CHAPTER 5 Infancy Cognitive Development Cognitive Development Jean

CHAPTER 5 Infancy: Cognitive Development

Cognitive Development: Jean Piaget

Cognitive Development – Jean Piaget • Piaget hypothesized that cognitive processes develop in an orderly sequence of stages (4). • • Stage 1: Stage 2: Stage 3: Stage 4: Sensorimotor Preoperational Concrete operational Formal operational

Piaget Basics • Schemes -Children’s concepts of the world • Cognitive development -Way of perceiving and mentally representing the world • Assimilation -Absorbing new events into existing schemes • Accommodation -Modifying existing schemes when assimilation does not allow the child to make sense of novel events

Sensorimotor Stage • Refers to 0 -2 years of cognitive development • First substage (1 st month after birth) -Dominated by assimilation of sources of stimulation into inborn reflexes such as grasping, visual tracking. • Second substage (1 to 4 months) Primary circular reactions -characterized by beginnings of the ability to coordinate various sensorimotor schemes -focus on the infant’s own body rather than on external environment

Sensorimotor Stage (cont’d) • Third substage (4 to 8 months) Secondary circular reactions -include repeated patterns of activity due to effect on the environment -focus shifts objects and environmental events • Fourth substage (8 to 12 months) -Infants begin to show intentional, goal-directed behavior in which they differentiate between the means of achieving a goal and the goal or end itself • Fifth substage (12 to 18 months) Tertiary circular reactions -purposeful adaptations of established schemes to specific situations

Sensorimotor Stage (cont’d) • Sixth substage (18 to 24 months) -Transition between sensorimotor development and the development of symbolic thought -External exploration replaced by mental exploration -Use imitation to symbolize or stand for a plan of action • Object permanence -Recognition that an object or person continues to exist when out of sight -Advances in the development of the object concept by about the sixth month

Fig. 5 -1, p. 95

Evaluation of Piaget Confirmation • Remains a comprehensive model of infant cognition • Many of his own observations of his own infants have been confirmed by others. • Pattern and sequence of events he described have been observed among American, European, African, and Asian infants

Piaget Criticisms – Cognitive development not as tied to discrete stages – Emphasis on maturation with exclusion of adult and peer influences on cognitive development – Underestimation of infants’ competence • Infants display object permanence earlier than Piaget believed. • Infants display deferred imitation as early as 9 months and not 18 months as Piaget believed.

Information Processing

Information Processing Memory • Memory improves between 2 and 6 months of age. • Older infants more capable of encoding than younger ones • Infant memory can be improved if infants receive a reminder. Deferred Imitation -Imitation of actions after a time delay occurs as early as 6 months -Imitation of neonates likely reflexive

Fig. 5 -2, p. 96

Fig. 5 -2, p. 97

Mirror Neurons • Activated when the individual performs a motor act or observes another individual engaging in the same act • Also connected with emotions in humans – The frontal lobe is active when people experience emotions such as disgust, happiness, pain, and also when they observe another person experiencing an emotion • Has been suggested that mirror neurons are connected with the built-in human capacity to acquire language

Individual Differences in Intelligence Among Infants

Individual Differences in Intelligence Among Infants • Understanding of infants’ intelligence based on scales of infant development • Bayley Scales of Infant Development -Consists of 178 mental-scale items and 111 motor-scale items -Mental scale assesses verbal communication, perceptual skills, learning and memory, and problem-solving skills -Motor scale assesses gross and fine motor skills -Behavior rating scale based on examiner observation of the child during the test also used • Testing used to identify handicaps

Instability of Intelligence Scores Attained in Infancy • Scores obtained during first year of life correlated moderately with scores obtained a year later. • Bayley scales and socioeconomic status were able to predict cognitive development among LBW children from 18 months to 4 years. • Bayley and other scales do not predict school grades or IQ scores very well. • Bayley scales are best at identifying gross lags in development and relative strengths and weaknesses.

