such as when it is appropriate to pick a flower and what to expect when a flower is given to a friend.

Finally, a formal operational schema might describe any number of abstract concepts. An example might be a schema containing abstract instructions for moral behavior that are described not only in basic physical or egocentric terms, but also involving religious ideals, non-egocentric ideas (e.g., empathy), and more abstract consequences and motivations for behaving morally.

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Another constant feature described in Piaget’s theory are the actual processes by which schemas are updated with newly constructed knowledge (Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

Overall, these processes are known as adaptation, which is another way to describe using the most sophisticated cognitive tools available to keep schemas up to date. Adaptation involves two complementary sub-processes: assimilation and accommodation (Scott & Cogburn, 2021).

Assimilation is the process of integrating new knowledge into existing schemas by editing the new knowledge to ensure an acceptable fit.

In other words, assimilation involves updating schemas without changing the structure of those schemas. This is a common process; to an extent, all our cognition is constrained by basic universal rules and principles that create a fundamental unchanging cognitive structure, and it is useful to use these rules to ‘warp’ knowledge in order to fit.

Some schemas are resistant to change due to personal significance or simply because it may be easier to edit new knowledge rather than overhaul the existing mental organization.

Accommodation, in contrast, is the process of adjusting the cognitive organization of schemas in response to new knowledge. This occurs when the existing structure cannot account for the new information, rendering assimilation impossible.

As a simple example, a child may have a schema for birds that includes everything with wings and a schema for mammals that includes everything without wings. When they are presented with a bat, they are faced with a fundamental contradiction of this organization and have to reshuffle their cognitive structures to accommodate and make sense of this shared feature.

These two sub-processes occur in a cycle, as accommodation creates and reshapes the cognitive structure of schemas, which helps assimilate new knowledge, until accommodation is again necessary, and so on.

The goal of this cycle is to maintain as much equilibrium as possible, where there is no conflict between new knowledge and existing knowledge. This state of equilibrium can never be perfect, but learning is the act of trying to make it increasingly stable.

Piaget’s schema – Sprouts

Piaget’s work is commonly compared with that of Lev Vygotsky, another influential learning theorist conducting research at a similar time.

Their theoretical approaches are both primarily concerned with how knowledge is constructed and reject the traditional notion of knowledge as something that is transferred from one individual to another.

However, while Piaget emphasized that knowledge is constructed by the individual and shaped by existing cognitive structures (schemas) that organize the experiences of that individual, Vygotsky saw knowledge construction occurring elsewhere.

Vygotsky’s theory asserts that knowledge is constructed in the individual’s immediate social environment and shaped and interpreted by the individual’s use of language.

In Vygotsky’s theory, language takes the place of Piaget’s cognitive tools and actions. According to Vygotsky, individuals know the world through language, and the extent to which they know the world is mediated by the extent to which they can use language (Stewin & Martin, 1974; Lourenço, 2012).

Importantly, when considering the inherently social aspect of language, it follows that other individuals in someone’s immediate social context would be equally influential in how the individual knows the world.

As a result, in the place of internal stages of development, Vygotsky described external zones of development: social contexts within which individuals can use language to construct knowledge and develop, expanding the scope to include a broader social context for development, and so on.

Piaget and Vygotsky’s approaches are not wholly mutually exclusive, as a Piagetian theorist must acknowledge the influence of context in constructing knowledge, just as Vygotskyian theorists must acknowledge the influence of individual experience in constructing knowledge.

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Likewise, this works in reverse, meaning that cognitive development becomes evident through observing how an individual apparently perceives the world.

A foundational experiment underlying Piaget’s theory examines differences in the ability to understand conservation of quantity. Children younger than seven were shown a row of squares and a row of circles of equal quantity. They were correctly able to identify that there were the same number of squares as circles.

However, when the experimenter moved the squares further apart, making a row of greater length, the children now answered that there were more squares than circles.

Because they lack the ability for reversible mental operations developed in the concrete operational stage, changing the appearance of the squares to make the space they occupied larger was sufficient justification for the children to conclude there were more (Kubli, 1979, 1983).

Other experiments have similarly shown how comprehending conservation changes as a function of developmental changes in how the world is represented. For example, another experiment showed children a pair of rods of identical length, placed side by side to demonstrate their equivalence. One of the rods was then displaced so that its position was nearer and therefore appeared longer.

Children younger than six were able to correctly identify the rods as equivalent length when they were side by side, but when displaced, they concluded one rod had become larger. Some slightly older children suggested the rods may become equivalent length again if the displaced rod was returned to its original position, demonstrating their development of reversibility.

Finally, the oldest children concluded that length was an invariant property that was conserved regardless of how the rod was displaced, showing a confident grasp of both reversibility and conservation (Kubli, 1979, 1983).

Another experiment clearly illustrates the development and refinement of schemas that accompany the transition between stages in Piaget’s theory. Children were presented with a picture featuring a bunch of flowers consisting of five asters and two tulips. They were then asked whether there were more asters in the picture or more flowers.

In children younger than roughly eight years of age, the typical answer is that there are more asters, demonstrating that these children have not yet developed the ability to comprehensively categorize the world into schemas of related objects and concepts, and therefore do not recognize that flowers should be a category inclusive of asters (Politzer, 2016).

Here are a few considerations of specific importance (Kubli, 1979).

The development of the ability to comprehend invariance and reversibility defines much of the content of Piaget’s stages . The development of these concepts reflects children’s understanding of rules that extend throughout the world and provide a fundamental basis for reality, and the development of the mental operations necessary to reason based on these rules.

As a result, teachers should adopt an approach that closely follows their students’ search for invariant rules and experimentation with reversibility. Teachers should not adopt a heavy-handed approach where they walk their students through these rules, nor should they become too detached from their students’ development and assume certain types of knowledge that their students may not have discovered yet.

Instead, the process of teaching should be a journey characterized by the discovery and construction of new forms of knowledge.

In an applied education context, teachers should also be careful not to focus too strongly on the theoretical assumptions of constructivism. While constructivism emphasizes the role of the learner as an individual, learning often occurs in a social context alongside a class.

Consequently, although learners are engaged in the construction of their own knowledge, they will inevitably try to model their knowledge on others and form theories about the world that are acceptable and relatable to others. Teachers should, therefore, remain aware that their assumptions and attitudes as educators remain highly influential in a constructivist framework.

To get an in-depth understanding of Piaget’s Schema & Learning Theory, we suggest investing in the following books:

1. The Psychology of the Child – Jean Piaget and Bärbel Inhelder

The Psychology of the Child provides the most accessible means of studying Piaget’s original work underlying his influential theory.

While contemporary writers may do a better job of putting Piagetian theory in context, when it comes to understanding and engaging with the theory itself, there is no substitute to reading about it in the words of the seminal psychologist himself.

Find the book on Amazon .

2. Children’s Thinking – Robert Siegler

Children’s Thinking provides a solid academic reference for a variety of theoretical approaches to cognitive development, including Piagetian theory.

It’s rarely useful to take a single-track approach to psychology, and your understanding and application of Piagetian theory will be improved greatly by learning about other theories of childhood cognition and development, which through their differences or similarities help to delineate Piaget’s ideas.

3. Constructivism: Theory, Perspectives and Practice – Catherine Fosnot

This book by Catherine Fosnot is a comprehensive and practical text analyzing the fundamental assumptions and applications of constructivist epistemology.

Studying the epistemological assumptions underlying psychological theory can seem like a chore, but it is absolutely vital in order to engage with your knowledge and develop a confident and flexible approach to applying Piagetian theory.

Fortunately, Fosnot’s insightful description and commentary are anything but a chore to read.

On our site, we have many relevant resources that will give a more solid theoretical background and also provide practical ways to apply theory. Here are a few recommended reads:

• Developmental Psychology 101: Theories, Stages, & Research provides a great alternative to the suggested reading above if you want a more digestible overview of the predominant theories of cognitive development and valuable insight into the broader theoretical context alongside Piaget’s ideas.
• Applying Positive Psychology in Schools & Education is a comprehensive guide to applying your knowledge of psychological theory in education. If you are learning about Piagetian theory as an educator, this article will provide essential further reading for developing the ideas you’ve learned here.

If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others enhance their wellbeing, check out this signature collection of 17 validated positive psychology tools for practitioners. Use them to help others flourish and thrive.

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Piaget’s theory of cognitive development provides a comprehensive and useful theoretical framework for thinking deeply about how information is translated to knowledge in the developing mind.

This has important implications for education, as having a clear theoretical framework for understanding how children learn helps make teaching a more structured and efficient activity for both teachers and students alike.

More generally, Piaget’s ideas also highlight the importance of considering the different ways individuals can have knowledge of the world, depending on their stage of development and methods of learning.

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Positive Psychology Exercises for free .

• Fosnot, C. T. (2005). Constructivism: Theory, perspectives, and practice (2nd ed.). Teachers College Press.
• Gandhi, M. H., & Mukherji, P. (2021). Learning theories . StatPearls. Retrieved November 5, 2021, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK562189/
• Kubli, F. (1979). Piaget’s cognitive psychology and its consequences for the teaching of science.  European Journal of Science Education , 1 (1), 5–20.
• Kubli, F. (1983). Piaget’s clinical experiments: A critical analysis and study of their implications for science teaching. European Journal of Science Education , 5 (2), 123–139.
• Lourenço, O. (2012). Piaget and Vygotsky: Many resemblances, and a crucial difference. New Ideas in Psychology , 30 (3), 281–295.
• Malik, F., & Marwaha, R. (2021). Cognitive development . StatPearls. Retrieved November 5, 2021, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK537095/
• Piaget, J., & Inhelder, B. (1969). The psychology of the child.  Basic Books.
• Politzer, G. (2016). The class inclusion question: A case study in applying pragmatics to the experimental study of cognition. SpringerPlus , 5 (1), 1133.
• Scott, H. K., & Cogburn, M. (2021). Piaget . StatPearls. Retrieved November 5, 2021, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK448206/
• Siegler, R. S. (1997). Children’s thinking (3rd ed.). Prentice Hall.
• Stewin, L. L., & Martin, J. (1974). The developmental stages of L. S. Vygotsky and J. Piaget: A comparison. Alberta Journal of Educational Research , 20 (4), 348–362.

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Cognitive Development Theory: What Are the Stages?

Sensorimotor stage, preoperational stage, concrete operational stage, formal operational stage.

Cognitive development is the process by which we come to acquire, understand, organize, and learn to use information in various ways. Cognitive development helps a child obtain the skills needed to live a productive life and function as an independent adult.

