Page 88 - Understanding Psychology

your own standpoint and having difficulty understanding someone else’s viewpoint and other perspectives. By age 7, the same child will tell you that the tall jar contains the same amount of water as the short one.
Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development Piaget described the changes that occur in children’s understanding in four stages of cognitive develop- ment (see Figure 3.9). During the sensorimotor stage, the infant uses schemas that primarily involve his body and sensations. The preoperational stage emerges when the child begins to use mental images or symbols to under- stand things. By the third stage, concrete operations, children are able to use logical schemas, but their understanding is limited to concrete objects or problems. In the formal operations stage, the person is able to solve abstract problems. According to Piaget, a person’s development through these four stages depends on both the maturation of his or her nervous system and on the kinds of experiences he or she has had. Everyone goes through the stages in the same order, but not necessarily at the same age.
EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT
While the child is developing his ability to use his body, to think, and to express himself, he is also developing emotionally. He begins to become attached to specific people and to care about what they think and feel.
Figure 3.8 Tasks to Measure Conservation
The concept of conservation can be used to show that children think less logically than adults do. Children in the preoperational stage do not understand that the property of a substance remains the same although its appearance may change. How is conservation related to egocentric thinking?
Type of conservation
First display
Second display
Child is asked
Length
The child agrees that the sticks are of equal length.
The experimenter moves one stick over.
Which stick is longer?
Preconserving child will say that one stick is longer.
Conserving child will say that they are the same length.
Substance amount
The child acknowl- edges that the two balls have equal amounts of clay.
The experimenter rolls out one of the balls.
Do the two pieces have the same amount of clay?
Preconserving child will say that the long piece has more clay.
Conserving child will say that the two pieces have the same amount of clay.
74 Chapter 3 / Infancy and Childhood