Human Cognitive Development Essay

The paper is designed to discuss human cognitive developing through the prism of various perspectives. Apriori, developmental psychology is nowadays dominated by Piagets views, so the essay provides a detailed examination of his theory, including it canonic assumptions, the connection between human physiology and cognitive development and the four stages of progress of cognitive abilities sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational and formal operational.Beyond the major focus, the essay similarly discusses four alternative arisees to cognitive development, including relevant research, conducted by the founders and followers of rational-constructivist, social learning, information-processing and sociocultural perspectives and the differences between traditional Piagetian views and these alternative positions.The author uses three articles from antithetical psychology-oriented journals Personal cognitive development and its implications for teaching and learning be Ferrari and Mahalingam (1998), Commentary on Vygotsky by Jean Piaget (2000) and the article, written almost immediately after the way out of Piagets stage theory The development of formal operations in logical and moral judgment by Kuhn, Langer, Kohlberg, and Haan.Developmental psychology is a extensive area of knowledge that seeks to explore and explain various aspects of human psychosocial development, including its moral, emotional and cognitive components (Ferrari and Mahalingam, 1998). Cognitive development refers to the development of human intellect, abstractive, critical and creative mentation that provide successful cognition and comprehension of the homo of objects.The most prominent and popular theory of human cognitive development was created by Jean Piaget, whose approach to the progress in this context is constructivist, so that the scholar views the construction of cognitive abilities as self-motivated action (Piaget, 2000). As Kuhn et al (1977) assume, Piagets research methods are base primarily on case studies they were descriptive. While some of his ideas are supported through more correlational and experimental methodologies, others are not.For example, Piaget believes that biological development drives the motion from one cognitive stage to the next (Kuhn et al, 1977, p. 98). Nevertheless, although Piagets investigation basically refers to physiology rather than psychology, the scholar manages to link biological and cognitive progress through the exposition of the transformation of reflexes into formal operations. Initially, he describes two major processes that occur in individual when adapting to the environs assimilation and accommodation.Both of them condition the complication of their manner of adaptation and therefore determine cognitive development (Piaget, 2000). Accommodation refers to the alteration of cognitive abilities in response to the requirements of the environment for the purpose of gaining something from the surroundin g world. Assimilation, in turn, refers to the transformation of the environment with further placing it into preexisting cognitive schemes and constructs (Piaget, 2000).Due to the fact that life situation and the corresponding requirements from the environment tend to complicate through the life course, the individual is hale to respond to complex stimuli and construct hierarchical cognitive structures (for instance, from general to concrete) (Piaget, 2000 Ferrari and Mahalingam, 1998). Piaget distinguishes and describes four stages of cognitive development. Sensorimotor stage, or infancy lasts from the birth to 2 years, has six sub-stages, associated with slack development of reflexes, focus of vision and coordination in movements.Intelligence is manifested through the progress in motor activity, but the individual uses no social symbols (e. g. language) during this period. The exploration of world is very dynamic, but the related knowledge remains limited because of the weak cog nitive abilities. The outcomes of this stage are the emergence of basic creativity or perspicacity (understanding of pictures and language) as well as the progress of symbolic abilities (Piaget, 2000).