The late Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget was a major figure in the study of cognitive development theory in children. He believed that it occurs in four stages—sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational.

This article discusses Piaget’s stages of cognitive development, including important concepts and principles.

FatCamera / Getty Images

History of Cognitive Development

During the 1920s, the psychologist Jean Piaget was given the task of translating English intelligence tests into French. During this process, he observed that children think differently than adults do and have a different view of the world. He began to study children from birth through the teenage years—observing children who were too young to talk, and interviewing older children while he also observed their development.

Piaget published his theory of cognitive development in 1936. This theory is based on the idea that a child’s intelligence changes throughout childhood and cognitive skills—including memory, attention, thinking, problem-solving, logical reasoning, reading, listening, and more—are learned as a child grows and interacts with their environment.

Stages of Cognitive Development

Piaget’s theory suggests that cognitive development occurs in four stages as a child ages. These stages are always completed in order, but last longer for some children than others. Each stage builds on the skills learned in the previous stage.

The four stages of cognitive development include:

• Sensorimotor
• Preoperational
• Concrete operational
• Formal operational

The sensorimotor stage begins at birth and lasts until 18 to 24 months of age. During the sensorimotor stage, children are physically exploring their environment and absorbing information through their senses of smell, sight, touch, taste, and sound.

The most important skill gained in the sensorimotor stage is object permanence, which means that the child knows that an object still exists even when they can't see it anymore. For example, if a toy is covered up by a blanket, the child will know the toy is still there and will look for it. Without this skill, the child thinks that the toy has simply disappeared.

Language skills also begin to develop during the sensorimotor stage.

Activities to Try During the Sensorimotor Stage

Appropriate activities to do during the sensorimotor stage include:

• Playing peek-a-boo
• Reading books
• Providing toys with a variety of textures
• Singing songs
• Playing with musical instruments
• Rolling a ball back and forth

The preoperational stage of Piaget's theory of cognitive development occurs between ages 2 and 7 years. Early on in this stage, children learn the skill of symbolic representation. This means that an object or word can stand for something else. For example, a child might play "house" with a cardboard box.

At this stage, children assume that other people see the world and experience emotions the same way they do, and their main focus is on themselves. This is called egocentrism .

Centrism is another characteristic of the preoperational stage. This means that a child is only able to focus on one aspect of a problem or situation. For example, a child might become upset that a friend has more pieces of candy than they do, even if their pieces are bigger.

During this stage, children will often play next to each other—called parallel play—but not with each other. They also believe that inanimate objects, such as toys, have human lives and feelings.

Activities to Try During the Preoperational Stage

Appropriate activities to do during the preoperational stage include:

• Playing "house" or "school"
• Building a fort
• Playing with Play-Doh
• Building with blocks
• Playing charades

The concrete operational stage occurs between the ages of 7 and 11 years. During this stage, a child develops the ability to think logically and problem-solve but can only apply these skills to objects they can physically see—things that are "concrete."

Six main concrete operations develop in this stage. These include:

• Conservation : This skill means that a child understands that the amount of something or the number of a particular object stays the same, even when it looks different. For example, a cup of milk in a tall glass looks different than the same amount of milk in a short glass—but the amount did not change.
• Classification : This skill is the ability to sort items by specific classes, such as color, shape, or size.
• Seriation : This skill involves arranging objects in a series, or a logical order. For example, the child could arrange blocks in order from smallest to largest.
• Reversibility : This skill is the understanding that a process can be reversed. For example, a balloon can be blown up with air and then deflated back to the way it started.
• Decentering : This skill allows a child to focus on more than one aspect of a problem or situation at the same time. For example, two candy bars might look the same on the outside, but the child knows that they have different flavors on the inside.
• Transitivity : This skill provides an understanding of how things relate to each other. For example, if John is older than Susan, and Susan is older than Joey, then John is older than Joey.

Activities to Try During the Concrete Operational Stage

Appropriate activities to do during the concrete operational stage include:

• Using measuring cups (for example, demonstrate how one cup of water fills two half-cups)
• Solving simple logic problems
• Practicing basic math
• Doing crossword puzzles
• Playing board games

The last stage in Piaget's theory of cognitive development occurs during the teenage years into adulthood. During this stage, a person learns abstract thinking and hypothetical problem-solving skills.

Deductive reasoning—or the ability to make a conclusion based on information gained from a person's environment—is also learned in this stage. This means, for example, that a person can identify the differences between dogs of various breeds, instead of putting them all in a general category of "dogs."

Activities to Try During the Formal Operational Stage

Appropriate activities to do during the formal operational stage include:

• Learning to cook
• Solving crossword and logic puzzles
• Exploring hobbies
• Playing a musical instrument

Piaget's theory of cognitive development is based on the belief that a child gains thinking skills in four stages: sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational. These stages roughly correspond to specific ages, from birth to adulthood. Children progress through these stages at different paces, but according to Piaget, they are always completed in order.

National Library of Medicine. Cognitive testing . MedlinePlus.

Oklahoma State University. Cognitive development: The theory of Jean Piaget .

SUNY Cortland. Sensorimotor stage .

Marwaha S, Goswami M, Vashist B. Prevalence of principles of Piaget’s theory among 4-7-year-old children and their correlation with IQ . J Clin Diagn Res. 2017;11(8):ZC111-ZC115. doi:10.7860%2FJCDR%2F2017%2F28435.10513

Börnert-Ringleb M, Wilbert J. The association of strategy use and concrete-operational thinking in primary school . Front Educ. 2018;0. doi:10.3389/feduc.2018.00038

By Aubrey Bailey, PT, DPT, CHT Dr, Bailey is a Virginia-based physical therapist and professor of anatomy and physiology with over a decade of experience.

Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development

Citation: Huitt, W., & Hummel, J. (2003). Piaget's theory of cognitive development. Educational Psychology Interactive . Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University. Retrieved [date] from http://www.edpsycinteractive.org/topics/cognition/piaget.html

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Jean Piaget (1896-1980) was one of the most influential researchers in the area of developmental psychology during the 20th century. Piaget originally trained in the areas of biology and philosophy and considered himself a " genetic epist e mologist ." He was mainly interested in the biological influences on "how we come to know." He believed that what distinguishes human beings from other animals is our ability to do "abstract symbolic reasoning." Piaget's views are often compared with those of Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934), who looked more to social interaction as the primary source of cognition and behavior. This is somewhat similar to the distinctions made between Freud and Erikson in terms of the development of personality. The writings of Piaget (e.g., 1972, 1990; see Piaget, Gruber, & Voneche) and Vygotsky (e.g. Vygotsky, 1986; Vygotsky & Vygotsky, 1980), along with the work of John Dewey (e.g., Dewey, 1997a, 1997b), Jerome Bruner (e.g., 1966, 1974) and Ulrick Neisser (1967) form the basis of the constructivist theory of learning and instruction.

While working in Binet's IQ test lab in Paris, Piaget became interested in how children think. He noticed that young children's answers were qualitatively different than older children which suggested to him that the younger ones were not dumber (a quantitative position since as they got older and had more experiences they would get smarter) but, instead, answered the questions differently than their older peers because they thought differently.

There are two major aspects to his theory : the process of coming to know and the stages we move through as we gradually acquire this ability.

Process of Cognitive Development . As a biologist, Piaget was interested in how an organism adapts to its environment (Piaget described as intelligence.) Behavior (adaptation to the environment) is controlled through mental organizations called schemata (sometimes called schema or schemes) that the individual uses to represent the world and designate action. This adaptation is driven by a biological drive to obtain balance between schemes and the environment (equilibration).

Piaget hypothesized that infants are born with schema operating at birth that he called "reflexes." In other animals, these reflexes control behavior throughout life. However, in human beings as the infant uses these reflexes to adapt to the environment, these reflexes are quickly replaced with constructed schemata.

Piaget described two processes used by the individual in its attempt to adapt: assimilation and accomodation. Both of these processes are used though out life as the person increasingly adapts to the environment in a more complex manner.

Assimilation is the process of using or transforming the environment so that it can be placed in preexisting cognitive structures. Accomodation is the process of changing cognitive structures in order to accept something from the environment. Both processes are used simultaneously and alternately throughout life. An example of assimilation would be when an infant uses a sucking schema that was developed by sucking on a small bottle when attempting to suck on a larger bottle. An example of accomodation would be when the child needs to modify a sucking schema developed by sucking on a pacifier to one that would be successful for sucking on a bottle.

As schema become increasingly more complex (i.e., responsible for more complex behaviors) they are termed structures. As one's structures become more complex, they are organized in a hierarchical manner (i.e., from general to specific).

• Sensorimotor stage (Infancy). In this period (which has 6 stages), intelligence is demonstrated through motor activity without the use of symbols. Knowledge of the world is limited (but developing) because its based on physical interactions / experiences. Children acquire object permanence at about 7 months of age (memory). Physical development (mobility) allows the child to begin developing new intellectual abilities. Some symbollic (language) abilities are developed at the end of this stage.
• Pre-operational stage (Toddler and Early Childhood). In this period (which has two substages), intelligence is demonstrated through the use of symbols, language use matures, and memory and imagination are developed, but thinking is done in a nonlogical, nonreversable manner. Egocentric thinking predominates
• Concrete operational stage (Elementary and early adolescence). In this stage (characterized by 7 types of conservation: number, length, liquid, mass, weight, area, volume), intelligence is demonstarted through logical and systematic manipulation of symbols related to concrete objects. Operational thinking develops (mental actions that are reversible). Egocentric thought diminishes.
• Formal operational stage (Adolescence and adulthood). In this stage, intelligence is demonstrated through the logical use of symbols related to abstract concepts. Early in the period there is a return to egocentric thought. Only 35% of high school graduates in industrialized countries obtain formal operations; many people do not think formally during adulthood.

Many pre-school and primary programs are modeled on Piaget's theory, which, as stated previously, provided part of the foundation for constructivist learning . Discovery learning and supporting the developing interests of the child are two primary instructional techniques. It is recommended that parents and teachers challenge the child's abilities, but NOT present material or information that is too far beyond the child's level. It is also recommended that teachers use a wide variety of concrete experiences to help the child learn (e.g., use of manipulatives, working in groups to get experience seeing from another's perspective, field trips, etc).

