Module 3

Cognitive Development

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

1. discuss the concepts and theories related to cognitive development of children
and adolescents; and
2. make connections, using knowledge on current research literature, between
cognitive development theories and developmentally appropriate teaching
approaches suited to learner’s gender, needs, strengths, interests, and
experiences.

Cognitive Development Theories

Cognitive development means thinking and reasoning development.
Cognitive development is affected by genetics, environment, and experiences, and can
be hindered by trauma and lack of stimulation. Every day, new discoveries are made
about the way the brain develops and processes information and how learning occurs.
Many theorists have contributed to the knowledge base on cognitive development. Two
main cognitive development theorists are Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky. Their work
serves as the basis for understanding the process of learning as an interaction of the
developing human brain and the environment

Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Jean Piaget was a Swiss psychologist whose insightful descriptions of children’s
thinking changes the way we understand cognitive development. Piaget created a
model describing how humans go about making sense of their world by gathering and
organizing information.

Piaget described four stages of cognitive development in children. The

stages describe development that is continuous and progressive, moving through one
stage before beginning the next. Each stage lays a foundation for the next stage. All
children progress through all four stages but at different rates within each stage. The

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stages are also related to age range, but there is variety within these ranges among
children.

Figure 1. Piaget’s stages of cognitive development (Source: verywellmind.com)

Piaget emphasized that “Construction is superior to instruction” which led to the

term constructivism. This refers to the belief that knowledge is constructed by
experience, not just by coming of age and passing through stages. Children build their
systems of meaning and understandings of reality through their experience and
interactions.

Piaget proposed that two basic principles guide children's intellectual

development: organization and adaptation. As children mature, their knowledge
schemes are integrated and reorganized into more complex systems that are better
adapted to their environment. Adaptation of knowledge schemes occurs through the
process of assimilation and accommodation. Through the process of assimilation,
children mold information to fit existing knowledge structures. In contrast, through the
process of accommodation, children change their schemes to restore a state of
equilibrium. The two processes explain changes in cognition at all ages.

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 Figure 2. Assimilation and Accommodation (Source: whatispsychology.net)

Sensorimotor stage (0 to 2 years of age)

The first stage is known as the sensorimotor stage and covers the ages of birth
to 2 years. It is called the sensorimotor stage because infant children explore their world
through their senses and movements.

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 Figure 3. Sensorimotor stage of cognitive development (Source: verywellmind.com)

The newborn child is born with certain behaviours called ‘reflexes’. For example
if you touch the mouth of a newborn child, it will try to suck. If you put your finger in the
palm of a newborn child’s hand, it will grasp it. Gradually, the child learns through these
reflexes, more by accident at first and later by trial and error efforts. By the end of this
stage, children are more planned in their approach to problem solving – an indication of
the development of their thinking ability, the Child can think through and plan their
behaviour.

Piaget also puts forward the idea of ‘object permanence’ which is developed in
the child by the end of this stage. This refers to the idea that a physical object exists,
even if it is not in the child’s physical presence. For example, a child plays with a bottle.
If someone takes the bottle from him by replacing another toy, or a bottle is out of his
sight, it (the bottle) still exists (more especially if it is used for feeding). At this point in
the child’s thinking development, symbols can be used to represent physical objects

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and this will allow the child to think about them. This is an advancement of the child’s
thinking ability.

Preoperational stage (Ages 2 to 7 years of age)

Piaget describes an operation as a thought which follows a set of rules or logic.

Children in the preoperational stage of cognitive development are able to fully use
logical thought. Children in this stage ‘have a greater ability to think about things and
use symbols to mentally represent objects’ (Slavin, 2006). During this stage, their
language develops very fast.

But thinking and reasoning development still has a long way to go. Piaget
discovered that preoperational children do not understand the conservation
principle. For example, if a ball of clay is molded into a different shape like a long
snake, the child will say that the snake contains less clay than the original ball, even
though the amount of clay has not changed. Their reasoning is based on what they are
seeing rather than logic. In a similar way, when a tall glass of water is poured into a flat
bowl, the child says there is less water in the flat bowl than there was in the tall glass.

Figure 4. Preoperational stage of cognitive development (Source: verywellmind.com)

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 Preoperational age children are also egocentric in their thinking. They think that
everyone else sees the world exactly as they do. They are unable to see the
perspective (viewpoint) of others. Preoperational thinking also lacks reversibility or the
ability to reverse the direction of thinking to return to a starting point. For example, they
do not have the ability to mentally remake the clay ball from the long thin snake and
realize the amount of clay is the same in both shapes.

Concrete Operational stage (7 to 12 years of age)

Children in the concrete operational stage “can form concepts, see relationships,
and solve problems, but only as long as they involve objects and situations that are
familiar” (Slavin, 2006). Children in this stage of development will no longer have
problems with the conservation principle and reversibility. This is a sign of dramatic
advances in thinking ability.

