Cognitive Developmentalisms

Focus

Distinct stages/phases of an individual’s dominant modes of cognition

Principal Metaphors

  • Knowledge is … the range of developmental possibility
  • Knowing is … stage-influenced interpretations of prior construals
  • Learner is … a transformer (individual)
  • Learning is … construing and reconstruing
  • Teaching is … occasioning, prompting, triggering, listening

Originated

1940s

Synopsis

Cognitive Developmentalisms focus on stages in the individual’s development of skills and preferences around reasoning, perception, language, and other thought-associated competencies. In general terms, these theories trace the development from the infant’s dependence on physical actions on concrete objects to more mature abilities to mentally manipulate abstract notions. While it has fallen into some disfavor, Jean Piaget’s Model of Cognitive Development continues to serve as the standard against which more recent versions are articulated:
  • Piaget's Model of Cognitive Development (Jean Piaget and Barbel Inhelder, 1940s) – a model that tracks development from birth to late adolescence through Sensorimotor, Preoperational, Concrete Operational, and Formal Operational periods. Piaget's Genetic Epistemology is essential to understanding the model.
A prominent subcategory of Cognitive Developmentalisms is:
  • Neo-Piagetian Theories of Cognitive Development – Both critiquing and extending Piaget's Model of Cognitive Development,  these models typically invoke more recent ideas from Cognitive Psychology and Cognitive Science in order to address a perceived deficiency (e.g., inadequate explanations of individual differences, the intimation of universal stages of cognitive development, and/or developmental stages beyond adolescence). The following are among the many other models (listed by decade of publication):
    • Pascual-Leone’s Neo-Piagetian Model of Cognitive Development (Juan Pascual-Leone, 1960s) – model drawing on Information Processing Theory, based on a distinction between basic-level thought (based on processing power) and higher-level thought (based on storage capacity)
    • Stages of Ego Development (Jane Loevinger, 1970s) – ego development organized in 10 stages (presocial, symbiotic, impulsive, self-protective, conformist, conscientious, autonomous, conformist, integrated)
    • Dynamic Skill Theory (Kurt W. Fisher, 1980s) – theory developed around a progression of four tiers of representation (reflexive, sensorimotor, representational, abstract)
    • Intellectual Development Theory (Robbie Case, 1980s) – model of cognitive development elaborating Pascual-Leone’s by arguing for multiple lines of development over four main stages (sensorimotor, interrelational, dimensional, vectorial).
Other Cognitive Developmentalisms take somewhat different tacks on the nature of developmental stages. A sampling includes:
  • Perry’s Stages of Cognitive Development (William G. Perry, Jr., 1970s) – Focused on the development of logical thinking, this model plots a journey through four major periods: Dualism/Received Knowledge; Multiplicity/Subjective Knowledge; Relativism/Procedural Knowledge; Commitment/Constructed Knowledge.
  • Women’s Ways of Knowing (Women’s Development Theory) (Mary Field Belenky, Blythe McVicker Clinchy, Nancy Rule Goldberger, & Jill Mattuck Tarule, 1980s) Citing the fact that Perry’s Stages of Cognitive Development (see above) was based entirely on male college students, Women’s Ways of Knowing is in part a critique of prominent Cognitive Developmentalisms of the 1900s. It describes how women view themselves and knowledge, identifying five perspectives: Silence; Received Knowledge; Subjective Knowledge; Procedural Knowledge; Constructed Knowledge.
  • Cognitive Tools Theory (Kieran Egan, 1990s) – five stages of understanding (somatic, mythic, philosophic, ironic) that support memory and enhance learning capacity
  • General Theory of Development of Self-Understanding and Self-Regulation (Andreas Demetriou, 1990s) – model of cognitive development that incorporates the roles of self-awareness and processing efficiency through three functional levels (processing potentials, domain-specific systems of thought, hypercognition)
  • Hierarchical Complexity Theory (Michael Commons, 1990s) – model positing 16 orders of hierarchical complexity in the development of cognition, some of which extended beyond ages and levels of development covered by most theories
  • Relational Complexity Theory (Graeme S. Halford, 1990s) – model that shifts the focus to four modes of reasoning used to solve problems (element mappings, relational mappings, system mappings, multiple-system mappings)

Commentary

Few reject the core assumptions of Cognitive Developmentalisms – that is, hardly anyone debates that humans progress from “concrete” to “abstract” thinkers, and in the process come into entirely new ways of thinking about and engaging with their worlds. Criticisms tend to be focused on specific theories. Piaget’s model, for example, is routinely faulted for its failure to attend to cultural context, social class, gender, and developments past adolescence – along with its limited empirical base and over-emphasis on age (i.e., wide ranges of developmental competencies can be observed among agemates).

Authors and/or Prominent Influences

Jean-Jacques Rousseau; Maria Montessori; Jean Piaget

Status as a Theory of Learning

Cognitive Developmentalisms can be classified as theories of learning. However, they tend to deal less with the dynamics of cognition and more with the modes/stages of learning across the lifespan.

Status as a Theory of Teaching

Cognitive Developmentalisms are not theories of teaching, but they the source of considerable advice on age- and stage-appropriate knowledge and activities. Piaget’s model has been particularly influential, especially in mathematics education. A prominent example of its application is around the trajectory through object-based activities in early school grades, through application-focused algebra in middle grades, to abstract work with functions in the higher grades.

Status as a Scientific Theory

For the most part, Cognitive Developmentalisms meet the requirements of scientific theories. They are also bolstered by complementary world in Neuroscience, psychology, sociology, and anthropology.

Subdiscourses:

  • Cognitive Tools Theory
  • Dynamic Skill Theory
  • General Theory of Development
  • Hierarchical Complexity Theory
  • Intellectual Development
  • Neo-Piagetian Theories of Cognitive Development
  • Pascual-Leone’s Neo-Piagetian Model
  • Perry’s Stages of Cognitive Development
  • Piaget’s Model of Cognitive Development
  • Relational Complexity Theory
  • Stages of Ego Development
  • Women’s Ways of Knowing (Women’s Development Theory)

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Please cite this article as:
Davis, B., & Francis, K. (2021). “Cognitive Developmentalisms” in Discourses on Learning in Education. https://learningdiscourses.com.


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