Piaget's research methods were based primarily on case studies (i.e., they were descriptive). While some  of his ideas have been supported through more correlational and experimental methodologies, others have not. For example, Piaget believed that biological development drives the movement from one cognitive stage to the next. Data from cross-sectional studies of children in a variety of western cultures seem to support this assertion for the stages of sensorimotor, preoperational, and concrete operations (Renner, Stafford, Lawson, McKinnon, Friot & Kellogg, 1976).

However, data from similar cross-sectional studies of adolescents do not support the assertion that all individuals will automatically move to the next cognitive stage as they biologically mature simply through normal interaction with the environment (Jordan & Brownlee, 1981). Data from adolescent populations indicates only 30 to 35% of high school seniors attained the cognitive development stage of formal operations (Kuhn, Langer, Kohlberg & Haan, 1977). For formal operations, it appears that maturation establishes the basis, but a special environment is required for most adolescents and adults to attain this stage.

There are a number of specific examples of how to use Piagetian theory in teaching/learning process.

• Bruner, J. (1966). Studies in cognitive growth : A collaboration at the Center for Cognitive Studies . New York: Wiley & Sons.
• Bruner, J. (1974). Toward a theory of instruction . Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
• Dewey, J. (1997a). Experience and education . New York: MacMillan Publishing Co.
• Dewey, J. (1997b). How we think . New York: Dover Publications.
• Jordan, V. B., & Brownlee, L. (1981, April). Meta-analysis of the relationship between Piagetian and school achievement tests . Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Los Angeles, CA.
• Kuhn, D., Langer, J., Kohlberg, L., & Haan, N. S. (1977). The development of formal operations. in logical and moral judgment. Genetic Psychology Monographs, 95 , 97-188.
• Neisser, U. (1967) Cognitive psychology . New York: Appleton-Century Crofts.
• Piaget, J. (1972). The psychology of the child . New York: Basic Books.
• Piaget, J. (1990). The child's conception of the world . New York: Littlefield Adams.
• Piaget, J., Gruber, H. (Ed.), & Voneche, J. J. (Ed.). The essential Piaget (100th Anniversary Ed.). New York: Jason Aronson.
• Renner, J., Stafford, D., Lawson, A., McKinnon, J., Friot, E., & Kellogg, D. (1976). Research, teaching, and learning with the Piaget model . Norman, OK: University of  Oklahoma Press.
• Vygotsky, L. (1986). Thought and language . Boston: MIT Press.
• Vygotsky, L., & Vygotsky, S. (1980). Mind in society : The development of higher psychological processes . Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

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Jean Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

Categories Development

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development suggests that children progress through a series of stages of mental development. The theory outlines four distinct stages from birth through adolescence, focusing on how children acquire knowledge, reasoning, language, morals, and memory.

Piaget’s stages of development are:

Table of Contents

An Overview of Jean Piaget’s Theory

The theory was the work of Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist who became the first to conduct systematic research on children’s cognitive development. This theory had a tremendous impact on the fields of developmental psychology and education.

What made Piaget’s stages so unique and revolutionary?

• Piaget was one of the first to suggest that the way children think is fundamentally different than that of adults. Prior to Piaget, the prevailing belief was that children were smaller versions of adults and that their thinking was simply less competent than that of adults. Piaget’s work demonstrated that children think about the world differently than adults do.
• Piaget’s stages suggest that kids actively participate and construct their knowledge. Rather than believing that children passively take in what they observe, Piaget believed that kids play an active role in learning about the world around them.
• Each of Piaget’s stages is marked by distinctive shifts in how kids think. His theory describes four stages of cognitive development that children go through as they learn more about the world.
• During the earliest stages of development, children learn about the world primarily through their senses. As development progresses, children’s intellectual abilities become increasingly sophisticated, eventually allowing them to think and reason about abstract concepts and problems.

How Did Jean Piaget’s Theory Develop?

Piaget’s fascination with science began early in life, with his initial interests lying in the natural sciences. Born in the late 1800s, Piaget was a child prodigy. He published his first scientific paper on mollusks when he was just 11 years old. He went on to earn a Ph.D. in Zoology. After spending a semester studying with Carl Jung , Piaget developed a stronger interest in psychology.

It was through his work in Alfred Binet’s laboratory in Paris that Piaget developed an interest in children’s cognitive development. Charged with interpreting the results of the standardized intelligence tests that Binet had developed for the French government, Piaget was interested in why children answered questions incorrectly. Upon questioning kids about their answers, he realized that how they responded depended upon their level of intellectual development.

His observations of his young nephew and later his own children added to his growing theory of childhood cognitive development.

Piaget’s theory focused on three critical components:

• Schemas , or the mental frameworks that make up knowledge
• The ways that this knowledge is acquired or altered ( assimilation , equilibration, and accommodation )
• The stages of mental development that children go through as they obtain and create knowledge.

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

In Jean Piaget’s theory, he proposed that children progress through four distinct stages of intellectual development. Each stage is marked by changes in how kids think about and relate to the people and objects in their environment.

1. The Sensorimotor Stage (ages 0-2)

• Children learn about the world via their senses
• Basic activities such as sucking, rooting, listening, grasping objects, and sucking on things are how infants learn about the world
• As they progress through this stage, they eventually learn object permanence, or that things continue to exist even when they can no longer be seen

During the first two years of life, a child’s knowledge of the world stems from motor actions and sensory information. A remarkable amount of learning takes place during this relatively brief period.

One of the critical events of the sensorimotor stage is the development of object permanence or the understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be seen.

The physical milestones of this stage also contribute to cognitive development as children explore the world through reaching, grasping, rolling, crawling, and eventually walking. The earliest foundations of language development are established during this stage as well.

During the sensorimotor stage, infants learn about the world around them through their senses, perceptions, and motor skills. Infants are limited in terms of their ability to independently explore, so every interaction they have with people and the environment serves as an important learning opportunity.

Babies and toddler rely on the basic abilities they were born with, such as rooting, sucking, chewing, and looking, to learn more about themselves, the people around them, and the environment they live in.

Looking at a very young child, you might question just how much they really are able to generate knowledge from their actions. The truth is that babies can acquire a tremendous amount of information just by utilizing their sensory systems and motor skills. Sights, sounds, movements, tastes, smells, and textures provide valuable information that helps infants discover the world.

6 Sensorimotor Substages

Piaget believed that the events of this stage were so dramatic that he divided the sensorimotor stage further into six distinct substages.

1. Reflexive Activities (0 to 1 month): The infant gains knowledge of the world through their inborn reflexes at this substage. At this point, an infant’s actions involve performing reflexive actions such as sucking at a nipple or chewing on a toy.

Through these actions, new objects are assimilated, and reflexes are accommodated to respond to new objects. While these actions seem very basic, they serve as an important stepping stone in intellectual development.

2. Primary Circular Reactions (1 to 4 months): Infants begin to repeat reflexive actions that are related to their own bodies and that they find pleasurable. For example, a baby might suck her thumb or kick her legs against a soft blanket. Babies also begin to notice when objects disappear.

3. Secondary Circular Reactions (4 to 8 months): Babies continue to repeat actions that they find enjoyable, but they also begin to perform actions that involve manipulating objects. For example, a baby might shake a toy in order to hear the sound that it makes.

4. Coordination of Reactions (8 to 12 months): During this stage infant begin to perform more goal-directed actions. Rather than simply repeating pleasurable actions, they will intentionally seek out actions or objects in the environment that they want to play with. For example, a child might push aside unwanted object to get to an interesting toy.

5. Tertiary Circular Reactions (12 to 18 months): During this substage, infants begin to experiment with new ways of solving problems. Babies now display intentional reactions that they have learned during the earlier substages. For example, a child might take a stack of blocks apart and will now try to figure out how to put it back together again. Babies also explore trial-and-error processes in order to see what happens or what sort of reaction they will get.

6. Early Representational Thought (18 to 24 months): During this final sensorimotor stage, children begin to show signs of symbolic thought. Babies now possess mental representations of objects, which means they are also able to think about things that are not there.

Object Permanence During the Sensorimotor Stage

One of the hallmarks of the sensorimotor period in Piaget’s stages of development is the presence of egocentrism . Children at this stage of development cannot take other people’s perspective.

In addition to being unable to see things from other people’s perspectives, children at this stage also develop object permanence or the understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be seen. During the early sub-stages of the sensorimotor stage, children lack any sense of object permanence. If an object cannot be seen, it simply no longer exists in their view.

As children progress through this stage, they begin to learn more about the objects around them and the fact that things can exist even though they may be hidden. During the first month of life, a baby may track an object with its eyes but ignore the objects sudden disappearance. From about 1 to 4 months, an infant will stare at the spot where an object vanished.

It is during the age from around 4 to 8 months that children start to search for an object that is partially concealed, and from 8 to 12 months a clear understanding of object concepts begins to emerge.

If you have ever played peek-a-boo with an infant, you can see the development of object permanence in action. A very young infant might not search for a hidden object and will be very surprised when it pops out from a hidden spot. On the other hand, a child with an emerging sense of object permanence will actively search for the hidden object.

The sensorimotor stage of development serves as an important building block for future cognitive growth. While children may be limited to learning through their senses and motor actions, this does not mean that this is an uneventful stage of development. A tremendous amount of growth takes place during the sensorimotor stage, laying the foundation for the upcoming preoperational stage of development.

 2. The Preoperational Stage (ages 2 to 7)

• Egocentrism is a common characteristic of this stage, since children struggle to see things from other’s point of view
• Children begin to think symbolically and are able to understand that symbols and words represent objects in the real world

The early part of this stage of cognitive development is marked by the emergence of language. Why is this an important part of Piaget’s stages? Because it suggests that children are capable of symbolic thought. Children utilize language to symbolically represent objects, people, and ideas.

While their thinking is becoming increasingly sophisticated, kids at this stage of cognitive development struggle with logic and mentally transforming information.

Piaget’s experiments demonstrated, for example, that kids in the preoperational stage have difficulty with conservation.  For example, kids are shown two glasses containing the same amount of liquid. The liquid is then poured into two different containers – a short, wide glass and a tall skinny glass. While they saw that the two amounts were equal, children in the preoperational stage will invariably select the tall skinny glass as containing more.

This period of cognitive development is also marked by an inability to take another person’s perspective, which Piaget called egocentrism.

In his experiments, Piaget found that when children were asked to select an image depicting another person’s view of a scene, they would simply select their own view because they could not imagine the scene from the other individual’s perspective.