During the concrete operational stage, children develop the ability of seriation -
they can arrange things in a logical order. For example, they can arrange a line of sticks
from shortest to longest. Children at this stage are also beginning to move away from
egocentric thought to decentered thought. This allows them to see that others might
have different perceptions than themselves. Another thinking ability developed in this
stage is class inclusion. For example, suppose a child is shown a plate of seven
bananas and three mangos. If asked whether there are more bananas than fruit, the
answer will be ‘no’. The class of objects can be thought about as well as the individual
objects. The preoperational stage child would say ‘bananas’

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 Figure 5. Concrete operational stage of cognitive development
(Source: verywellmind.com)

Towards the end of this stage, the child will be able to respond to inferred
reality. A demonstration of this is when the child is shown a picture of a red car. The
picture of the red car is then placed behind a black filter and the child is asked what
color the car is. The preoperational child will say it is a black car whereas the concrete
operational child is more likely to realize it is still a red color. The concrete operational
child can see things in a different context.

Format operational stage (11 years to adulthood)

Figure 6. Formal operational stage of cognitive development

(Source: verywellmind.com)

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 At about puberty, children begin to develop thinking like adults. They begin to
think abstractly and to consider possibilities outside the immediate time. Adolescent
children can better deal with possible situations as well as what is real. They can also
think about thinking itself and are more aware of their own thinking processes. They can
approach a problem or topic from a number of different ways and this allows for a richer
understanding of a situation or other people. They will also ask more questions and not
as readily accept facts as they did as a young person

Vygotsky’s Socio-Cultural Theory of Cognitive Development

Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934), a Russian psychologist and social constructivist,

agreed with Piaget that children actively construct their knowledge. However, his theory
is a socio-cultural cognitive theory which emphasizes the importance of social
context, culture, parents, and teachers on the child’s development. He saw that
children’s thinking progressed in dramatic play (role play), as they took on social roles
and solved problems through self-talk.

His theory has two key ideas:

1. The first is that cognitive (thinking and reasoning) development is

understood only in terms of the historical and cultural contexts children
experience.
2. The second is that cognitive development depends ‘on the sign systems
that the individual grows up with: the symbols that cultures create to help
people think, communicate, and solve problems – for example, a culture’s
language, writing system, or counting system’ (Slavin, 2006).

The sign systems are acquired first through instruction and information from
others. Once the sign systems are known by the child, then they can be used in thinking
development and problems solving without help from others. When the child can do this
they have the ability for self-regulation (self-monitoring). Language becomes much
more than just a social tool for communication. All children’s development occurs
through a sequence of steps that is the same for all children.

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 In order to teach self-regulation, the child has to develop a tool of thought called
‘self-talk’ or ‘private speech’. This self-talk is easy to observe when a young child talks
aloud to itself as it solves a problem. Young children use talking to themselves to guide
their behavior. Later this self-talk becomes silent. Children need to use language for
communication with others before they can use it for their own thinking. A lot of practice
and time is needed for the transition from external to inner speech to take place, and
occurs between the ages of 3 to 7 years. Studies have shown that those children, who
use self-talk, learn complex tasks more effectively than children who do not use it.

The Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) is a term Vygostky uses to describe

the most appropriate level of learning tasks that a child can demonstrate competence,
with adult or peer support. It is a level of learning tasks just beyond what the child is
able to do unassisted (or by themselves). If a task is lower than the ZPD (or too easy),
the child can achieve the task easily by themselves, but they may become bored and
unmotivated. If a learning task is higher than the ZPD (or too difficult), the child may feel
lose with no chance of successful achievement.

Figure 7. Zone of proximal development

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 Hence, the ZPD describes the level of tasks that are not yet learnt but the child
would be capable (or ready) to learn them with assistance. The important role of the
teacher is to move each child to the upper level of their zones to achieve progress in
their learning.

Scaffolding

One key idea which comes from Vygotsky’s theory is the idea of scaffolding.
This means a system of providing a lot of support at the beginning of a new learning
task, and then gradually withdrawing that level of support as the learning takes place.
Vygostky views the child as having a rich set of concepts, but these were not systematic
or organized. The teacher, with their more systematic, logical set of concepts helps the
child to develop their new understanding. Gradually, the child increases their
responsibility for learning as understanding develops.

Vygostky’s theory also supports the idea of cooperative learning or having

children work together to help each other learn. Cooperative learning is successful
because the children are working within their ZPD and can provide slightly more
advanced models of thinking. Each child will also learn of other ways of thinking and
reasoning as the ‘self-talk’ of each child is made available to all children in the group –
they will be able to hear other children ‘self-talking’ as they go about their work.

