Essay on Jean Piaget: Cognitive Development Pioneer & Swiss Psychologist

Jean Piaget was a psychologist from Switzerland, besides also being a genetic epistemologist. One of the reasons as to why he is a well-known person is based on the fact that he developed the cognitive development theory which was about the intellectual stages of development that a child goes through as they grow within the period when they are still children. Before the onset of this theory, there was no form of cognitive development of children, as the conclusion was that they are younger adults (Easley, Piaget & Rosin, 1978). In his theory, he suggested that the manner of thought as depicted by children is totally different from that of adults. The cognitive development theory had a tremendous impact on the creation of developmental psychology as a unique discipline that is within psychology as it was used extensively in early childhood education (Beilin, 1992). He is one of the pioneers of the theory of constructivist that talks about the manner in which people gather and construct world based knowledge depending on the way that they interact with what they know and the life experiences that they go through. It is based on these developments that in the year 2002 from a survey, he was voted in and ranked second as being influential among psychologists in the 2oth century.

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Since childhood, Piaget began having signs which indicated that he had an invested interest in natural sciences. At the age of eleven years, he did his first research paper on the albino sparrow, where he concentrated on studying its behavior. His continued study of natural sciences earned him a Ph.D. in zoology in 1918 from the University of Neuchatel. It was until later on that he started developing a curiosity for psychoanalysis; hence she began working at an institution for boys that was owned by Alfred Binet (Piaget, 2013). The latter is famous for the fact that he developed the first ever intelligence test, which Piaget took part as one of the assessors. While his main earlier works were in the field of natural sciences, it was not until 1920 that he shifted his interests towards the field of psychology. It is worth noting that his marriage to Valentine Chatenay served as the basis of his works considering that it was through his children that he developed his many theories (Piaget, 2013).

One of his interests was in genetic epistemology, and it is from the same where he discovered that the thought process of children is not the same as that of adults. Considering that epistemology is a philosophical branch which studies the origin, extent, nature, and the limits that human exhibit in knowledge (Piaget & Cook, 2011). While he was interested in all that, he also wanted to know the thought process nature, its development process, and how genetics influences the stages. The fact that he worked with the intelligence tests as developed by Binet means that he had the chance of concluding that the thinking of children is not the same as that of adults (Piaget & Cook, 2011). While it is something in the public domain today, at the time of discovery it was something revolutionary. It was from the same discovery where he came to an understanding that it is during childhood that knowledge develops as one grows. From his findings, he stated that children sort what they gather as knowledge from the various experiences and interactions and group the same in clusters called schemas. In case one gets some new information, it is compared to what exists in the schema, after which it is either accommodated, or a new set of a schema is developed to keep the new category of information through assimilation (Rosenblith, Piaget, Tenzer & Elkind, 1968).

In one of his arguments, he stated that every time children suck on things they are assimilating some form of information. They change everything into something that they can suck, as that is the best way that they can comprehend objects based on their intellectual and mental structuring (Easley, Piaget & Rosin, 1978). Piaget, therefore, came to the conclusion that when one changes objects into things that they can comprehend with ease, or meet their worldly needs, then they are assimilating them. For the case of children, while they assimilate things for purposes of making them fit their needs, they also modify the same to a level of their mental state so as to meet the needs of the environment that they directly interact with. As a start, infants only take part in simple reflexes such as sucking, but later on, they develop the habit of picking objects and have them in their mouths. As they are engaging in that activity, they are changing their reflex response to have them become part of their reflexes (Taylor, 2016). Considering that at that point they are in conflict with themselves, it is then that they get the opportunity of developing intellectually. Piaget tested this theory by taking time and observing the behavioral traits that his children depicted. Besides that, since his theory is greatly dependent on the biological maturation process, Piaget brought about the issue of being ready. Readiness is concerned with the fact that some information or experiences should not be taught, and in the case of children, it should not be done until they get at a specific appropriate cognitive stage of development (Taylor, 2016). For instance, children who are in the preoperational stage take part in irreversible thought where they cannot realize that once they have mentally transformed an object it can be taken back into its state of origin.

Currently, Piaget is widely known for the fact that he conducted research on the cognitive development of children, using his own. He then created a theory which constituted of four stages which children go through as they develop intellectually and their thought process. The first one is the sensorimotor stage which starts at birth to two years, where the children comprehend the world using their senses and movement. It is when they cannot see the world in the same way as others do, but instead transform everything to fit their mental needs (Piaget, 2013). The second stage is the preoperational stage which begins from when the child starts learning how to speak at the age of two up to when they are seven years. It is the stage where they play through symbolic play, where they see things from their mental point of view and not that of others. It is then that when they play there could be instances when one pretends to be cooking using bottle tops, papers, and sticks (Piaget, 2013). The third stage is the concrete operational stage which starts at the age of seven to eleven. It is at this level that children begin to have logical thoughts, though it is limited to the things that they can manipulate physically. They also get to improve their skills of classification, where they comprehend things that were previously foreign to them. The final stage is the formal operational stage which goes on until one becomes an adult, where the children completely develop intellectually and they can use their minds to think logically, as they develop problem-solving skills (Piaget, 2013).

From his works, Piaget offered the necessary support for concluding that children have a different thought process when compared to adults. His research offered several crucial milestones in the mental development process of children. The same work triggered various forms of interest in the field of developmental psychology and cognitive development (Beilin, 1992). As a result of that, his concepts and ideas have become fundamental units for study in education and psychology. Professionally, Piaget started the International Center for Genetic Epistemology in the year 1955, where he was the director until September 1980 when he passed on. In the field of developmental psychology, he is regarded as the most influential person considering that he influenced the works of famed psychologists like Lawrence Kohlberg and Lev Vygotsky, besides many others who are not known. From the works of Brainerd and Reyna regarding The Science of False Memory, Piaget was a person who influenced vast areas such as linguistics, philosophy, sociology, and psychology. From the start of the 1960s to the 1980s, most of his works dwelt on developmental psychology, in the same manner, that the ideas of Freud had dominated the area of abnormal psychology some years before then (Beilin, 1992). Piaget is credited for single-handedly shifting the focus of child psychology from the traditional thought of treating them as "smaller adults" to a unique set of human beings who needed observation independent from adults.

References

Beilin, H. (1992). Piaget's enduring contribution to developmental psychology. Developmental Psychology, 28(2), 191-204. doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.28.2.191

Easley, J., Piaget, J., & Rosin, A. (1978). The Development of Thought: Equilibration of Cognitive Structures. Educational Researcher, 7(11), 18. doi: 10.2307/1175382

Piaget, J. (2013). Construction of reality in the child (5th ed.). London: Routledge.

Piaget, J., & Cook, M. (2011). The origin of intelligence in the child. New York, NY: Routledge.

Rosenblith, J., Piaget, J., Tenzer, A., & Elkind, D. (1968). Six Psychological Studies by Jean Piaget. The American Journal Of Psychology, 81(4), 616. doi: 10.2307/1421073

Taylor, K. (2016). Diverse and Critical Perspectives on Cognitive Development Theory. New Directions For Student Services, 2016(154), 29-41. doi: 10.1002/ss.20173