 3. The Concrete Operational Stage (ages 7 to 11)

• Children begin to utilize logical and organized in their thinking, but they tend to think about things in very concrete terms
• They struggle to think about abstract ideas or concepts
• They learn conservation, or the idea that the total amount of something such as a glass of water remains the same even if it is divided into smaller parts

The concrete operational stage of cognitive development is marked by the emergence of logical thought. Kids become much more capable at applying logic, but they also tend to be very concrete, literal thinkers. At this point, they still struggle with abstract ideas and hypothetical situations.

In addition to thinking more logically, kids also become less egocentric and capable of conservation. At this stage of cognitive development, children can better consider other people’s perspectives and understand that other people do not see things the same way they do.

 4. The Formal Operational Stage (age 11 to adulthood)

• Children at this stage of cognitive development are beginning to utilize abstract thinking when they consider problems
• As they consider complex problems about the world, including social and moral issues, they become better at considering theoretical and abstract ideas

The fourth and final stage in Piaget’s stages of cognitive development is characterized by the emergence of abstract thought. Instead of simply relying on their own experiences, kids begin to imagine multiple possible ways of solving problems.

Whereas younger kids typically rely on trial and error when solving problems, those who have reached the formal operational stage can systematically solve problems using logic. Trial-and-error may still come in to play, but it involves a more methodical and organized approach rather than the haphazard style that younger kids use.

In Jean Piaget’s theory, he did not identify exact ages when these stages occur. However, most explanations of the theory identify a typical range during which the stage often occurs.

While Piaget believed that these stages were universal, not all individuals reach the later stages. Not everyone, for example, reaches formal operations and becomes skilled at deductive reasoning and abstract thinking.

The Impact of Jean Piaget’s Theory

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development had a lasting impact on the fields of psychology and education. Most educational programs today are based around the idea that instruction should be geared towards a child’s developmental level. Strategies such as peer-led instruction and social facilitation are also rooted in the tenets of Piaget’s stages.

While influential, Piaget’s theory has not been without criticism. Many note that development does not necessarily align to a series of distinct stages, a fact that even Piaget himself observed.

Others suggest that his stages may have been too broad, vague, and not clear on how children’s learning actually occurs.

Researchers also suggest that Piaget underestimated children’s abilities. For example, the understanding of object permanence is thought to occur much earlier than what Piaget believed.

Nevertheless, Piaget’s theory of cognitive development had a powerful impact on our understanding of the intellectual abilities and growth of children.

Fischer KW, Bullock D.  Cognitive development in school-age children: Conclusions and new directions . In:  Development During Middle Childhood: The Years From Six to Twelve.  National Academies Press.

Hugar SM, Kukreja P, Assudani HG, Gokhale N. Evaluation of the relevance of Piaget’s cognitive principles among parented and orphan children in Belagavi City, Karnataka, India: A comparative study . Int J Clin Pediatr Dent . 2017;10(4):346-350. doi:10.5005/jp-journals-10005-1463

Phillips, J.L. (1975). The Origins of Intellect: Piaget’s Theory. San Francisco: W.H. Freeman and Company.

Piaget, J. (1977). Gruber, H.E.; Voneche, J.J. eds. The Essential Piaget. New York: Basic Books.

Piaget, J. (1983). Piaget’s theory. In P. Mussen (ed). Handbook of Child Psychology. 4th edition. Vol. 1. New York: Wiley.

Schaffer, D.R. & Kipp, K. (2010). Developmental Psychology: Childhood & Adolescence. Belmont, CA: Cengage Learning.

[…] each phase of development. References https://www.explorepsychology.com/child-development-theories/ https://www.explorepsychology.com/piagets-theory-cognitive-development/ […]

Jean Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development

Jean Piaget created one of the most well-known theories to explain a child's development. This page will review the basics of his theory on cognitive development.

If you have ever babysat, worked with children, or cared for younger siblings, you might have experienced moments where you noticed that the child just didn’t understand simple concepts. When you play peek-a-boo with a baby, it seems they genuinely don't know where you went. When you try to reason with a toddler, it appears they can’t understand why their brother also needs to eat food, even though they want it for themselves.

Other than causing hilarious moments of misunderstanding, these situations show how far along the child is in their cognitive development. Children develop certain concepts and skills as they age into young adults.

Who is Jean Piaget?

Jean Piaget was a Swiss psychologist who traveled to France to study children and intelligence. While studying children and raising three children of his own, he noticed that children would get the same questions wrong or misunderstand similar concepts at the same age.

He developed a theory outlining the different stages children underwent to complete their cognitive development.

Piaget identified four stages that children must undergo to achieve full cognitive development. These four stages are the following:

Sensorimotor Stage

• PreOperational Stage

Concrete Operational Stage

Formal Operational Stage

If you want to remember the order of these four stages, use this mnemonic device: “Some People Can’t Focus.”

Let’s go through each of these stages.

This is the first stage in the theory of cognitive development. It starts at birth and continues until the age of 2. During this stage, babies use their senses to develop schemas, a concept I will explain later, and learn about the world around them. Piaget breaks the sensorimotor stage into six substages.

The first substage is the refinement of basic reflexes that help the baby survive and feed. By the sixth substage, the baby has begun experimenting with different movements to get a reaction or experience sensations. They might hold a rattle, shake it, or throw it across the room to see the consequences of those actions.

In this stage, the child develops object permanence. When children are first born, they cannot understand that items exist outside of what they can see and hear. As they develop, they understand that even though their mother has walked out of the room, the mother still exists.

Preoperational Stage

The Preoperational Stage, the second stage of cognitive development, spans from ages 2 to 7. This is also known as “early childhood development.” While the child has already established that things exist outside of what they can see and hear, they are still limited to understanding things from their own perspective.

This is called egocentrism. However, as the child moves through the Preoperational Stage, the child begins to use symbolic play and thought to move out of an egocentric way of thinking. They can begin to see things from other points of view. While Piaget theorized that this development happened around age 7, other psychologists have concluded that egocentrism ends around age 3-5.

Children also start to develop language at this time. They use symbols to connect letters and words with sounds. This is why children begin to read as early as 2.

Throughout the Preoperational Stage, children also learn to combine different schemas to solve problems and understand the world around them. In the beginning stages of the Preoperational Stage, children have difficulty understanding Conservation. They can’t comprehend, for example, that the same amount of liquid can be held in two containers with different shapes. They may say a tall, skinny glass can hold more liquid than a short, wide glass of the same volume.

The children reach the age of 6 or 7 and move into the Concrete Operational stage. They can begin to use logic to solve problems and come up with conclusions. Children are generally limited to inductive reasoning during this stage. For example, if they observe 10 dogs and all 10 dogs pant in the summertime, they can conclude that all dogs pant during the summertime.

Deductive reasoning comes later.

Children can begin to grasp the idea of Conservation in the Concrete Operational Stage. They also begin to understand Classification and Reversibility. Reversibility works well with Conservation. Children between the ages of 7-12 begin to understand that if you smash a ball of clay, it still has the same quantity as it did previously. With reversibility, the child begins to understand that smashing the ball of clay is reversible. They can simply roll the ball back up, maintaining the same quantity.

Classification is the ability to classify and organize objects. Through seriation, the children can also classify and order those objects due to logic.

These skills greatly contribute to a child’s ability to understand the world around them and solve problems. However, they are still limited and have one more stage in their cognitive development.

Stage 4: Formal Operational

The last and final stage in Piaget's theory of cognitive development doesn’t end when a child reaches their teenage years or even adulthood. When the child reaches the age of 11 or 12, they enter the Formal Operational Stage. This stage lasts for the rest of their lives.

The Formal Operational Stage is when the child uses abstract thinking and deductive reasoning to solve problems. They can think outside the world's rules and use more than just trial and error to approach problems.

Children also develop meta-cognition during this time. Not only can they start to use hypothetical situations to solve problems and solve more complex problems, but they can also think about their thought processes.

Influence of Environment, Culture, and Upbringing on Cognitive Development

Every child, while undergoing the stages of cognitive development, does so in the context of their environment, culture, and upbringing. These factors significantly influence the pace, sequence, and nuances of their developmental milestones.

• Environment : A stimulating environment can accelerate a child's cognitive development. For example, children exposed to a variety of sensory experiences, interactive toys, and engagement with caregivers tend to develop cognitive skills faster than those in deprived settings.
• Culture : Cultural norms can define what skills are emphasized or de-emphasized during a child's upbringing. In some cultures, memorization might be emphasized more than critical thinking, influencing the way cognitive skills evolve. Moreover, cultural practices and beliefs can shape the schemas children develop. For instance, children in collectivist cultures might develop schemas centered on community and relationships faster than those in individualistic cultures.
• Upbringing : Parenting styles and familial structures play a pivotal role. Children in authoritative households, where they're encouraged to ask questions and explore the world around them, might progress differently in certain cognitive areas than those in more restrictive environments.
• Language and Communication : The complexity and structure of the language spoken at home can influence cognitive development, especially in terms of abstract thinking and expression. Bilingual children, for instance, often showcase flexibility in thinking due to their ability to switch between languages.
• Educational Systems : The educational structure a child is exposed to can significantly alter their cognitive progression. Systems that promote critical thinking, creativity, and exploration might lead to different developmental trajectories compared to those that emphasize rote learning.

It's essential to recognize that while Piaget's theory provides a structured overview of cognitive development, the individual journey of each child is nuanced and influenced by a myriad of external factors. Recognizing these influences not only provides a more holistic understanding of a child's cognitive development but also underscores the importance of providing an enriching, culturally aware, and supportive environment for every child.

In the context of Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development, as children journey through the various stages, they continuously amass knowledge and craft mental structures called schemas. Schemas are essentially cognitive blueprints or frameworks that help us organize and interpret the world. As children encounter new experiences and information, these schemas are developed, adjusted, and expanded. Let's delve into some primary schema types :

• Person Schemas : These revolve around information about specific individuals. For instance, a child may develop a schema that their grandmother always wears glasses and smells like roses. As they encounter more people and note various distinguishing characteristics, their person schemas evolve.
• Self-schemas : These are deeply rooted in one's own self-perception and understanding. They encompass information about oneself and evolve with every new personal experience. For a young child, a self-schema might be rudimentary like recognizing they have blonde hair. However, as they mature, self-schemas become more intricate, encapsulating personality traits, personal values, and self-worth.
• Event Schemas (or Scripts) : These schemas relate to routine activities or events. A child might develop an event schema around bedtime: brush teeth, read a story, and then lights out. These become deeply ingrained, and deviations from the 'script' might be met with confusion or resistance, especially in younger children.
• Social Schemas : These involve general knowledge about how the world operates, especially in a social context. It can encompass societal norms, roles, and behaviors expected in particular settings. An example might be the expectation to say "please" and "thank you." As children grow and are exposed to diverse cultures and societal norms, their social schemas can adjust to incorporate a broader worldview.

