There are several cognitive development theories that are used to explain children’s growth but the most widely known is Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development. During Piaget’s work in the 1920’s, he noticed that children would make specific mistakes on intelligence tests based on their ages. He hypothesized that the mistakes were a result of brain maturation, not necessarily the child’s intellect. After many observations and tests, Piaget proposed a theory of cognitive development that described how a child moves from one stage of development to the next with increased cognitive understanding and sophistication (Piaget, 1929).

Piaget’s work was revolutionary because he believed that children actively construct knowledge about the world around them and that they are not passive in their learning. He also popularized the notion that children do not think the way adults do. Based on Piaget’s work, we have a better understanding of children’s thought processes and how these processes influence the way in which they interact with the world.

Piaget’s theory of cognitive development includes four distinct stages–sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational. Each stage builds upon the next and results in changes in thinking. According to Piaget, every child will progress through each stage in the same order but brain maturity combined with life experience will determine when a child moves onto the next stage. Infants and toddlers will move through the first two stages of Piaget’s theory.

It is important to note that although Piaget’s theory is used widely to understand how young children develop cognitively, there are many criticisms that should be taken into account. One of the major criticisms of Piaget’s work is that he often underestimated children’s abilities. Children may be capable of more at an earlier age than Piaget originally suggested. For example, some researchers have seen that young children obtain object permanence as early as 4 months old.

5.6.1 Sensorimotor Stage

The first stage of Piagets’ cognitive development theory is the sensorimotor stage. This stage coincides with children ages 0-2 years old. During this period, infants and young toddlers will develop an understanding of the world through their senses via things that they can see, hear, touch and smell. Their brain will connect sensory experiences (seeing, hearing) with motor actions (reaching, touching). As we learned in Chapter 4, newborns are born with instinctual reflex movements and they are wired to learn through their senses. If you have been around young children you have noticed the amount of time and effort they put forth into touching everything or putting objects in their mouths. They are working hard to refine skills and are doing exactly what they need to be doing during this stage of their lives!

Object permanence is a critical milestone in Piaget’s theory and is the major achievement of the sensorimotor stage. Object permanence refers to a child’s understanding that even though something is out of their sight, it still exists. It is also around this time that children show signs of stranger and separation anxiety.

Figure 5.2. Photo byUnsplash.

The sensorimotor stage is marked by several substages associated with increased cognitive understanding and motor skills. These are described in table 5.1.

Table 5.1. Sensory motor stage.

Attaining object permanence generally signals the transition to the next stage of development, the preoperational stage.

5.6.2 Preoperational Stage

The second of Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development is the preoperational stage. This stage coincides with children ages 2 to 7 years. The preoperational stage is divided into two substages known as the symbolic function substage (ages 2 to 4) and the intuitive thought substage (ages 4-7). The symbolic function substage is characterized by gains in symbolic thinking which allows for advances in language development, problem solving and memory. We will discuss the intuitive thought substage in Chapter 7.

During the symbolic function substage, children use mental representations, which is the ability to think about things that are not currently present or to think about something in the past. Children can also imagine and use symbols to represent things in their environments. One way that we can witness this growth is through the way children play. Children who are operating in the preoperational stage love to play pretend. A box can become a house or a car. A stick may become a sword or a wand. The possibilities are endless! Cognitive advances allow children to use play as a medium for solidifying learned schemas or to integrate new information through accommodation.

During the early stage of preoperational development, Piaget believed that children experience egocentrism, which refers to the inability to see the world through other people’s perspective. While egocentrism is experienced throughout the lifespan, young children in particular experience egocentrism because they are still learning to separate themselves from other people. In other words, young children believe that others feel and think the way they do. Children can develop perspective taking and empathy in their early years provided that they have opportunities to interact meaningfully with others.

Egocentrism allows for a toddler’s thinking to be illogical or incomplete. For example, they may engage in a thought process called magical thinking in which children believe that their thoughts or actions influence things that happen in their environment. This often leads children to connect unrelated events together simply because the two events may have occurred simultaneously one time. For example, a child is angry at their caregiver and they yell at them. Suddenly, the parent falls on the floor and hurts their ankle. The child may believe that their anger and yelling caused the parent to fall and hurt themselves. More broadly speaking, magical thinking can also refer to beliefs about supernatural phenomena such as the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus.

Animism is another type of cognitive process that preoperational children demonstrate. Animism refers to the belief that inanimate objects have lifelike abilities. For example, they may see their teddy bear as having feelings or believe that their favorite doll has to take a nap because it is very tired from playing all day. Piaget believed that children viewed the world, nature, and objects as alive and with purpose. Children tend to grow out of this type of thinking by the time they are 3 years old.