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Intelligence and Individual Differences
As every teacher knows, there are large differences in the way individual learners
respond to the demands of education. No two students are exactly alike. An important
task is to provide an education that allows students to be successful with their
lives in individual ways.

There is no agreed-on definition of intelligence. Though it is one of our most

highly valued possessions, yet we don’t know exactly what intelligence is. It can only be
measured indirectly by watching behavior which is supposed to be intelligent. We can
open a person’s head and observe directly the intelligence operations going on inside.
Intelligence has been defined as “problem solving skills and the ability to adapt and
learn from life’s everyday experience” (Santrock, 2002). To begin this lesson, we will
look at different theories that have tried to describe intelligence.

Concept of Intelligence (Binet)

Interest in intelligence dates back thousands of years. But it wasn't until
psychologist Alfred Binet was commissioned to identify students who needed
educational assistance that the first intelligent quotient (IQ) test was born. Although it
has its limitations, and it has many lookalikes that use far less rigorous measurements,
Binet's IQ test is well-known around the world as a way to compare intelligence.

During the early 1900s, the French government asked Binet to help decide which
students were most likely to experience difficulty in school. The government had passed
laws requiring that all French children attend school, so it was important to find a way to
identify children who would need specialized assistance.

Binet and his colleague, Theodore Simon, began developing questions that
focused on areas not explicitly taught in schools, such as attention, memory, and
problem-solving skills. Using these questions, Binet determined which ones served as
the best predictors of school success.

He quickly realized that some children were able to answer more advanced
questions that older children were generally able to answer, and vice versa. Based on

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this observation, Binet suggested the concept of mental age, or a measure of
intelligence based on the average abilities of children of a certain age group.

This first intelligence test, referred to today as the Binet-Simon Scale, became
the basis for the intelligence tests still in use today. However, Binet himself did not
believe that his psychometric instruments could be used to measure a single,
permanent, and inborn level of intelligence.

Binet stressed the limitations of the test, suggesting that intelligence is far too
broad a concept to quantify with a single number. Instead, he insisted that intelligence is
influenced by many factors, that it changes over time, and that it can only be compared
in children with similar backgrounds (Cherry, 2019).

Figure 8. Sample IQ test question (Source: simplypsychology.org)

The Binet-Simon scale of 1905 comprised 30 items designed to measure judgment,

comprehension, and reasoning which Binet deemed the key characteristics of
intelligence.

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General Intelligence (Spearman)
At one end of the range of theories of intelligence is the theory of Charles
Spearman (1904) who proposed that intelligence was a single quality or ability
within the human brain. Spearman discovered that people who score high on IQ or
mental ability tests usually scored higher on other types of tests, and people that scored
lower generally had lower scores on other tests. Spearman thought that, if all mental
tests are positively correlated, there must be some common variable or factor that
produces this positive correlation. Using statistics, he demonstrated it was true.

This general factor he called ‘g’. If a person had a lot of this general intelligence,
then the person would be intelligent in all areas. So, a person with a lot of ‘g’ will
perform well in mathematics, language, reasoning, memory, and other tasks. If a person
had only little ‘g’, then they would not act intelligently in all these areas – perhaps only
some areas, or at a low level in all areas. This way of thinking about intelligence is
known as ‘general factor theory’.

Figure 9. The general factor theory (Source: venngage.net)

Spearman also proposed a second factor of intelligence which he called a

specific intelligence ‘s’, leading Spearman to the eventual development of a two-factor
theory of intelligence. According to this two-factor theory of intelligence, the
performance of any intellectual act requires some combination of ‘g’, which is available
to the same individual to the same degree for all intellectual acts, and of ‘specific

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factors’ or ‘s’ which are specific to that act and which varies from strength from one act
to another. Since ‘g’ is needed in all tasks, the most important information to have about
a person’s intellectual ability is an estimate of their ‘g’ factor.

Primary Mental Abilities (Thurstone)

Louis Leon Thurstone (1938) challenged the concept of a g-factor. After
analyzing data from 56 different tests of mental abilities, he identified a number of
primary mental abilities that comprise intelligence, as opposed to one general factor.

The seven primary mental abilities in Thurstone's model are verbal comprehension,
verbal fluency, number facility, spatial visualization, perceptual speed, memory, and
inductive reasoning (Thurstone, as cited in Sternberg, 2003).

Table 1. Thurstone’s Seven Primary Mental Abilities (Ruhl, n.d.)

Mental Ability Description

Word Fluency Ability to use words quickly and fluency in performing such tasks
as rhyming, solving anagrams, and doing crossword puzzles.

Verbal Ability to understand the meaning of words, concepts, and ideas.

Comprehension

Numerical Ability Ability to use numbers to quickly computer answers to problems.

Spatial Ability to visualize and manipulate patters and forms in space.

Visualization

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 Perceptual Ability to grasp perceptual details quickly and accurately and to
Speed determine similarities and differences between stimuli.