Evolution Across Stages

• Sensorimotor Stage : Schemas during this stage are mostly based on sensory and motor experiences. A baby might develop a schema that shaking a rattle will produce sound.
• Preoperational Stage : As children start to engage in pretend play, their schemas become more sophisticated, encompassing symbols and language. Their self-schemas start to form more distinctly, as they recognize themselves in mirrors and photos.
• Concrete Operational Stage : Children begin to understand the concept of reversibility and conservation, leading to more advanced event schemas. Their social schemas also expand as they engage in group activities and learn about societal norms.
• Formal Operational Stage : Schemas during this stage become abstract. Adolescents can think hypothetically and deduce conclusions from premises. Their self-schemas might become intertwined with philosophical thinking about identity and existence.

As children transition through these stages, it's vital to recognize that while the foundational essence of schemas remains, their complexity, depth, and breadth evolve tremendously. It underscores the dynamic nature of cognitive development and the intricate tapestry of experiences that shape our understanding of the world.

Assimilation and Accommodation

As I said earlier, we acquire new schemas, but we also change those schemas as we acquire new information and thought processes. These two processes are called assimilation and accommodation . 

Assimilation

Assimilation is adjusting the schema you currently have to make room for new or even conflicting information. You also learn where and how to store the information that you currently have.

Technology is a great example of how we assimilate new information. You might have had your first exposure to a word processor when you played on a typewriter. You learned how to place your fingers on the keys and saw that pressing each letter created a letter on the page.

However, as technology evolved and you grew up, you were introduced to new schema, like Microsoft Word. You still put your fingers on the same keys and saw letters pop up on the screen, but you also learned how to Save, Print, Copy, and Paste the letters you typed.

Throughout the development of technology and your need to use a word processor, you become better and better and organizing the skills and information needed to complete your tasks. Your original schema about word processing was never proved to be “wrong” but was merely expanded by new information.

Accommodation

Accommodation is the process of altering or modifying existing schemas to fit new information. Sometimes, this might even involve the formation of an entirely new schema.

For instance, consider children's understanding of animals. When they first encounter a gorilla, they might classify it broadly as a hairy primate under the schema "gorilla". However, as they gain more exposure and knowledge, they realize not all hairy primates are gorillas. Subsequently, they refine their schema, differentiating between "gorillas", "baboons", "chimpanzees", and "orangutans". Each of these animals then has its own distinct schema, changing the child's original, more generalized understanding of what a gorilla represents.

Similarly, schemas can be influenced by societal and familial inputs, which aren't always accurate. For example, children raised in prejudiced environments might grow up with skewed schemas about certain groups of people, influenced by their parents' biases. If they're taught to believe that a particular group of people is inferior, they'll view the world through that lens.

However, as they grow and interact with the broader world – perhaps meeting individuals from that group, being exposed to diverse viewpoints, or receiving education that challenges their biases – they may come to realize that their initial schema was flawed. This realization would prompt the child to accommodate the new, more accurate information, thereby reshaping or even replacing the old prejudiced schema with a more informed and equitable understanding. This highlights the dynamic nature of cognitive development and the ongoing interplay of experience, learning, and personal growth.

Equilibration (balance of Assimilation and Accommodation)

Assimilation and accommodation are two key learning processes. You cannot expand your worldview without making room for new information and developing new schema. But which one is most important?

Piaget believed that an equal amount of both assimilation and accommodation were necessary to foster cognitive development. Children benefited most when they could make room for new information that didn’t change their existing schemas and could alter schemas with new, more factual information.

How Piaget's Theory of Cognitive Development Affects Teaching and Interacting With Children

As you learn more about the different stages of cognitive development, you can use activities to foster a child’s development. You can encourage pretend play to develop a child’s understanding of symbols. You can give them logic puzzles to help them refine their skills during the Concrete Operational Stage.

Continue learning about each stage of cognitive development. As you do, you will learn more about when children acquire different skills. Use this information to help your students or the children in your life through the four stages.

Related posts:

• Assimilation vs Accommodation (Definition and Examples)
• Assimilation in Psychology (Definition + Examples)
• Concrete Operational Stage (3rd Cognitive Development)
• Acculturation (Definition + 20 Examples)
• Schemas in Psychology

Reference this article:

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Developmental Psychology:

Developmental Psychology

Erikson's Psychosocial Stages

Trust vs Mistrust

Autonomy vs Shame

Initiative vs Guilt

Industry vs inferiority

Identity vs Confusion

Intimacy vs Isolation

Generativity vs Stagnation

Integrity vs Despair

Attachment Styles

Avoidant Attachment

Anxious Attachment

Secure Attachment

Lawrence Kohlberg's Stages of Moral Development

Piaget's Cognitive Development

Object Permanence

Unconditional Positive Regard

Birth Order

Zone of Proximal Development

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Piaget’s Sensorimotor Stage of Cognitive Development

Saul McLeod, PhD

Editor-in-Chief for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MRes, PhD, University of Manchester

Saul McLeod, PhD., is a qualified psychology teacher with over 18 years of experience in further and higher education. He has been published in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Clinical Psychology.

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Olivia Guy-Evans, MSc

Associate Editor for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MSc Psychology of Education

Olivia Guy-Evans is a writer and associate editor for Simply Psychology. She has previously worked in healthcare and educational sectors.

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The sensorimotor stage is the first of the four stages in Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. It extends from birth to approximately 2 years, and is a period of rapid cognitive growth.

During this phase, infants and toddlers primarily learn through sensory experiences and manipulating objects. Key achievements include understanding object permanence (recognizing that objects continue to exist even when not seen) and developing a sense of self as distinct from the world around them.

During this period, infants develop an understanding of the world through coordinating sensory experiences (seeing, hearing) with motor actions (reaching, touching).

The main development during the sensorimotor stage is the understanding that objects exist and events occur in the world independently of one’s own actions (“the object concept”, or “ object permanence “).

For example, if you place a toy under a blanket, the child who has achieved object permanence knows it is there and can actively seek it. At the beginning of this stage, the child behaves as if the toy had simply disappeared.

The attainment of object permanence generally signals the transition to the next stage of development ( preoperational ).

Developmental Milestones

1. object permanence.

• What It Means : The realization that objects continue to exist even when they’re out of sight. Significance: 
• When It Happens : This understanding typically begins to emerge around 4 to 7 months of age. By 8 months, many babies begin to show clearer signs of this realization, though a complete understanding usually solidifies by 18-24 months.
• Why It’s Important : It’s the starting point for memory skills and realizing that things around them are constant.
• Signs to Watch For : Your baby enjoys games like peek-a-boo and will look for toys you’ve hidden, showing they know it’s still there.

2. Cause and Effect

• What It Means : Recognizing that certain actions produce specific results.
• When It Happens : Babies start showing initial signs of grasping cause and effect between 4 to 8 months. For example, they might realize that if they shake a rattle, it will make noise. This understanding deepens and becomes more sophisticated throughout the sensorimotor stage and beyond.
• Why It’s Important : This helps your baby start thinking logically and understand how things work.
• Signs to Watch For : You might see your baby dropping toys from their high-chair repeatedly, not just for fun, but also to see what happens and to get your attention.

3. The Start of Pretend Play

• What It Means : Using one object to stand in for another (like pretending a banana is a phone), showcasing the onset of imaginative play.
• When It Happens: Pretend or symbolic play usually begins around 18 months but becomes more pronounced and complex by the age of 2 years. This is when children start using objects to represent something else, like pretending a banana is a phone or a box is a car.
• Why It’s Important : This imaginative play shows they’re starting to think in creative ways and is a foundation for language skills.
• Signs to Watch For : Watch for moments when your child uses one object to represent another, like using a bowl as a hat or a box as a car.

Sub-Stages: Development & Examples

The sensorimotor stage of development can be broken down into six additional sub-stages including simple reflexes, primary circular reactions, secondary circular reactions, coordination of reactions, tertiary circular reactions, and early symbolic thought.

1. Reflex Acts

The first substage (first month of life) is the stage of reflex acts. The neonate responds to external stimulation with innate reflex actions.

During this period, the infant, or neonate, primarily interacts with the world through inborn reflexes rather than deliberate behaviors.

A prominent example is the rooting reflex: when a baby’s cheek or mouth is gently touched, the infant will reflexively turn their head toward the source and begin to suck. This reflex aids in breastfeeding and showcases the neonate’s innate response mechanisms during this early stage of development.

2. Primary Circular Reactions

Primary Circular Reactions refer to a developmental phase in Piaget’s sensorimotor stage, specifically between 1 to 4 months of age. The baby will repeat pleasurable actions centered on its own body.

In this phase, infants begin to coordinate sensations and two types of schema (habit and circular reactions). The term “circular” denotes the repeated nature of an action that a baby finds pleasurable or interesting.

The actions in primary circular reactions are centered on the baby’s own body, rather than the external environment.

For instance, a baby might accidentally suck their thumb and find it pleasurable, leading them to engage in thumb-sucking repeatedly.

These actions are “primary” because they originate from the baby’s own body movements and are not yet focused on the outside world.

These are not reflex actions. They are done intentionally – for the sake of the pleasurable stimulation produced.

3. Secondary Circular Reactions

Secondary circular reactions refer to a phase in Piaget’s sensorimotor stage, typically evident between 4 to 8 months of age.

In this phase, infants become more focused on the external world and begin to repeat actions that produce enjoyable or interesting results in their environment.

Unlike Primary Circular Reactions, which are centered on the infant’s own body, secondary circular reactions involve the repetition of actions that involve external objects.

For example, a baby might accidentally shake a rattle and, finding the sound interesting, deliberately shake it again to reproduce the sound.

This phase represents the child’s growing awareness and interaction with the environment, as they begin to understand cause-and-effect relationships with objects around them.

4. Co-ordinating Secondary Schemes

Coordinating secondary schemes is a phase in Piaget’s sensorimotor stage, typically occurring between 8 to 12 months of age.

In this stage, infants begin to combine and coordinate separate actions into more complex sequences, marking the start of intentional and goal-directed behavior.

Rather than just repeating individual actions involving external objects (as seen in secondary circular reactions), in this phase, children show the ability to carry out actions with a specific goal in mind.

For instance, a baby might push one toy out of the way to reach another toy behind it, demonstrating an understanding of spatial relationships and object permanence.