Table 5 -1, p. 98

Use of Visual Recognition Memory • Visual recognition memory - Ability to discriminate previously seen objects from novel objects; procedure based on habituation • Children with greater visual recognition memory attained higher IQ scores. • Individual differences in capacity for visual recognition memory are stable. • Capacity for visual recognition memory increases over first year after birth. • Studies on visual recognition memory and later IQ scores show good predictive validity for broad cognitive abilities throughout childhood.

Language Development

Early Vocalizations • Children develop language according to an invariant sequence of steps or stages. • Language begins with prelinguistic vocalizations. -Cooing (2 nd month) -Infants use tongues, vowel-like sounds -Appears to be linked to pleasure -Babbling (6 -9 months) -Combination of consonants and vowels • Echolalia (10 -12 months) -Infants repeat syllables • Intonation (end of 1 st year) -Use of patterns that rise and fall; resembles adult speech

Table 5 -2, p. 101

Development of Vocabulary • First word -Spoken between 11 -13 months -Brief and consist of one or two syllables • General nominals -Similar to nouns -Includes names of classes of objects • Vocabulary acquisition -Slow at first -3 or 4 months from when the first word is spoken, children learn 10 -30 words -18 -month-old vocabulary may be 50 words -22 -month-old vocabulary may be 300 words • Specific nominals -Proper nouns

Overextension • Overextension – Children extend the meaning of one word to refer to things and actions for which they do not have words. – Overextensions gradually pulled back to proper references

Development of Sentences • Telegraphic speech -Brief expressions that have meanings of sentences • Mean length of utterance (MLU) -Average number of morphemes that communicators use in their sentences • Morphemes -Smallest units of meaning in a language -e. g. Walked is two morphemes: walk = verb, -ed = past-tense suffix • MLU increases rapidly once speech begins

Fig. 5 -5, p. 103

Development of Sentences (cont’d) • Holophrases -Single words that are used to express complex meanings -e. g. , “Mama” means… “There goes Mama” • Telegraphic speech -Two-word sentences -e. g. , “That ball”; words is and a are implied -Shows understanding of syntax -Rules in a language for placing words in order to form sentences

Theories of Language Development • Nurture view -Holds that a child learns the language that the family speaks 1. Imitation -Children learn language, at least in part, by observation and imitation. 2. Reinforcement -Children learn language due to the social cues of smiling, stroking, and talking back to them. Extinction -Foreign sounds drop out due to the lack of reinforcement. Shaping -Reinforcing children’s utterances as they approximate actual words (may be selective)

Theories of Language Development (cont’d) • Nature -Holds that children have inborn tendency in the form of neurological “pre-wiring” to language learning • Psycholinguistic theory -Language acquisition involves interaction between environmental influences. -Innate tendency labeled language acquisition device (LAD) -Inborn tendency supported by studies of deaf children and in the language development among all languages

Theories of Language Development (cont’d) • Surface and deep structure -On the surface, languages differ in vocabulary and grammar. -However, languages share “universal grammar” allowing for transforming ideas into sentences. • Chomsky maintains children are genetically pre-wired to attend to language and deduce the rules for constructing sentences from ideas.

Brain Structures Involved in Language • Biological structures of LAD based in left hemisphere of the cerebral cortex for nearly all right-handed people and for 2 out of 3 left-handed • Damage to Broca’s or Wernicke’s area called aphasia -Disruption in the ability to understand or produce language -Located left hemisphere • Broca’s aphasia -Can understand but not reproduce speech well • Wernicke’s aphasia -Can speak freely with proper syntax -Have trouble understanding speech and finding the words to express themselves

Fig. 5 -6, p. 107

The Sensitive Period • Language learning most efficient beginning at 18 to 24 months (sensitive period) • During this period, neural development provides plasticity of the brain. • Damage to the brain easier to heal the younger the child • Social contacts important in the development of language • Malnutrition and abuse can contribute to poor language learning and ability.