Memory Ability to recall information such as lists or words, mathematical

formulas, and definitions.

Inductive Ability to derive general rules and principles from presented

Reasoning information.

Although Thurstone did not reject Spearman’s idea of general intelligence

altogether, he instead theorized that intelligence consists of both general ability and a
number of specific abilities, paving the way for future research that examined the
different forms of intelligence.

Multiple Intelligences (Gardner)

Another champion of the idea of specific types of intelligences rather than one
overall intelligence is the psychologist Howard Gardner (1983, 1999). Gardner argued
that it would be evolutionarily functional for different people to have different talents and
skills, and proposed that there are eight intelligences that can be differentiated from
each other. A potential ninth intelligence; that is, existential still needs empirical support.
Gardner investigated intelligences by focusing on children who were talented in one or
more areas and adults who suffered from strokes that compromised some capacities,
but not others. Gardner also noted that some evidence for multiple intelligences comes
from the abilities of autistic savants, people who score low on intelligence tests overall
but who nevertheless may have exceptional skills in a given domain, such as math,
music, art, or in being able to recite statistics in a given sport (Treffert & Wallace, 2004).
In addition to brain damage and the existence of savants, Gardner identified these 8

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intelligences based on other criteria including a set developmental history and
psychometric findings (Lally & Valentine-French, n.d.; Marenus, n.d.).

Figure 10. Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences (Source: simplypsychology.org)

Table 2. Description of Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences

Type of Intelligence Definition

Verbal/Linguistic A sensitivity to the meaning and order of words.

Intelligence: (Authors, journalists, speakers….)
(Word smart)

Logical/Mathematical Ability to understand mathematics and other

Intelligence: complex logical systems.
(Number/reasoning smart) (Scientists, engineers, accountants….)
Musical/Rhythmic The ability to understand and create music.
Intelligence: Musicians, composers and dancers show a
(Music smart) heightened musical intelligence.
(Musicians, composers, sensitive listeners….)

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Visual/Spatial Intelligence: The ability to “think in pictures”, to perceive the
(Picture smart) visual world accurately, and recreate (or alter) it
in the mind or on paper. Spatial intelligence is
highly developed in artists, architects, designers,
and sculptors.
(Architects, artists, sailors, designers….)
Body/Kinesthetic The ability to use one’s body in a skilled way, for
Intelligence: self-expression or toward a goal. Mimes,
(Body smart) dancers, basketball players, and actors are
among those who display bodily-kinesthetic
intelligence.
(Dancers, athletes, surgeons, craftspeople….)

Interpersonal Intelligence: An ability to perceive and understand other

(People smart) individuals – their moods, desires, and
motivations. Political and religious leaders,
skilled parents and teachers, and therapists use
this intelligence.
(Teachers, health professionals, social
workers….)
Intrapersonal Intelligence: An understanding of one’s own emotions. Some
(Self smart) novelists and or counselors use their own
experience to guide others.
(Psychologists, theologians….)
Naturalist Intelligence: An ability to detect patterns and organizations in
(Nature smart) nature. For example, the ability to recognize and
classify plants, minerals, and animals, including
rocks and grass and all varieties of flora and
fauna.
(Farmers, botanists, park rangers, ecologists….)

The idea of multiple intelligences has been influential in the field of education,
and teachers have used these ideas to try to teach differently to different students. For
instance, to teach math problems to students who have particularly good kinesthetic
intelligence, a teacher might encourage the students to move their bodies or hands
according to the numbers. On the other hand, some have argued that these
“intelligences” sometimes seem more like “abilities” or “talents” rather than real
intelligence. There is no clear conclusion about how many intelligences there are. Are
sense of humor, artistic skills, dramatic skills, and so forth also separate intelligences?
Furthermore, and again demonstrating the underlying power of a single intelligence, the
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many different intelligences are in fact correlated and thus represent, in part, “g” (Brody,
2003).

Triarchic Theory of Intelligence (Sternberg)

Figure 11. Triarchic Theory of Intelligence (Source: Lumen Learning)

Robert Sternberg (1988) described intelligence in terms of how well a person

selects and shapes their environment. The more successful they do this, the more
intelligent they are. This is known as successful intelligence where there is a balance
among selection and shaping or adapting the environment to achieve social and
personal goals. It requires three different abilities as seen in the table below:

Table 3. Sternberg’s Successful Triarchic Intelligence

Category Definition

Analytical Ability Analyzing, evaluating, comparing and contrasting a real life

situation is essential for working out solutions or options. You
must understand the situation before you can work out a
solution (analyzing data)
Creative Ability This would include the ability to invent, discover, or imagine.
These abilities allow the intelligent individual to generate
solutions or options for solving a problem and so enable new
ways of selecting and shaping the environment and adapting to
it. (creating new products or ideas)
Practical Abilities These are the skills that allow the individual to put the solutions
or options chosen into practice – application skills.
(using information)

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 These three abilities for Sternberg’s theory of triarchic successful intelligence.
One advantage of this model is that it emphasizes the individual’s success in adapting
to their real world, and, so, makes the idea of intelligence more practical and concrete. It
also means that any test which attempts to measure the level of an individual’s
intelligence needs to measure creative and practical abilities.