For example, the infant will not just shake the rattle, but will reach out and knock to one side an object that stands in the way of it getting hold of the rattle.

It’s a pivotal stage as children start to combine previously learned behaviors, anticipate outcomes, and purposefully engage with their environment to achieve desired results.

5. Tertiary Circular Reactions

Fifth comes the substage of tertiary circular reactions. During this substage, infants engage in experimental interactions with their environment through trial-and-error behaviors.

Unlike previous secondary circular reactions, where actions were often repetitive, in tertiary circular reactions, children purposefully modify their actions to see the outcomes, showing a form of early problem-solving.

An example might be a child dropping a toy at different angles or with different forces to see how it reacts.

6. Symbolic Thought

Finally, in substage six, there is the beginning of Piaget’s Preoperational Stage (Ages 2-7)symbolic thought. This is transitional to the pre-operational stage of cognitive development. Babies can now form mental representations of objects.

Symbolic thought emerges in the latter part of the sensorimotor stage, around 18-24 months. It signifies a child’s ability to form mental representations of objects or events that aren’t currently present.

This development enables activities like pretend play and the use of symbols, indicating an understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of sight, a concept known as object permanence .

Symbolic thought marks a cognitive leap, setting the foundation for later stages of conceptual and abstract thinking.

What To Look Out For In Your Child 

Navigating the early years of parenthood, you’ll witness your child’s unfolding cognitive milestones, offering subtle clues about their understanding of the world.

For instance, a clear indicator of their grasping object permanence is when they remain calm as you exit the room, comprehending that you haven’t vanished entirely.

This understanding can make transitions smoother, allowing them to feel comfortable with familiar adults, knowing that you’ll return.

Moreover, as your child progresses through the sensorimotor stage, their budding comprehension of cause and effect becomes evident.

Initially, this might manifest as deliberately spilling food or making water splashes in the bath, driven by curiosity. As this understanding deepens, they’ll engage more deliberately with toys and objects.

For example, they’ll quickly learn which button on their favorite toy elicits a sound and repeatedly press it, showcasing their grasp of cause and effect.

How To Help Your Child During This Stage

Supporting your child during the sensorimotor stage can be both fun and insightful. To foster their grasp of object permanence, engage them in a simple game of hide and seek.

This doesn’t require a large space; even hiding behind your hands or using toys like puppets and teddies can work wonders. Observe their reactions; as they mature in their understanding, their excitement, evident through giggles and animated movements, will increase.

As they navigate through this developmental stage, providing them with materials for open-ended play encourages self-led discovery. Playdough, paints, and even daily objects can captivate their curiosity.

Don’t be surprised if they start experimenting with their food, blending textures to see how they change. This exploration is a testament to their burgeoning cognitive growth.

Introducing materials that highlight cause and effect can be particularly beneficial. Water play stands out as a favorite.

Whether it’s contrasting toys in the bathtub or a basin filled with water and sponges, such activities entertain and enhance their understanding of how their actions influence outcomes.

Piaget, J. (1952). The origins of intelligence in children . New York: International Universities Press.

Piaget, J. (1954). The construction of reality in the child . New York: Basic Books.

Piaget, J. (1964). Part I: Cognitive development in children: Piaget development and learning. Journal of research in science teaching, 2(3) , 176-186.

Further Information

• Di Paolo, E. A., Barandiaran, X. E., Beaton, M., & Buhrmann, T. (2014). Learning to perceive in the sensorimotor approach: Piaget’s theory of equilibration interpreted dynamically. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 8, 551.

Cognitive Development: The Theory of Jean Piaget

Cognition refers to thinking and memory processes, and cognitive development refers to long-term changes in these processes. One of the most widely known perspectives about cognitive development is the cognitive stage theory of a Swiss psychologist named Jean Piaget . Piaget created and studied an account of how children and youth gradually become able to think logically and scientifically. Because his theory is especially popular among educators, we focus on it in this chapter.

Piaget was a psychological constructivist : in his view, learning proceeded by the interplay of assimilation (adjusting new experiences to fit prior concepts) and accommodation (adjusting concepts to fit new experiences). The to-and-fro of these two processes leads not only to short-term learning, but also to long-term developmental change . The long-term developments are really the main focus of Piaget’s cognitive theory.

After observing children closely, Piaget proposed that cognition developed through distinct stages from birth through the end of adolescence. By stages he meant a sequence of thinking patterns with four key features:

• They always happen in the same order.
• No stage is ever skipped.
• Each stage is a significant transformation of the stage before it.
• Each later stage incorporated the earlier stages into itself.

Basically this is the “staircase” model of development mentioned at the beginning of this chapter. Piaget proposed four major stages of cognitive development, and called them (1) sensorimotor intelligence, (2) preoperational thinking, (3) concrete operational thinking, and (4) formal operational thinking. Each stage is correlated with an age period of childhood, but only approximately.

The sensorimotor stage: birth to age 2

In Piaget’s theory, the sensorimotor stage is first, and is defined as the period when infants “think” by means of their senses and motor actions. As every new parent will attest, infants continually touch, manipulate, look, listen to, and even bite and chew objects. According to Piaget, these actions allow them to learn about the world and are crucial to their early cognitive development.

The infant’s actions allow the child to represent (or construct simple concepts of) objects and events. A toy animal may be just a confusing array of sensations at first, but by looking, feeling, and manipulating it repeatedly, the child gradually organizes her sensations and actions into a stable concept, toy animal . The representation acquires a permanence lacking in the individual experiences of the object, which are constantly changing. Because the representation is stable, the child “knows,” or at least believes, that toy animal exists even if the actual toy animal is temporarily out of sight. Piaget called this sense of stability object permanence , a belief that objects exist whether or not they are actually present. It is a major achievement of sensorimotor development, and marks a qualitative transformation in how older infants (24 months) think about experience compared to younger infants (6 months).

During much of infancy, of course, a child can only barely talk, so sensorimotor development initially happens without the support of language. It might therefore seem hard to know what infants are thinking, but Piaget devised several simple, but clever experiments to get around their lack of language, and that suggest that infants do indeed represent objects even without being able to talk (Piaget, 1952). In one, for example, he simply hid an object (like a toy animal) under a blanket. He found that doing so consistently prompts older infants (18–24 months) to search for the object, but fails to prompt younger infants (less than six months) to do so. (You can try this experiment yourself if you happen to have access to young infant.) “Something” motivates the search by the older infant even without the benefit of much language, and the “something” is presumed to be a permanent concept or representation of the object.

The preoperational stage: age 2 to 7

In the preoperational stage , children use their new ability to represent objects in a wide variety of activities, but they do not yet do it in ways that are organized or fully logical. One of the most obvious examples of this kind of cognition is dramatic play , the improvised make-believe of preschool children. If you have ever had responsibility for children of this age, you have likely witnessed such play. Ashley holds a plastic banana to her ear and says: “Hello, Mom? Can you be sure to bring me my baby doll? OK!” Then she hangs up the banana and pours tea for Jeremy into an invisible cup. Jeremy giggles at the sight of all of this and exclaims: “Rinnng! Oh Ashley, the phone is ringing again! You better answer it.” And on it goes.

In a way, children immersed in make-believe seem “mentally insane,” in that they do not think realistically. But they are not truly insane because they have not really taken leave of their senses. At some level, Ashley and Jeremy always know that the banana is still a banana and not really a telephone; they are merely representing it as a telephone. They are thinking on two levels at once—one imaginative and the other realistic. This dual processing of experience makes dramatic play an early example of metacognition , or reflecting on and monitoring of thinking itself. Metacognition is a highly desirable skill for success in school, one that teachers often encourage (Bredekamp & Copple, 1997; Paley, 2005). Partly for this reason, teachers of young children (preschool, kindergarten, and even first or second grade) often make time and space in their classrooms for dramatic play, and sometimes even participate in it themselves to help develop the play further.

The concrete operational stage: age 7 to 11

As children continue into elementary school, they become able to represent ideas and events more flexibly and logically. Their rules of thinking still seem very basic by adult standards and usually operate unconsciously, but they allow children to solve problems more systematically than before, and therefore to be successful with many academic tasks. In the concrete operational stage, for example, a child may unconsciously follow the rule: “If nothing is added or taken away, then the amount of something stays the same.” This simple principle helps children to understand certain arithmetic tasks, such as in adding or subtracting zero from a number, as well as to do certain classroom science experiments, such as ones involving judgments of the amounts of liquids when mixed. Piaget called this period the concrete operational stage because children mentally “operate” on concrete objects and events. They are not yet able, however, to operate (or think) systematically about representations of objects or events. Manipulating representations is a more abstract skill that develops later, during adolescence.

Concrete operational thinking differs from preoperational thinking in two ways, each of which renders children more skilled as students. One difference is reversibility , or the ability to think about the steps of a process in any order. Imagine a simple science experiment, for example, such as one that explores why objects sink or float by having a child place an assortment of objects in a basin of water. Both the preoperational and concrete operational child can recall and describe the steps in this experiment, but only the concrete operational child can recall them in any order . This skill is very helpful on any task involving multiple steps—a common feature of tasks in the classroom. In teaching new vocabulary from a story, for another example, a teacher might tell students: “First make a list of words in the story that you do not know, then find and write down their definitions, and finally get a friend to test you on your list.” These directions involve repeatedly remembering to move back and forth between a second step and a first—a task that concrete operational students—and most adults—find easy, but that preoperational children often forget to do or find confusing. If the younger children are to do this task reliably, they may need external prompts, such as having the teacher remind them periodically to go back to the story to look for more unknown words

The other new feature of thinking during the concrete operational stage is the child’s ability to decenter , or focus on more than one feature of a problem at a time. There are hints of decentration in preschool children’s dramatic play, which requires being aware on two levels at once—knowing that a banana can be both a banana and a “telephone.” But the decentration of the concrete operational stage is more deliberate and conscious than preschoolers’ make-believe. Now the child can attend to two things at once quite purposely. Suppose you give students a sheet with an assortment of subtraction problems on it, and ask them to do this: “Find all of the problems that involve two-digit subtraction and that involve borrowing from the next column. Circle and solve only those problems.” Following these instructions is quite possible for a concrete operational student (as long as they have been listening!) because the student can attend to the two subtasks simultaneously—finding the two-digit problems and identifying which actually involve borrowing. (Whether the student actually knows how to “borrow” however, is a separate question.)

In real classroom tasks, reversibility and decentration often happen together. A well-known example of joint presence is Piaget’s experiments with conservation , the belief that an amount or quantity stays the same even if it changes apparent size or shape (Piaget, 2001; Matthews, 1998). Imagine two identical balls made of clay. Any child, whether preoperational or concrete operational, will agree that the two indeed have the same amount of clay in them simply because they look the same. But if you now squish one ball into a long, thin “hot dog,” the preoperational child is likely to say that the amount of that ball has changed—either because it is longer or because it is thinner, but at any rate because it now looks different. The concrete operational child will not make this mistake, thanks to new cognitive skills of reversibility and decentration: for him or her, the amount is the same because “you could squish it back into a ball again” (reversibility) and because “it may be longer, but it is also thinner” (decentration). Piaget would say the concrete operational child “has conservation of quantity.”

The classroom examples described above also involve reversibility and decentration. As already mentioned, the vocabulary activity described earlier requires reversibility (going back and forth between identifying words and looking up their meanings); but it can also be construed as an example of decentration (keeping in mind two tasks at once—word identification and dictionary search). And as mentioned, the arithmetic activity requires decentration (looking for problems that meet two criteria and also solving them), but it can also be construed as an example of reversibility (going back and forth between subtasks, as with the vocabulary activity). Either way, the development of concrete operational skills support students in doing many basic academic tasks; in a sense they make ordinary schoolwork possible

The formal operational stage: age 11 and beyond

In the last of the Piagetian stages, the child becomes able to reason not only about tangible objects and events, but also about hypothetical or abstract ones. Hence it has the name formal operational stage —the period when the individual can “operate” on “forms” or representations. With students at this level, the teacher can pose hypothetical (or contrary-to-fact) problems: “What if the world had never discovered oil?” or “What if the first European explorers had settled first in California instead of on the East Coast of the United States?” To answer such questions, students must use hypothetical reasoning , meaning that they must manipulate ideas that vary in several ways at once, and do so entirely in their minds

The hypothetical reasoning that concerned Piaget primarily involved scientific problems. His studies of formal operational thinking therefore often look like problems that middle or high school teachers pose in science classes. In one problem, for example, a young person is presented with a simple pendulum, to which different amounts of weight can be hung (Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). The experimenter asks: “What determines how fast the pendulum swings: the length of the string holding it, the weight attached to it, or the distance that it is pulled to the side?” The young person is not allowed to solve this problem by trial-and-error with the materials themselves, but must reason a way to the solution mentally. To do so systematically, he or she must imagine varying each factor separately, while also imagining the other factors that are held constant. This kind of thinking requires facility at manipulating mental representations of the relevant objects and actions—precisely the skill that defines formal operations.

As you might suspect, students with an ability to think hypothetically have an advantage in many kinds of school work: by definition, they require relatively few “props” to solve problems. In this sense they can in principle be more self-directed than students who rely only on concrete operations—certainly a desirable quality in the opinion of most teachers. Note, though, that formal operational thinking is desirable but not sufficient for school success, and that it is far from being the only way that students achieve educational success. Formal thinking skills do not insure that a student is motivated or well-behaved, for example, nor does it guarantee other desirable skills, such as ability at sports, music, or art. The fourth stage in Piaget’s theory is really about a particular kind of formal thinking, the kind needed to solve scientific problems and devise scientific experiments. Since many people do not normally deal with such problems in the normal course of their lives, it should be no surprise that research finds that many people never achieve or use formal thinking fully or consistently, or that they use it only in selected areas with which they are very familiar (Case & Okomato, 1996). For teachers, the limitations of Piaget’s ideas suggest a need for additional theories about development—ones that focus more directly on the social and interpersonal issues of childhood and adolescence. The next sections describe some of these.

Bredekamp, S. & Copple, C. (1997). Developmentally appropriate practice, Revised edition. Washington, D.C.: National Association for the Education of Young Children.

Case, R. & Okamoto, Y. (1996). The role of central conceptual structures in children’s thought . Chicago: Society for Research on Child Development.

Inhelder, B. & Piaget, J. (1958). The growth of logical thinking from childhood to adolescence: An essay on the growth of formal operational structures . New York: Basic Books.

Matthews, G. (1998). The philosophy of childhood . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Paley, V. (2005). A child’s work: The importance of fantasy play . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Piaget, J. (1952). The origins of intelligence in children . New York: International Universities Press.

Piaget, J. (2001). The psychology of intelligence . Oxford, UK: Routledge

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Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development: Experiments with Kids

Jean Piaget, a psychologist who published his most influential works from the late 1920s through the 1950s, is most known for his theory of stages of cognitive development. He suggested a four-stage model that children go through as they develop more complex reasoning skills.

Children start out in the sensorimotor stage, which lasts until they’re roughly 2. They have no sense of themselves as individuals, obviously, and wouldn’t recognize their hand as “theirs.” They aren’t afraid of heights or touching something hot because they can’t grasp the idea of falling or something being hot–those ideas are too abstract.

Here’s a video that illustrates some of the limits of reasoning at this age:

In the preoperational stage (Piaget said it lasted from around age 2 until about 7), kids start being able to grasp symbols. For instance, they can draw a series of squares with a triangle on top to represent a house. They also start to learn the alphabet, which is, of course, the set of symbols we use to read and write.

On the other hand, they don’t understand abstract concepts like amounts, speed, or weight. In one of Piaget’s most famous experiments, he showed that children at this stage can’t comprehend that if you pour liquid from a short, wide glass into a tall, narrow glass, it’s still the same amount:

By the concrete operational stage (roughly 7-12 years old) kids comprehend ideas like weight, amount, and speed, and can understand that the amount of liquid in the two glasses is the same:

They can also understand causal relationships, though not necessarily explain the reasoning behind them. Here, the younger kid says what would happen if you hit a glass with a feather based on what he knows about feathers, whereas the older child reasons from the previous statement and answers according to the logic proposed (despite it being obviously inaccurate):

Finally, Piaget said that in the formal operational stage (after about age 12) kids can understand abstract concepts and reason logically. If you ask them what “justice” means, they can explain it. The girl in the last video, who reasoned from the previous statement (which had been presented as true), illustrates formal operational thinking.

Of course, there are questions about Piaget’s model (described in Kimmel and Aronson, 2009, Sociology Now ). Do we really only go through each stage once? Might we have to go through some of them again when we hit new life challenges or milestones? Do we have to completely master one stage before we can progress, or is it possible to have some overlap? Are these stages universal? Would we expect childhood mental development to occur in the same way in a society where people are middle-aged by 20 as they would in one where they aren’t middle aged until 35 or 40? Might the fact that kids in some societies are given more “adult” tasks at a young age affect their mental development?

Of course, another issue comes up about the formal operational stage…Kohlberg and Gilligan (1971, “The Adolescent as Philosopher,” Daedalus , p. 1051-1086) estimated that about 30% of people in the U.S. never actually develop advanced abstract reasoning skills. I will make no further comment on that.

Comments 40

Ar — september 15, 2009.

Might the fact that kids in some societies are given more “adult” tasks at a young age affect their mental development?

I would suspect that such reasoning ability has some similarity with the early development of skills in general. A lot of skills generally thought of as adult can be mastered by young children if they start early and focus on it. Reading is such a good example that we take it for granted, being an extremely difficult and unnatural task. Why do children nonetheless learn to read so early in their lives? Because we expect it of them. Children who have similar levels of cognitive achievement expected of them in other, less commonly emphasized areas would easily surprise most parents and teachers, I'm sure.

They are limits, but I don't think most children are anywhere near those limits for most things. When it comes to "adult reasoning," things are particularly worrying, since interconnections within the brain are most powerful when they are formed while the relevant white matter is still plastic. By the time a person is legally an adult, almost all of that has been solidified. If a person has not already had their ability to make adult decisions routinely pushed to the limit, they will never be able to reach the same level of skill at such things as if they had been forced to make adult-type decisions throughout more of their so-called adolescence. The practice of holding non-adults to lower standards is almost certainly harming them in the long run.

Larry Harnisch — September 15, 2009

Speaking strictly from my experience, theories and studies are fine and valuable until you actually have a kid -- then all the book learning and hypotheses go out the window. As always, your mileage may vary.

kate — September 15, 2009

One of the more interesting things I've read about Piaget's model is that trauma victims often do indeed (if you buy the model concept) regress to former stages of cognition and have to develop through the stages once more

AG — September 15, 2009

Actually, the babies are displaying amazing social acuity. In that first video, they are looking for the object where they have been taught to look for it. When the experiment is removed from a social context, babies don't make that mistake!

Check out this little article. It's only 4 minutes. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112524209

Lisa — September 15, 2009

These videos are great! As a teacher, I've had to study Piaget's theory several times so I'd read all about the two glasses experiment. However, I had never seen/heard of some of the other tests, and it was great to see them in action!

Joe — September 15, 2009

Of course, what I always find to be an interesting question is what kinds of perceptual and reasoning tasks do we never achieve the capacity for? Are there any?

Ranah — September 17, 2009

Adults make the same types of mistakes for other things... for example some really believe that pulling 6 digits out of 49 stands a good chance in a lottery... even if to win, you have to guess ALL 6 digits (chance is more than 1 in a million). There are LOTS of adult mistakes regarding abstract relations like that, especially if these adults don't know math.

Anonymous — September 18, 2009

Frankly, I don't think the little boy's response to the feather/glass question arose from a lack of abstract reason. I think he simply refused to accept the premises of the argument (that striking a glass with a feather would lead it to break). And who could blame him?

C — September 18, 2009

Frankly, I don’t think the little boy’s response to the feather/glass question arose from a lack of abstract reason. I think he simply refused to accept the premises of the argument (that striking a glass with a feather would lead it to break). And who could blame him?

Media Run « Go Lexi Go! — September 28, 2009

[...] Piagets Stages of Cognitive Development [...]

Lips — October 25, 2010

Anna flynn — october 2, 2012.

Does anyone ever explain to the children that the amount of coins or water are the same even though they look different just to check if they could understand the concept of space and shape even though they might not have reached the next age/stage of development? 

Saturn — November 8, 2012

I recently turned 15 and I have noticed over time I have changed and have been able to solve things differently and more easily. I remember just a few years ago I didn't understand how certain things worked and now I can figure it out for my self. I have become more of an abstract thinker; for example I can actually solve word problems in my head without having to write everything out.

Page 189 | Babysitting in Bangkok — July 15, 2013

[...] was so excited about this I tried Piaget’s conservation experiment with my two siblings. I poured water into two glasses of the same size. Then, I took one glass and [...]