Cognitive Information Processing Theory ( Richard Shiffrin)

Information Processing (IP) Theory is concerned with how people view their
environment, how they put that information into memory, and how they retrieve that
information later on. The Information Processing Theory approach is based on the idea
that humans process information they receive instead of simply responding to external
stimuli.

The information processing theory is a cognitive approach to understanding how

the human mind transforms sensory information. The model (Figure 12.1) assumes that
information that comes from the environment is subject to mental processes beyond a
simple stimulus-response pattern. "Input" from the environment goes through the
cognitive systems which is then measured by the "output." Information that is received
can take several paths depending on attention, encoding,recognition, and storage. The
central executive feature controls how much information is being processed, though
more primitive sensory areas of the brain first accept environmental input. The theory
looks at real time responses to presented stimuli and how the mind transforms that
information.

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 Figure 12. Information Processing Model. The model is constructed to represent
mental processes much like that of a computer. No one theorist claims to have invented
the model. The model creates a basic structure for experimental research of these
internal cognitive processes. (Source: https://oer.galileo.usg.edu/education-textbooks)

The model assumes that through the process of maturation, one develops
greater abilities to attend to stimulus, recognize patterns, encode, and retrieve
information. Over long spans of time, individuals process information with greater
efficiency.

Over the lifespan, individuals experience more information, associations, and

ways to categorize the input. The process may seem passive, but the model assumes
that input from the environment is actively transformed and rehearsed to become a part
of long-term memory. For environmental information to become a part of long-term
memory, one must attend to, rehearse, and make sense of the stimuli. The interaction
between nature and nurture coincide for changes in development. The model does not
attempt nor can it distinguish between the two.

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How Does the Information Processing Model Work?
Table 4. Sensory, Short-Term (Working), and Long-Term Memory (Author, n.d.)

Type Characteristics Representation Capacity Duration Cause of

Forgetting

Sensory limited and senses (seeing, 4 items .5-3 seconds decay

Memory passive; store hearing, taste,
information feel, touch)
gathered from
the external
environment

Short-Term active information visual imaging 5-9 items 16-30 seconds interference
Memory processing: and acoustic (5-15 seconds
rehearsing and (sound) encoding without
chunking rehearsal)

Long-Term unlimited; store semantic semantic permanent forgetting

Memory information over encoding: encoding: the retrieval
extended chunking, chunking, pathway
periods of time imagery, and imagery, and
(hours, elaboration elaboration
days, weeks, (knowledge: (knowledge:
months, declarative, declarative,
years, etc.) procedural, procedural,
episodic, episodic,
imagery, imagery,
strategic, strategic,
collective/ collective/
conceptual) conceptual)

Sensory memory is where information gathered from the environment is stored.

Sensory memory is very limited, passive, and lasts about .5-3 seconds. It has the
capacity of holding 4 items. It is affected by attention. Information is gathered from the
environment through the sensory register (sensory motor). In order for information to
enter the short-term memory from the sensory register, it must be attended to by the
senses. Information that is not attended to is lost from the sensory memory and never
enters the short-term memory. The best understood sensory registers (SRs) are for
seeing (iconic) and hearing (echoic). Very little is known about tactile (touch), olfactory
(smell), and gustatory (taste) SRs. For example, light reflecting off the cup hits my eye;
the image is transferred through my optic nerve to the sensory register. If I do not attend

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to it, it fades from this memory store and is lost. In fact, my cup is on my desk most of
the day, and I see it without really "seeing" it many times during the day.

Each memory stage has four attributes: 1. Representation; 2. Capacity; 3.

Duration; and 4. Cause of forgetting. For the visual sensory register, for example,
representation is iconic-limited to the field of vision, and lasts for about 250
milliseconds. The main cause of forgetting is decay. Representation in the auditory
register is echoic (based on sound); its duration is 2-3 seconds; it is only limited to the
sounds we can actually hear and decay is the primary cause for forgetting. Much less is
known about the other three register types.

Short-Term Memory (STM) is also known as working memory. It is where

consciousness exists. In the cup example, if I attend the cup, it will be moved into STM.
At this point, it is difficult to talk about the cup in STM memory without referring to long-
term memory (LTM). For example, I might attend to the cup and think, "That's my cup. It
has coffee in it. I poured that coffee 3 hours ago." Each of those statements draws on
LTM. I know it is my cup because it is the one that a potter friend of mine made for me. I
know it has coffee in it, because I remember getting it this morning. I know that I poured
that cup at 9:00 am. The statement that the coffee is 3 hours old required me to look at
the current time, and retrieve from LTM that subtracting the current time from pouring
time tells me how old the coffee is. Performing the subtraction used no STM processing
space, because experience in doing arithmetic allows me to do this automatically. STM
is where the world meets what is already known, and where thinking is done. You
perceive and attend to stimuli; that information is then actively processed based on
information stored in LTM. The use strategies such as rehearsal (repeating information
verbally (acoustic encoding) and chunking (categorizing information together in one
memory slot) can expand the capacity of short-term memory (McLeod, 2009). In terms
of the characteristics of this memory stage, the representation is echoic. It is limited to
5-9 items, and it lasts between 15-30 seconds (Atkinson & Shiffrin, 1971). At the STM
stage, interference is the principal cause of forgetting. STM can hold about 7 (the magic
number) items (Miller, 1956). A common example of this is calling information for a
phone number. After the operator gives you the number, you begin repeating it to keep
it in STM. This repetition is termed rehearsal. Rehearsal can also be used to get
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information into LTM, but it is very inefficient. Rehearsal primarily serves a maintenance
function; it can be used to keep information in STM. In the phone number example, if
someone interrupts you to ask you a question while you are rehearsing the number,
responding interferes with rehearsal, and the phone number is lost. You must call the
information again.

The final stage in the IP model is long-term memory (LTM), which involves the
storage and recall of information over extended periods of time, such as hours, days,
weeks, or years (Merriam-Webster, 2017). LTM is everything we know and know how to
do it. For most cognitive psychologists, the world of LTM can be categorized as one of
three types of memory

Figure 13. The Inspiration web illustrates that most cognitive psychologists categorized
that Long-Term Memory consists of declarative knowledge ("I know that… even
numbers end with the digits 0, 2, 4, 6, and 8!"), procedural knowledge ("I know how… to
pronounce and comprehend new vocabulary!"), and episodic knowledge ("I remember
when… I graduated from high school!"). By Tiffany Davis, Meghann Hummel, and Kay
Sauers (2006).

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Language Development
Language and cognition are partners in child development. We use language to
learn new ideas, to talk about our thoughts and fears, and interact with those around us.
Language is how thoughts fly through the air from one mind to another. Language skills
and cognitive skills are related to each other. Stronger language skills mean stronger
cognitive skills.

Language is a form of communication whether spoken, written or signed that is

based on a system of symbols. It is also the ability to communicate with others, thought
and feelings are symbolized so as to convey meaning in different forms of
communication such as written, spoken, sign, facial, gestures, pantomime and art. All
children learn their first language, unless they have physical problems. Why is language
important?

1. We need language to speak, listen to others, read and write.

2. It enables us to describe past events and to plan for the future.
3. It lets us pass down information from one generation to the next and
create a rich cultural heritage.
4. It is a means of communicating thoughts, feelings and emotions.
5. It is used to secure information.
6. It is used to express the results of the individual's reasoning.
7. It is used to express one's feelings and emotions.
8. It is used to bring actions to others.
9. It is used to satisfy the human need for sociability.
10. It is used to help the individual develop and maintain a feeling of
importance of self
11. It is used to serve as a bond that holds people together.

The development of language following shortly after birth is achieved in the kind
of orderly sequence that characterizes motor development in the average child. A great
deal of learning goes on before a child utters his first word. From the start, infants make
a lot of noise. They cry at first, and then they coo. In the babbling stage, infants begin to
make a greater variety of sounds such as “da-da” and “ta-ta”. It is as if they were playing
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with almost every sound used in the various human languages. Later, they stick more
closely to the sounds they often hear spoken around them.

Infants also listen. Around the third month, they begin to prefer the human voice
to other noise, their mother’s voices later preferred to those strangers. They use their
auditory equipment right away long before they speak their first word.

Speech is only one form of language in which articulate sounds or words are
used to convey meanings. The pattern of parts of speech learned is nouns-verbs-
pronouns-adverbs. There are two types of speech performed by the child: (1)
Egocentric where the child either talks for himself or for the pleasure of associating
with anyone who happens to be present. This is called “pseudo conversation” or a form
of “collective monologue”. The other is (2) Socialized, the kind of speech that occurs
when social contacts are established between the child and his social environment. The
major tasks involved in speech development are:

1. Comprehension of the speech of the others.

2. Building vocabulary
3. Forming sentences
4. Pronunciation

There are several theories concerning Language Development. Most of the

theories around language also fall under classical theories on cognitive development.