Maria — September 18, 2013

Fun ways to teach your child money management | your family finances — september 23, 2013.

[...] can have their own bank accounts and are even shopping online. Unfortunately, children only start understanding abstract concepts at around the age of 12. So prior to this age money needs to be concrete for them to understand it. [...]

Mad Hatter's Modulation - This experiment works. AND it’s cute. — October 16, 2013

[...] http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2009/09/15/piagets-stages-of-cognitive-development-experiments-... [...]

guest — February 14, 2014

Well maybe im crazy but I thought what the little kid thought you hit a glass with a feather and it will not break. I guess i'm not an abstract thinker.

ePortfolio (Early Childhood) – Human Development Psychology — April 14, 2018

[…] Sharp, G. (2009). Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development: Experiments with Kids. Retrieve from https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2009/09/15/piagets-stages-of-cognitive-development-experiments… […]

sfsg — July 8, 2019

https://thesocietypages.org please reply to me thanks your so murch

Anonymous — October 9, 2019

broaden my horizon and enhance my understanding of children's learning.

ANYA — January 25, 2021

hi, can't see any of the videos. would you please post them?

Jamie — June 28, 2021

Hello! Does anyone have the links to the videos that were once embedded? Thanks!

Social-emotional learning, Part 3: How did this happen in a state like Idaho? - Idaho Freedom — July 19, 2021

[…] Jean Piaget said the ability to reason abstractly does not develop in children until age 11 or 12. As many school […]

Reta Tarbox — November 13, 2023

We really appreciate your effort and also dedication. Thank you for being such a excellent associate!

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1 Stages of Cognitive Development

At the end of this chapter, you will be able to:

• Identify key elements of Piaget’s cognitive development theory
• Explain how Piaget’s cognitive development theory can be utilized to support instruction
• Summarize the criticisms of Piaget’s cognitive development theory and educational implications
• Explain how equity is impacted by Piaget’s cognitive development theory
• Identify classroom strategies to support the use of Piaget’s cognitive development theory
• Develop a plan to implement Piagets’s cognitive development theory

Introduction

Jean Piaget (1896-1980), a Swiss psychologist, is best known for his pioneering work on the development of intelligence in children. His studies have had a major impact on the fields of psychology and education. In his work Piaget identified the child’s four stages of mental growth. Among Piaget’s many books are The Language and Thought of the Child (1926), Judgment and Reasoning in the Child (1928), The Origin of Intelligence in Children (1954), The Early Growth of Logic in the Child (1964), and Science of Education and the Psychology of the Child (1970).

From his observation of children, Piaget understood that children were creating ideas. They were not limited to receiving knowledge from parents or teachers; they actively constructed their own knowledge. Piaget’s work provides the foundation on which constructionist theories are based. Constructionists believe that knowledge is constructed and learning occurs when children create products or artifacts. They assert that learners are more likely to be engaged in learning when these artifacts are personally relevant and meaningful (Constructivism, n.d.).

In studying the cognitive development of children and adolescents, Piaget identified four major stages:

• sensorimotor
• pre-operational
• concrete operational 
• formal operational

Piaget believed all children pass through these phases to advance to the next level of cognitive development. In each stage, children demonstrate new intellectual abilities and increasingly complex understanding of the world. Stages cannot be “skipped;” intellectual development always follows this sequence. The ages at which children progress through the stages are averages-they vary with the environment and background of individual children. At any given time, a child may exhibit behaviors characteristic of more than one stage.

Figure 2.1 Stages of Cognitive Development The inspiration web below illustrates Piaget’s four cognitive development stages: sensorimotor (birth-2 years), preoperational (2-7 years), concrete operational (7-11 years), and formal operational (adolescence-adulthood). Illustrated by Tiffany Davis, Meghann Hummel, and Kay Sauers (2006).

 

Video 2.2: Illustration of Schema, Assimilation, & Accommodation

Figure 2.3 assimilation process.

In Figure 2.3 when the parent reads to the child about dogs, the child constructs a schema about dogs. Later, the child sees a dog in the park; through the process of assimilation the child expands his/her understanding of what a dog is. When the dog barks, the child experiences disequilibria because the child’s schema did not include barking. Then the child discovers the dog is furry, and it licks the child’s hand. Again, the child experiences disequilibria. By adding the newly discovered information to the existing schema the child is actively constructing meaning. At this point the child seeks reinforcement from the parent. The parent affirms and reinforces the new information. Through assimilation of the new information the child returns to a state of equilibrium.

Figure 2.4. Accommodation Process

In Figure 2.4. the process of accommodation occurs when the child sees a cat in the park. A new schema must be formed, because the cat has many traits of the dog, but because the cat meows and then climbs a tree the child begins to actively construct new meaning. Again, the parent reinforces that this is a cat to resolve the child’s disequilibrium. A new schema about cats is then formed and the child returns to a state of equilibrium.

Criticisms of Piaget’s Cognitive Development Theory

Researchers during the 1960’s and 1970’s identified shortcomings in Piaget’s theory:

• By describing tasks with confusing abstract terms and using overly difficult tasks, Piaget underestimated children’s abilities. Researchers have found that young children can succeed on simpler forms of tasks requiring the same skills.
• Piaget’s theory predicts that thinking within a particular stage would be similar across tasks. In other words, preschool children should perform at the preoperational level in all cognitive tasks. Research has shown much more diversity in children’s thinking across cognitive tasks.
• According to Piaget, efforts to teach children developmentally advanced concepts would be unsuccessful. Researchers have found that in some instances, children often learn more advanced concepts with relatively brief instruction. Researchers now believe that children may be more competent than Piaget originally thought, especially in their practical knowledge.

Educational Implications

An important implication of Piaget’s theory is adaptation of instruction to the learner’s developmental level. The content of instruction needs to be consistent with the developmental level of the learner. The teacher’s role is to facilitate learning by providing a variety of experiences.

“Discovery Learning” provides opportunities for learners to explore and experiment, thereby encouraging new understandings (Kafia & Resnick, 1996). Opportunities that allow students of differing cognitive levels to work together often encourage less mature students to advance to a more mature understanding. One further implication for instruction is the use of concrete “hands on” experiences to help children learn.

It is important to consider the developmental stages of students and adapt instruction to support students in progressing both academically and socially.

Additional suggestions include:

• Provide concrete props and visual aids, such as models and/or time line;

• Use familiar examples to facilitate learning more complex ideas, such as story problems in math;

• Allow opportunities to classify and group information with increasing complexity; use outlines and hierarchies to facilitate assimilating new information with previous knowledge; and

• Present problems that require logical analytic thinking; the use of tools such as “brain teasers” is encouraged.

Huitt and Hummel (1998) asserted that only 35% of high school graduates in industrialized countries obtain formal operations and many people do not think formally during adulthood.

This is significant in terms of developing instruction and performance support tools for students who are chronologically adults, but may be limited in their understanding of abstract concepts.

• Children are shown a three-dimensional display of a mountain scene.
• Kids are asked to choose a picture showing the scene they observed. Most children are able to do this with little difficulty.
• Next, children are asked to select a picture showing what someone else would have observed when looking at the mountain from a different viewpoint.

Invariably, children almost always choose the scene showing their own view of the mountain scene. According to Piaget, children experience this difficulty because they cannot take on another person's perspective.

Other researchers have also conducted similar experiments. In one study, children were shown a room in a small dollhouse. Children could see in the dollhouse that a toy was hidden behind a piece of furniture.

Children were then taken into a full-size room that was an exact replica of the dollhouse. Very young children did not understand to look behind the couch to find the toy, while slightly older children immediately searched for the toy.

Developmental psychologists refer to the ability to understand that other people have different perspectives, thoughts, feelings, and mental states as theory of mind .

Conservation in the Preoperational Stage

Another well-known experiment involves demonstrating a child's understanding of conservation. In one conservation experiment, equal amounts of liquid are poured into two identical containers.

The liquid in one container is then poured into a differently shaped cup, such as a tall and thin cup or a short and wide cup. Children are then asked which cup holds the most liquid. Despite seeing that the liquid amounts were equal, children almost always choose the cup that appears fuller.

Piaget conducted several similar experiments on the conservation of number, length, mass, weight, volume, and quantity. He found that few children showed any understanding of conservation prior to the age of five.

While influential, Piaget's theories are not without criticisms. Some of these center on:

• The ages at which skills emerge : Other researchers have also found that kids can overcome egocentrism as early as age four, which is earlier than Piaget believed.  
• The focus on inability vs. ability : As you might have noticed, much of Piaget's focus at this stage of development focused on what children could not yet do.

The concepts of egocentrism and conservation are centered on abilities that children have not yet developed; they lack the understanding that things look different to other people and that objects can change in appearance while maintaining the same properties.

Skills Often Emerge Earlier Than Piaget Suggested

However, not everyone agrees with Piaget's assessment of children's abilities. Researcher Martin Hughes, for example, argued that the reason that children failed at the three mountains task was simply that they did not understand it.

In one experiment, Hughes demonstrated that children as young as age 4 were able to understand situations from multiple points of view, suggesting that children become less egocentric at an earlier age than Piaget believed.

How children engage with the environment may also play a part in their ability to understand the world around them. Researchers have found, for example, that children tend to struggle more with understanding the principle of conservation when they are passive observers.

Kids who actively manipulate materials can better recognize that quantity remains the same even when split up or placed in different containers.

Several important cognitive milestones emerge during the preoperational stage of development. Some of these include:

• Age 2 to 3 : Kids begin to engage in pretend play, can follow simple directions, and can sort objects into different categories. 
• Age 3 to 4 : Kids develop more refined schemas, or categories of information, that they use to sort and understand objects. They also understand past vs. present, have a longer attention span, group similar objects, and seek answers to their questions about the world.
• Age 4 to 5 : Children's cognitive skills become more refined and they are better able to imitate the actions of adults. 
• Age 6 to 7 : Kids develop a better understanding of time and more advanced language skills.

Understanding such milestones can help you better assess whether or not your child's development is on track. However, it is essential to recognize that all children develop at different rates. 

If your child is not meeting one or more milestones after the age such skills typically emerge, it may be cause for concern.

Talk to your child's doctor if you are worried that your child is not achieving milestones that typically happen during the preoperational stage. They can assess your child's abilities to determine if your child needs additional assistance or intervention.

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By Kendra Cherry, MSEd Kendra Cherry, MS, is a psychosocial rehabilitation specialist, psychology educator, and author of the "Everything Psychology Book."