First is the INNATIST Theory. This theory states the presence of The Language
Acquisition Device (LAD), a postulated "organ" of the brain that is supposed to
function as a congenital device for learning symbolic language. First proposed by Noam
Chomsky, the LAD concept is a component of the nativist theory of language. This
theory asserts that humans are born with the instinct or "innate facility" for acquiring
language. Chomsky has gradually abandoned the LAD in favour of a parameter-setting
model of language acquisition (principles and parameters).

The COGNITIVIST Theory, by Jean Piaget, maintained that language acquisition

cannot take place until cognitive development has paved the way for it. Cognitivist

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theory asserts that children develop knowledge of the world and then “map” this onto
language categories and relations.

Last is the SOCIAL CONTEXTUAL Theory. Lev Vygotsky is the proponent of

this theory which states that social interaction influences both language and cognitive
development. Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) suggests that social
interaction can help students make cognitive breakthroughs. Since much of the
interaction occurs through language, it follows that language does influence cognitive
development.

Infancy
Language development begins before birth. Towards the end of pregnancy, a
fetus begins to hear sounds and speech coming from outside the mother's body. Infants
are acutely attuned to the human voice and prefer it to other sounds. In particular they
prefer the higher pitch characteristic of female voices. They also are very attentive to
the human face, especially when the face is talking. Although crying is a child's
primary means of communication at birth, language immediately begins to develop
via repetition and imitation.

During the Pre-speech stage, there are several ways by which language
acquisition starts. Turn-taking is the beginning of verbal communication. Infants as
young as 2 months have been observed listening to their mother’s speaking, and then
responding to signals for them to take a turn to speak. Gestures are behaviors used by
infants until they develop words to replace them. It includes:

● Gazing
● Facial gestures or expressions
● Pointing
● Offering objects or reaching for things
● Discriminating sounds

Before the end of their first year they are beginning to understand the meanings
associated with words and sounds they hear. They will be producing controlled
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sounds as they age. It starts with crying, cooing, then babbling. Between 7 and 10
months, clear syllables of consonants and vowels can be heard and by 10 months, most
infants babble clearly, systematically, and repetitively even without prompting. However,
it must be noted that children with hearing problems do not reach this stage until later.

Receptive Vocabulary is also exhibited during the pre-speech stage. At 6-9

months, infants begin to understand their first words but which they may not use
themselves yet like “Stick out your tongue”. It increases dramatically from an average of
12 words at their 1st birthday to an estimated 300 words or more at their 2nd birthday.

The Speech stage happens by about 12 months, where about 50% of all
children have said their first word and by 15 months, 90% will normally have achieved
this. Once the child earns to use words, a single word is often used to communicate a
variety of messages. This is called holophrastic speech. For example, “milk” can mean
“ I want milk.”, “The milk is gone.,” “That is milk.”, ‘The milk fell.” About 18 months,
progresses to two-word sentences. ( telegraphic utterances), e.g. “More milk”.

Speech Readiness is the period when speech is more easily acquired by the
young child than at other times. It occurs between 12 to 18 months. On the other hand,
Readiness to Imitate occurs toward the end of the first year of life. The baby attempts
to imitate specific sounds he hears.

There are two ways in which a child associate meanings with words:

a. Direct or Explicit way - the adult names a thing or defines a word for the
child.
b. Indirect or Implicit way - through experiences with concrete or verbal
context, the child associate meanings.

Early Childhood
Fast Mapping at 2 years. At this age, multiple word sentences are already used,
e.g.”I want more milk, please”. Sometimes, there are difficulties pronouncing words
correctly like in words using double consonants ( st, dr, sm). Children in early childhood

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learn the meaning of words, phrases, and sentences (semantics), the grammar rules
(syntax), and the rules of conversation (pragmatics).

Middle Childhood
During this age, vocabulary continues to grow. There is also continued
improvement in articulation of difficult words unless there are physical difficulties.
Further, their word meanings become more complex and more like adults.

Children at this age use language for communicating and as social functions
such as chants, games, nicknames, secret language ,songs , etc. They can appreciate
different forms of humor because of their expanded understanding. They show
Increasing ability to analyze words, even abstract ones.

It is estimated that children need at least 8 to 10 years to understand the

structures of their first language; adults who were isolated or without language
experiences at an early age do not acquire a language easily after puberty. Similarly,
adults who try to try to learn a second language usually experience more difficulty doing
this than do young children.

Receptive language development (the ability to comprehend language) usually

develops faster than expressive language (the ability to communicate). Two different
styles of language development are recognized. In referential language development,
children first speak single words and then join words together, first into two-word
sentences and then into three-word sentences. In expressive language development,
children first speak in long unintelligible babbles that mimic the cadence and rhythm of
adult speech. Most children use a combination of these styles.

Factors affecting Cognitive and Language Development

Like the other domains, cognitive development is a result of the interplay between
nature (inherent) and nurture (environmental) factors.

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Nature Factors
The child’s Health also has a profound effect on cognitive and language
development. Severe and prolonged illness has been found to delay the development of
the speech.

Intelligence. Studies show that the lower the intellectual rating is, the poorer the
speech.

There are also differences observed in congnitive and language development between
sexes. Girls show a greater mastery of speech sounds even before they begin to talk,
than do boys.

Interestingly, the child’s Ordinal Position in the family tree may also play a role
in their development. Firstborn children are encouraged to talk more than their later-
born siblings and their parents have more time to talk to them.

Nurture Factors
The Family also plays a significant role in the nurturing of cognitive and
language development of the child. Socio Economic Status affects family activities,
i.e. some tend to be less organized in lower class families than those in middle and
upper class. Family Size appears to influence speech development as only children are
encouraged to talk more than children from large families where discipline is likely
authoritarian and prevents children from talking as much as they would like to; in this
sense, we can also opine that the type of discipline used in the family shape
development as well. Family relationships (“secret language”, lack of close
relationship with their parents) is also important.

Bilingualism or learning two languages simultaneously necessitates the learning

of two words for every object the child wishes to name. Research suggests that when
children acquire two languages equally well (known as “balanced bilinguals”) then there
are benefits for their cognitive development such as wider experiences in two cultures,
development of mental flexibility, superior concept formation and a more diversified set
of mental abilities. Balanced bilinguals show more skill at finding multiple meanings of

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words than monolinguals. These positive effects apply to those who acquire two
languages simultaneously. However, these children make unequal progress in the
languages: one language is stronger (major language) from time to time, either because
of the input that the child is receiving from other speakers, or because there are more
opportunities to use one language than the other.

Guide Questions
1. What is cognitive development?

2. What are the theories related to cognitive development?

3. What is intelligence?

4. What is the relationship of language development to cognitive development?

5. What are the factors affecting cognitive and language development?

Answers to Guide Questions

● Cognitive development means thinking and reasoning development.

● Many theorists have contributed to the knowledge base on cognitive

development. Two main cognitive development theorists are Jean Piaget and
Lev Vygotsky. Piaget described four stages of cognitive development in
children, which are Sensorimotor stage (0 to 2 years of age), Preoperational
stage (Ages 2 to 7 years of age) , Concrete Operational stage (7 to 12 years of
age), and Formal operational stage (11 years to adulthood). Piaget emphasized
that “Construction is superior to instruction” which led to the term
constructivism. This refers to the belief that knowledge is constructed by
experience, not just by coming of age and passing through stages. Children build
their systems of meaning and understandings of reality through their experience
and interactions.

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 Vygotsky, a Russian psychologist and social constructivist, agreed with Piaget
that children actively construct their knowledge. However, his theory is a socio-
cultural cognitive theory which emphasizes the importance of social context,
culture, parents, and teachers on the child’s development.

● There is no agreed-on definition of intelligence. Different theories that have tried

to describe intelligence with The Concept of Intelligence (Binet) , General
Intelligence (Spearman), Primary Mental Abilities (Thurstone), Multiple
Intelligences (Gardner), Triarchic Theory of Intelligence (Sternberg),
Cognitive Information, Processing Theory (Atkinson and Shiffrin).

● Language and cognition are partners in child development. We use language to

learn new ideas, to talk about our thoughts and fears, and interact with those
around us. Language skills and cognitive skills are related to each other.
Stronger language skills mean stronger cognitive skills.

● Like the other domains, cognitive development is a result of the interplay

between nature (inherent) and nurture (environmental) factors.The Nature factors
are health ,intelligence,sex, and ordinal position while the Nurture factors are
family,socio economic status,family size, type of discipline,and family
relationships.

Key Points
1. Cognitive development means thinking and reasoning development.
2. Many theorists have contributed to the knowledge base on cognitive
development. Two main cognitive development theorists are Jean Piaget and
Lev Vygotsky.

Jean Piaget described four stages of cognitive development in children. The

stages describe development that is continuous and progressive, moving through
one stage before beginning the next. Each stage lays a foundation for the next
stage. All children progress through all four stages but at different rates within

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 each stage. The stages are also related to age range, but there is variety within
these ranges among children.

Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934), a Russian psychologist and social constructivist,

agreed with Piaget that children actively construct their knowledge. However, his
theory is a socio-cultural cognitive theory which emphasizes the importance
of social context, culture, parents, and teachers on the child’s
development.

4. Different theories that have tried to describe intelligence but there is no

agreed-on definition of intelligence. On this note,there are large differences in
the way individual learners respond to the demands of education. No two
students are exactly alike. An important task is to provide an education that
allows students to be successful with their lives in individual ways.

● Language and cognition are partners in child development. Language skills and
cognitive skills are related to each other. Stronger language skills mean stronger
cognitive skills.

● Like the other domains, cognitive development is a result of the interplay

between nature (inherent) and nurture (environmental) factors.

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